By Nicole Crump, director, Tactix Marketing Plans
As with all marketing, the difference is defined by the target audience. Because of this, one of the fundamental functions of marketing, and certainly a good starting block when embarking on a new campaign, is to compile detailed information on your audience. Who are your current audience? Is this your ideal audience? Where does your target audience communicate? What do they read? What are their perceptions of your brand and of your competitors?
For most makers of market-ready products, audiences will be both B2B (business to business) and B2C (business to consumer). You are working to gain favour with not only resellers, investors and business partners, but also the consumer market. For these companies, marketing plans will, by necessity, be a little more complex. On the B2B side they may cover developing professional networks, communication with business partners and suppliers, pitching products to new stockists. In terms of B2C communications, product packaging, website branding, social media, brochures, point of sale and advertising may all be part of the mix.
Marketing of component products, ingredients or even machinery for food production all falls into a more B2B marketing category. This will see less focus on communications to wider audiences, instead favouring more personal communications – targeting key businesses and even specific decision makers within those businesses to develop their perception of the brand.
What is your one overriding piece of marketing advice for those companies supplying single ingredients or components to food manufacturers?
Play to your strengths, find your point of difference and ensure that you constantly communicate this in all your communications.
How is your product different to the competition? Is it of better quality? Is it cheaper? Can it be produced faster? Can it be produced in greater volume? These are all selling points and it is likely you will already have a fairly good idea which applies to you.
The aim is to hone in on one, the one that sets you apart, and really own that space. You may feel that by not communicating as many potential strengths as possible you are selling yourself short. This is seldom the case. One clear and concise message, well delivered and frequently repeated is more powerful than a lengthy and confusing list of potential strengths.
You may wish to single out your quality, for example. In this case, all communication leaving the company, which may provide a touch point for those you wish to influence should carry on it the message of superior quality. There is no need to change the text in most instances; in fact it is preferable that you do not.
Communications channels you may wish to use may include brochures, letters, advertising, Facebook, your company website, even email signatures.
How can social media be used to generate interest in food products?
The world of social media is full of great examples of food companies implementing an online marketing campaign incredibly well.
Take Frucor’s energy drink V, for example. To drive discussion around the company’s newest variant of the drink, blue V with a mystery flavour, all marketing communications – advertising, billboards, packaging – drove consumers to a Facebook page running a customised application (app). The app asked people to guess the flavour, with the most creative answer winning the grand prize.
This is an example of how well a marketready food product can be rolled out in social media, with a fully integrated marketing campaign that carries all the same wording and visuals.
For companies dealing mainly with unfinished products or raw ingredients, the social media mix is unlikely to be the same. While many companies see Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest as tempting and inexpensive mediums for raising profile, because they are unlikely to make new connections in the B2B realm they may simply lead to wasted resource.
For these companies, the professional network LinkedIn may prove more beneficial. We often hear LinkedIn dismissed, however this tends to be through poor use or understanding of what can be a particularly powerful and cost effective business networking channel.
How does marketing and branding fit in with product packaging? What tips and tricks are there to maximise your brand through effective packaging?
Product packaging is an incredibly important part of marketing, and vice versa. Taken in isolation, packaging forms a large part of a customer’s decision to purchase, particularly where it is an unconsidered purchase as is the case with FMCGs such as food items. Look closer, however, and you will notice the abundance of marketing communication links coming to and from the packaging.
Where new products are released with a distinctive design, this can often be carried through to all marketing collateral.
The design may be used to skin your website or social media assets, on direct mail communicating the launch, in advertising and on any outgoing communications to potential customers or stockists. The aim, of course, is for the product to be instantly familiar at point of sale, so the more ubiquitously the design work is used the better.
Working in reverse, marketing campaigns can also be promoted effectively on packaging. Communicating new websites, product related smartphone applications, social media, a charity effort or community relations campaign and a raft of other marketing activities.
In an industry where technology advancement, new breakthroughs and sometimes even subtle improvements to ingredients can secure new business, how would you recommend manufacturers go about communicating these ‘wins’?
As one of the four Ps of the marketing mix, promotion has a large part to play in marketing and, as such, there are a number of vehicles marketing specialists can employ to communicate these ‘wins’. One of the most effective of these is public relations.
While PR is an incredibly broad vocation, one of its principal aims is to shape public opinion by creating advocates in key influencers, be it a media figure, a brand ambassador or a trusted member of a particular group or community.
Employing a public relations professional to implement a media relations campaign around that new technology that has given you the competitive edge can result in a positive third party endorsement of your business in both mainstream and niche media.
These articles are invaluable collateral when pitching your product to potential business partners.
Nicole Crump is the director of Tactix Marketing Plans, specialists in fixed price marketing strategy planning.
For more information:
Visit: www.tactixnz.co.nz
