TV, print and billboard ads were once the gold standard for marketing. Basically, companies pushed their name in front of the masses in an attempt to build brand awareness.

But now customers want personalized, one-on-one interactions with brands, and marketers are beginning to see how a targeted approach can stretch their marketing dollars further and generate leads faster. This changes everything.

Print, radio and Super Bowl commercials — there’s only one reason companies spend money on these marketing methods: bragging rights. They have little to do with actual branding and lead generation.

But you probably knew that. What you may not realize is that many startups still use techniques that seem hyper-personal and new but actually don’t move the needle for their companies. Here are some conventional methods that are missing the mark:

Sell Online ​​​​​​

Selling online has a number of advantages over selling by traditional methods, including:

1. Making savings in set-up and operational costs. You don't need to rent high street premises, pay shop assistants or answer a lot of pre-sales queries.
2. Connect your sales with your digital marketing strategy: You can have all your social media, blogs and sale pages connected to your sales platform in order you can promote your products and services.
3. Reducing order processing costs - customer orders can automatically come straight into your orders database from the website.
4. Changes can be made on the fly - Another added benefit of an e-commerce store compared with a physical store is the ease in which changes can be made. Take for example changing the price of a product; with an e-commerce store prices can be changed in the back end by simply changing the products’ price field.
5. Manage your budget: You can set your budget based on the time, potential customers and your possibilities.

6. Expand Customer Reach - Reaching a global audience, thereby increasing sales opportunities.

7. Always available - Competing with larger businesses by being able to open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

8. Increase brand awareness - Customers research online first, whether they buy online or in-store. Having an online presence helps makes sure that potential customers find your product information and are able to comparison shop.

9. Easy transaction - Being able to receive payment more quickly from online transactions.

10. Edge over others - Attracting customers who would not normally have investigated your type of high street outlet.

11. Be Where Your Customers Are - The majority of consumers don’t just research products online. Most consumers are now buying online, too. Sell where your customers are. If most of your customers shop online, then you should be selling online! eCommerce allows you to meet the shopping expectations of your customers.

12. Power of data analytics - Improving your offerings using the data gathered by tracking customer purchases.

Promote your website through Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Once you have your website, it is important to promote your website on search engine. It become important to optimise our website as per the search engine algorithm so that buyers can reach out to your easily. A few reasons why you should optimise your website as per the search engine are given below:

1. SEO pulls-in quality traffic

2. SEO traffic is more likely to convert

3. SEO increases sales and leads

4. Top SEO rankings provides 24/7 promotion

5. SEO builds trust and credibility

6. SEO is a long-term strategy

7. SEO increases your brand awareness and equity

8. SEO receives 90% more clicks than PPC

9. SEO drives offline sales

10. SEO can give smaller businesses an edge on larger companies

11. SEO will increase your email newsletter subscribers

12. SEO is Affordable

    SEO is more affordable than advertising to increase your conversions. SEO pricing typically ranges from $800-$2000 per month. However, the return is invaluable. Once you rank #1 on Google, your website will receive thousands of free hits to your website.

Engage influencers

1. Send them a personalised gift
2. Buy them lunch (or offer to meet in person)
3. Leave them a review on Amazon or iTunes (or give them a testimonial)
4. Offer them your product for free
5. Endorse them on LinkedIn
6. Join their newsletter and respond to their questions
7. Introduce them to someone (a potential customer, or a connection)
8. Send them birthday wishes

Content Marketing

Write for your audience – The best pieces of content are the ones directed at your key audiences. Understand your customer: know their pain points, what gets them psyched, and what keeps them up at night. Killer content address your audience’s needs and concerns!

Add a visual element to ALL your content pieces – People get bored with text really fast! To keep visitors reading, it’s essential to have images breaking up your text paragraphs. Don’t overlook the importance of a visual element, even in blog posts that are predominantly text-based. You can see some examples of highly visual business blogs here.

Infographics – We know readers love visual content, and infographics are a prime example of beloved, linkable visual assets.

Marketing is impossible without great content

Regardless of what type of marketing tactics you use, content marketing should be part of your process, not something separate. Quality content is part of all forms of marketing:

• Social Media Marketing: Content marketing strategy comes before your social media strategy.
• SEO: Search engines reward businesses that publish quality, consistent content.
• PR: Successful PR strategies address issues readers care about, not their business.
• PPC: For PPC to work, you need great content behind it.
• Inbound marketing: Content is key to driving inbound traffic and leads.
• Content Strategy: Content strategy is part of most content marketing strategies.

Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing refers to the process of gaining traffic or attention through social media sites. Social mediaitself is a catch-all term for sites that may provide radically different social actions. For instance, Twitter is a social site designed to let people share short messages or “updates” with others.

Benefits of social media marketing are:

1. Increase Brand Awareness

2. Improve Brand Loyalty

3. Stay Top of Mind With Your Customers

4. Boost Customer Engagement

5. Open & Fast Communication

6. Easy Way to Distribute Content

7. Make Content Go Viral

8. Increase Website Traffic

9. Network With Influencers

10. Content Spreads Organically

https://sproutsocial.com/insights/benefits-of-social-media/

Launching your product / services with an innovative idea

10 steps of launching a new product or service

1. Start early
2. Make the product or service available to important influencers
3. Brief industry analysts
4. Seed the social space with “leaks.”
5. Do something unusual
6. Get partners involved. Channel and marketing partners who have a financial stake in the success of the launch are natural allies.
7. Make it easy for people to learn more about your product with free trials, downloads, product videos, and demos.
8. Ignore the elements of the launch that do not drive business.

https://www.fastcompany.com/3004920/10-steps-successfully-launching-new-product-or-service

Like Harman Kardon was launched in India with printed chocolates.

Contest Marketing

Contests and sweepstakes are common promotional tools used by companies to attract customers to their company or product. A contest is slightly different from a sweepstakes in that it requires participants to complete some sort of challenge, such as a trivia question, or demonstrate talent or skill.

Why contest marketing should be a part of your marketing strategy:

1. Contests are a great tool for building your fan base
2. Contests enable you to engage your audience
3. Contests are a rich source of data
4. Contests empower consumers to do your marketing for you

https://www.americanexpress.com/us/small-business/openforum/articles/4-reasons-why-contests-should-be-part-of-your-marketing-strategy/

Email Marketing

Many people still swear by email marketing. But a mass-delivered message just doesn’t work for most companies — even if it’s delivered by email. One message can never resonate with a general audience.

1. Email Marketing is Targeted
2. Email Marketing Increases Brand Awareness
3. Email Marketing is Easily Shareable
4. Email Marketing is Measurable
5. Email Marketing is Cost effective

Participate in Exhibition

There are exhibitions organised by various organising companies, where you can introduce your product / services to the targeted audience. Make sure you leave a long lasting impact to the people who visit you during the exhibition. A few ideas is to give them a super innovative brochure or give them a small gift so that they remember you even after the exhibition like logo printed chocolates.

Benefits of participating in an exhibition:

1. Generate lucrative, highly targeted business leads

2. Learn what’s working (and what isn't)

3. Develop and strengthen your brand

4. Learn about new developments in your industry

5. Meet new companies that can help your business

6. Learn what your competitors are doing right

7. Speak directly to your target market

Unusual sponsorships

Urban living results in some unique marketing opportunities you won’t find elsewhere. They secret is, you need to think creatively to capitalize on these opportunities.