We are in a mission to create awareness that effective Marketing is a key part of successful small businesses around the world. In order to this, we want bring those who have practiced proper marketing for their success. One such example is BeWAXed. Durga Kenny and Marcus Kenny are both founders and partners in life and business. Who had a simple idea and took it to sky high within a short period of time. Surprisingly enough they both have no formal education in Marketing. Yet they managed to understand the dynamics of marketing and had been persistent in delivering value to their customers.

BeWAXed soon become a household name for an average and modern women in and around Colombo for body waxing. However, Durga Kenny says “it had not been an easy journey!”. Building a business from a simple idea to a successful business that is as large as BeWAXed which has four branches in Sri Lanka already in Colombo and Kandy Further, looking forward to expand in to modern malls such as Shangri-La Colombo and international markets such as India and Maldives had been one tough journey. Especially when you achieve all these within a short period such as 5 years!

Identifying the market

‘It all started once when I visited a salon for waxing and found that the service could’ve been better’ Durga says. Taking that experience, Durga and Marcus thought it would be a great idea if there was a specialized waxing salon that promotes professional and internationally standard waxing service. They identified the gap in the market and they understood that it was a growing need when the socio economic factors are improving in Sri Lanka. While most salons at that time were having waxing as a part of their service, they lacked focus on specializing and promoting it as an essential service. That is where BeWAXed positioned itself.

Market Research

“We did a little bit of research about the market” Durga says. She spoke to people who could be their customers and also who could be her potential competitors. Over several rounds of discussions, she understood that that most customers ‘loved it’ and most competitors ‘hated it’. While gathering this information locally, she also studied how it is done in the international markets. This information helped them to formulate their strategy and to come up with the brand.

Segmenting, Targeting and Positioning

Durga says they saw the segments that they needed to capture. They identified that there is a huge number of women who doesn’t get professional waxing at that time. Also they saw that there were segments such as ladies that come in a Mercedes Benz and an average girl that comes in a bus. Understood that it is important that BeWAXed has something to offer for both without making any of them feel uncomfortable. Hence, they came up with different packages that would involve different types of products that will be used for these different customers. Making all of them happy customer at the end.

Brand and its elements

“BeWAXed was a name that Marcus came up with” Durga says. The name itself is very clear in what it offers. It took the town by storm when it shows absolute precision in the specialized service that it offers with a simple brand name. Their idea was to keep the brand simple and fun. So they thought that they would keep the font simple and prominent and colour that would appeal the target market. In addition, the brand elements such as hair type textures on the ‘WAX’ word and the slogan of ‘We take it all off!’ were extra topping to the brand recall.

What is most important is that how the brand stays consistent across its communications. Durga ensures that these elements such as the colour, font and logos stay consistent in every communication such as the store interior, staff uniforms, promotional items, advertisement etc. These reflected and resulted in better brand recall from its customers.

Building the brand

Creating the name, colours and logos are easy, but building the brand is hard. Building the brand needs a lot focus on the customer satisfaction. It is important for any brand to offer exactly what it promises. Durga understood this really well. She says that they brought in a lot of international standards, ensure careful service and most importantly the personalized service. She believes, no matter how much her organization grows, she will keep a personal touch with her clients to ensure that they feel comfortable. One of the great things the she offers as a small business is that her personal responsibility in dealing with complaints. She goes to the extent of even refunding the cash if the customer is genuinely not happy about the service. This helped the brand grow exponentially and created a lot of word-of-mouth.

Advertising & Promotions

Although Durga was not sure of what ‘360-degree Marketing’ was, she had been doing it in a well-planned and consistent manner. She understood the need to have an approach where she will cover all grounds when it comes to promotions. Coincidentally that is what we call 360-degree marketing!

Digital – It had been the prime medium for their growth over the years. BeWAXed has a Facebook page operating for the last 5 years since their first day of launch. She had grown it up to close to 80,000 followers. What is shocking is that she had done all these by herself! She takes personal responsibility of posting in Facebook every day and that is amazing. In addition, they have a website, www.bewaxed.lk and recently started Instagram page.

Magazine – Although she advertises is certain magazines from time to time, she is not sure whether they bring any results. Thus she feels that it may not be working for her.

Loyalty cards – They have a large loyal customer base with a loyalty cards given to them. BeWAXed has proven that even a small business can successfully implement loyalty cards and make their customers feel valued.

Press Releases – Durga is fond of press releases. She believes that these press releases create a lot of good will among the customers and she consistently ensure that there are press releases carried out regularly.

Strategic Partnerships – Recently BeWAXed partnered with Amante in offering cross discounts for their customers from both sides. This was a huge success given that both brands had similar type of clients. In addition, they also partnered with Avirate in the same way.

Point of sales materials – They also have leaflets explaining their services, desk calendars, stand banners, posters etc to keep the customer engaged with the brand.

All of these elements and more put together they have covered their customers well. The secret to their success is the kind of engagement and satisfaction that they have with their clients. Their idea may have been copied by many today, but their passion and continuous importance of engagement cannot be copied easily. It may be the single most important reason for their exponential success during a such short period of time.

Word of advice for other small businesses

Durga’s advice for other small businesses is that “try to go that one step ahead in creating value to customers to keep your customers happy. Also as owner of the business, try to put yourself as the face of the business. Today customers would love to see that. Most importantly, if you feel that you have the right mix to become successful in your business, don’t take others opinion for granted.”.

Final touch

BeWAXed showcased how they can identify an untapped market, create a business model around it, craft an appealing brand and stay engaged with their clients. For any small business that look for ways to become successful this is a proven mantra. If any business think that they are too small to practice all these together, here is an example how they did it.

We as Small Business Marketing Consultants help you can understand this mantra. We try to bring in the importance of integrated marketing in to your business and help you execute them for success. Talk to us for a Free Consultation on how you can create integrated marketing in to your business.

The post BeWAXed: They took it all off! [Case Study] appeared first on The Marketing Department.

On the contrary, Forbes report that 80% of the small businesses fail in their first five years from launch or get stagnated in the same position. Lack of proper communication and marketing are two of the most commonly found reasons for this failure.

When looked deeply enough, most of these entrepreneurs who started their business passionately. They had the skills and knowledge in the respective business area. However, it is was their lack of continued communication for customer retention and customer acquisition caused them to lose customers and business over a period of time. Hence, it is important for small business to understand that proper ‘Marketing’ is key to a sustainable success.

Most large businesses today were once a small business. To name a few from global and local context,

• Apple – started as small scaled computer chip manufacturer in the garage
• GSK – started as apothecry shop in london in 1715
• Body Shop – started as cosmetic shop in UK to cater local customers
• Delmege – started as trading shop in down south in Sri Lanka
• Hameedias – started as clothing tailor in the late 1940s

And the list can go on and on. The point is; most of these businesses wouldn’t have grown to where they are now without proper marketing. At least at one point they understood the importance of proper marketing for continuous growth and sustainability. If not, they wouldn’t have an entire team of professional marketers running their marketing function right now.

So what is Marketing?

It is not uncommon that when we say Marketing, many assume that it is either ‘Advertising’ or ‘Sales’. There is nothing wrong in that, it’s just that Marketing means a lot more than ‘Advertising’ or ‘Sales’. A typical definition for Marketing would be like ‘A management process to understand and satisfy customers’. Don’t worry about it too much about it. The definition keeps changing from period to period. That’s the nature of marketing! What is understood as marketing today may change tomorrow. However, the fundamental ideology of marketing will remain the same. That is, Marketing is about Identifying, Understanding, Communicating and Satisfying Customer wants. To put it simple, when you have a great product/service, you must do the following to acquire and retain customers which in other words called ‘Marketing’.

• Identify the right customers from the millions of people out there – This is very crucial, because if you haven’t identified your customers correctly, you may end up wasting your valuable resources including both time and money.
• Understanding the identified customers thoroughly – Once you identified, you need to understand them deeply enough to get insights from their likes and dislikes to where and how would they shop similar products/services
• Communicating to them consistently – As human beings we tend to forget something, if we haven’t heard about them for a long. Thus it is very important that you keep your communication consistently even after they purchase. Advertising falls here as small part of the whole process of communication.
• Satisfying the customers so much to make them loyal customers – Irrespective of how best the product/service you would offer, they will not become a loyal customers if the service is horrible. After sales communication and ensuring that they are satisfied is critical for customer loyalty.

These are four critical steps in marketing.

So why Marketing is important?

Unlike a hundred years ago, the competition is very intense in today’s world. Growth of population, urbanization, globalization and increase in internet and communications are making businesses harder to acquire and retain customers. A shop owner from some village in China is now has the ability to compete with a grocery owner down our street, a small scale electronic manufacturer in India can compete with an electronic retail shop in town. This is how the world is changing and kicking out a lot business. Being physically present there with decent number of existing customers doesn’t necessarily ensure business anymore.

“What is the point in having an excellent product, if you can’t communicate the same effectively to your customers?”

That is why it is so important for small businesses to take marketing seriously. Because, the way technology and other aspects changing the world, even a large company would struggle to continue. However, the good thing is, if you have identified the right customers, if you have understood them deeply, if you communicate to them continuously and if you keep them delighted with your products and service you will not only retain them but also make them talk about your brand and create word of mouth. This will help you acquire more customers and grow business.

How can we help you in this?

The Marketing Department is marketing consultancy firm that is created to help small businesses in Sri Lanka. We are a team of professional marketers. Individually we have wealth of knowledge and experience in marketing. Unlike most other agencies who would propose you only the digital marketing, we focus on the entire 360 degree marketing. We have created a model that makes small businesses in Sri Lanka to have a marketing department for an affordable price. Contact us and get a free consultation on how you could do better in your overall marketing.

The post Small Business Marketing need Extra Care appeared first on The Marketing Department.

This change in the last 10 – 15 years have created a stigma in the minds of people that Entrepreneurship is the right way forward, thus working for corporates have literally become a bad thing. Public speeches, workshops and marketing of some of these companies have created this stigma of working for corporate companies and moving up in the career is no longer Sexy!

However, one must realize that entrepreneurship is not a new thing to the world. Anyone from your next door grocery owner to Richard Branson are entrepreneurs. In fact, the companies that are considered corporates today, once have started as small business by an entrepreneur. Thus, what is small entrepreneurship today will become a large corporate in future if successful. Hence, it is a cycle and it is a fact that not everyone needs to become an entrepreneur and can succeed in life moving up the career.

So what makes you conclude whether you are an entrepreneur or a successful employee

1. Passion

   Entrepreneur or an employee, you still need to be passionate about doing what you do. The moment you lose that passion whether being an entrepreneur or an employee you will lose progress in life. Losing passion overtime is normal. When one finds what he/she does no longer interesting and viable, it is natural to lose passion. In this situation, an employee will be able to make the transition without much risk and cost, where as an entrepreneur will struggle to change especially when he/she is stuck with obligations.

2. Work-life balance

   Typically an employee will have a good balance of work and life. Whereas an entrepreneur may struggle with the commitments thus making him/her sacrifice that balance for the sake of work. Having said that successful entrepreneurs blend their work in to day-to-day life and not feel that they are losing precious moments of their life. So boils down to whether you need your weekends off to spend differently.

3. Unlimited earnings

   It is obvious that successful entrepreneurs earn the highest in this world for the risks they have taken compared to successful employees. An entrepreneur has the opportunity to increase the earnings in shorter time whereas an employee will have to wait till the next increment or the career change. So if you are person who think you have potential and opportunity to increase the income steadily and sustainably, you can be successful entrepreneur.

At the end of the day, both being an entrepreneur and being an employee has pros and cons. There is no right or wrong. No pathway guarantees you success unless you figure out where you belong and when exactly you should make that change. All what matters is whether you are successful in your area of work or not.

The post Entrepreneurship: the sexy or the taken for granted? appeared first on The Marketing Department.

In reality, marketing not a magic, but it’s just math. While I acknowledge that not every aspect of marketing can be measured using ROI or any other metrics, it is about how all these elements work together constructively to help achieve the ultimate goal. In order to do this effectively, following are some key metrics that can be used to measure the effectiveness and efficiency..

Return on Investment (ROI)

ROI is the most commonly used metric to measure the effectiveness of marketing. However, as mentioned before, not everything that we do as marketing cannot be justified with ROI. There are aspects like PR, CSR and POSM cannot be measured with rupees and cents. However, a marketer should be able to justify the overall spending with a financial return over a period of time. The period can be determined and planned based on activities or campaigns, which would, in turn, would help measure results.

Awareness

Awareness is key to the ultimate success of business or brand, especially the awareness among the target segment. With the growing digital marketing, it is easy to understand the awareness of each campaign or promotion. Google analytics and social media tools such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube can help measure the reach of each content.

New customer leads

It is said that if a campaign has been seen by 100 people, typically 10 people will become prospects, out of that 10 prospects, 01 could become a customer. Thus, based on the new customers gained to a business can be used to understand how successful the campaign is. This is important because not every new customer lead will end in business. However, a new customer lead is a result of an effective campaign or marketing.

Customer loyalty

Most of the business focuses more on how to acquire new customers than focusing on increasing business from the existing customers. It is said that it costs more than 7x times to acquire a new customer than retaining an existing customer and making them loyal. If the campaigns helped existing customers to repeat purchase or increase, it can be also used to measure effectiveness.

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