Today there is no shortage of products and services, only clients.

Today it’s important to be competitive in more than one aspect of marketing. Traditional marketing and internet marketing are extremely important in this mix but, more importantly, social media as well.
The advent of the internet has expanded the marketing concept, and allowed marketing executives and companies with a marketing driven approach to provide their own communication platform directly to the world, without having to be filtered by trade magazines, trade stands, access to newspapers and public relations, etc.

What has changed in marketing during the internet era?

1. Benefit cost analysis. The greatest change has been the advent of internet activity that allows companies to go directly to their customers and to their market segments online.

Previously, Yellow Pages and other traditional methods of marketing and advertising made it difficult for companies to go directly to their market, and the costs associated with this were extremely high. The traditional sales force was an essential part of any company wishing to market and sell to customers locally, nationally and globally. We see that costly salesforces today are declining and instead, companies are paying more and more attention to online and internet activity, as well as supporting this with direct brochures, newsletters, etc.

The cost benefit of the internet has been addressed in our previous newsletter, but we have many clients that have been spending up to $40 000 with Yellow Pages who can now reach the market, get greater results and much more effectiveness with a budget of $4-8,000 ($700+ a month).

In addition, they can “push” the marketing factors on a variable basis to suit geographical markets and time periods/ scenarios more effectively through the use of Google ‘click’ online advertising and through the constant attention to social media and optimisation of their website, combined with good website design including landing pages.

2. The interface between the internet and marketing has strengthened. In the beginning, around 2003, after Competitive Edge had been in business providing internet services for nearly four years, the marketing activity was still very much divorced from having a website on the internet. The two powerful forces are now joined, and e-Marketing and internet provide a dynamic fusion that gives a strong, powerful “push” and “pull” platform for contact and influencing customers and potential customers, both internationally and locally.

The interface between marketing and the internet has integrated, especially where many of our clients are using the internet as a basis for presenting their credentials, their corporate image, their value proposition and even their products online.

The salesforce as a success “tool”, is becoming more dependent on using the internet as a presentation and influencing device. Hardly a minute goes by without a customer somewhere demanding to know your internet address and being able to look at who you are, what you offer, how you offer it and how good the proposition is online, even if they are in front of your salesforce.

Many of our customers are facing an increasing challenge because the space and connection between marketing and the internet is so close. The major challenge comes in the form of customer complaints and customer relations management. If services are not provided on time, or products provided are faulty or not up to quality, then social media, where people spread the word by mouse, has become an absolute nightmare for companies that cannot perform. Keeping the internet close to, and in sync with your marketing is of the upmost importance today.

Customer relations and the internet factor are also extremely important and part of the new development of marketing in the internet era. Customers demand to be able to locate you ‘on time’ through the internet. They do not want to hang on to phones or listen to voice activated systems. What they want to do is to email you or contact you online or, better still, go to a website where you have provisioned for them to leave a message. This ‘just-in-time’ or “fast-food” contact between customers, suppliers and organisations is becoming critical to those who want to succeed and grow.

The internet is more than another ‘hype’ factor. The internet provides real benefits and drives customers to the bottom-line and, as we can see with an online shop, can actually carry out the full sales, marketing and closing the sale function for you while you are doing other things within your business.

As such, the internet is probably the most powerful strategy and marketing weapon that you have within your organisation and yet, while most of our clients have approached the internet with this viewpoint, many people in business are still leaving the internet out in the “web-land” space.

The internet is a critical tool for creating, transacting (fully or partially), and retaining sales.
The internet has also come into its own as an important companion to marketing, in the way that it provides the communication and selling platform that we mentioned above. Never before have companies had the chance to provide their own individually focused and targeted communication online to the world.

It is a virtual publication platform that you can use to tell the world via blogs, or website changes what you’re about, what you offer, how you offer it, who you offer it to, what the price is, what the terms and conditions are, where you wish to operate and what particular value proposition you can give to those customers through performance.

As such, it should cannibalise a lot of money that was previously spent on publications, advertising and promotions which could never be measured efficiently. It puts advertising and promotion into a domain where you can, through Google analytics, find out exactly how successful you are with the promotion money you spend. You can work out a return on investment and you can develop budgets around that return on investment (ROI) and compare it to the use of a salesforce, the use of third parties, the use of agents, the use of other merchants, etc.

The measurement and performance factor, as mentioned above, is critical to being able to work out how effective your advertising and marketing spend is. The internet has provided this tool for the first time in modern marketing history.
The internet is very cost effective. When you look at the cost of a sales person at the sophisticated sales level, which could be around $200 a call, right through to the Berri Fruit Juice cash van salesmen at $150 a call. The internet can buy you a lot of power at $5-6 per click value. This value of $5-6 per click is very high and, in many cases with key words you could be paying as low as $1-2 per click.

Therefore it provides extremely good value although, over time, this value is going to become less available. For those companies that are in a growth phase, now is the time to start investing in your corporate image and buying online while Google is still going through the throws of growth and the price of click campaigns is extremely good value, and good competitive traffic is still relatively “thin” in many categories.

The internet does change the marketing process. It changes the focus of marketing, and makes marketing more of a “think global” activity. The internet also changes the way in which we speak and communicate as it is a shorthand and fast version of how we use and contact the market: this has changed how people communicate. It often makes it very difficult for the businesses we approach, as many of them are used to writing long articles and communicating with lots of “speak”.

In the internet world, you should be able to deliver your message succinctly and with a focus on content. If you can’t do this, then you will lose in this new era.

How does the internet affect the sales role? Well, we’ve already addressed this in points above, but now it is important to consider how you can place more of your selling online and less of it in a person in a car travelling around meeting customers face to face. While this face to face selling has been effective, and may still be effective for you, and your product or service may demand that particular approach, you have to consider that most clients today do not have the time to meet face to face for 1-1.5 hours. They want to do it as quickly as possible online, and they want to communicate with you and get the message quickly. Therefore, rethink how you sell and how you use the internet to make certain that when your people visit, you get the most return for your sales dollar..

How does the internet affect the market research role? Well, traditionally market research was done face to face, and it was done with clipboards, through focus groups and through questioning clients, and through annual reviews, etc. Those days are gone.

At Competitive Edge, a market research company of nearly 30 years’ standing, we hardly do any research face to face, and most of our research is done via internet or via sending out evaluation forms or quick-format questionnaires that the clients can easily score on scale questions, etc.

However, the internet does provide access to clients and to information that was never available before. Trying to contact 30 clients nationally was a nightmare in previous times, but today you can do that online, via the internet, and get a reply in 2-3 days. More of our clients should be focussed on using the internet for research purposes, and for constantly checking their supply, performance, delivery, corporate position and image online.

How does the internet effect business to business marketing? Well, business to business marketing has never had such a good communication channel as the internet. It is so easy to talk to a client on a weekly or monthly basis and just to keep up-to-date with short sentences or paragraphs, information on product launches, etc. without bothering the client too much or jumping in a car to go and see them.

All of this adds to the effectiveness of client relationship and client contact, which is of paramount importance in business to business marketing. The consultation and relationship sales approach is much easier with the internet than in previous times.

Has the internet killed Direct Mail? Well, Direct Mail was an era in which there was a revolution, because clients could suddenly reach mass markets with specific, persuasive offers that could yield immediate results. It was a cheaper form of communication than advertising in magazines, trade journals, attending large conferences and trade-shows, etc. In its day, it was very cost effective.

However, Direct Mail has a cost which includes postage, graphics, printing, etc. whereas the internet does not. You can easily develop your own direct mail using Photoshop software and, in most cases, you can deliver the mail through your newsletter or even online as part of your internet site. This makes the internet very cost effective and, in this way, it has killed a lot of traditional direct mail. The role of Direct Mail, in many cases, has slipped to second place to the internet.

Today, Direct Mail is used to support the internet, or even to “push” clients to the internet, so in that aspect it is a persuasive tool for getting clients to go to the internet and look at the website, online shop, blogs or articles you have written as a basis for protecting, gaining or maintaining business.
How effective is your benefit selling? Traditionally, Australian companies have engaged in feature selling. They put down as many features as they can about their product or service, and hope that one or two of these will ‘hit the mark’ and get through to the client.

In the internet era, the marketers have to be focussed on benefit selling.

They should do their research and find out, either through face to face approaches or via research techniques, the major benefits clients are looking for in particular sectors and via particular industry groups. Once this is established and the major benefits have been ascertained from the long list of potential benefits that anyone can gain from your product or service, then you are in a stronger position to present these.
Presenting a long list of features on your webpage or through other internet or online facilities such as email campaigns, newsletters, etc. is a waste of time. Clients, as we have said above, want “fast-food” direct results for their online efforts. They want it now and they want it quickly, so you should be able to “nail down” the key/ dominant benefits and deliver them to your clients in a quick and efficient method if you wish to gain from internet activity.

Customer responsive was always an important part of marketing. Customers who get a quick response were always impressed and they always felt that they had received good service. Nothing has changed. The internet era, however, has assisted marketing by making a quick response very easy.

Even if you can’t deal with a client at that time, you can email them back and tell them you have received their message and let them know you will get back them today, or even in two hours time (note emails should be good for only 24 hours). In the letter writing or Direct Mail era, this was extremely difficult. Even in recent times, when telephony improved and the telephone, through voice-activated systems, etc. became a major tool for customer responsiveness and communication, there were blockages with menus, problems with getting through to particular departments, etc. The internet is a great tool in this situation.

The internet, via the email, cuts through all the traffic and goes directly to the desk of the person whom you wish to contact, and develops and nurtures a relationship with the contact/ client. Being responsive has never been easier and you only need two lines on an email to let them know you’re in touch: you have received their message, you’re acting on the proposal, you’re following up on the product, etc. etc. In this way, marketing in the e-Commerce era has really gained from the internet.

Marketing via the internet offers real-time connection with clients and decision makers, as well as giving you value chain connections.

Internet maintains real-time database activities as well. This enables you to quickly locate, via your database, people’s number, email address, or their other details. It also enables you to make an increased number of sales calls and contacts on a regular basis, as you are not writing long letters or trying to deliver mail, you are merely responding on a just-in-time basis, and you can actually run quite numerous call plans for clients.

The use of the internet, however, brings with it some essential key skills that must be practised and revised on a continual basis. These skills include the core marketing essentials and processes that make marketing and conversion from marketing to sales success a reality. These are:

1. Succinct strategic communication.

2. Call to action. Always ask for the order.

3. Product and service portfolio. A range of options for products and service purchase.

4. Customer feedback and contact processes and channels.

5. Customer contact and call programs to ensure that responsiveness it maintained.

6. Continuous improvement and focused activity around products and services. Both on the web and in real time, products and services age more quickly in the internet age.
7. Feedback on customer contact and purchasing decisions and quick changes and adaption to the fast-moving market that we live in.

8. Critical product and service requirements, which includes follow-up on service satisfaction and new product launches.

9. Competitive behaviour online and through service product delivery. You must be able to know what your competitors are doing, and adjust your competitive traditional and online strategies to make sure you retain your competitive edge. If you don’t do this, then your clients may know before you do, via online activity, and go elsewhere.