“Most startups don’t fail at building a product; they fail at acquiring customers.”
– Gabriel Weinberg, CEO & Founder DuckDuckGo
Unreliable. Overrated. Just plain stupid. These are terms that naysayers have tagged startups. Putting critics aside, startups play an integral role in the economy. Besides being economic drivers that create millions of jobs every year, startups act as playgrounds for new ideas and innovations.
From that innovation, however, comes risk. Money is always tight, and new investments must be vetted time and time again to ensure any new expenditures lead to exceptional results.
For that reason, marketing is often seen as a burden to an operating budget. While some startups may not need to pursue customers until the product or service is ready for market, completely ignoring the stepping stones to a successful company – branding, website design, market research – before a product is ready is like putting the reigns on a race horse right before it hits the straightaway.
A good marketing strategy explains the emergence of a new solution to an age-old problem and gets people excited about a product before it hits the market. Startups aiming for future success will have incorporated marketing strategies into a business plan well before the product is ready to launch – and that delivers the customers.
However not every startup has a marketing master on board. Startups often employ just a few individuals pushing plans forward without a complete marketing strategy. But companies in this situation still need marketing to be successful. Those engaged in bootstrap marketing should actively read up on marketing information from a reputable source that takes a startup’s needs into account.
Recently, Access Marketing Company launched a new business-centric marketing resource and community, “Market. Eat. Sleep.”, to meet the needs of the active entrepreneur. Created with business owners in mind, Market. Eat. Sleep. delivers bite-sized how-tos, marketing buzz and insights that don’t waste a startup owners’ time. Check out Market. Eat. Sleep. today and contribute your own marketing ideas to this growing community.
