Marketing Your Startup

by Simona Covel

  By the time the next event came around, WordStream staff was ready. The staff created several simple forms that attendees could quickly fill out. One was a basic request for a product demo for those who forgot their sign-in info. Another allowed attendees to email a link to the free tool to the right colleague. Then there was a sign-up for the WordStream newsletter and a fishbowl for collecting business cards. It was a useful illustration of how bare-bones solutions can be best when all you really need in a trade show situation is an efficient capture of contact information. At the end of the four-day conference, the team had collected 160 cards. And, with multiple sales reps on hand, there were plenty of useful conversations between the WordStream team and the folks putting cards in the bowl. In fact, the sales reps took notes on the back of the cards. They wrote down their own name and the potential customer’s biggest pain point. That way, the business card—in addition to providing basic contact info—contained knowledge that would help the sales team pursue the lead in earnest.

  WordStream’s total spend on the third conference—practically down the street from its headquarters—was $16,000. By staying local, the team not only saved money, it was able to staff the conference with multiple sales reps, facilitating lead qualifications and information captures.

  In addition to the 160 business cards WordStream captured in the fish bowl, it generated 60 qualified leads at that conference—a sixfold increase from the previous event.

  Guerilla Marketing at Trade Shows

  No matter how valuable they can be, trade shows are simply too expensive for many young companies. But in many industries, they are hubs of potential customer activity. So why not crash one? With a little careful planning, it may be possible.

  If you can, before the show, visit the main venues and surrounding hotels. Figure out where people will walk, pick up buses, catch cabs, have lunch, and meet for drinks. You’re trying to find the best locations for maximum visibility. Along the way, suggests Don Rainey, general partner at venture capital firm Grotech Ventures, meet the bell captain in the hotels that are nearby but aren’t part of the official show, say hello to the head of housekeeping and talk with the bar staff at local watering holes. These folks are integral players in the guerilla marketing game and can often make or break your campaign.

  Ask your new friends crucial questions: Would the housekeeping, bar, or bell staff don a free t-shirt, hat, or button with your logo? Do any of the hotels have in-room programming and can you be included? A fundraising mantra comes into play here: If you don’t ask, the answer is always no. No matter what, always stay clear of the things that are the purview of the trade show itself. You don’t want to get yourself blacklisted from future shows. You just want to take advantage of the larger ecosystem around a show to get some visibility for your company. There is a lot of room for everyone around a big event.

  It’s not always going to work. And it’s not for the faint of heart. But in some cases, the hotel staff will naturally assume someone else authorized you to replace the hotel’s normal coasters in the bar with your logoed ones—maybe with the help of a tip for the bartender, Rainey notes. You could try putting t-shirts on the bell staff, or find the popular bars in town and tape posters in the bathroom stalls. You can also send a team wearing your logo and take lots of pictures to post on social media to position your brand as part of the festival experience. Pass something out that’s relevant to the event, or better still, fill a need that attendees have (soap, shampoo, relief from the noise). Be professional: Always bring a high-quality product or pitch, and enough inventory.

  You want to execute your ploys in close proximity to one another and throughout the run of the show. As part of the action phase, expect some backlash. Trade show organizers may not take kindly to your antics. If someone gets mad, apologize and move on.

  Whatever you do, don’t expect to just show up at the trade show or event and set up shop. Most festivals and shows are strict about when, where, and how you can sell, so know the rules before you go.

  GRASSROOTS MARKETING

  When you think of grassroots marketing, you probably think, “cheap.” It’s true: Grassroots campaigns generally rely on word of mouth and organic, non-paid placement. But just because it can be done inexpensively doesn’t mean it’s for everyone.

  For grassroots efforts to pay off, you generally need a super-targeted audience, says digital media strategist Samuel Edwards. If you’re trying to engage Mexican Americans between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four who live in Tennessee and watch professional basketball, it’s difficult to justify paid advertising that will target a much larger swath of the population. Grassroots efforts give you more control over your reach.

  Grassroots tends to work when your audience craves interaction and personal attention. Think about a craft vodka maker canvassing local bars. That target market wants to think of themselves as discovering something new rather than choosing a beverage based on national ad campaigns. There’s an inherent “coolness” to grassroots marketing that is particularly effective for certain kinds of products and markets.

  Finding Customers

  If your audience fits into those buckets, there are a few ways to get started. People are naturally curious. When they see a large crowd gathered on the street with signs and giveaways, they (almost) always stop. Sending out brand representatives to interact with passersby creates a more lasting effect than simply sending out targeted Facebook ads. That’s particularly true in an era when people are glued to smartphone screens all day long. If you can convince them to look away from their mobile devices and interact with a booth or a pop-up event, the interactions tend to be memorable and effective.

  Additionally, employing street teams creates a more personal connection to your brand. Most interactions now take place behind a screen; they’re anonymous and impersonal. When customers have the chance to interact with actual people, they feel like they’re heard and their opinions matter.

  If your business has an enthusiastic niche customer base or audience, you can follow in the footsteps of marquee companies like Lululemon and Red Bull and use local influencers to market for you. Red Bull’s “Wings Team,” for example, is comprised of college students who market the brand’s lifestyle of energy and excitement. If you have enthusiastic fans, deploy them to the streets to pass out product, or send them to wherever your audience hangs out. They’ll do more to establish credibility among their peers than you ever could.

  Instead of simply being seen as middlemen between a company and its consumers, brand ambassadors give a company life beyond its corporate offices. You have to cultivate the relationships and set parameters, since these people are a reflection of your brand. It is imperative for you to spend the right amount of time recruiting, training, and building relationships with your ambassadors to guarantee their authenticity and resonance with your audience.

  How Much Does It Cost?

  A large part of the point of grassroots marketing is that it’s cheap. The cost of some printed material, or some samples, and your time—that’s all it takes.

  Can I DIY?

  Grassroots is made for DIY. It’s all about your authentic voice, and connecting with customers and potential customers. While a marketing consultant can help you shape the idea, you want to be the face, and the boots on the street for the implementation.

  CASE STUDY

  Sam Adams Goes Grassroots for Decades

  IN 1984, JIM KOCH founded the Boston Beer Company, maker of Samuel Adams Boston Lager. In 2007, he described to Inc. how his small brand outmaneuvered the big guys when it came to marketing. The lessons about connecting with people are timeless:

  Forget about media buying and ad agencies. If you’re competing with people who have way more resources than you, traditional marketing isn’t helpful. You have to start with a product—whether it’s beer or software—that’s meaningfully better or cheaper than the established competition. You also have to realize that it’s going to take time to c
hange people’s perceptions. It took Sam Adams ten years to get national distribution.

  The next step is finding the consumers whose needs the product meets and educating them. It doesn’t have to be a lot of people. We targeted imported beer drinkers in thirty bars in Boston. I learned that you need to convince not only the decisionmaker (for us, the bar’s general manager) but also the influencers (the bartenders), and that you need a ten-second pitch that they can tell customers. Ours was: “Try this new beer: It’s handcrafted in small batches. You’ll like the taste.”

  When you’re trying to educate consumers, do the small things that the big guys think are below them. For us, that meant table tents, promotional nights, and interacting with our target customers. Twice a week, I would go to a bar and talk to people about the beer. That helped me understand what kept people from drinking Sam Adams. I found out that people had an irrational attachment to imported beer that had little to do with the actual quality. So we put booklets on the bottles that explained why our domestic beer was better. The booklets cost 1.4 cents each—or about 2 percent of sales—but it was worth it. By our third year, we had distributed five million of them.

  We didn’t start doing TV ads until 1996, and they did not drive any noticeable growth. In the end, you can’t fool customers into buying a product that’s not any better than the next one. That’s the province of well-financed companies. A small company has to be better and find ways—the more dramatic the better—to show consumers that it’s better. Otherwise, go home.

  CASE STUDY

  Happy Family Takes Grassroots National

  WHEN SHAZI VISRAM LAUNCHED organic baby food company Happy Family in 2006 (then called Happy Baby), all of her funding came from her own pockets or from family and friends. Without money for advertising, “we were forced to get creative,” she told Inc.

  The company printed a brochure explaining why organic food was important for babies and why Happy Family’s organic foods were a healthier and better alternative to jars. Then the team of four scooped up the brochures and headed outside to parks and playgrounds, to talk to every parent and caregiver they could find. “We visited moms’ groups and reached out to healthcare professionals. We hand-delivered products for sampling to local family and parenting media,” Visram remembers.

  While chatting up strangers wasn’t easy, Visram says, she was heartened by all of the friendly responses and good wishes along the way. Local toy and children’s clothing stores even agreed to display brochures. The brand grew and was eventually picked up by Whole Foods—a coup that put tremendous sales pressure on the small company. Knowing that “the mom-to-mom network was our greatest marketing asset,” Visram says, they tried to figure out how to scale that model nationally.

  It was the aughts, and the mommy blogs were proliferating. So, the company started sending out samples and information to bloggers, quickly gaining a following. Years later, says Visram, “we send samples of every new Happy product to mommy bloggers for product reviews and giveaways. We never turn down a request from a blogger no matter how small her following, and we are delighted to see an increase in dads who blog.”

  Today, Happy Family employs more than a hundred people, and its products can be found in major retailers across the country.

  REFERRAL MARKETING

  How did you find your dentist? Your doctor? A babysitter for your kids? The chances are high that you do business with someone who came recommended from a friend or family member. Customer referrals are one of the most powerful selling and marketing tools available: Eighty-three percent of respondents said they trust the recommendations of friends and family, the highest of any form of advertising, according to one study from Nielsen.5

  Referral marketing, sometimes called word-of-mouth marketing, uses someone else’s recommendation of a brand to bring in new business. Because loyal customers refer the brand to people they think will also like it, companies can reach the right customers with a message that’s coming from a reliable source. Plus, referrals don’t just lead to more customers; they often lead to better customers. Current customers know who would benefit from your company’s services better than you ever could. They’re also likely to talk up your company as they make referrals, making those newly referred customers educated and predisposed to loyalty.

  When to Ask for Referrals

  Before you put any sort of plan into motion, sit down and think about what you hope to get out of your referral program. Besides the obvious reason—getting more customers—what are you trying to achieve? Perhaps you’re looking to increase customer loyalty, grow sales, turn more customers into lifetime customers or get more brand advocates. Once you identify the specific objectives, you can set key performance indicators to measure the success of your program.

  There is a right time and a wrong time to ask your customers to help you market your product or service. If your business is one where a customer can quickly see the benefit of what they bought from you, then you should ask for a referral soon after the purchase, when they are still excited about the product. On the other hand, if you sell a product or service and the benefit of that is not clear for some time—say enterprise software—then the customer is not necessarily in a position to give you a referral immediately. It may take a long time for the customer to realize the benefit and be excited about recommending it. Keep in mind your product or service’s life cycle before putting your plan together.

  How to Ask for Referrals

  Once you know the right time to ask for a referral, figure out how you’re going to ask. Even when you already know a customer likes your company, asking for a referral can still feel awkward. You don’t want to be seen as pushing for another sale (even though that’s exactly what you’re doing and need to do). You can soften the sales-y tone by focusing less on how customers can help your company and more on how you can help customers and their friends. Put the burden of facilitating the referral on you instead of the customer: Ask for their friend’s contact information in a web form, send them a link to be shared via social media, or even offer a copy-and-paste message they can easily send to a friend.

  One natural way to get started is to issue a survey as part of the post-sale process. Consider surveying your customers about a week after purchase, when feelings about your company—positive or negative—are still vivid. While any survey will help you understand your customers’ sentiments, a question like this is valuable for referrals: “How likely is it that you would recommend [your company] to a friend or colleague?” If they say they would, follow up with a request for a referral.

  Once you get customer feedback or testimonials, don’t forget to incorporate that into your marketing materials and onto your website.

  Adding an Incentive

  Even if your customers really, really like you, it can be hard to motivate them to make a bunch of referrals. After all, people are busy, and their time is valuable. That’s why many companies use an incentive. Often the most effective incentives have a cash value, such as a discount on your products or services, but they don’t have to be monetary to work.

  For example, Dropbox has an extremely successful referral program, and it doesn’t carry a high price tag. In exchange for referring a friend, customers are given free storage space. Whatever you decide to do, make sure the incentive makes sense for your brand and for your customer. Put yourself in their shoes and think about what you could offer that would benefit them the most.

  Once you select your incentive, publicize it. Create a central location where customers can get all the information about your referral program, such as a dedicated landing page on your website. When setting up the page, make sure it’s easy to find. Make it easily accessible from your homepage by including it within your main navigation.

  This page will be where you include your main message and call to action as well as all details about how to submit a referral. If possible, include a form right on the landing page to make submitting the referral even easier.
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br />   No matter what you give away, your referral program will only work if you have a great product to begin with. Your customers should be excited to channel their love for your product into a desire to share their great experience.

  How Much Does It Cost?

  The cost of a referral program comes in the setup, any web development or software, promotion you put against it, and of course, the value of the incentive that you’re giving away.

  Referral programs don’t have to be expensive. A small discount on your product or a month free for a subscription service are powerful incentives—especially when your customers feel they’re helping others get in on something good.

  How Measurable Is It?

  If you’ve set up the program carefully, you’ll be able to garner great metrics. If you’re mostly using your website to collect referral forms, set up analytics beforehand, so you’re tracking completed forms and conversions. You’ll need to know how people are getting to your landing page, including where they’re coming from and what they clicked on. Once you know which channels are most successful—for instance, are most of your referrals coming from Facebook?—you can boost your efforts there. And if any channels are performing poorly, you can direct your efforts elsewhere.

  Once you’ve built it, make sure they come. Come up with a schedule to promote your referral program across social media, email, and your blog. Use as many channels as makes sense to ensure you reach as many people as possible.