Afrikan Heroes

Can your startup really remain in business without marketing?

While most startup owners struggle on the best ways to pitch their deals, marketing still remains the only way to shoot your startups out there. Marketing is a hard game; sometimes nothing even comes out of it after a hard day’s labour.

Targeted markets have also become extremely intelligent and discerning. Below, we discuss some of the best marketing approaches for your startups.

Network With The Press and Journalists

• While many people get all their stories from social media, a lot still has to be done about the trust they have on those stories. In fact, more than eight-in-ten U.S. adults (85%) got news on a mobile device, up from 72% in 2016. However, while 39 percent of Americans who got news in newspapers, on TV or on the radio believed the news is misinformation, more of them believed that 65 percent of news on social media is made up or can’t be verified as accurate. The implication of this to your startup can only be better imagined.

• The role of journalists here is to help dig out your business, through press releases and other strategies and bring it out more into public domains. Therefore, look out for journalists with a track history of reporting on the subject areas your startup focuses on. ShapeShif is a list of journalists on Twitter worthy of note. 

Instead of Attending Others’ Events, Try Organizing Your Own Events

• Plan and host a memorable event to make an impact. Through events, you allow people to experience and interact with your startup, product or service while participating in the event. Most times, the events may not even cost much; just a space, a time slot and a few people sharing a few ideas or inviting discussion. You get a great opportunity to do a bit of informal market research/user testing. Events could be done online through Webinars, Virtual Events, Live Streaming Events, or physical events through workshops, conferences,trade-shows, breakfast, launches or dinners.

According to — Craig Hanna, EVP North America, Econsultancy, @Cragster

“Not all events are created equal. Companies must consider live events an extension of their brand and content marketing and build events that really engage. For me that means thinking about the customer experience you REALLY want to portray!”

Book A Stand At Major Events

According to a 2018 event trends study, a majority of senior-level marketers agreed that live events are the single-most effective marketing channel, beating out content marketing, email, social media, paid, and search. A good strategy is to look out for any industry-specific events in your area where the audience is more suited to your product, hoist your stand and do the real marketing.

Be A Panelist or Do A Keynote Speech At Major Events

Participating in panel discussions or being a keynote speaker at a major industry event is a powerful way to share your ideas and get recognized for what you do. To find events to feature in, get yourself closer to events in your area. Once you are accepted, make sure to include links to your social pages and encourage people to reach out. According to a Medical Marketing & Media (MM&M) survey, 80 percent of marketers targeting Health Care Professionals in 2015 said they relied on meetings and events, 64 percent used printed sales materials, 57 percent used patient education materials, and 50 percent relied on paid speaker programs.

Pull Down Your Out-of-Fashion Websites and Put Up A More Professional One

Having a good website can never be overemphasized. Among the first things a potential investor or buyer will look out for is your website. According to the Medical Marketing & Media (MM&M) survey, 59 percent of marketers say they use websites, 45 percent use social media, 32 percent use digital ads, and 20 percent use mobile apps for their marketing efforts. For example, Forty-one percent of Americans search online for health information, and digital-savvy consumers are more than two times as likely to say their healthcare quality has increased due to their digital engagement, according to a 2016 Adobe Digital Insights U.S. Digital Health Survey. 

Tom Swanson, head of Healthcare Industry Strategy at Adobe, has this to say about the increasing online presence of consumers:

“If pharma companies are attempting to reach patients or consumers, digital channels are where those consumers are, where they’re conducting their research, and where they want to be engaged.”

It is your job to make sure they get a great experience when they do. The best strategy is to keep the website simple, informative and easy to read. 

Use Podcast To Spread The Message

Podcasting has generated immense prominence as a tool for marketing over the years. A podcast is a set of digital audio files that are available on the internet for downloading. A user can subscribe to the podcast to receive the digital files once they are uploaded.

In fact, the increased usage of mobile phones has led to the explosive growth of podcasting. Podcast subscriptions on iTunes alone surpassed 1 billion in 2014. RawVoice, which tracks 20,000 shows, said the number of unique monthly podcast listeners has tripled to 75 million from 25 million five years ago. Podcast is alternative marketing tool because not everyone is comfortable to shoot videos and some small businesses may not have the right equipment to shoot videos that will stand out.

In a survey conducted on 300,000 podcast listeners, it was found that 63 percent of the respondents had bought what the host had promoted. This indicates the effect of using podcast to reach out to the audience and influence their buying decisions.Once you have created the podcast, you can start promoting it to increase its exposure and reach out to a larger audience. John Levy on Forbes has a good primer on what you need to get started.

TGIM (Shopify) As A Case

“Thank God It’s Monday” is a phrase Shopify is banking on in their new podcast. Shopify calls it the podcast for people who can’t wait for the week to start. The TGIM shows aim to inspire Shopify’s audience of innovators by telling success stories of like-minded entrepreneurs, packaged in 30 to 45 minute themed episodes.

Partner with Another company In Related Industries To Boost Marketing

Partnering with other companies in your space can help your marketing strategy in a big way. In the decentralized space, even your competitors are your greatest collaborators. Therefore, prepare list of companies in your industry and look for ways to work on projects together.

Shyp As A Case Study

An interesting scenario about how such partnership has worked is that of on-demand shipping startup, Shyp which partnered with Banana Republic, in the Christmas of 2014 to help last-minute shoppers get presents to family and friends. Shyp representatives handled wrapping and shipping, offering a more traditional concierge for those who didn’t want to wait to use the service until they got to their home or office. Banana Republic got to experience working with Shyp, while the start-up got visibility and the opportunity to meet many potential customers.

Stage A Viral Campaign On Social Media

Creating a viral content might seem impossible. While this may be the case, each of the viral video marketing campaigns has proved that viral content creation can be done, any time. For most businesses, using a combination of social sharing and PPC video campaigns to give your campaigns the initial visibility they need to go viral is going to be a great choice, regardless of whether you have a big or small social following. The goal will be to get the ad in front of as many relevant audience members as you possibly can so that it can gain momentum in share.

Branded videos are increasing in popularity, with one in five social media users willing to share them on their news feed, and 85% of people actually saying they would like to see more video content from brands

Coca Cola Benefited From Viral Marketing

• In 2013 carbonated soft drinks were down 3.3% . Coca-Cola has not been immune to these pressures. For generations, Coca-Cola has been one of the world’s most iconic brands. 

• But something is different for teens today. There are so many more beverage options that ‘iconic’ does not readily translate into ‘for me.’ In fact, half of all US teens had not enjoyed a Coke in 2012. 

• In order to increase sales, Coke needed to make a personal connection with teens. There is nothing more personal than your name. That is where the ‘Share a Coke’ concept was born: take the Coca-Cola brand name off 20-ounce bottles and replace it with 250 of the most common teen names, a simple, powerful idea that would connect teens to Coca-Cola. 

• Using viral marketing strategy, ‘Share a Coke’ delivered unprecedented sales impact. 

• Overall, paid media drove 10% of incremental sales for Coca Cola. It also drove sales directly and indirectly through owned/earned channels which in turn generated another 9% of incremental sales lift. Static and interactive outdoor drove 3.3% of sales and paid influencer content programmes drove 2.1% of sales— the highest paid media contributions.

Write Guest Posts or Articles on News Sites or Newspapers

Guest blogging is one of the best online marketing strategies to invest in. It is a way of spreading your brand’s message and wining the trust of your target audience. This could be a useful way to help position yourself as an authority on certain subjects.

Andrew Youderian, an eCommerce entrepreneur and owner of numerous online stores using the dropshipping model is a regular guest blogger on Shopify.com. According to him:

‘‘ Despite having only three guest posts published, traffic from the Shopify blog made up the fourth largest traffic stream to my blog, sending nearly 2,400 visits! Even more important, the Shopify readers were the most engaged, spending significantly more time on my site than direct or Google visitors.

The conversion data was even more impressive. My analytics are set up to track conversions/goals as anyone who subscribes to my blog by downloading my eBook. Despite being #4 in traffic, Shopify visitors were the second biggest source of subscribers — even beating out visitors from Google! Over three months, those few articles generated more than 550 subscribers.’’

Give Out Token and Free Gifts To Customers

These can be a great way of rewarding your community.

Zappos Is A Game Changer

In 2015, Zappos decided to deliver a free gift to every household in Hanover, New Hampshire (a town reportedly heavy with customers particularly loyal to Zappos) — nearly 1,900 gift boxes were personally delivered by more than 30 Zappos employees.

The commitment brought the Zappos brand closer to more customers. Indeed, in 2009, a very impressive 44% of new Zappos customers heard about the retailer simply by word of mouth.

Make Use of A Wide Range of Social Media Platforms:

Become More Strategic Marketing on Twitter

Twitter is such a good platform for its users. Your business could get such an instant retweet that may spiral into thousands of retweets. To be more strategic, increase your following by tweeting regularly, day and night (use staff/freelancers in other countries) and make sure to engage with other leaders in the space. 

Use Medium Blog for Announcements

A blog is the place for major announcements, roadmap updates, and more technical pieces. According to the New York Times, as of May 2017, Medium was up to 60 million unique visitors each month What makes Medium unique is that it has a 93 Domain Authority (DA). DA is a 0–100 statistical measure of a website’s reputation.

Because of Medium’s high Domain Authority, you have a higher likelihood of getting traffic to your content from Search. All things being equal, the same content has a higher likelihood of ranking on Medium than on your own domain that has a substantially lower domain authority — especially when you are just getting started. Domain Authority is a significant factor in how a website will rank in search engines.

Airbnb Engineering & Data Science

Airbnb Engineering & Data Science is one of the numerous companies that have presence on Medium. The company has more than 80k followers on the platform.

Blogging on Medium is a far quicker way of establishing yourself. You get to publish into specific categories with millions of followers in each. 

Post Regularly on Reddit

Reddit is a popular forum for all things internet-based. The trick is to take part in the communities you want to join. Upvote, comment, and share articles–not just your own–to show that you’re a valid part of the community. Once you have done that, you can create a sub-Reddit for your product specifically and invite your new found fellow Redditors to discuss and explore your content.

Ghost Influence Is A Case In Point

Brian Swichkow, founder of the social-marketing firm Ghost Influence, said he now “gets calls all of the time” from agencies wanting to subcontract his work, which has the potential to quadruple a brand’s social impressions, from Reddit. Swichkow said he attracted $500,000 in new business in just a few weeks after a campaign for an unnamed wearables product went viral. 

“You have to present value to the community in the voice of the community. If you don’t do that, you will fail. There’s no way around it, ”Swichkow said.

Use LinkedIn To Grow Your Business

Although much of the attention goes to Facebook, Twitter and Telegram for marketing channels, LinkedIn is a powerful marketing tool. Some of its 87 million Millennial users are highly influential: nearly 11 million of them have decision making authority for their companies. When executives were asked about the top places to find relevant, high-quality content, 91 percent cited LinkedIn, while only 29 percent said Twitter, and 27 percent said Facebook. So open your own LinkedIn profile and head straight to groups. There are a number of groups with high profile individuals you should be targeting with your startup marketing campaign. 

Answers Questions on Quora as an Expert

Quora, the Q&A hub has seen every tech entrepreneur, and occasional billionaire CEO and former President answer questions for the curious public. Answering questions for people on all matters gives you an opportunity to include links to resources, you have found useful, and even your website! It is a smart tool for marketing that many other industries have overlooked. But note that Quora answers are upvoted. The implication of this is that if you use it to spam others, you may have difficulty getting very far.

Facebook?

Only a small percentage — maybe 1% to 5% — of people who have liked your page will see your updates. To get a wider reach, you will need to spend more money. This can range from $5 to $300 to reach 500 to 50,000 people; not just your fans. However, ‘reaching’ these people will only put your ad into their newsfeeds; there is no guarantee that they will click or even see it. Actual engagements can then prove expensive, sometimes reaching $12 each — far too expensive considering advertising alternatives. 

Facebook has also announced a new algorithm that prefer contents shared by a user’s friends over any advertising or branded content. As a part of this, they warned brands that their “post reach and referral traffic could potentially decline”. See more about how Facebook is shifting its focus away from advertising. 

Social Media Influencers Can Help

Influencer marketing is one of the best ways to quickly build your brand online and raise awareness among your target audience.

According to Forbes, influencer marketing is growing faster than digital ads, with emphasis placed on leveraging an industry leaders’ followers to foster growth in your own business. By having their own highly curated following, social influencers represent a great way to directly access a certain target audience. The most important thing is in finding which social influencer has created a target market that matches yours, and how effective their campaigns have been. Instagram has some of the most sophisticated tools for measuring the success of an influencer. Here’s a decent list. 

Engage Celebrities or Music Artistes Who Use Tech

What better way to share your project than by turning it into a work of art? This can be a really good way of letting your audience find out what you do in an interactive way. Who said marketing needed to be dull?

Spotify  Owes Much Of Its Early Success To This

Spotify made the best move linking the music streaming company with the best of celebrity bloggers. These bloggers not only danced to the music but spread the good news.The result: they kept coming back for more of the music.

Related: How Spotify Bult A 36 $Billion Music Business And Lessons To Learn

In just one year, Spotify had built a product that music bloggers were already excited about. This was followed by negotiations with record labels. With sales falling, negotiation with the American “Big Four” record labels — EMI, Sony, Universal, and Warner Music — became an option. A couple of smaller labels also agreed to make their entire back catalogs available to Spotify for use outside the U.S. on a limited basis. Indeed, this was a game-changing deal. In fact, Spotify needed the labels — and their back catalogs — as much as the labels needed a new way to reach young music fans.

Create Referral Links To Business

A referral program is a deliberate, systematic way of getting people to make referrals to your business. People are twice as likely to pay attention to referrals from a friend. Plus, referrals get some of the best new customers you can get, with higher brand loyalty and profit margins. Here’s a substantial list of great examples of referral programs by some of the world’s most successful companies.

Scribe Writing Is A Perfect Example

A book publishing company called Scribe Writing offers $2,000 for every referral made. Authors who have already published a book with the company can refer other authors. If they sign up, the referrer gets the money in cash, or have it applied as credit to their Scribe Writing account. There’s also a third option to donate the referral reward to charity. With this strategy, Scribe Writing leverages their customers’ network to get more authors to publish with them. The monetary reward is compelling, and new authors are more likely to trust other authors who have experienced the service, and recommend it. In fact, a Harris Poll survey says that 77% of Americans prefer cash as a reward in exchange for referrals. 

However, not many small businesses have the cash to splash out on such programs like this. You need to have a solid strategy if you want to make this worth your while.

Get A PR Team Who Can Place Your Adverts On The Right Places

PR marketers help put you reach your target audience. Since they are usually agents who help place your brands in all media, they are one sure-fire way of producing results. Implementing a PR plan enables you to establish your brand identity in a practical, cost-efficient manner, and helps you market your business in several important ways.The biggest piece of advice is to work out what your company is and what it is trying to promote before heading out to an agency. You will be burn through cash if your key selling points are not clear enough.

Optimise Your Website’s Search Engine Capacity

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of increasing the visibility of a website or a web page to users of a web search engine. Good SEO however takes time, and ranking for certain terms can feel endless. Doing an audit on what terms you currently rank for and what you would like to rank for is a great place to start. Here are six free resources to help get you started.

Use Telegram to Communicate Directly

Telegram — a cloud-based messaging app, available for desktop and mobile devices with a high level of information security. In March 2018 telegram hit 200 million monthly active users. It also has 15 billion daily messages.

More than 220 000 new users sign up every day. Budget spent on app promotion: $0. Telegram is free of charge; its main financial source is donations. This brings countless opportunities for Telegram advertising. Since there is still little competition, new comers stand a chance reaping the rewards from it. That is good news for small and middle-sized companies, because they can build their presence without competing against large ad budgets. Telegram’s services include: Concierge; Online ordering; Real-time support; Individual assistance; Customer feedback processing; Team communication and coordination; Up-to-date information; Product promotion; Additional traffic to the site; Increasing brand awareness; Non-stop client support; Additional channel for payment processing.

Charles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh, a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organisations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.