Before you can sell anything you need to:
- make your target audience aware of it
- tell them what it will do for them
- tell them where they can buy it
- what it costs
- why it offers excellent value for the price.
Know what value is? Here is the best definition we've seen. It's from the excellent book, Words That Work, by Dr. Frank Luntz, page xxvii.
"VALUE" = price + convenience + reliability
Your job is to convince buyers that your product has "VALUE."
If you are marketing a product that never existed before you have the added duty of making people aware of the problem your product solves, and why they need a problem solved today that they did not need solved yesterday.
The Web
The Web provides you with an around-the-clock marketing machine par excellence. All you've got to do is take advantage of it. The tools, capability, and reality of the Web's ability to market and sell if beyond reproach. As far as business people are concerned, the Web is the real deal.
Your Customers
Okay, you've got your product and you've done your market research. You know who will be buying your product(s). You should also know if traditional advertising, social networking, and/or online ads are best to reach your buyers. If you don't know that yet, you need to find out, or be prepared for a trial and error campaign.
If your customers are online (and they may not be), what sites do they frequent? Here are some ways you can reach them and connect with them online. You can pick and choose the ones that work best for you. Be sure to do a integrated campaign. Tie everything you use together, including your company Web site, and maybe a product Web site as well.
Smart Phones and Tablets
In addition to computer screens you will want to develop for (what we call) the small screen. These devices are making real inroads into the laptop market, and you don't want to leave them out of your marketing plan. Be sure you design a your Web site to address these devices because they provide much of what a laptop does. And for many people offer an alternative that fully meets their needs.
Social Networking
The online world of social networking is not to be ignored. Facebook will have one billion members by the end of 2012. That's one in seven of all the people on the planet. It is very likely that your customers are there. Twitter is nearing 500 million, LinkedIn has about 131 million. So, social networking needs to be addressed.
You can advertise on search engines, and on social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, and likely Twitter in the future. You may also want to advertise on blogs that compliment your products, are popular news sites, or cover the industry or subject of your eBook. Be sure the blog gets lots of traffic.
Further, you can sell at Amazon and other online book sellers. Include testimonials from people who are in the know about your subject matter.
Using a blog is a good way to stay in touch because it's interactive. Use it to place the first chapter of your book online for comments. This is an excellent way to tune the book to the needs of your audience as it is being developed. This provides you the ultimate in market research.
YouTube and videos provide superb marketing opportunities and are inexpensive. Be sure to SEO your YouTube account so that it will be found by search engines.
For more on setting up your social networking campaign, download our Nine Steps To Social Networking Success.
Your Web Site
A site that sells a book is not your normal corporate Web site. It is a sales site and not to be under estimated as a marketing tool. It's job is to sell your book, so it only presents material on the book. Include endorsements, where to buy it, and information about you the author as your expertise pertains to the book.
Article Marketing
Publishing articles that relate to the book is one of the best ways to make people aware of it in a non-threatening environment. Look to publish the article in magazines that are a good fit for the product. Be sure to use the About the Author section to your advantage.
Want more on anything you see here? Does article marketing sound good? Post a comment and we can cover more on what's important to you. And, if you read out Nine Steps to Social Networking Success let us know what you think. What would you like to see added? They are not designed to give you answers, but to generate questions that, when answered, lead you to the development and implementation of a customized social networking campaign.
