The 5 Marketing Laws Any Business Owner Should know

No matter what business you’re in, what industry you’re in, you have to know these immortal marketing principles.

Simply by being aware that they exist, you will make more money. You will convince more people to buy from you.

Ready? Let’s dive right in.

1. Marketers ruin everything. So milk the cow while you still can

I’m a marketer and I admit: we ruin everything.

Every marketing channel will become crowded one day. Some of them disappear and some of them will stick around but they won’t work as they once used to.

Take email marketing for example.

20 years ago you were happy to open up your email and see a new notification, right?

And what do we do now? We use all kinds of apps to stop emails from coming in, right?

Why?

Because marketers figured out that the more emails you send, the more you sell. Which is true.

Same happens with every channel out there.

What’s the trend now? Messenger marketing. Chatbots. It’s still an untapped channel in some industries.

For instance, in dental marketing, almost no one is using it. And it has soooo much potential to promote a dental practice and attract new patients.

And this is not just in the dental industry. It’s valid for the whole healthcare market and other industries in general.

Here’s another example.

Facebook attracted hundreds of thousand new users simply by sending out invitation emails to everyone in your email address book.

Try launching your app relying on this tactic now and you’ll fail miserably.

Google AdWords used to be one of the cheapest ways to get more customers.

It still works, but it’s much more expensive than 10 years ago for example.

Advice: when you find a marketing idea/channel/strategy that works great doouble in on that and milk it for as long as it lasts.

In the meantime, start testing out some other marketing ideas and start expanding your acquisition channels.

2. Marketing is not about creativity. It’s about answering to your client’s questions

I run a dental marketing agency and I get to speak with a lot of dentists. Almost everyone asks me: “What creative marketing ideas can we use to promote our dental practice and attract new patients?”

I always answer: “ Well, I’ve written a 5000+ words dental marketing guide and another 5000+ words article packed with online dental marketing ideas,but none of them contains any out of the ordinary marketing idea that no one ever heard.”

If you’re a dentist and you want to learn how you can promote your dental practice, you can read The Complete Guide to Dental Marketing here.

They’re surprised to hear this from a marketing person who is supposed to be creative, right?

The truth is, in over 4 years of working as a marketer, I never had any clever or creative idea.

And I sold everything from expensive apartments to online courses.

Instead, I always rely on common-sense, first principle thinking.

What is that?

Well, whenever we want to buy something, we ask ourselves (consciously or unconsciously!) some questions.

The business which provides the “best” answers, gets the deal.

Here are some common sense questions every business should try to answer to.

1) Why should I choose you (from the customer’s perspective)

“We have quality services/products” is not an answer.

Why?

Do you know any business that claims to have products or services of bad quality?

What can you do instead?

Provide reviews. Offer some case studies. Get some in-depth video testimonials from your clients.

2) Why me? (from the customer’s perspective)

This is an overlooked marketing aspect.

A lot of times the client believes that the product is great, but he doesn’t know if it’s right for him.

For instance, let’s say you sell a course on cooking.

Is it an advanced course or a beginner’s course? If I’m a beginner, will it help me or not?

3) Why now?
Fact: we’re all lazy. We like to postpone things. Especially when we have to pay for something.

So a simple, but overlooked marketing trick is to offer a REASON for people to buy now.

Here are some questions you should think about:

  • Is there a limited amount of places/tickets/items etc.?
  • Is there a certain deadline after which you cannot buy anymore? Why?
  • Prices go up after a certain time? (Why?)
  • Seats/tickets are selling extremely fast because of something?

You see, the idea is to put a bit of urgency on people. But always tell the truth. People sense fake deadlines.

4) What’s the risk? Can you minimize it?

We’ve all been through bad experience where we bought something online and we just wasted money on crappy products.

Bottom line: put yourself in your customer’s shoes. You’ll find tons of great marketing ideas without having to be a creative person.

3. Marketing channels change. People don’t

A lot of times business owners get overwhelmed about how fast things change and how they cannot keep pace with all these new marketing channels.

Fear not. Marketing is about people. The channels are just a way to reach them and communicate your message.

Here’s an example from the dental marketing industry.

Dentists used to promote their dental practice offline through newspapers, flyers, mail (yep, the offline one) etc.

Now dentists promote their dental practice online mainly through their website and social media.

But how do people actually decide whether to check if they should schedule for an appointment or not?

In the past: they’ve asked their friends if they know about this new dental practice.

Nowadays: they check online reviews.

Marketing channels have changed. People rely more on the online world.

But here’s what hasn’t changed: people still need external validation. People still need to check with other peers whether it’s ok to try a new service/product/company or not.

The marketing principle never changed: leverage social proof in your marketing campaigns.

4. Don’t chase new customers. The old ones make you 10x more money

The first question a business owner asks when hiring a marketing agency is: “How can you help me make get more customers?”

It’s the same question in any industry.

Why is this a problem?

Because existing customers:

  • Buy more (in quantity)
  • Buy more often
  • Negotiate less
  • Refer other people

And it’s 10 times less expensive to keep an existing client than to acquire a new customer (depending on the industry, of course).

Getting new clients is expensive. Because people don’t know you and don’t trust you. Once they do, you pay almost nothing to make them buy again from you.

What can you do to sell more to your existing customers?

Here are just a few ideas you can try:

  • Send an email with (maybe) a special discount only for them
  • Run retargeting campaigns only to people who bought from you in the last X days
  • Implement cross-selling and up-selling
  • Offer discounts when ordering a second/third time
  • Create loyalty programs

5. Calculate the return on investment based on customer’s lifetime value

Here’s a situation I face all the time.

Dentists are sometimes complaining that they invested, let’s say, $1000 in a dental marketing campaign and they got only 10 new patients.

This means they basically paid $100 to attract a new patient, right?

And if they made, let’s say, only $200 – $300 on the first visit, the math doesn’t look quite good, right? Because they also have high costs with material, staff, etc.

But, what if you change a bit the way you look at the results of a marketing campaign?

For instance, let’s say you spend $100 to acquire a new customer. And on the first sale you make only $300.

But then the customer (or patient in our example) stays a loyal customer and buys, on average, 10 times from you.

10 times x $300 average sale = $3000.

And in the case of a dental patient, for instance, the average amount a person pays on a single visit is over $500.

So now you realize you can spend even more money in acquiring a new customer because in the long run, that customer will bring you in at least 10 times more money.

And if you take into consideration that an existing customer buys more, more frequent, the math looks even better.

So make sure you calculate what is the lifetime value of your clients. How much is (on average) each customer paying you for the whole period in which they do business with you?

In this way, you can find out how much you can actually afford to spend on marketing. And if you can find out this, you can also find out how to tap into other marketing channels that your competitors might not have access to.

Conclusion

If you want to have success in your online marketing campaigns, remember one thing: don’t try to be creative.

Simply ask yourself some common-sense questions such as:

  • Why should I choose you (from the customer’s perspective)
  • Why me? (from the customer’s perspective)
  • Why now?
    • Is there a limited amount of places/tickets/items etc.?
    • Is there a certain deadline after which you cannot buy anymore? Why?
    • Prices go up after a certain time? (Why?)
    • Seats/tickets are selling extremely fast because of something?
  • What’s the risk? Can you minimize it?
  • How can I make people come back to buy more from me? How can I sell more to existing customers?
  • What are the marketing channels that are working right now?
  • How much do customers stick with my business and how much are they paying me in this time?

These simple questions will help you generate tons of effective marketing ideas.

Leave a Comment