Marketing Fairy #4: 3 Proven Steps to Build Customer- first Marketing Strategy
Who is the most important person in your story?
Reading time: 3 minutes
Hi,
I am Angelina. Thank you for reading the Marketing Fairy newsletter - a weekly dose of no-bullshit advice on how to turn great words into more sales. I hope every letter will inspire you to take action and turn readers into customers.
Who is the most crucial person in your story?
Today Im writing about probably the most common mistake made by many businesses. They believe their business is about their product. Companies that implement a "customer first" philosophy will reap long-term benefits and financial victories.
What is customer-first marketing?
Customer-first marketing is a marketing philosophy that puts your customers and prospects at the heart of everything you do.
Source: The DRUM
What are the crucial steps to the “customer first approach”?
1. Start with understanding their pain/problem.
You need to really get to know your ideal customers. What do they require, what bothers them, and what are their habits? Do they read newspapers or are they mostly on Facebook? How can your product or service help them?
2. Adopt a customer-centric mindset.
And do it across the entire company, especially sales. If your sales team is still driven by the old "my product is the best" story, changing your marketing approach is pointless. Who gives a f… how excellent your product is?
It. is crucial for every company team member to have a customer in mind, not just the those in direct contact with them.
The only correct way to do this is:
Be in the customer’s shoes. All the time.
TIP:
If you work in marketing, or you’re a copywriter, print out your ideal customer persona description and image. Stick it on your wall. Look at them when you write for them!
3. Segment and personalise to get a better customer experience
Segmenting your audience is crucial so you can determine what each customer wants, when and how they want to be reached. Then, you can deliver a personalised message, for the better customer experience.
Customer experience is a new battlefield, and the customer experience is the new brand, says Forbes:
Today, 89% of companies compete primarily on the basis of customer experience – up from just 36% in 2010.
On top of that, when you know 86% of buyers are willing to pay more for a great customer experience, you get a pretty clear picture of where to invest your bucks.
I don’t know if you find this useful—is it too broad, or boring or do you find it valuable? Please share your thoughts! Tell me what you want to learn, and what actionable insights you would like to get from me and I’ll practice my “customer first” mindset.
Marketing Fairy Recommends:
Trello
Trello is a visual project management tool that lets you intuitively organise and prioritise your projects and tasks. With Trello, you can create boards for different projects and add tasks in the form of cards, which can be moved from one board to another as the project progresses.
Trello will help you be more productive by keeping your tasks organised and on track.
Trello is available for free, and for a small fee, you can upgrade to a paid plan for additional features. You can read more about how I use Trello here: How I Use Trello to be More Productive at Work and Manage my Daily Life.
Quote that matters
“If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking.” - Murakami
Do you know I’m at the beginning of my new side-hustle journey? I’ll document the entire process so every future marketing solopreneur can learn from my mistakes and winnings.
If you want to share your feedback on my writing or this newsletter, please reach me at angelina.radulovic@gmail.com
Speak to you soon,
Angelina, Marketing Fairy