Naturally you want it all:
- A corporate identity you can
be proud of and which speaks volumes about you business, your
aspirations and your capability.
- A fantastic corporate brochure
or sales catalogue
- A fleet of branded vehicles
- Full page adverts in prominent
positions in all your target customers' favourite magazines
and newspapers, even TV and radio ad campaigns
- A rich and detailed website which
is at the top of the rankings on every major search engine
- An exhibition stand which will
be the envy of all your competitors
Is this a dream or reality? Fast forward
to the real world, and now we come to the budgets and the wish
list above turns into cheap logo, a flimsy brochure with amateur
photography, a small cramped press ad, a basic temporary website
and some simple posters dotted around your exhibition stand.
Hardly the way to enhance your reputation!
Spread too thinly your marketing budget
can do you more harm than good. Much better to look at your
intended audience and target your marketing activity at a few
things done well.
Your corporate identity is crucial, it
is the foundation for all your marketing activity. Get this
wrong or go for a temporary option while you get started and
you will waste time and money at a vital time in the building
of your business. While you work on this with your chosen designers,
it is time to think big, think back to your wish list of all
the fantastic marketing that for the time being is out of reach.
How will the new identity that you are creating work with the
bigger picture. Does it give you room to grow, will it still
be relevant in five years time.
The next stage will be different for
each type business. For business to business (B2B) activity
you should consider spending your remaining budget on a website.
Possibly have your brochure designed, but hold back on the printing
and have it available for download on the site as an Acrobat
PDF. If you are a moblie business such as tradesman, look at
your vehicle graphics. Each of your vehicles is a mobile advert
which is parked outside your clients premises or on the move
working for you all the time.
The rest of your marketing activity is
then in your hands, via networking, using the phone and just
getting out there and seeing as many new prospects as possible.
Only spend your budget on tools that will help you to achieve
your initial aim which is getting a new business meeting. Stage
three is how you handle the follow up to the meetings, but to
start with you need to get those meetings.
Do each thing well and always put your
best foot forward. One cobbled together piece of marketing can
undo all the good work on image creation that has gone before
and you know how long one step forward and five steps back takes.