The problem with startups is that when they see how the companies they follow do the marketing or bring their customers, they want to follow the same path.
I believe they are smart enough to know that what works for those big companies might not work for them. But we have another thing here. When we see one marketing channel working really well, everyone jumps into it. We see everyone is using the same channel, but after some time, you see that it is dead.
That has happened on Twitter, Pinterest, and email marketing. That is also happening on Instagram, because everyone wants a piece of it, and customers stop responding after some time. So it dries out. This is happening on LinkedIn as well. LinkedIn is full of cold messages these days.
And this is not just about marketing channels, but also the type of ads or the type of marketing content we use for marketing.
And that’s the reason all the mainstream marketing channels have a low response rate now. I have been studying startups with their data and strategies. So far, a little more than 80 this year. I am seeing this almost everywhere:
Email marketing: Response is low. Dropping CTR every season.
SEO: Already very hard to rank. Now there’s AI Mode in Google
PR: Everyone knows they are spam. The real ones are costly.
Ads: Getting expensive as well because of the high competition of running ads and lower CTR.
So the law of marketing says
If you have a new product, you should build a new marketing channel
— I read something similar in Andrew Chan’s article, and I fully agree with it.
So what are the startup marketing channels?
Go after a single company, a community, or a city
Emailing your friends and ex-colleagues
Run small events with speakers
Run online communities
So what will be the benefit? Your response time will be higher because you are face-to-face with them and talking to them directly. There’s a trust being developed.
And don’t worry about scaling. This is not for people who already have thousands of customers. This is for those startups that have just 100 customers and want to reach 200.
Part two of this law is:
A bold brand beats a big brand.
A bold brand is one that says, ‘My product is not for everyone, but for a specific person.’ Or you say: That product sucks, my product is the one you need.
So you are ready to do what many well-established companies can’t do because their reputation is at stake. But here you can take a risk.
These are the one-time jobs you are doing to gain momentum and gauge the response from your target audience. As you grow, you will need to build sustainable and bigger marketing channels.