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I’ve noticed that when it comes to marketing, freelancers are firmly split into two camps:

• The first are freelancers who realise the absolute importance of marketing their freelancing services in a strategic, well-planned manner.
• The second are freelancers who only think about marketing themselves when they’re running low on clients and money.

Which camp do you belong to?

One of the biggest brand management companies in the world is quite clearly a master of branding and marketing; it is the force behind billion dollar brands such as Duracell, Gillette, Max Factor, Pampers, Lacoste, Pringles, Tampax. Seriously, if they can sell a vile, disgusting liquid like Sunny Delight and convince parents that it’s healthy and kids that it’s cool to drink, they know what they’re doing!

Here are three of the most important things they do when it comes to marketing:

1 Know your market

Don’t just know your market, really know your market. I’m sure you hear this all the time but it’s what the big boys do and so should we. Before the big marketing companies even design or manufacture a product, they conduct hours of research, testing and focus-group brainstorming sessions. They design the product specifically for the consumer.

A more recent distinction in this area is this: who is the buyer versus who is the consumer? The person responsible for handing over the money isn’t necessarily the person who ends up using the purchase. Who do you market to? It depends on the product but ultimately, you design for the consumer and market to the buyer and the consumer.

How to apply this to freelancing:

• Ask yourself this: Who are your ideal clients? Why?
• Review what you offer and see if it’s the optimum solution for your existing clients.
  For example, are your design services structured and priced according to your clients’ needs or are they structured that way because it’s just the way you did them initially? Do your web design services include add-ons that a client doesn’t really want or need, you just include them to make more money? Do your writing clients need the NLP/compelling writing skills you have for their technical, detail-oriented brochures?
• Is the decision-maker the end user for your services?
  For example, is the person who creates the brief and signs off your custom-designed website going to be responsible for maintaining and updating it? When you’re designing a poster for a client, whose needs do you focus on meeting - the client’s personal taste or the people at whom the poster is targeted?

2 Know your brand

Almost as important as knowing your market, knowing your brand is what sets you apart from your competitors.

It’s what someone would say about you if they were woken up in the middle of the night and asked to describe you or your company.

How to apply this to freelancing:

• What would your existing clients say about you?
• If you don’t know, ask them - ask them to describe you and your business/services in single words or give them a list of words and ask them to rate how applicable they are to your business on a scale of 1 to 10.
• What do you want your clients to say about you?
• If there’s a disconnect between the first and second, then how can you change that and bridge the gap?

3 Build the business around the brand

This ties in very closely to number 1 and also to one of my previous posts “The Secret To Keeping Your Freelance Clients Happier Than Larry“. The very best companies design their entire business around the customers’ needs.

Everything from the marketing to the payment options to the support services are designed because the business knows the customer, knows what they need and builds the business to deliver this.

How to apply this to freelancing:

• Check out the above post and identify at each of these stages what your clients’ needs are - do you fulfill these needs?
• If you don’t meet their needs at each stage, then what simple things can you do to better service your clients and address their needs?
• If you have more than one type of client, then is your business set up to cater for this or do you use a one-size-fits-all approach? How well does this work for you - and your clients?

The lessons from the big boys, when it comes to marketing, are wholly applicable to freelancers and their businesses; they are designed to take the mystery out of marketing and remove any confusion about what your customers want. They’re designed to help you, as a freelancer, view marketing as an integrated part of what you do, on an ongoing basis.

After all, if it weren’t for marketing you wouldn’t get clients; and if it weren’t for your clients, you wouldn’t be in business.

Original post by FreelanceSwitch.com