What is a good marketing strategy when starting a webshop?

[freebird31wizard]

We just want a general idea on how to proceed with our marketing. We will shortly open a new webshop, with a unique product for children big and small :-) ...

How to best market our shop?

[www.c8imc.co.uk]

I would begin with the basics:

1. Branding - logo and business card very important the logo will determine if people want to be associated with your salon or brand
2. get yourself an on-line on all the directories specific to your location things like freeindex, yell, thompson
3. create yourself a facebook/linked in account specific to your business - show off your work there, get customer quotes on there recommendations etc try and get as many quotes from your customers you need to keep this consistent and monitor what people are saying etc make friends with your clients on these sites
4. website does not have to be huge site but make it slick, easy on the eye get a good logo done make sure the site is reflective of how you feel the quality of your products are ...services, opening times, seasonal special offers, customers book online??...selling products, advice,
5. Direct marketing...you can either buy data from a data agency or sift for it online we are not talking about 000's of pounds here but more like 16p per record try and get contact address email phone (mobile preferably). Also for your existing customers to ensure you keep them get them to fill out a satisfaction card after each purchase. Also the type of data you can get especially if you are targeting children go directly to their schools and advertise via them
6. Association - maybe with a complimentary business where if they send anybody over to you they get a % off and vice versa but remember this association need to be specific to your business and should complement what you do
7. Advertising on local websites, magazines newspapers etc....i'm not a big fan of this especially for small businesses as i find it very costly with not the same return. Radio advertising is good but again find the radio station specific to your audience

The purpose of doing any marketing is to deliver an integrated campaign targeting customers from a number of angles to give you awareness and leads so this will enforce you message and your brand which will then give you consistent leads.... remember nothing happens over night and you need to be consistent with your marketing to ensure a successful marketing campaign. The intensity and frequency of your marketing will be determined by how busy you are if you are full then you don't need to do a lot look at just awareness building and customer retention on your existing customers to protect them from your competitors and if you are at that stage then word of mouth which should be your most powerful tool is kicking in. They key thing to remember is that your core competence needs to be consistently good to ensure your marketing works...and marketing has a habit of biting back where people are not delivering on what they promise on their marketing.

reputation is imperative if you stay on top of your game and stay in tune with the latest developments in the industry and are consistently improving your skill levels then your customers will not want to go anywhere else.

if you look at the above process and start your planning using the framework i have detailed you can still be moving with the key points i have specifically highlighted for your business they will form the crux of your marketing other elements may come from your research and planning not all the points need to be implemented look at the timing and look at the budget. Also ask your customers how do they prefer to be communicated with that should narrow down your marketing effort.