Nothing sells without marketing, period! I have spent most of my professional career in marketing. I have said this phrase to countless clients. I believe these words. I have seen the truth of this statement put into action time and again. You can quote me on this.

However, not all marketing leads to a sale, does it? The honest truth about marketing is some methods are better at attracting and convincing people to buy from you than others. How do you decipher the winning methods from the losers? Here are a few things to consider when you are trying to find the marketing method that will hit the target.

Understand your target market

If you are going to be effective in marketing, you have to understand the group of people you are trying to sell. Are there certain characteristics that exemplify them as a whole? For instance, do you have a product or service that is best sold to a specific age group? What about another demographic, such as mothers of small children or men over the age of 40? If you think that everyone is your target market, think again. Unless you are selling a necessity of life, like food staples, you have a group that is more likely to buy from you than others. Once you identify that group, find out what makes sense in terms of selling to them. For instance, if you are selling commercial truck insurance to independent over-the-road truck drivers, there are certain methods you want to stay away from. For instance, text marketing would not fit the demographic. They could lose their license if they are caught reading a text while driving. What would work? What about road signage, late night radio spots, a brochure at a display in a truck stop? For every group, there are methods that are effective in gaining their attention. Figure out the group and then figure out the method.

Segment your marketing methods

What are you trying to accomplish with your marketing methods? Ultimately, all methods lead to a sale or they are not worthy of putting any effort behind them. However, there are steps to a sale and you would be wise to understand what step you are trying to accomplish with each of your marketing methods. Right now, content marketing is big in new media marketing. This would include methods such as blogs, case studies, expert articles, how to videos, etc. Content marketing is a method where there is not a hard sell to buy your products or services. It is sharing what you know so you can be seen as an expert in your field. That lends credibility that eventually leads people to trust you and buy from you. Content marketing fits into a larger segment we call Awareness Marketing. Other methods in Awareness Marketing might be sponsoring of events, explaining your products and services on your web site, signs with your logo and brands listed, etc. The next step after Awareness Marketing is First Time Sales Marketing. It is where we are making an offer to a potential customer to buy from us. Now if your marketing method is meant to be an Awareness piece of your marketing plan, don’t expect it to magically turn into a First Time Sales effort. Within First Time Sales Marketing, are there people segments that are not the actual buyers, but have great influence over the buyers? When you think through all of the steps that need to happen to lead up to that first sale, including all of the people who need to be touched by your marketing, the method you use should fit each situation.

Repackage your marketing

Once you figure out your target market and find out what has worked in the past, it is easy to do the same method over and over again. However, repetition can become so routine that is becomes ineffective. If your marketing methods have lost their edge with your customers, it is time to push that edge. Find a fresh way to reach them. Many times the same message in a new medium can be highly effective in reaching a target market. For instance, try taking the comments from your blog, social media site, or compliments that customers have said to you and turn it into a testimonial piece. Nothing sells like a satisfied customer. Consumable products have been doing this sort of thing for years. Think of the many ways that soft drinks are packaged and then repackaged to keep your attention (big bottles, little bottles, vintage bottles, bottles with your name on them, etc.) The branding is consistent, the marketing method changes.