Sharon: Hello everyone, this is Sharon here, and I’m here with Steven Kohnke from Denver Business Coach. Good morning, Steven.
Steven: Morning, Sharon. How are you doing?
Steven: I’m good. I’m good. As always, looking forward to our topic of the day. So what are we going to be talking about today?
Steven: Yeah, as a business owner, it is sometimes helpful to really think of your businesses, not just the service or product or things that are just happening, but really as several different technical areas they need to be focused on and maintained regularly.
So in these conversations, what we’ve done is really broken down those big components for a successful business into foundations, leadership, sales, marketing, operations, financials and H.R. And we’ve put together a series of tips and insights that business owners can use and apply to build that better business. And today, that pillar that we’re really focusing in on is marketing and then more specifically, having effective marketing channels, really knowing what those are.
Sharon: All right, well, let’s start then with a description of what effective marketing channels, what do you mean by that?
Steven: So we’ve talked in the past before about really understanding your target audience, and that has a little bit to do with this. So to have effective marketing channels, you really need to understand exactly how to get in front of your right audience. And this can be sometimes a trial and error.
But to better understand psychographics of your target audience, which we’ve spoken about in the past a little bit, it’s it makes it less of an experiment to really understand where your people are going to be and then hit them there. Effective marketing channels means you have a great ROI on a specific marketing effort, whether it’s, for example, a magazine ad, social media posts, radio or podcasts, a newspaper directory.
Those are all just a couple of examples of channels that have been used in the past, but making sure you have the right ROI and a good ROI for those channels.
Sharon: Ok, well, super helpful description. So let’s talk a little bit more about the why. Why is it so important that a business owner really prioritize understanding their effective marketing channels?
Steven: Yeah, by understanding which are the best ways to actually get in front of the right people, your right audience to buy what you offer, it means less waste. Ultimately, the faster you get to understanding the most effective channels, the better cash flow you’ll have because you won’t be wasting money on efforts that don’t work. And then by doubling down on the channels that do work, you have better potential of actually scaling your business through the right channels, using the right channels.
Sharon: That makes perfect sense. So let’s get to the how. How does a business owner go about determining those most effective marketing channels?
Steven: Perfect question. You know, first things first …
Sharon: Such an easy answer. Right?
Steven: Right. There’s a lot of things that go into it. But as we mentioned before, the first things first is to really understand your audience. That’s demographics and psychographics. Who are they? Where are they going to be? What are they? Where do they spend their free time?
From there you have a better understanding of exactly where to put an app or where to be speaking about what you do. So, for instance, say you’re a chiropractor that really focuses in on runners by critically thinking about runners and where they spend their most time.
Good place to put maybe a pamphlet would be a running shoe store instead of a McDonalds. You know, the two different kind of running chiropractor advertising at McDonalds. Probably not going to find too many runners there. You then develop that material and come up with the actual strategy to execute. But you’re paying attention to the return on investment, so you need to track it.
And that’s probably really the most important piece here, is to… The most important piece of it is to track and measure. So then you can really tailor down what channels are working, what channels are not. I mentioned before under the “why” is, you can you can double down on the ones that are and get rid of the ones that aren’t and have a better chance at scaling.
Sharon: Great information, and I’m sure this is just the tiniest tip of the iceberg that we’re discussing, so how can somebody find out more if they know that this is an area they need to work on for their business?
Steven: Yeah, that’s great. Easiest way to get a hold of us is our website denverbusinesscoach.com. Reach out to us through there. There’s a couple of different ways to do it. Any one of us would be happy to have a conversation around how to get in front of the right audience and develop that channel strategy.
Sharon: All right. Well, thank you, Steven, as always, very informative. And look forward to our next conversation.
Steven: Yeah, thanks, Sharon. Look forward to it. Bye.
Sharon: Bye Bye.