The Internet has proven itself a place to market products and services. This article outlines the importance of all stakeholders and the planning needed across the product, sales and marketing cycles where Internet-specific strategies can be applied.
Who Are The Stakeholders?
A stakeholder refers to any group of individuals being targeted by the Internet marketing effort. This could include prospective customers, existing customers, shareholders, employees, potential employees, consultants and the press.
Many companies launch their Internet marketing campaign by mostly targeting prospective customers. In reality, targeting several different stakeholders can have a more profound impact on overall success, for example:
- Prospective customers generate new account sales
- Existing customers upgrade business
- News sites, blogs, etc. generate publicity
- Consultants generate positive "word of mouth" exposure
- All customers better understand product requirements
- Employees have better sales tools
Internet Marketing Plan
Many people believe that the definitive goal of marketing is to maximise sales. As a result, they focus all their marketing efforts on increasing sales. However, the ultimate goal of marketing is to maximize profits. A comprehensive Internet marketing plan should focus on three objectives:
- Increasing sales
- Decreasing cost of doing business
- Improving communications with stakeholders
So marketing is more than sales. The Internet is a powerful tool to conduct market research and assist in various aspects of the marketing cycle:
- Marketing plan - customer requirements, competitive analysis
- Product development and launch
- Product modification
Focused Marketing Objectives
The product life cycle begins by finding out what customers want and what competitors are doing. The Internet can be used to solicit feedback on products and services, and run concept testing surveys, promote new products, and obtain customer feedback to impact product modifications or service improvements.
For the marketing cycle, the Internet can be used to enable direct nonfiltered messages to and from the public, businesses, consultants, and the press. Much like traditional advertising, it can achieve marketing objectives such as improving corporate and product brand image awareness.
When it comes to sales, the Internet can accomplish a great deal before transacting a final sale. Thousands of prospects can be efficiently moved through the early phases of the sales cycle - from awareness, to interest, to desire. Literature requests can easily be fulfilled and at low cost, including reprints of positive press quotes and articles.
In sales support, efficiency is obvious when answering customer queries and where some customer service levels can be fully automated.
The reader may be interested in a related Internet marketing article, Internet Bullseye Marketing Explained.
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