Are you on the way to build a small business, side hustle or aiming to become an influencer in a niche?
You're in the right place if you are a solo entrepreneur and you have already found your business idea. You already know which product or service you want to bring out to the world. And now you want to get started making money online.
When it comes to marketing, there are proven blueprints that will work for most of you. Modelling a successful business and marketing structure will most likely give you similar succcess. And I will provide you with those blueprints because they are the basics to set up any business.
I would like to give you a roadmap to build the marketing part of your business. Following this roadmap you will be able to build or grow your business and make money online.
Before you can start marketing your business you should answer the following four basic questions:
1. What is your product or service you want to offer?
What is it that you want to bring to the world? Do you like to share your experiences in a certain field, e.g. reviewing cosmetic products, or do you sell an actual product, like your hand-made pottery, or are you a tax consultant filling in tax reports and doing accounting for small businesses? Are you selling online courses? Or are you a physio therapist setting up your new office?
2. Finding your business niche and identify your target market:
There are four main aspects your future business would fit into:
Wealth, health, hobbies, relationship.
Which of these major category does your business fit in?
Are there any special interest groups your product or service would fit in?
Health: skincare, fitness, supplements, mindfulness etc.
Wealth: online marketing, investment making, leadership etc.
Relationships: husband-wife relationships, kids relationships etc.
Hobbies: arts and crafts, gardening, sailing, sports etc.
For example in health you could be a personal trainer and you would specialise in ketogenic diet and HIIT trainings. Then the HIIT and ketogenic diet are you niche markets in the health category. You might want to narrow it further down to your target audience which you would sell to.
3. How to find your target audience
To be able to grow your business it is important to understand who will buy your service or product. This will help you to convert your leads at a later stage of the business building process.
Imagine your favorite customer and describe him or her. Start with the basic demographics like age, gender, profession, status, country, city or countryside, interests, hobbies, values ect.
Let's take the example from above:
You would offer HIIT trainings and ketogenic diet tips for women above 30 until 50 who have a family. They live in a bigger city and are English speaking.
Your defined demographic will help you to find your niche market. And will help you find your tone of voice because after this definition you can imagine how you would talk to this person as if the person would stand right in front of you.
4. What are your target audience's desires?
It is important to understand the pain points of your potential customers. People are searching for things that support them to achive their goals, make their life easier or solves their problem.
With the clear image of your target group in mind. Imagine one single person and find out about how this person would life, their struggles and ambitions.
Sometimes I imagine to talk to a friend or relative of mine who would definitely buy this service or product.
Again, as example:
Maybe they want to loose weight and get fit. They have a demanding lifestyle, juggling the family and nailing it in the business world as well. They don't have much time so they want short and efficient trainings and are also looking for easy meal preparation which would also fit into their family lifestyle.
Write down the answers to these four questions into a word or excel file. Save it in a good place as this will be your handbook to build your brand. And you will get back to this and add more at a later stage.
Congratulations! You are now four steps closer to market your new business and make money online.
Pro tip:
If you are at the very beginning of the journey I recommend you to start evaluating your idea with a shorter and modern version of a business plan: Canvas business model. Many experts belive that this nowadays can fully replace an old school business plan.
And here comes the daily dose of self-marketing: I can help you setting up your marketing and advertising strategy and create an action plan on how to move your company forward and generate leads for your business. Contact me here.