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Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

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Re: Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

#51

I'm a senior digital marketer who has worked both agency and client-side with anything from shoestring budgets to millions of dollars/month for close to a decade. I'd like to share some guidance on digital media and analytics that I have observed many people/companies making mistakes with. Not saying any of this to brag--just giving context so you can more effectively judge the quality of my advice. 1. Please dear go…

Very robust answer. Thanks for taking the time to respond!

Re: Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

#52

I write about this kind of thing quite a bit. http://www.strategicmessaging.com/marketing-communication-es... is on marcom essentials vs. nice-to-haves. http://www.strategicmessaging.com/marketing-in-stealth-mode/... is specifically on stealth-mode marketing (not quite an oxymoron). And http://www.strategicmessaging.com/strategy-for-it-vendors-a-... is the strategy (not just marketing) worksheet that a whole lot of t…

Quality stuff, have an upvote!

Agreed!

Re: Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

#53

I'm a senior digital marketer who has worked both agency and client-side with anything from shoestring budgets to millions of dollars/month for close to a decade. I'd like to share some guidance on digital media and analytics that I have observed many people/companies making mistakes with. Not saying any of this to brag--just giving context so you can more effectively judge the quality of my advice. 1. Please dear go…

Very robust answer. Thanks for taking the time to respond!

Thanks--I guess I had a lot of this pent up and this was the perfect thread to post it in.

Re: Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

#54
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if a competitor has already validated the market for me? For example, they exist and have existed for a few years, but still don't service my need. Is it valid to assume I can attack their market share?

I know that as engineers we'd like to avoid talking to strangers as much as possible, but there's simply nothing better than speaking with your potential customers. Having a competitor is a good sign, but how do you know they're profitable? How do you know they're solving the problem well enough that they're even worth imitating? How do you know they're not frustrating the hell out of their users? If you speak to pot…

This is critical. As a marketer, I've seen - far too often, mind you - a severe disconnect between the perception of one's customers, and the reality.

Not saying that you need to have full personas, in which you include ALL motivations, demographics, customer journeys - the works - but it helps to have something on paper that you can refer to.

The beauty of it is you can always change them!

Re: Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

#55

1. Figure out your market before you build anything. Talk to them, get to know them, figure out what they need. 2. Ask them for an intent to purchase or to reserve a spot in line or whatever. 3. Build landing pages and advertise them so that you can validate your ability to acquire customers before building anything. 4. Create a human machine that looks/feels like the real machine you are going to build later. 5. Sel…

Serious question regarding #1: What if I am the market because I am addressing a need I have that others have not addressed? Is the question then whether others have the same general needs? Do I get to walk around thinking I have instant validation, or am I rolling the dice on the likelihood that others have the same problem?

I was about to ask the exact same question. I'm trying to solve a problem that I (and some colleagues) face daily, which I assume others must face too. Actually, I sorta know others have had the same problem because when I first looked for a solution, I came across a few posts and discussions offering terrible solutions that I didn't like. After being annoyed enough, I figured I'd try and see if I could develop a solution.

Re: Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

#58
Hi, I am new here and I have a product, its a VPN(Virtual Private Network) trying to make a venture through it. Why VPN? because people like i my country and many other are facing bans and censored contents on internet. Can you people please help me and some suggestions on marketing this product as i am computer scientist so have weak side in marketing. I will be really thankful :) P.S: If you want to check the product , here is the link: getolive.org

Re: Marketing your startup: What's on your checklist?

#59
post #15

1) Set up a Twitter page. 2) Set up a facebook page. 2) Have your branding the same on all social media. 3) Connect to relevant followers or potential customers. 4) Connect your blog posts automatically to twitter.

How do you mean by connect your blog posts automatically to twitter, you mean have twitter link to new blog posts? What tool do you use?

In wordpress you can connect your twitter feed, so when you write a blog post it automatically posts on twitter. I can't remember if it was a plugin I added.

It also makes the short url for you. So you can track on statcounter.com how many people clicked that short url.

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