Advertising to new customers who have never heard of your brand – never mind bought from it – can be difficult.
It is certainly a lot of hard work taking large amounts of customers through the buying cycle from awareness to interest through to the sale. For this reason, a lot of firms feel it is highly necessary to ensure that these customers become advocates of the brand, buy again from them and recommend them to friends.
There are a number of marketing platforms designed exactly for this purpose. This article explores the two most popular methods of marketing to those who are already fans of a brand – email marketing and social media.
A number of brands will email customers with news about their company or details of their latest offers using free email marketing software. They encourage customers to opt in to an email marketing campaign, perhaps when they sign up to a company loyalty card or use their company website to buy a product. Many offer incentives to sign up, such as 10 per cent off their next order.
In return, the company receives the permission to email consumers, which can help encourage customer loyalty and repeat purchases.
Social media marketing is a relatively new concept but, considering the huge popularity of websites like Facebook and Twitter, is arguably one of the most cost-effective ways to improve brand awareness.
Using similar methods as those to encourage email marketing opt-ins, brands will encourage social media users to ‘Like’ ‘Follow’ or ‘+1’ their account etc. with incentives and offers. Followers of a brand’s page will have updates added to their social feeds which also serve to keep the brand in their mind.
The great thing about social media is that following a brand is a public
endorsement which is automatically shared with a user’s entire contact list.
Strengthening the relationship between a brand and its existing customers is a great strategy to improve sales. Email and social media remain two of the best methods of achieving this.
