Marketing Your Business For Repeat Sales

Thanks for your question, it’s a fairly broad one and as such I have run right over the word count limit, so it will be answered in instalments over the next 2 weeks.

Your question really addresses 2 topics;

• Marketing your website
• After-market customer care (to gain repeat sales)

The most important thing to consider here is defining your Target Market. This is so important for every business regardless of the size or type. The narrower and more defined your target market, the better able you are to position yourself to meet their needs, particularly if you are a sole trader or SME. A target market is generally described by its demographic and or psychographic profile, which includes many personal and social details, some of which are:

1. Age (in groups)
2. Gender
3. Income levels
4. Marital status
5. Education levels
6. Geographic location (including urban, country/rural)
7. Social group (social class, ie WAGs, DINKs, Single Parents, lifestyle choices)
8. Professional group (industry, role within business i.e. tradesman, CEO, sole trader)
9. Interests (could be a hobby, musical preference, favourite sport, etc.)
10. Religious &/or spiritual beliefs
11. Political affiliations
12. Industry type

When choosing or identifying a website’s target market, there are a few things to keep in mind:

1. The size of the target market.
2. Whether the target market is growing or shrinking.
3. Whether or not there’s a demand for the website or online business in the particular target market.
4. Whether or not the target market is likely to actively use the internet. No point setting up an online store if your customers are primarily elderly, technophobic, or unable to access the internet (I’m sure there must be some out there).
5. Whether or not it would be easy to monetize the target market. (For example, you wouldn’t sell high-end electronics to a low-income target market, and you wouldn’t run a content site exclusively on ad revenues if your target market is traditionally “ad blind”)
6. Things that influence members of the target market. (For example, would they be influenced more by a referral from a friend, an ad, or ‘expert’ opinion)

Don’t forget to look for common areas of congregation for your target market, if they are sharing an interest in your product, what other shared interest exists? Could you find them discussing the migration of birds on ornithological sites or dissing politicians on a social networking site? What kinds of courses, memberships or other products are likely to appeal to them? Who could you form a strategic alliance with to cross promote your products?

Once you have identified your target market, you need to define the benefits and solutions that your product offers to this group. What can people expect to gain from spending money with you? This becomes the focus of your sales pitch. Make sure it is a positive solution for something they want or think they need. For a great template to help you identify this click here.

So work on those tips for the rest of the week and see what you come up with. Next week will talk more about driving traffic to your site.

If you have a question in mind feel free to send it to info@profitune.com , you will also go into the running to win 1 of 4 books.