Best Marketing Promotion Methods

It is said, that 'customers are the kings' and indeed they are. The marketing departments of every firm fight tooth and nail to lure customers and increase the sales of their products. Promotional methods are important and efficient marketing strategies of various companies. While millions of dollars are spent on advertising methods, promotional marketing methods are relatively less expensive and can be more effective.

What is Promotional Marketing?

Promotional marketing is a business tool that is designed to pull customers to buy the products of a company. Generally, promotional marketing is carried out by companies to launch their products or attract more potential customers. Before devising any strategy for promotional marketing, firms must ensure that they allocate a budget to the promotional marketing and set a target that gives them maximum return on the invested money.

Promotion Strategies

There are basically two promotion strategies; the push strategy and the pull strategy. According to the push strategy, the marketers give generous discounts and benefits to the customers, so that, the sales can be increased drastically. One of the most successful strategies, the method of giving discounts is often successful for most of the firms. In the push strategy, main focus is on reducing costs of the advertising. The other strategy, the pull strategy minimizes the use of different channels and the major focus is on advertising the product. Its goal is to create a potential market for the products of the firm.

Advertising

Advertising is an expensive method of promotional marketing, wherein, the products are made to reach a large number of people. For example, by using electronic media, TV, radio, press and outdoor hoardings, advertisers target the audience and try to create an impact on customers.

Personal Selling

One of the oldest ways of direct promotion is to sell the products by direct interaction between the seller and buyer. It is believed to be the most difficult form of marketing, as it requires skills of persuasion and excellent communication skills.

Contests

One of the effective, popular and most preferred form of promotional methods is to arrange certain contests for the customers. We all will agree to the fact that winning surprise prizes in a shopping mall or fashion store is simply exciting. One of the most attractive marketing strategies, organizing contests among the customers is a brilliant way to promote the products.

Pamphlets/Coupons

In the quest to attract more customers, companies distribute coupons and pamphlets about the products. The customers are either given basic information about the newly launched products or they are provided with discounted coupons on the purchase of some accessories/apparels. Coupons make for an effective marketing plan for small business units.

Free Samples

The idea of freely distributing products, sounds weird and crazy for any company, however, there is a certain element of truth in the fact that marketing firms have gained substantial promotion through the idea of free samples. While, it is not logical to just distribute your products, you can devise a strategy, so that, the idea of free samples doesn't incur losses for your firm.

While evaluating different methods of promotion in marketing, one should realize these strategies are not set formulas or recipes for the successful launch and eventually high sales of the product. No doubt, these strategies are effective, but there are various market forces that can affect the sales prospects of firms.

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Best Viral Marketing Tools

The practice of using viral marketing tools is in use since ancient times and finds mention in the Greek historical records, although it wasn't referred to as 'viral marketing'. A virus is characterized with a rapid multiplication after it infects a body and within a short period it infects every person in its zone of influence. The same principle applies to viral marketing.

Consider a scenario in which your high school friend is slapped by another colleague and 4-5 people notice this event. The next day you go to school and hear almost every person around you talking about the incident. How do you reckon this happened? Let us assume that each person who saw the incident mentions it to 5 people who further pass the news onto 25 people and so on. Within 2 more such iterations 625 people know that your friend had been slapped! This is a exactly how it works.

Understanding Viral Marketing

The aim of a viral marketer is to spread or rapidly multiply the message or information that needs to be conveyed. The most effective way to do this is a word of mouth publicity or through a fast medium like the Internet. The main advantage of using this technique is that, it requires less effort, as the medium of communication itself acts as the primary source of information and marketing. For example in the above mentioned case, the people themselves become the primary source and ensure rapid spread of the information. Thus it can be seen that viral marketing can be a very effective way of selling or presenting your product or service to the target clientèle.

Another important aspect is to understand the factors that can effectively and convincingly assist you in promoting your product. The best way to market an entity is through a network of closely related people since they trust the word of a friend or an acquaintance more than any advertising campaign. Hotmail is a classic example of the systematic use of this tools. It made use of the internet marketing platform to advertise its services. Hotmail services had tags attached to every e-mail account of the net user. The tags were simple signing up forms meant for adding further users. These customers would then send mails to their regular communicators most of whom actually did sign-up for the service, following the primary customer. The chain result was an exponential increase in the subscribers for Hotmail service.

Important Viral Marketing Tools

• Understanding the market psychology: A 'free' service is an instant attention grabber. Nothing sells a product better than giving it free of cost initially. It may sound ironic but the strategy is very effective, especially in the case of web services. Promoting a product by offering trials directly or through the existing customer base lures a client to at least try it or recommend a trial to their near and dear ones.
• Being a receptive domain: Willingness to accept a remark whether good or bad, is the hallmark of a responsible campaigner. People trust a service better if it is open to criticism and suggestions. If a person feels more involved in the process, there is a high probability of that person using the product or service. People who have Internet access are especially prompt in commenting on a service.
• Scrutiny and resolving: Once a detailed analysis of product sales and its feedback is done, acting on the results is crucial. This is a very sensitive medium. The information passed on at such speed also involves a lot of risk. The marketing medium cannot be controlled once the process begins. Therefore it is extremely important to project the desired and carefully studied image of the product. It involves rectifying the glitches or any shortcomings promptly and ensuring a constant watch on the market happenings.
• Taking care of the roots: Many firms take the existing promotion medium or regular customers for granted and as a result lose a large customer base. These tools are fabricated on the basis of trustworthy deliverance of service. The existing base is promoting a product either by default as in the case of hotmail or purposely because the client himself is convinced about its suitability for use. If the service rendered to this user is sub-standard or fades out, so will the marketing procedure following it. Therefore, always update the service to the satisfaction of even the most loyal and trusted user. This is one of the best way to develop a permanent client base and a reliable setup.
• Promotion and development: The recent Hollywood flick 'The Dark Knight' is a genuine example of viral marketing at its best. First, the huge number of batman fans across the world served as the biggest promoters of the movie. Besides them, the promoters ensured maximum reach of the movie by interactive movie games, contests and virtual participation in movie scenes like voting for the 'Gotham city' (the city in the movie) mayor and similar reel life experiences. Once the people could associate with the story and characters they became an 'unpaid' set of marketers for the movie. The results of a 'virally infected' movie mania are there for everyone to see.

These tools are like double-edged swords; if handled with caution they function the best, if not, they can cause severe damage. Hence, a careful and studied approach is highly recommended before trying it out in your business venture.

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Strategic Communication Process for Viral Marketing

"Viral marketing" may sound strange to those who have never encountered the term. It may strike you as to how a term like viral could be incorporated into the marketing industry terminology? Well, your doubts may hold the reigns of validity. It certainly delivers a deceitful connotation to those who don't gather the slightest idea of the concept.

Ironically, this is one concept that also grabs eyeballs in creating self-awareness. Viral marketing matches up to define itself as a thoughtful marketing strategy that concentrates on spreading awareness about a particular product; thereby, also maintains the word-of-mouth ideology. It is the marketing industry that systematically uses the terminology to elicit interest in the masses through the Internet. The communication process is such that the most important information which may attract the attention and interest of the consumer is put forth, or is circulated through the word-of-mouth technique.

The communication process may be termed as 'viral fire'. I say this, as I believe that to a certain extent, viral marketing works on the principle of how a virus is communicable in nature. It is through the virus spreading that many people may endure common colds, or fevers; in the same manner, it is only through viral marketing that there are people who pass on a good word about the product, or service they have availed of, and found it beneficial, or satisfying. It serves to be a virtual propagator that spreads the news, through its marketing strategies. There are essentially two ways in which the communication takes place: spontaneous and planned.

Methods of Communication

Spontaneous Communication

The spontaneous viral communication is a strategy that focuses on the provision of a product or service by the company. When the customers or consumers are satisfied, they would provide their feedback in the form of availing the service or the product all over again and continuing to use their offered methods. Through this method, those who have used this product will pass on their positive impression to friends or potential buyers who may be interested in the services and the product. In turn they may do the same for the ones they know. In a short period, you would have a number of people using the product or the service.

Planned Communication

A research conducted by Phelps et al. (2004), produced a forensic report publishing the efficacy and frequency of forwarding emails, with regards to classifying the email mode of communication into four sections. They also found that emails eliciting specific human emotions highlighting its minutiae, have a greater probability of being passed on. Emails that function as virtual bulletin boards are likely to garner attention by the receiver. Thus, while indulging in viral marketing, emails proves to be a strategic instrument for effective and agile communication pathway.

The email is, therefore, a model of planned communication. Planned communication is a program set up by the company or the organization to let the masses know about the products or services they have on offer. The communication process has a planned strategy that functions on the principle of the following elements.They are:

Take Away Products

This is a standardized, and the most popular method in helping the company market their presence. "Free" and "discounted rates" are favorite terms in the marketing terminology. They will offer their products for a free trial to let the masses know that they are 'in the market', and their products are competitive. In terms of services, there are text messages and emails forwarded so that the information may be utilized by those interested. Coupons and rewards are distributed through emails to create awareness about the product or service they are propagating. In short, they serve to be an incentive for the masses to try a product, or service.

Easily Communicable Messages

The organization devises certain techniques to help people pass on the message quickly and easily, without any fuss, or time-consuming tactics. They are of the view that the consumers are overworked, and it is best to provide them with an alternative that does not consume much of their time. This is how they could let others know, particularly when they have an accessible via media to do so.

Preparation for Varied Response

The organization that has released the campaign must be prepared for any one of two set response; it may be small-scale (involving very few people to participate); or large-scale (to face 'n' number of people being interested in availing the benefits that you have put forth).

Concentrate on the Typical Human Mentality

The organization has to understand; rather, predict what makes the consumers tick, and what are the motivational factors that make them all the more interested; thereby, igniting their curiosity meters. Use certain time-tested devices such as humor, love, the urge to be trendy, the desire to go around popular places in the world, and the riches. These are some of the tendencies that market men can play upon.

Human Communication Networks

The existing human communication networks are the most successful and effective, as they have close contacts and relations through networks on the Internet and social networking sites. This is the strongest way through which messages can be sent and passed on. They are instant, and don't require the individual to invest more time.

This is how the communication process of viral marketing materializes. I believe this article has given you the cycle that the marketers follow to have their strategies take wings, and reach new heights.

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How Much Costs You On Facebook Advertising

So, after a lot of staving off, I finally got the opportunity to watch 'The Social Network'. For those who have no idea what it is, it's a movie about the youngest billionaire in the world, Mark Zuckerberg, who created history by creating the biggest social networking site on the web, Facebook.

However, I do expect you to know about it. Anyway, I did watch the movie calmly, but couldn't sleep that night. What stuck in my head was the power of Internet. Okay, okay, I may sound a bit superannuated while I speak about it as who, in this world, doesn't know what is the power of Internet advertising? While you're reading these words that I've written, someone is minting millions in some part of the world just with the help of the Internet. Hard-hitting, I know it is.

So, first of all, Congratulations! You have taken the first big leap by deciding on advertising on Facebook, and I'm sure you're looking forward to people becoming a fan, liking, and commenting on your product all day and all night. Of course, this would generate revenues for you in large number. But then, even you have to spend some, in order to get some. So, here's presenting a comprehensive information on the varied Facebook advertising costs; per click, per lead, and everything that you need to know about costs of advertising on Facebook.

Deciding the Cost

The very first line on the Facebook Ad page quotes that advertising on Facebook is simple and cost-effective. To start with, Facebook doesn't cost every advertiser with a definite amount. Instead, you are asked to pay the price that is defined by the market, or other advertisers of similar category. So, in order to advertise on Facebook, you need to recognize your target audience, choose between pay per click advertising (CPC) or pay per thousand impressions (CPM).

Before I move further, one of the many amazing advertising tips I have talked about in the past would apply here; choosing CPC or CPM. Well, go for CPC if you want people to click through your web page and drive conversions by means of your advertisements. On the other hand, if your ultimate goal is to spread awareness about your product, website, or service, you should go for cost per thousand impressions or CPM. Cost per click or per impression is based on the amount that is required for your advertisement to make the bid yours, which may or may not be lower than the maximum you bid earlier. (This is just a piece of advice for first time Facebook advertisers).

Now, you need to opt for the maximum bid your advertisement should have, absolutely based on the bid range as provided, which would be what other advertisers are already paying for your target stats. Furthermore, it is essential for you to set your ad's daily budget in reference to the maximum bidding done, as well as the number of clicks or impressions you are contemplating on paying for a daily basis. This financial demographic would act as your budget on daily basis. One important thing to be kept in mind is that, when, on a particular day, your budget has been met, your ads would automatically be stopped broadcasting. No, you aren't ever charged more than your set daily budget, so you need not worry about anything.

Starting Costs

Facebook offers you amazing advertising techniques and proper management and monitoring of receipts via emails or managers, for the billings. With reference to the budget you set daily, you will be charged once a day only. For as less as $5, it is possible to run an ad campaign based on either CPC or CPM, on a daily basis. However, the minimum limit for Facebook to charge you then and there is $25. So, if you run 5 campaigns for 5 days, costing $5 each, Facebook will wait until 5 days to charge you a total amount of $25. Just remember to keep a track of the email notifications and messages that are sent by Facebook in reference to the charges. This will make retaliation easy for you.

In order to fetch maximum benefits of advertising on Facebook, just remember, You is the buzzword. Now, this doesn't refer to you, the reader. Instead, it refers to the users who will click on your ad. Think of it, an ad that has nothing in it, and does not serve the purpose of users, is as better as no ad at all. Hence, keeping in mind the golden rule of Internet advertising, consider the customer as the most powerful entity. Hopeful as I am, this write-up has not only given a comprehensive idea about the monetary stats associated with Facebook advertising, but also a tad-bit of know-how about the most effective ways to use this extraordinarily lucrative platform. So, gear up, create an ad, for the best time to showcase yourself is... now!

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How does Facebook Make Money?

They say its free. They also say that Mark Zuckerberg - the guy who started Facebook - is one of the richest people around; a billionaire apparently. So, how the hell does this guy give free accounts to its users and yet sit happily atop a goldmine? The figures going around about Facebook's annual revenue are heart-stopping to say the least. While in 2008, the revenue was around US $280 million, the figures touched a US $2000 million mark in 2010. The numbers that are doing the rounds for 2011 are more than US $4000 million. All this from a free website! So where is the money coming from?

Sometime back, there was a hoax on Facebook claiming that it's going to be a paid membership site. The claims were denied by the site stating that it is free and always will be. Free account notwithstanding, Facebook is making money. And lots of it!

Advertisements

I'll solve the mystery for you in one simple word - advertisement. The same thing that runs most websites across the world. That is the big secret behind Facebook's burgeoning revenue. If you open your Facebook profile, you will see that the right hand side of the page is full of ads. You can give the thumbs up to the ad or the thumbs down. The thumbs down will remove the ad and it will not come back.

Facebook being a decidedly smart social networking institution knows which ad to put where. Like the Google AdSense, it too provides ad to the pages based on the interests and the overall profile of the user. So, if you mention in your profile that you are a fan of Nike or any other sportswear brand, the related ads will appear on the right hand side of the page for companies and websites selling them. Facebook ads are not intrusive and hence, people do not get annoyed with them, unlike those super-irritating pop-up ads.

And their advertising system makes sense, since it ensures that the right ad is displayed to the right customer, since the ads are selected for an individual page based on the interests and likes of the user. This avoids unnecessary waste of Ad space on the page where the chances of the Ad being 'hit' are theoretically pretty low. Also, the ad system gives the user a 'thumbs down' option, which ensures that the particular ad does not appear again. That too is a pretty interesting thought, given that the ad hasn't a chance of being clicked and letting it sit in front of the users will continue to rile them.

Gifts

Ever sent a virtual gift on someone's birthday? You must have at some point, if you knew how to use Facebook. Well you do pay for some of them and a big slice of it goes into coffers of the company. While simply writing 'happy birthday' suffices for some, the 'send a gift tab' on your friend's wall encourages others to send a virtual gift - paid for online. All the money almost always goes to the company, but if the gift is provided by an outsider, then a portion of it goes there. But much of it is still retained by the website. At the cost of $1 for each gift, Facebook Virtual Gift Shop is a very lucrative business which earns the company almost $200 million every year. However, not all the earned money goes to the website alone, it also donates money to various charities around the world. For instance, during the Haiti crisis, the company offered users an opportunity to buy gifts which would directly benefit the victims of the Haiti tragedy.

Application Performance

The beautiful thing about companies like these which work on different platform are the plethora of business ideas that they bring to the table. Let us take the example of Farmville, which is doing reasonably well on Facebook. Now the application is provided free for use and the parent company (Zynga) is getting a lot of traffic because of the game's popularity. So isn't Facebook entitled to take a slice of that pie? After all, they are providing a platform for gaming companies like Zynga to their burgeoning user base.

Credits

Facebook Credits is the official currency in the world of Facebook. This virtual currency enables users to purchase items in various gaming and non-gaming applications. With $1, a user can buy 10 Facebook Credits. Of all the revenue earned through Credits, the website keeps 30% and the developers get 70%. Users can purchase these through their cards but the most popular purchasing option is PayPal. The Credits can also be bought as gift cards in Target, Walmart and other stores across the US. Although the amount of revenue generated by ads is highest, Facebook credits is supposed to cross that in the coming years.

The website does not charge any fee from its users and hence, is able to give out the information about users to applications and advertising sites more freely than the sites with paid memberships.

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6 Secrets for Successful Facebook Marketing

Facebook is the number 1 most visited site thus to promote your business on the Facebook is a very efficient method to increase you business revenue and awarness. In order to succeed in Facebook marketing, you will need to understand what are the best practices and unique opportunity to avoid Facebook Marketing pit fall. Here is the lists of 7 secrets to create a successful Facebook marketing campaign.

Successful Facebook Marketing #1 – No Hard Sell

Facebook is a place where people make use as fun social space on the Internet. People will check status, picture and even video of other people posted on Facebook to relax. You will need to join in the people community and become part of them rather then treated as business crook who hard selling the people.

Hard selling tactics that used in real life is not applicable on the Facebook marketing Advertising login, posting repeatedly on your product or service will not bring your message to you followers but instead it will causes a negative effect and resulting follower unfollowing as think that you are spamming their wall.

Successful Facebook Marketing #2 - Run a Contest

Facebook contest is always the best way to market and campaign your product/services. Organizing a contest campaign will raise the awareness to those non follower and growing your following lists to you business. People like free gifts and they will participate if there is any contest on this.

Here is some suggestion on what contest you can run. You can start running contest campaign such lucky draw where you will require the contestant to like a post. When the people like your post, it will post to their timeline thus the other friends will start know about this and some even will participate.

Successful Facebook Marketing #3 – Post Regularly

If your business Facebook page has follower, meaning these people are interested with your company service/product. You should be feeding the people with information on your services/product regularly. Statistic shown that 50% will check their Facebook at least once a day as they would want to know what’s the new feed on Facebook thus posting your product/service information will raise seen rate.

Guideline is that you should post at least once a day and when you post, make sure that the content is interest. This is to avoid your following thinking that you are spamming them.

Successful Facebook Marketing #4 – Using Own Personal Profile

Depending on the nature of your business, but if your business is branded by YOU (such as Realtor, author, consultant and etc), you may want to consider using your own profile to help out on your marketing. You can even share your personality and your success story while sharing news about your business.

This action will gain the confident from the people as they who they are the following. This method is likely to increase your business and success in Facebook marketing as this is a proven method.

Successful Facebook Marketing #5 - Use Picture or Videos

People will get attracted to appealing photo or videos thus this is a factor in making successful Facebook marketing. You should be using the picture or video frequently to keep your followers engaged. Here are some example of what you can post:

• If you are a personal trainer, you can post a video of how to do an exercise correctly
• If you are an architect, you can post how is a renovation progress day by day
• If you are in a clothing line, you can post the new clothing stocks that arrive

The picture or videos will attract people to click onto your post and check out the details of it.

Successful Facebook Marketing #6 Engage with your follower

The next secret of successful Facebook marketing is that you would need to nurture your relationship with your follower/subscriber. Well, it does take time to build a good relationship with other people so you will need to be patient on nurturing this. You can start of by replying comment if your follower has comment on your post.

You can also start to learn more about your customer thru Facebook insight. With this you can start to tailor your post to meet up with the needs based on the statistics from the Facebook insights.

These are the 6 secrets in making of a successful Facebook Marketing that you can adopt to improve the Facebook marketing and increase your business. Let me know of what you think and whether have you tried and whether it’s working well in your marketing campaign.

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Business Marketing By Using Facebook

Social networking sites are a rage all over the world for their power to interest and intrigue the users. A networking platform such as Facebook, can serve bigger purposes than just chatting with friends, if used wisely. The use of social networking as a tool to promote a business idea or create awareness about a social issue, is being widely felt. For amateur businessmen, using Facebook for business marketing reduces expenditure on advertisement. This cost-effective measure for advertising allows a business to be popular across international boundaries with just a little effort. What more could a startup want?

How to Use Facebook for Marketing Your Business

Attention

Using Facebook for business marketing, follow the same rules of advertising through any other medium. Seeking attention is the first step of advertising. Facebook gives you an option to create a page (an identity or a profile) for your business. Login to the site, and create this page, by adding a profile picture and details. The site will guide you at every instance and the instructions are quite simple to understand. A page will give your business an identity and a starting point.

Interest

Why would people look at your page? Why would they like it? What's in it for them? Fair enough. To increase views, likes and followers for the page, you need to make the page interesting with pictures, intriguing snippets, quizzes, polls, personal information about the founders, prizes and such other stuff. The second step of using Facebook for marketing business, is to generate an interest amongst the viewers and to retain it. Remember that the page has to be regularly updated and it has to be kept alive with interactivity to retaining its users' interest.

Desire

After you've got attention and generated interest, you need to arouse a desire amongst users about your products or services. More the interactivity, more desirous will be the product. Persuasive updates, consistent advertising messages, pictures that bring out the essence of your product and making offers of reasonable deals are some of the ways in which your followers will want to own your product or avail your service. Increased number of followers, constant interactivity, inquiries and suggestions are all indicators of the fact that your product has reached the desired state.

Action

This may seem confusing, as we are talking about a virtual marketing. Responding to queries, which increases your sales is the action in question here. Say for instance, you are promoting a startup event company. After following the aforementioned steps, if you get calls from potential customers who would buy the invites, it is a job well done. When it gets rolling because of its popularity, it is known as action, in advertising terms. The same holds true for Facebook.

Satisfaction

It is important to revert to your customers and get important feedback from them. A feedback will help you figure the levels of satisfaction and the scope for improvement. This makes your customers feel valued, which goes a long way is establishing a loyal customer base and increasing your clientele.

Virtual business marketing is easy but it requires dedicated effort minus deviations. It is one platform that will give you a wide audience that is spread across the world. Thus, launching yourself in the international world is just a click away. Advertising a product on a social networking website comes with a great responsibility of matching up to people's expectation. And they don't ask for much! Worth a shot, I say.

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