All marketing efforts will fall into one of two categories:  push and pull strategies.  If you have ever been a part of any sort of marketing or advertising effort ever, you have used a strategy that falls into these categories.  You just may not have thought of defining it that way. Online marketing strategies are not any different.  In fact, with online strategies distinguishing and utilizing them is even more distinct.

Quick Distinction between Pushing and Pulling

As a father of 4 kids, I get told the difference of pushing and pulling all the time.  My kids instinctively know the difference and consistently want to explain it to me.  And, most of the time they use me to demonstrate that they didn’t really push their sibling they just pulled them a little. But, that is all for another article.

When talking about marketing efforts, here is a very simple way to distinguish between a push or a pull strategy.  We want to pull people in who are looking for our products and services.  And, we want to push the ideal prospects towards our company even though they may not yet be looking for our products/services at this very moment.

When it comes to online marketing, let’s discuss some examples of how we can both strategies to create leads and drive sales.

Pull Marketing Online

The easiest (and generally the most used) example of pull marketing for online strategies is Search Engine Marketing (SEM).  This is simply when an individual utilizes a search engine (Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.) and they are looking for your company OR your type of products and/or services, you absolutely want to pull them into your website.  How do we do this you ask?

Utilizing Pull strategies with SEM is actually quite easy but it takes a well thought out and accurately designed SEO strategy to position your website accurately and consistently for search returns.  I consistently see client and prospects websites where they tell me that they have been doing SEO for years and that they have it handled.  Then as I do my initial investigations on their site we learn quickly that their site is not optimized for the market, products, and/or services that they think.  SEO is not a one-time action and then walk away and expect incredible results month after month.  It’s a robust, organic system that is constantly changing because of changes in index methodology, new competitors seeking the same audience, and many other changing variables.

Positioning yourself (SEO outcome) properly and consistently for the major search engines will help you with your Pull strategies.  And, if done well, you will Pull new business for free because organic search results are free to you vs. paid advertising.

How will Paid Advertising Pull new leads and sales?

Paid Advertising is just that.  You can place paid advertisements directly in front of people who are utilizing the same search engines to find products and services.  The paid advertisements (or Pay Per Click (PPC)) strategically placed ads based on the words the searcher utilizes to find what they are looking for.  If your website is not naturally showing up on search results then you may want to consider paying for ad space for people who are currently looking for your products and services.

PPC is utilizing the same type of Pull methodology except that you are paying a “click rate” if someone actually clicks on your ad.  We will discuss PPC in more detail in a future article.

To summarize, Pull Strategies are using any online systems available to pull people to your website when they are actively looking for your products and/or services.  These tend to be hot prospects who are at this very moment interested in your product or services and looking for someone, anyone to help them meet their current need.  Have you positioned your online efforts so they can find you?  Are you sure?

Push Marketing

Push strategies in the online world very different than push strategies offline.  Push strategies in a completely offline world were wholesale discounts, kickback, bonuses, sales and any other strategy to try and entice someone who would not have normally considered your product or service.  Therefore, pushing them into something they would not have considered without the “push” motivation to investigate it.

With online methods we are able to utilize Push methods in a variety of strategies.  Strategies in which discounts, sales, promotions are not necessarily the only (or best for that matter) methods for capturing a prospects attention.

Utilizing Social Marketing (SM) strategies we can accurately and consistently place brands, products, services and the like in front of a variety of targeted audiences and through an array of methods.  And, even more impressive in my opinion, we can create sub-targeted groups within our target audience AND create specific ads, messages, graphics, etc for each sub-targeted group.  If the goal of marketing is to capture their attention and convert them into a lead and/or sale, then being as personalized in our messaging as possible is an amazing tool to help us reach our end goal.

Utilizing demographic and sociographic data through online systems is an easy and very cost-effective way to target our Push Marketing strategies.  It is personalized communication to multiple audiences, it is quantifiable and we can make changes and updates almost immediately to continually increase our ROI on these marketing efforts.

Let’s talk through an example to make sure we understand how this strategy works.  Take for example a digital print provider.  They have 4 segments of sub-targeted prospects.  They are:

1. Graphic Designers

2. Marketing Agencies

3. Small/Medium Businesses

4. Enterprise (Fortune 1,000)

Through utilizing Push strategies with Social Media campaigns, we created a specific strategy for each targeted group.  The strategy did the following:

1. We created a micro website (or Landing Page within their corporate website) for each targeted group.  Each Landing Page had targeted messaging, graphics and calls to action based on each group’s profile.

2. We created 4-6 PPC ads per targeted group and strategically placed them using sociographic data available through a variety of social networking sites.

3. We quantified the ROI on each AD within each sub targeted group. We utilized click rates, bounce rates, pages per visit and most importantly a conversion rate.  A conversion was someone that completed our goal for that Landing Page that ultimately gives us the lead (data information and direct contact with the individual)  And, the direct contact is requested by the individual so it is a hot lead for their sales reps to contact immediately.

The Ads that we created for this campaign were targeted with graphics and copy to capture the attention of each sub-targeted group member.  The copy and graphics were designed to capture their attention because we knew information about them (sociographic data) so we could utilize messages that we knew would capture their attention.  The ads were passive in nature in that they were placed in front of these individuals while they moved along webpages.  However, there was not anything passive about our strategy.  We knew exactly who was going to see which ad and we had a very direct goal of leading them to pages that spoke directly to them and had a Call to Action that we designed to capture their attention, meet their needs, solve their problems and prescribed our client as the solution to their problems.

The results were outstanding.  We consistently refined our ads and our calls to action based on quantifiable results.  We eliminated poor performing ads and replaced the marketing dollars to ads that had better results.  The results from this client are amazing and I will be happy to share them in more detail with anyone interested in learning more about our strategies, systems and client results.

So this overview of Push and Pull methods of marketing begs the question, which one should you use?

In this market, and with the available online tools and programs, the question should be How do I use both concurrently to maximize my marketing efforts?

A proper balance and strategy utilizing both will give you the best overall returns.  All of us know that we need to be in front of people that are currently searching for our products and services.  They have money in hand and direct need or problem to solve and you are the solution.

We also know that with online information (sociographic data) we can consistently target our ideal clients with specific messages and calls to action that will capture their attention.  If you knew that your neighbor was an ideal client for your company, would you wait around for them to have a need and figure out that you may be a solution?  Or, would you walk over and introduce yourself and ask for the opportunity to present your solutions?  You may not be so bold as to just walk right over and talk about your business but I guarantee that you have competitors that will do it.

Want to set yourself up for success?  Give us a call and see if we are a good fit for helping you grow your revenues.

Brandon Lee is co-founder of Candybox Marketing. He is a successful entrepreneur and business owner.  He has built and sold 3 companies in the past 15 years and is now utilizing all of his marketing and business development strategies to help his clients build successful companies as he has done through the years.  To reach Brandon, you can email him at Brandon@CandyboxMarketing.com or via telephone at (818) 292-0529.