An Introduction to Marketing
Marketing is likely the business department that receives the most recognition. Marketing is the business process of promoting and selling products or services. Since marketing results in the advertisements or other promotions that the public sees the department is, in many ways, the face of a business. However, marketing involves far more than the page in your local newspaper, or the 15 second commercial that plays before the video you really want to watch. Good marketing starts with sound research, planning, and strategizing. Once all the initial work is done, marketers must be sure they have a grasp on the 4 P’s of the marketing mix: product, price, place, and promotion. From there, the marketing department can go on to create advertisements and work towards developing a successful brand for the decoration industry.
An Introduction to Marketing Research
The custom decoration industry is continuously growing when it comes to competition, suppliers, and new products. Both new and old decoration businesses conduct market research periodically to help put themselves in the best possible position to succeed. Researching competition, new suppliers, new products, and new decoration methods are just a few topics on which a decoration business can conduct market research. Knowing the ins and outs of the decoration industry helps you better communicate with customers, and puts your business in a better position to succeed.
An Introduction to Creating a Marketing Strategy
No product decoration business can simply create a product or service and become a leader in the market overnight. It takes thoughtful planning and execution of a marketing strategy to take a product or service and turn it into a business. A marketing strategy is a business’s comprehensive game plan for approaching and penetrating its target market through competitive advantages and unique selling propositions. There is significant local and national competition in the product decoration industry. However, with a marketing strategy in place a business knows how it will compete, and therefore ensure its place in the market. A good marketing strategy begins before you enter the market and continues to evolve once the business has established itself. Marketing strategy is both a fundamental aspect of and a basis for a business’s marketing plan. The marketing plan, on the other hand, lays out step-by-step the ways that the business will go about executing its marketing strategy.
An Introduction to Customizable Products
When it comes to product decoration, screen printing is king. Just because screen printing takes up such a large market share, however, does not mean it is the end-all, be-all of the product decoration world. Few businesses thrive by offering a single product. Obviously, you can offer different types of screen printed products, but being able to meet more of your customers’ diverse needs without overextending your business will help to attract new customers and keep existing ones. It is common for a sports team to need jerseys printed, hats sewn, a team banner to hang at games, a plaque to give to their sponsors, and awards to hand out at the end of a season. You may not be able help your customer with all their needs, but understanding how to insource or outsource them strategically can lead to more business and happier customers.
An Introduction to Pricing Decoration Products & Services
Pricing custom decorated goods and services can be a bit complicated. There are many variable costs that go into decorating a custom product, and yet it is important to be able to quickly and accurately quote a customer. When pricing custom-decorated products, it is best to try and keep the product and decoration price separate. This makes quantity discounts much easier to calculate and lets the customer know the different product prices quickly. While screen printing is the most common form of apparel decoration, the majority of the custom decoration processes are no minimum, full-color processes. Direct-To-Garment (DTG), sublimation, and wide format printing all use CMYK inks & digital printers to create full-color finished products. Embroidery is very much the same, but does not use CMYK inks. Instead, each color has its own thread (like screenprint ink colors), but the setup of the job is minimal like with digital printing methods. Since embroidery and digital printing processes have no minimum order requirements, low-run orders with higher margins are more common when compared to screen printing.
An Introduction to Place
The places where businesses conduct transactions have evolved over time. Over the years, selling products has grown from an in-person experience, to over the telephone, and now to the internet. This evolution has also opened the door to an expansion of the marketing definition of “place,” which now includes distribution channels. In fact, place has come to signify the ways in which a customer has access to purchase products, and the convenience with which the consumer can gain that access. The reason that “place” is so important to marketing is that customers need to be able to access a business and its products, and this expanded definition of place better fits modern applications of the marketing mix.
An Introduction to Promoting Custom Decoration Services
When most people think of marketing, it is likely that what comes to mind is actually only one aspect of marketing: promotion. Considering that promotion is defined as all methods through which businesses communicate their brand and products to consumers. This should come as little surprise. In fact, without promotional efforts, it would be nearly impossible for a new product decoration business to gain market share. Promotional planning is the process of optimizing the utilization of marketing tools, strategies, and resources to promote a decorated product with the intent to generate demand and meet set objectives. Without a solid plan, promotional activities can be not only wasteful, but even harmful to a product decoration business’s reputation. Promotion is essential for a decoration business to increase consumer product knowledge, generate sales, and set the business and its decorated products apart from the competition.
An Introduction to Creating a Brand for the Decoration Industry
A decoration business’ brand is more than just a name or a logo. A brand is ultimately how the outside world views the business. A business’s brand is determined by several factors, including the name, logo, taglines, sounds, colors, and more. Today a business’s website and social media presence are a major part of its brand. Creating a positive, recognizable brand is a major gateway to success in the business world. Companies like Google and Apple are known all over the world due to their excellent brands. Building up that type of brand equity takes years of high quality products and/or services and careful brand management.
Conclusion
Marketing is one of the most complex departments of a product decoration business, in large part because marketing is such a diverse field. Without quality marketing, it would be difficult for a business to not only thrive, but survive. With the rapid growth of the internet, it has become easier for product decoration businesses to connect with their markets. This, in turn, increases competition, meaning that any business that cannot keep up will be left behind. After all, if no one knows about a product decoration business or its products, how could they ever sell them? It takes significant time and effort to market a decoration business and its products, but doing so allows the business to develop a brand and establish itself in the marketplace.
