Chapter 12: The Role of Professionals in Your Marketing Campaign
There are various levels of professional expertise that you might need to take in to account when undertaking a marketing campaign. Some of these will only ask for a membership fee whereas others might stretch your budget a bit.
We have already discussed the possibility of recurring to marketing and business promotion experts as well as advertisement organizations and groups all over the country. We have also taken in to consideration recurring to professional advert companies to assist you in drawing up your marketing plan as well as in establishing the strategy you will be using in your marketing campaign.
Factors that should be taken into consideration when determining whether you will be recurring to professional help or whether you will be running the marketing campaign on your own include the financial aspect which mainly deals with how elastic the budget that you are ready to dedicate to your marketing campaign is; your confidence, human resources and marketing knowhow. Perhaps you will opt to use professional assistance for the larger scaled projects of your marketing campaign and deal with other low budget and manageable aspects such as designing flyers, sending mail both online and through post on your own.
While this decision is entirely up to you, there are certain professionals that you might need to consult with in the long run and better yet even at the beginning. Some of these professionals would include financial and legal advisors. While financial projection and cutting your losses are important issues to you; you might wonder why one would include legal advisors in one’s marketing campaign. If this sounds like you, then you should begin to understand that once you start a marketing campaign you are starting to build relationships with other people. As a product or service provider you will be responsible to abide by the various consumer and financial laws that regulate your relationship with that of your clients or prospects. Let us take in to consideration for a moment an important principle that we discussed in the chapter about the advertising basics. We had mentioned the importance of keeping your word. This was done in the context of credibility where we said that your message and offers have to be credible. If they are not credible people will not bother trying out your products or services and that is a loss in itself. Now let us be practical for a moment and remember that not all people view a particular message in one and the same way. Imagine, that even if your message was not so credible or even if it were credible and you successfully attract traffic to your business but you subsequently fail to provide them with what you promised them in your marketing campaign in the very beginning, then there is a high probability that you risk facing legal action against you due to the fact that your marketing campaign has mislead the particular individual.
Alternatively, imagine getting a customers’ complaint about a defective product or an unsatisfying service and you are currently promoting that product wide and large to general public out there. How do you think a legal action and the related bad publicity will influence your marketing campaign? Will it be in a good or in a bad light? Bad. No doubt there.
This small example out of the variety of problematic events that you might face when running your business with particular reference to your marketing campaign is the very reason why seeking the legal advice of a professional would be extremely helpful even prior to commencing your marketing campaign. This will ensure that you understand the fine line of what constitutes misleading advertisement for example. Getting professional legal feedback about internet marketing such as anti-spam laws, consumers’ rights and your obligations as a service or product provider can save you a lot of time and money not to mention the fact that it will safeguard the reputation of your business which you have worked so hard to build. You do not want your business to suffer out of let’s say ignorance of your legal or financial obligations which are of course two issues that need to be taken into consideration by any diligent business owner, director or manager.
This guide has put forward a high standard of marketing experience for you to understand but the advice given is specifically related about marketing strategies and thus you should also carefully think about obtaining some legal and financial advice together with other economic and market studies. This will ensure an overall bullet proof marketing campaign not to mention the peace of mind that you are doing everything by the guide.
Despite the fact that approaching a professional is recommended, you need not worry. Once you understand the legal dynamics of your business, it will not be difficult to keep your business operation running as a legitimate one. Take spamming for example. Although all the spam mail that is going around somewhat decreases your chances of getting more of your e-mails opened or recognized as legitimate ones by your email service provider, recent legislation has put a lot of effort in order to support people like you whose emails have a lawful and legitimate purpose. Therefore, the anti-spam laws are more focused on stopping spammers than from stopping you from running your own legal marketing campaign.
You need however to be aware that these laws vary depending on the state that you reside in and they might be different in another state where you used to reside or a new state where you intend to run your business. Looking at the main reference points that each laws have in common would be a good start to keep your business operation a legitimate one. For instance, a common standard acceptable under all laws involved would be that you are perfectly safe in sending emails to people that you have already came in contact with and these people would include people such as your existent customers, those people who have given their consent in receiving feedback about your business including those people who have passed on their contact information so that you can follow them up or people who have requested information. It also includes people who have for example willingly participated in a market study that you have carried out including the taking part in surveys and the filling in of questionnaires. The issue of consent revolves itself around the fact that you have made people are that you intend to use their email addresses either for promotional reasons and to follow up a query among other legitimate reasons. Again it is necessary that you are clear with these people as to why you need their email address. If you are not clear then how far their permission to be contacted and the extent to which their emails can be used is questionable and might lead to breach of related laws.
Thus, it is always safe to make customers and prospects tick the box as to whether they wish to receive further information on the contact information provided. This makes sure that you know where you are getting all your contact information from. Looking through your current client database and taking out addresses that you recognize as a potential threat due to the fact that you don’t know where the main source originated is another extra precaution that you can take.
Again just like we discussed before it is important that anything you do shows an honest business approach and therefore anything contained in your emails including your contact information, promotional offers as well as subject line should be a true reflection of what your business stands for as well as a reflection of what you are ready to offer in return for people making use of your business.
