Marketing
Issue No. 37 - October/November 2007
7Cs to successful online marketing
by Mr Marcus Campbell
When people enquire about creating a website, they generally ask two questions: “How much?” and “How can I be number one in the search engines?”
Although the questions seem poles apart, they have something in common and it’s not just the internet – it is a marketing plan and communication campaign.
While the marketing plan identifies the internal and external effects on the business, and sets objectives, strategies and processes to promote the product or service, the campaign relies heavily on effective communication with the target audience. This cause and effect determines the ‘result’ of the campaign.
The (result) depends on how effective the ��C’s of communication’ have been adhered to (cause). In other words, how well credibility, context, content, clarity, consistency, channels and capability have been addressed in the eyes of the target audience.
Addressing each of the 7C’s goes a long way to building a healthy reputation for your business. The 7C’s will help you to sell your product or service, to recruit the best staff even in a period of uncertain skill availability, and to attract the most desirable business partners.
In short, if you don’t address your marketing and communication needs offline, the online effort will fall short.
An example of this is when you attend a networking event and are given a business card from a potential supplier. The card is well presented, the supplier is well presented and, in general, you feel that you may do business with them in the future.
The moment has arrived. Prior to engaging the supplier, you decide to check out their website.
To your horror, it takes forever to load so you visit a number of other websites in the meantime. When it finally loads, you are amazed at the 250 fonts used in as many variations and you notice it was last updated before the new millennium.
You start reading the home pag...
