Awareness - Much Needed

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Remember what I call the "Great Eight"?

• Audience.
• Awareness.
• Acquisition.
• Welcome Program.
• Anniversary Program.
• Optimization Program.
• New Merchandise.
• Existing Merchandise.

Today we talk about Awareness.

In less than a paragraph, describe how a shopper who has never heard of your brand before learns about your brand?

If your answer is any of the answers below, you don't have an Awareness Program.

• Keyword Search via Google.
• Mail a Catalog via a Co-Op.
• Subscribe via Email Marketing.

The new Marketing Leader needs to quickly (within 30 days preferably) establish the Awareness Program (and associated costs) she will implement.

The best Awareness Programs are low-cost / no-cost, or are mid-cost but generate large quantities of prospects. Read what companies like Stitch Fix, Duluth Trading Company and Wayfair say about Awareness ... you'll hear comments about large quantities of new customers who are not tracked ... if your Customer Acquisition program tracks everything, your Awareness program is worth nothing.

Content brands and Vendors are soooooo much better at Awareness than are most of my client base. Think about a company like Civic Science - an individual on Twitter said I had to get on their email list, and I could only do that by sending an email to the founder. Ok. I did that.

A recent email campaign referenced a Forbes article (click here) which I'm reasonably confident wasn't authored out of goodness of heart. 

From the email campaign, you can see research - not everything of course (click here), but something. When you get to the research, you can participate yourself ... and you can sign up for various email campaigns.

Vendors / Content brands are very good at Awareness Programs. Many in my client base have an opportunity to implement Awareness Programs. Look to the B2B folks for inspiration.