A primer for small businesses that are struggling to figure out how to identify and communicate with their target markets.

1. Chris Nahil
Message & Medium, LLC
Donna Mavromates
MavroCreative
Mary 20, 2015

2. Achieving Product/Market Fit is the
Holy Grail of a New Company.
Does the product you offer closely match the needs of
customers in a specific market?
How do you find out?

5. Disciplined Entrepreneurship,
Bill Aulet, Managing Director, Martin Trust Center for MIT
Entrepreneurship
 Well funded?
 Easily reachable?
 Compelling reason to buy?
 Whole product?
 Entrenched competition?
 Springboard into new markets?
 Consistent with passions, values and goals of
founders?

6. A group exercise
1. Make a list of 3 potential markets for your
product
2. Add 6 more markets that you can jump to
from the original 3
3. Share and discuss the connections

7. • End user
• Application
• Benefit
• Leading customers
and influencers
• Market insight
• Partners and players
• Market size
• Competition
• Age, gender
• Geography
• Income
• What drives them
• What keeps them
awake at night
• Media consumed &
info sources
• Contact details and
permission

9.  Story is built on messages
◦ Who are you?
◦ What do you deliver?
◦ Who do you do it for?
◦ Why do you do it better than others?
◦ Why are you different?
◦ Why should we care?!
 Good messages:
◦ Compelling, credible, consistent
◦ Not what you do, what you do for others
◦ Magnify strengths (credibly)
◦ Diminish weaknesses (credibly)
◦ Adjust to accommodate change

10.  Owned Content
You make it, you own it!
Web site, blog, email marketing, collateral, videos,
podcasts, graphics, events, signage/in-store/POS
 Earned Media Coverage
You earn you way to accolades from someone else!
Media coverage, endorsements and case histories
 Paid Media & Content
You paid for the placement on a third-party
platform or network!
 Radio, TV, print, online ads; search engine marketing

12.  Web site!
 Strong content, SEO, clear contact info, samples/stories, email
sign up, news section, refresh regularly
 The Blog…why and how?
 Social media profiles up to date
 Listen, share, engage
 Marketing calendar
 Blog posts and comments
 Content: news, case histories, graphics, user/partner-generated
 Email marketing
 Events: host and attend
 Promotions
 Basic PR program
 Build relationships with media, influencers
 Steady “drumbeat” of news, features

13.  Paid Media
Consider: AdWords, sponsored Tweets, LinkedIn
advertising, FB ads (targetability)
Traditional advertising and direct mail
 Speaking opportunities
 Video
YouTube, Vimeo, Wistia
 Marketing automation for small businesses
Landing pages
Lead nurturing, account management
Vendors: SharpSpring, BoingNet, HubSpot, Hatchbuck,

14.  Web site
 Wix, SquareSpace, GoogleSites, 1and1, Web.com
 Surveys and Polls
 Survey.io
 Survey Monkey
 Monitoring/research
 GoogleAlerts
 Mention
 Feedly
 MuckRack
 HootSuite, TweetDeck, search.twitter.com
 Blogging/sharing
 WordPress, Blogger, Tumblr, Instagram, Pinterest, Buffer
 Email Marketing
 ConstantContact, Mail Chimp, GraphicMail, VerticalResponse

15. Focus on delivering a GREAT product and
service experience and
turn earliest customers into champions
Communicate: feedback and ideas
Build trust and credibility, share everything
Create community, help build connections
Find credibility-building partners
Cultivate referrals via every channel

16.  Commit to CONSISTENCY
 Use what you know about your customers
 Treat your audiences as part of the family
 Be credible and creative
 Earn your reputation as a trusted, sought
after source and partner

17. Books
 Disciplined Entrepreneurship, Bill Aulet
 Four Steps to the Epiphany, Steve Blank
 Marketing in the Round, Gini Dietrich, Geoff Livingston
 Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead, David Meerman
Scott and Brian Halligan
Blogs and Web Sites
 DuctTapeMarketing.com, John Jantsch
 MarketingProfs.com, Ann Handley
 Startup-marketing.com, Sean Ellis