Best Marketing Tips By World’s Greatest Marketers

Best marketing tips are hard to find. A marketing tip that works for a business model might not work for another business model. 

However, there are some universal marketing tips that are evergreen and work for every business whether big or small. 

Looking for the best marketing tips for startups as well as fortune 500 companies? I have compiled a list of the best marketing tips as suggested by the world’s greatest marketers of all times like Steve Jobs, Henry Ford, and Seth Godin. 

These marketing tips are useful for all companies irrespective of their sizes. Here are the top marketing tips to grow your business and acquire more customers. 

Marketing Tip #1- Promote Brand Values (Steve Jobs)

People prefer to buy from a brand that is valuable. A business becomes valuable when it creates world-class products that redefines the entire industry. 

Here is Steve Jobs’ best marketing tip, “Marketing is about values. It’s a complicated and noisy world, and we’re not going to get a chance to get people to remember much about us. No company is. So we have to be really clear about what we want them to know about us”.

If you want your business to become valuable in the eyes of your customers then you need to promote your brand, not your products. 

Apple promotes its brand under the ‘Think Different’ campaign and the results were the success of its products like iPad, iPhone, or MacBook. People know if the product is coming from Apple then it’s got to be valuable. Apple ads promote the brand so that people discover the value of the business.

When people buy your products or services, they are investing money in your business. They must feel a sense of pride to buy your products. It should be the maximum value for money. 

Promoting brand value in ads is known as “brand advertising”. It is aimed at establishing long-term relationships with your customers. Brand advertising campaigns establish your brand identity. People think about your brand at every stage of the buyer journey. This leads to more customer acquisition and maximum sales. 

Marketing Tip #2- Know Your Market (Henry Ford)

Henry Ford once said, “If I had simply asked people what they wanted, they would have asked me for faster horses!” 

What this statement means is that people are still unaware of their problems. You need to conduct extensive research as a brand before you start spending money on your marketing campaigns.

Promote your products in a manner that solves your customer’s biggest problems. People will pay you because the feeling of getting rid of pain is really high. It’s no wonder that people buy solutions to their problems so you should have a strong reason why people should buy from you. As Henry Ford cleverly highlighted, people are not even aware of why they need your products? 

You really can’t succeed in your marketing effort if you don’t know your market. Conduct extensive market research, identify what your competitors are selling, how are they selling and where are they selling? Similarly, find out what your customers are purchasing, why are they purchasing and where are they purchasing? 

Highlight your customer’s biggest and most pressing problems in your marketing campaigns and explain how your product solves them. 

Marketing Tip #3- Create a Memorable Slogan (Seth Godin)

Remember when you were a kid, how did you learn ABC? Your teachers taught you by saying “A for Apple”, “B for Ball”, “C for Cat”… Because it was easier to remember things when you create something catchy.

The marketing tip here is, get a memorable slogan for your business so that it becomes easier for people to remember your business. However, do not just create a slogan because it looks ‘catchy’. The slogan should be a true reflection of your brand.

Marketing Wizard, Seth Godin says, “Underneath the slogan, perhaps, is a story. And the slogan well told is a symptom of that story, a shadow of what you’re truly up to. So sure, start with a slogan. But don’t bother wasting any time on it if you’re merely going for catchy. Aim for true instead”.

Some of the famous brand slogans are:

• Nike – Just Do it!
• McDonald’s – I’m lovin’ it!
• Apple – Think Different
• FedEx – The World On Time
• BMW – The Ultimate Driving Machine
• Coca-Cola – Open Happiness
• Subway – Eat Fresh
• LG – Life’s Good
• L’oreal – Because You’re Worth It

Notice that every brand slogan tells a story. The crux here, create a slogan that accurately depicts your brand story in an easy to remember manner. Take help from the world’s best brands. Without a good slogan, your marketing efforts won’t yield a better ROI. 

Marketing Tip #4- Follow The 4 P’s of Marketing Mix (Philip Kotler)

Philip Kotler is a renowned American marketing author. He necessitated the importance of “marketing mix”. 

According to Kotler, “Marketing mix is the mixture of controllable marketing variables that the firm uses to pursue the sought level of sales in the target market”.

The marketing mix has 4 Ps:

• Product
• Price
• Promotion 
• Place

You must follow a balanced marketing mix assigning an equal weightage of each P of marketing. Making the necessary changes to meet the market changes will help you to get the best results from your marketing campaign.

A single change in any one of the four marketing elements might require a change in the remaining elements. For example, if you change the price of the product then the promotional strategies will need to be changed to adapt to the change in the price of the product.

Marketing Tip #5- Indulge in Word-of-Mouth Marketing (Conrad Gessner)

Conrad Gessner was a Swiss naturalist who created a poem about Tulips that led to extensive word-of-mouth marketing by Europeans. 

People who didn’t know about the Tulip flower were made aware by Conrad’s poem which was easy to repeat. The below image shows the first illustration of Tulip with Conrad’s handwriting in it.

More and more people started reciting the poem and people were introduced to a new flower named ‘Tulip’.

In Feb 1637, the price of a single Tulip bulb rose to 10 times the monthly expenses of a craftsman. This period in history is also known as ‘Tulipmania’.

Conrad was the first person who invented the word-of-mouth marketing strategy. 

The lesson you should learn from this marketing genius is to “get people talking”. If people start talking about your products and services then your business will start to grow. 

Google is an example of a company that has become so successful in the initial stages only because of word-of-mouth marketing. 

People started using the search engine and loved the way it presented the most relevant results to the user. They discussed the search engine with their family and friends. As a result, more and more people came to know about Google. 

Offer the best services to your customers so that people start recommending your brand to others. This is the power of word-of-mouth marketing.

Marketing Tip #6- Advertisement Should be Used As a Form of Information, Not As An Entertainment or Art (David Ogilvy)

David Ogilvy was a British businessman regarded as the “Father of Advertising”.

Ogilvy believed in the idea that advertisements should not be used as a form of entertainment or art. Rather, it should be used as a form of information. 

He had a strong emphasis on creative brilliance and professional discipline. He was a follower of direct response advertisements that were published in different newspapers of his time to generate leads. 

Ogilvy believed in the power of ‘Big Idea’ which means, your advertisements should create a strong message to pull the customers towards your brand. If you don’t have a ‘Big idea’ then your product won’t reach the masses. 

Rather than using fancy words in advertisements that promote ‘buy the products’, Ogilvy emphasized the idea of informing people ‘why the product is better and what are the advantages of using it’. 

Modern advertisers follow this principle of informing the customers about the products that they are selling instead of pushing the customers towards a sale. 

The modern advertisement era believes in the act of informing the customers and waiting for them to convert sooner or later. This is the correct approach in marketing that you must follow. 

Elaborate on your products or services. If people are able to understand what you sell and why it is useful for them, they will come and buy from you. 

Marketing Tip #7- Leverage The Power of Content Atomization (Walt Disney)

Walt Disney was a pioneer of the American Animation Industry. He is credited for the creation of Mickey Mouse which is the favorite cartoon character for most of the children.

Content atomization or content repurposing is a strategy that Disney used way back in 1957. Marketers of today should use this strategy to reach a more qualified and a larger audience base using the same set of content pieces that are already published, instead of creating a new content piece for every platform. 

When Disney started producing animated films, it not only produced the content for the theatrical films but it created a whole new empire for cross-promotion of the content on a variety of verticals. 

Disneyland was created to promote the movie characters. Books and comic books were launched to reach audiences interested in reading. Merchandise was licensed and sold to outlets that sold Disney merchandise that is loved by children. Music was launched to reach people who loved listening to the music and loads of TV commercials were introduced to reach the masses. 

What do you learn from this marketing strategy? You can’t make your content popular by just leveraging the power of one channel. You need to reach every nook and corner of the world where your target audiences are present. The main character (the theme) of your content should be the same for all. Gradually, people will start recognizing your business. 

Today’s digital marketers need to adopt the strategy of content repurposing where the content published on the company’s blog should be cross-promoted on LinkedIn and Quora. Moreover, ads should be run on different PPC platforms to reach the masses. Last but not least, influencer marketing should be leveraged to promote a large group of audiences. 

Content atomization or content repurposing is one of the best marketing tips that every marketer should follow.

Final Thoughts

Applying the best marketing tips can increase the sales of your products or services by improving your overall branding. Remember, marketing is both art and science. You need to be knowledgable enough to understand how human minds react to certain offers. Besides, you should be creative enough to prepare ads that your audience will cherish. Happy marketing!