Successful start-up marketing requires great product along with great marketing. In case of start-ups, two basic truth exists. One is great product alone is not enough for success and second no amount of marketing can sell the poor-quality product. It’s not the product, but how the product is developed and marketed makes money.
In common parlance, Marketing and Business Development are used interchangeably but these are two different terms. Marketing refers to activities related to business promotion, selling product and services including market research and advertising whereas Business development refers to pursuing business opportunities for business or organizations. Marketing is the front face of the business growth whereas business development works in back stage.
You can sell your product to potential customers only if you are visible to the public eye through proper marketing. Take the e.g. of “Surf Excel” it targeted customer mind with very interesting campaign called “Daag Acche Hai” It’s such a huge campaign which covers offline and online media coverage. The purchase decision of consumer is not only with rational but also emotional connect. It very well targeted emotional quotient. It shows the message with many children small stories, when they are doing something good, their clothes get dirt. In the same line, ad campaign of IDEA with tagline “What an IDEA Sirji”. These ad campaign have helped to build its brand in the Indian Market. As per famous quote “Good marketing makes the company look smart, great marketing makes the customer feel smart.”
On the other hand, business development refers to identification of opportunities either internal or external that drive growth of your company. It focuses on long term strategic goals of the Company and evaluating the best paths to pursuing growth through focus on existing products and customer base. It can be summarized as the ideas, initiatives and activities aimed towards making a business better and bigger. This includes increasing revenues, growth in terms of business expansion, increasing profitability by building strategic partnerships and making strategic business decisions. It creates long-term value for an organization in terms of increased customers, bigger markets share, and better relationships.
Start-ups cannot be successful without a marketing and branding strategy from which business development efforts can be build. As always, a firm’s brand needs to be strongly defined and integrated throughout all mediums so that when a customer visits a website or ad or any online portal, they will receive the consistent message about the business.
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