Is Your Marketing Like a Breakfast Burrito? Why It Should Be - Turbify Resource Center - Get the information you need to succeed online

DISCLAIMER: This post will make you hungry. My apologies. I just made a fantastic breakfast burrito, and as I always say, inspiration comes in surprising places.

When you think about the perfect breakfast burrito, it’s got the perfect balance of crispy, fresh tortilla, warm egg, gooey cheese, and spicy salsa, at least in my book. As I enjoyed one this morning, it made me think about how marketing, if done correctly, has a similar balance among all the components.

Recently, I spoke with a client who hired my marketing firm to write and publish press releases. He’s not using social media, email, blogs, or any other marketing tactics, so I let him know he’d see limited results with just press releases without those other tools in place. He’s not alone; a lot of small business owners think that by doing one type of marketing (usually the most affordable), they’ll increase sales. It rarely happens that way.

Instead, you need a healthy balance of different strategies. It’s all about diversifying those eggs in your basket, then making a breakfast burrito with those eggs! Here’s your recipe for success:

Table of Contents

Tortilla: Start with Your Foundation

Your foundation is your overall marketing strategy. It will encompass the different channels you’ll use to reach your target market, how you’ll use each, and what goals you hope to achieve. Just like with a tortilla, your strategy is what will hold everything together.

Egg: Make It Anything but Boring

Eggs, like marketing, can be bland and unexciting, unless you really put effort toward preparing them in unique ways. For me, I sprinkle a little Tony Chachere’s Creole seasoning on my eggs, and maybe a bit of scallion. When it comes to your marketing, you’ll know what you’re doing is boring if it’s not moving the needle toward more web visits or sales. Everyone else is marketing in your industry; it takes effort to stand out with your content, emails, and social updates.

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Cheese: Make It Yours

People who don’t love cheese as much as I do tend to lump it into one sticky, gooey category. But as you get to know the nuances of cheese, you understand that each has its own voice and flavor. Find your flavor. Once you spend some time on social media, for example, you’ll start to get into a groove of knowing what gets a positive response from your community. Maybe it’s your daily photo of behind-the-scenes shots in the office. Or your tweetchat. Whatever magic you find you’ve got, rock it for all it’s worth.

Salsa: How Hot Do You Want It?

Just like salsa adds spice to my breakfast burrito, you also need to pep things up in your marketing. Don’t be afraid to push the envelope. Get reactions. Anger people. But only if that’s your brand. If you’re a play-it-safe kind of stationery company, sharing provocative articles probably won’t be in your best interest. But if you’re an outrageous surfwear company, your customers probably want you to toe the line between safety and danger. Find the balance based on your company’s risk profile.

If you work on each of these aims, you’ll end up with the perfect meld of branding, communication, and connection with your demographic. No one wants to eat just cheese or salsa. It’s all about having all those flavors together. What’s in your burrito?

About Susan Payton

Susan Payton is the President of Egg Marketing & Communications, an Internet marketing firm specializing in marketing communications, copywriting and blog posts for the software industry. She’s written three books: DIY Press Releases: Your Guide to Becoming Your Own PR Consultant, 101 Entrepreneur Tips and Internet Marketing Strategies for Entrepreneurs, and has blogged for several sites, including The Marketing Eggspert Blog, as well asCorpNet, Small Business Trends, Chamber of Commerce, and ScheduleBase. Follow her on Twitter @eggmarketing.