New Zealand Marketing 101

Written by: Steph Kendall, Published July 2007

It's impossible for us to cover every aspect of marketing in one short article, but here we offer a brief overview of what marketing is and what the opportunities for marketers, particularly in New Zealand, are.

What Marketing Is

Marketing is commonly agreed to be an important part of any business. It involves:

  • Generating demand
  • Motivating people to buy your products and services (and buy again)
  • Identifying a specific need common to a group of people (a target market)
  • Communicating with people (your target audience)
  • Getting noticed by these people and creating awareness in your target audience
  • Addressing what benefits your target audience wants from your offer

Target Market
Your target market is essentially a group of people whom you have identified to have a similar need. The best way to find out about these people is through market research. By finding out as much as you can about existing and potential customers, you can position your offer accordingly.

Beneficial Offer
What do you offer that is going to be of benefit to your target customer? In what ways will your service or product improve their life? In otherwise, why should they buy it?

Communication
Work out what you need to say to people about your offer and how. Are you going to support its benefits with information about its features, your company, your staff or your service (guarantees and warranties etc)? A good starting point is ask yourself what you want to know about a company before buying a specific product or service.

Getting Noticed
Work out where your message is going to get seen by your target market. What types of communication are they going to be coming into contact with: is it TV, radio, Internet, print, billboards, flyers, letters or emails?

Making the Sale
There are many factors at play before someone decides to part with their cash. Things that you can do to help you close the sale include: providing enough information so people can make a purchasing decision, making it clear what to do and what happens next, making it easy to pay, backing up a sale through guarantees and warranties. Keeping in touch with your customers once they've bought once and encouraging them to buy again.

Marketing Opportunities in New Zealand

Marketing opportunities appropriate for your business may consist of all, or some, of the following elements:

  • Web sites
  • Electronic communications, emails and flyers
  • Advertisements on search engines and other Web sites
  • Advertisements in newspapers and magazines
  • Flyers / brochures / newsletters
  • Press releases, radio and television advertising
  • Sponsorship and product placement
  • Yellow Pages, White Pages and local directories (offline and online)

Finding Out What Works

Without measuring the success of each of your marketing tactics, you run the risk of throwing money away time and time again, so remember to measure your returns. Track where your enquiries and sales are coming from the sources available to you, such as your customers, your marketing and promotional codes, Web statistics and email measurement tools.

More Marketing Information

We have only touched on the barest of marketing essentials here. There is a huge amount of information out there, especially online, to help you with finding out more. Some of the resources or partners, we'd recommend include:

Marketing

Web and Search Marketing

  • Avatar News - Our easy and entertaining monthly newsletter read features tips and advice about Web marketing.
  • Search Engine Watch - Information about search marketing, including search engine optimisation and advertising.

Email Marketing

  • Gravity Mail - Email marketing software and information on running email marketing campaigns.

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