Marketing is a part of business that entrepreneur should not joke about, in fact it should be second thing after idea generation but that is not the case for many entrepreneur they see marketing as the last; what they can figure out later.
Some of them will not even include it in their feasibility study, once they have the killer idea they will surely see success what an erroneous assumption!
Clicking the link to this article means you want to learn more about how to market your product but I bet it is not because you want to learn how marketing works well if you are here because of the first reason it is a plus for you because this article will show you how marketing works and how to market you product in Nigeria.
What is marketing?
Marketing in simple terms is showing people what you have produce so that they can buy it, but it should be to potential customer , people that are ready to buy what you produce and this should be what every organization will be after to avoid waste of resource.
What I have learn is that some business actually factor in marketing to whatever they are building but they are doing it the wrong way to the extent that they waste have of their resources on marketing budget with nothing to show for it.
As I wrote in the introduction marketing should start from the beginning, from the onset of idea generation, you need to consider who you are producing for where you are producing, is the product affordable and how easy to use the product.We will dwell on this co in the next chapter.
Factor to consider before embarking on marketing in Nigeria
People / customer
The first factor to consider are your customer, who are they? What is their purchasing power?
Some entrepreneur will wake up with product or services idea but they won’t sit down to analyze it, usually the adrenaline would have cloud their judgement they will create luxury goods or services targeting low purchasing power customer or what would you say to pedicure and manicure business woman targeting a slum, tell me have they eaten not to talk of taking care of their nail or a tech startup with accounting app targeting a road seller surely it will be a failure.
Not that those product are not good they might be okay even top notch the problem is that they are targeting people that do not really need their product it is not solving their pain point, this will take us to product
Product
Product is the second factor to consider once you find the target customers who are willing to give your product a chance.
Does your product solve their pain point not pleasure but pain, if you make your product solve pain point, people will always come to your with their money
Also your product structure is it what people can pick up and learn in a day? If it is software, how is the user experience, do they have to click many button before performing a task?.
The best way to create product that user love is to include them in the creation process, don’t just assume you know what they want, use agile method to build your product or services if you don’t know what agile is it is a method of building product such that you break the product into different functions, as you build the function or part you get feedback from customer.
If you can do tis trust me you have already done the 50% of marketing
Price
This can be tricky because you need to price your product with competitor, consumer and profitability in mind, higher price sometimes can lead people to you while lower price may repel people, this is why it is tricky.
If you are in luxury industry you might want to price your product higher but if your target customer are low purchasing power customer reduce your price compare to your competitor but not to the extent that you won’t make a profit.
All in all product with better quality and lower price is the best it is hard, yes I know if you are in Nigeria you will have to find a way to lower your cost while still producing quality goods or service.
Place
Place is another important factor
Wherever you establish your business will determine how your marketing will go, a low traffic source for physical business will be a problem because no matter how you market it is the same people that will patronize you, this can also be the case for online business that niche down too much.
The secret of marketing is to niche down but not too much such that you have few target customer, it will be a waste of money if you embark on marketing in a narrow niche and it will be hard for you to move from such niche to a higher niche because their will be no revenue to do so.
Also, your place will determine the cost of production for instance in America most of their company such as Apple move their manufacturing arm to china because it is cheap and affordable they produce in china and sell to America and other part of the world.
Medium to market your product in Nigeria
Before, there is only physical medium to put your product in front of your potential customer but now you can use both online and physical medium and they are
Logo and flyers
Do not underestimate the power of flyers if you are just starting out. Your flyers is like a bird telling people that you are now in town, it might not actually bring you customer but it will make people aware that your business exist.
Your logo and flyers should be catchy, remember we are in a rushing world, first impression matter without a catchy flyers that will hold people gaze for seconds you might meet your flyers on the road floor without been distributed
Signpost
Signpost will do the same job as flyers but this one is forever and can also serve as direction.
To not miss out on the benefit of sign post, erect it in a junction not too far from your location
Billboard
If you have large marketing budget you can also use this medium it will send customer to your door.
The only advice here is to only use bill board if your business is location based, if it is not, online marketing will be better
Newspaper
You might think newspaper is dead but no! It is not well it might be dead for some business but for business like car and real estate it is much more alive.
Though newspaper advertising can be costly but it pays, you will surely sell your product and if it is good product you can expect word of mouth to come in.
TV and Radio
This is another physical medium you can take to advertise your product, but it also location based unless you use national Radio and TV.
Build website or blog
We are now in two interrelated world, as you build your brand physically you must do so online. Build blog or website with SEO content that will derive traffic to it.
As you know SEO is a tedious work and most of the keywords are already taken by the giant what you can do is to target low keyword and move up from there or build backlink
To create your website with SEO content that will derive traffic to it you can contact us
Social media
Social media now serves as a medium to communicate and relate with customer but be careful as it is easy to build brand on it so it is easy to lose face. to have more follower post engaging content, do not post only your ad, if you are full of yourself nobody will follow you.
Social media ad and google ad
If you want quick result, do social media or google ad. Surely you can’t do this alone unless you want to burn your money, find online marketing agency that will help you out.
Forum
Find forum that have your target customers, post content that will set you as authority and before you know it people will want to know your business and buy your product.
Conclusion
Above is how to market your product in Nigeria, we touched how marketing works and marketing medium, and you will agree with me that will do at least 80% justice to it.
It is now time for you to act on the article, don’t just read and forget, if you do you have wasted your time. Act on it and move your business forward.
To those that are still on entrepreneur fence pondering whether to go in or not, my advice to you is to come in though it is hard but you will surely reap the fruit of your labour if you are consistent, so stop been wantrepreneur and become startuppreneur
