I am sure this subject is going to resonate with a lot of our listeners – we’re going to be talking about Marketing on a Budget.

Brilliant, let’s get started. Well, basically, products and services don’t sell themselves. All too often though we hear of startup businesses, who allocate precious little to their marketing budget, who then face critical decisions when their business fails to take off.

I know, it is one of the biggest contributing factors to business failure. It’s so easy to think of marketing as a luxury when you’re working to a tight budget but it is so important.

Unfortunately, there is no one size fits all. Consider two shops in the same town. One with a strong High Street presence and good footfall, the other tucked away up a quieter street. The first will obviously have higher rent and rateable costs so hopefully will have to spend less on marketing than the other whose costs are lower but whose marketing need is greater.

It’s the same for a new business over an established one who may have a loyal customer base. Marketing spend for a new company that needs to establish themselves quickly, you would think is going to be greater than with the established company.

Yes, that company, in order not to stand still, will need to grow and retain their market. Overall, then, their individual spend may be the same however their focus will be different, with the first concentrating on market and product development and the second placing greater emphasis on market penetration and potentially diversification. All said,

So let’s give the listeners some tips to get started! We’re going to talk about the basics of making sure you are targeting the right people and then we’ll discuss practical things you can do later in the podcast.

Great, so firstly you need to consider ‘time’ and allocate a cost to it - are you best placed to be running this activity - what’s ‘your’ price point?

Then look at what stage is your business at – are you a start up, growing, changing, or selling up? Businesses should allocate a percentage of actual or projected gross revenue – usually between 3-5 percent for established business marketing and between 5-10 percent for start-up marketing.

But again allocation depends on several factors: your industry, the size of your business, and its stage of growth. For example, during the early brand-building years, retail businesses spend much more than other businesses on marketing – up to 20 percent of gross revenue.

So, a marketing budget is a component of the marketing action plan and should be split between brand development costs and promotion. Once you have developed your marketing plan and budget, it shouldn’t be fixed or inflexible.

True, there may be times when you need to throw in some unplanned activity, at the end of the day, knowing whether the spend is helping you achieve your marketing goals is more important than sticking to a budget.

I guess it’s important to mention here that you need to know WHY you’re spending money on marketing.

Good point! You’re going to talk about planning again, aren’t you?!

Don’t we always?! It’s true, if you haven’t got a plan for what you want to achieve, how will you know how best to allocate your precious resources?

Absolutely! Is your focus to increase sales, convert leads to sales, retain customers, enhance your reputation, or even innovate by breaking into new markets or developing new products?

Today’s customers and consumers are very tuned in to the marketing messages they receive in all forms and they are so sophisticated now, they are actually controlling the messages they receive.

This is so true, they are able to choose from any competitors from anywhere around the globe,