Estimated reading time: 3 minutes

It's Only Common Sense: Marketing to the Right Customers

Editor's Note: To listen to Dan's weekly column, as you've always done in the past, click here. For the written transcript, keep reading...Of course branding is important--your brand is everything your company stands for. It represents the way you do business, how you stand out in the marketplace, what your service offering is all about, and what you're selling. But it’s not the only thing. You must incorporate marketing if you're going to be successful.

By marketing I mean getting the right customers interested in your products and services. To simplify, branding is something you put out there for everyone to see and learn about your company, even the companies who will never use your products. They might love our brand, our image, and what we stand for as a company, but they just don't need the product. In short, branding makes you known to everyone--even those who don’t need your product or service.

Marketing, on the other hand, is the discipline of addressing those specific companies who need our products. Marketing, as my friend Keith Robbins likes to say, is “getting the fish to jump into the boat.” But we have to make sure they're the right fish.

If your specialty is building great RF boards you've got to go after the RF market. You must direct your marketing at those customers who want RF products. If your company’s expertise is in building thermal management boards you have to appeal to that market, those companies that care very much about the co-efficient of thermal management materials. Get the picture? It’s all about addressing your marketing to those who want and need the products you sell.

The first step to developing a marketing plan to is have a clear understanding of who your customers are. The best way to do that is to analyze your current customer base and discover who your best customers are. That’s not too difficult: Look at your best customers and figure out why they are your best customers. Why do they love your products? Then, figure out what they do, what their products are, how they use your products, and those products are best suited for them. You can also analyze what they like about the way you do business. If you’re not sure, ask them. 

What you are actually doing is creating an ideal customer profile and, from that profile, you can develop an ideal customer filter to use as a template for finding future customers. Once you have done this you can set about creating your marketing.

The basis of marketing is to create something that will appeal to those filtered, ideal potential customers and demonstrate to them how you are an expert in producing the products they need.

For example, if your ideal customers are in the medical market, focus on what is important to companies in that market. If you've done your homework, you'll know that with medical electronics it’s all about reliability and consistency. Medical products cannot fail...ever. You must demonstrate to these customers, using metrics, how you produce the most reliable circuit board on the market today. Write white papers and give seminars--this will position your company as the expert circuit board producer for medical electronics. Customers will come to rely on your company as the industry experts when it comes to building boards for their products.

Being an industry expert comes with a great deal of responsibility. You will be expected to have a clear understanding of your customers, where their industry is going, where their technology is going, and make sure your PCB technology is there to not only meet, but actually exceed, their needs. This will take much hard work, but the rewards will be worth it, especially when you can dominate the market.

The same applies to all markets. It’s not complicated. There are just three things to remember: 1) figure out what your good at and get better at it; 2) figure out who your ideal customers are; and 3) develop and communicate a marketing effort that presents you as the expert in the industry.

Once again, branding is important, but marketing will get the right fish to jump into your boat. It’s only common sense.