Advice on Marketing my new product ?

[Samh]

Hi all,

I am new to the forums and would like to hear any advice people have on what I should do to get the word about my new product out there.

I know it's bad form to ask and not contribute so I made sure to write a long reply to someone else's thread, hopefully providing some value, before posting this.

The product is CustomerCradle, you can check it out at www.customercradle.com there is a short 2 minute introductory video at www.customercradle.com/LearnMore.html

It's aimed at small businesses that advertise using flyers, radio, direct mail etc and it allows them to record and report on where their customers are coming from.

So the business owner asks the customer (in person or on the phone) "thanks for calling can I ask where you heard about us ?" and then in a couple of clicks enters that information into CustomerCradle. Once they have gathered data they can analyse the data to see what advertising method is reaping rewards and where they should focus their efforts.

Here are some of my ideas :

- Posting (with permission of admins) in specific market forums offering discounts. For example cleaning company forums, or florist forums.

- Writing blog posts aimed at small businesses, to generate content for search engine ranking and to pull in interested people.

- Google adwords / Facebook advertising. I have not in the past found these ads worthwhile. In my opinion they don't convert anywhere near as well as organic search.

- emailing small business marketing blogs and asking them to review.

One thing I have learned with a previous product is the power of third party mentions / endorsements. It would be unreal if a popular site would review the product but I can't do much more than let them know about it and see what happens.

Any feedback is appreciated.

Cheers

[mike@engagemarketing]

Hi Sam,
just a few quick ideas:

I would be cold calling marketing consultants and explaining how they can improve their work and add value to clients.

You could talk to some local council business programs and provide a few free copies for a competition for the thousands of local businesses in the region.

Hope that helps,
Mike

[Samh]

Thanks for the response Mike.

So i could

- Contact marketing consultants that deal with small businesses, explain what CustomerCradle is, offer them a personalised discount code that they can pass on to their customers. So if their customers come to my site and buy using their discount code they might get 20% off or something like that.

Do you think I would need to offer the consultants a commission or by giving them a discount code they can give away I am already giving them enough value ?

Commissions seems difficult to me given that the product is so cheap, I don't mind paying them but the amounts would be so small it seems almost not worth talking about.

- I like the idea of contacting associations (chamber of Commerce perhaps ?) and offering licenses for competitions.

Thanks for the feedback.

Cheers
Sam

[mike@engagemarketing]

The marketing consultants could use it themselves to monitor each of their managed clients marketing activities. You could offer them a free copy for their own use and a discount code (of which they receive the discounted value) for their use in giving to clients or directing people off their blog or website.

Your right in that it might not return much commission, but they add value in being able to offer a discounted product of good value to their customers

[nimmysnv]

According to me if you want to market a new product then it is important to create a blog post about that product or to go for making an article that highlights the importance of that product and how it is beneficial in terms of marketing it in different fields, after this placing a small description about that product to different free classified sites is also very helpful.

Also, placing the article to different article submission sites is another important part I guess. another way is social media sites as, giving some brief details about the product and specifying some good points about the product mentioning the importance in some fields.

you can also place some offers with your services to get more traffic on your site.

[Samh]

Thanks for the suggestions nimmysnv.

I will search around but do you have any free classified websites you would suggest ?

Cheers
Sam H

[small business marketing]

Hey Sam, welcome to FS. I am in Canberra and would be keen to catch up.

I coach small business owners in implementing a marketing system into their business that drives sales.

That said, from my knowledge of the Canberra market, you might find some push back from the traditional marketing crowd here for your service - they don't like to measure results (which of course is a joke!) I met with a high profile advertising agency recently where mid conversation (and in context) I suggested they add an offer to a particular retailers advertising so they could better measure its effectiveness. They dismissed the idea because the 'advertising campaign' was in place to generate awareness, not direct sales ('results' in my language). I explained that if you have an unlimited advertising budget then sure, spend what you want on building your image and brand. If you're a small business though, you need a real return for every marketing dollar you spend. We have not spoken since....

Anyway, drop me a line, I'm keen to catch up.

Gary at small-business-marketing-australia.com

Cheers

Gary

[Hugh Thyer]

Identify your ideal prospect. This could be their industry, size, growth rate, whatever.

Then find a way to get in contact with them. A list broker might be an excellent start. Or there might be industry specific magazines.

And go from there. Most businesses don't realise they need your product so they don't go looking for it. But if you can give them case studies and success stories then they'll want that same success too.

Also network in groups where very motivated business owners are. I won't name names here, but if you can find some coaching groups you can network within AND your product is good, you could do very well. I'm sure you can find some groups around.

[Samh]

Thanks for the advice Hugh.

[nimmysnv]

Originally Posted by Samh

Thanks for the suggestions nimmysnv.

I will search around but do you have any free classified websites you would suggest ?

Cheers
Sam H

Hi Samh,

Thanks for the appreciation as yes I have some good free classified sites where you can place your ads free and you dont need to pay for anything.

http://www.hifreeads.co.uk
http://www.webclassifieds.us
http://www.usfreeads.com
http://www.bestwayclassifieds.com
http://www.adlandpro.com

These are the sites that I used mainly for placing free ads.

Please try these out and if you want a whole list then please PM me.

Thanks!