When it comes to marketing a new business – why would you want to mimic your competition?, why would you want to do the same as them, to stand out from the crowd you need to better than them!. Even if you are selling exactly the same nuts and bolts as the company next door – you need to say it and sell if differently.
In an ever more competitive world more and more companies are finding it difficult to realise their USP (unique selling point), lots of businesses don’t have one, when margins are tight and the market is saturated its difficult to sell the same products along with umpteen other companies and be unique. You could sell it for free?. – If you are considering this option, you will need deep pockets in order to sustain this for a period of time until you can gradually ask your customers for a price increase.
Assuming you are avoiding this option, then what else can you do to sell in such tough times?
One way is to visually stand out from the crowd. Have your leaflets and flyers designed by a professional to give you a better chance of communicating. We realise that money is tight when starting a business, but skimping on design and advertising is not going to help you get the business off the ground, unless you want a slow gradual start.
Any printed promotional material is your first point of contact with your potential customers, get this wrong and you’ve lost before you have started. The old saying ‘You only get once chance to make a first impression’ is very valid.
Many business owners are able to use free design templates, which they have to hand. A template form MS Word or MS PowerPoint is not going to give you a compelling design, its does give you something to start with, and admittedly its better than nothing, but theses design templates are obviously not unique, the impact is watered down if its been seen before, even if its been used for a completely different market than yours, or worse it maybe being used by a competitor.

This is negative marketing – it leads to it being looked upon as you have copied the idea – this will do nothing for your reputation, it can only end in an unimpressed feeling for your company or organisations brand.
Statistics have shown that if you spend the money on design created by creative qualified graphic designer then your response rate is higher, this is why there are so many working graphic designers, its because they have proven good design works. Yes you will save money doing it yourself, but why trust it to chance.
Sometimes in life you have to bite the bullet and do things properly, this way you know that if you had it designed professionally, then you gave it your best shot. Yes you may have a much friendlier customer service than your competitors, you may have a faster or more reliable turnaround, you may even have a better quality product, but all of this is academic – all of this comes after you have made the sale. So if your marketing looks naff then you will too.
So our advice is to be professional in your approach to marketing and most importantly – Be Unique, use a creative edge to give you the best chance of your business venture taking off and being successful.

Dean Williams

Dean Williams is a design and marketing blogger working for Print-Print Limited, promoting business and building brands through quality print marketing. If you’re interested in small business promotion then please get in touch hello@print-print.co.uk