Marketing for Startups - Incubadora Sinergia

Agenda
Marketing
● Startup Marketing
● Marketing Basics
● Messaging and Content
● Channels and Tactics
○ Landing Pages
○ Other Channels

Before even looking at tactics...
● Must have a clear idea of your goals
● Must know what is necessary to deliver / dist your value
● Set up channels with clear calls-to-action (CTAs) for people to
take actions and express interest
● Know your customer / business
○ What is the job to be done?
○ How often (frequency) does this job need to be done?
○ What volume do you need now? To breakeven? To justify investment?
○ How is this process going to work offline and online?
○ What messages are important for them?

Big Changes in Starting Companies
Remember the context you compete in...
● It’s cheaper to start and market a company
○ more competition for your clients / users
● Potential market is bigger
○ “Software is eating the world”
○ More long tail opportunities (for niche business models)
● New companies all face the same challenge: communicating
with users
○ Rise of Online Marketing as a standard
Marketing is still just as daunting, intimidating...

Market Market Market Market Market Market
New
Product

Offline Marketing
● Ads - Print & Exterior
● Branding
● Events & Expos
● PR
● TeleMarketing
+ High volume
- Push
- Price
- Very little data
New
Product

Offline Marketing
● Ads - Print & Exterior
● Branding
● Events & Expos
● PR
● TeleMarketing
+ High volume
- Push
- Price
- Very little data
New
Product
Online Marketing
● Search
● Social
● Content
● Email
● Location Based
+ Intent (Pull)
+ Very cheap
+ Realtime
- A ton of data

WE THINK:
An overwhelming amount of
marketing channels and possible
actions
REALITY:
Marketing channels are a function of
our business model

Is there a scalable business model?
● Hustling
Things your competition won’t
do, what is necessary
● Search Optimization
Find you through search*
● Content Marketing
Blogs, videos, social media,
infographics, influencers, etc.
(feed SEO)
● Email Marketing
Direct access to people’s inbox
● Online Advertising
○ Search
○ Social Media
○ Banner / Display
○ Affiliate
● Mobile Downloads
Mobile specific networks
● Branding
Large Ads, Sponsorships
If No, then... If Yes, then...
Credit for model - https://youtu.be/MKxRs2vpsog

“OK, but that doesn’t apply to me”
Justification to spend money (and dangers):
● “Early stage, trying to grow fast”
○ Danger - is your product validated, does it have a fit?
● “Figuring out which marketing channels work”
○ Danger - is your messaging and UX good?
● “Figuring out how to price”
● “I don’t know how to do marketing”
○ Danger - Expensive / Generates dependencies
Reality:
A mixed model is ALWAYS short term

Why? The economics just don’t work

This has a cost
Getting customers takes
time and money

This has a cost
Getting customers takes
time and money
This is where we get
money
These guys are supposed to
pay us

How are your business economics?
Total Marketing
Costs
Total Customers
÷ Customer
Acquisition Cost=
$1000 100 $10
Total Revenue Total Customers
÷ “Lifetime”
Customer Value=
$900 100 $9
CAC
LTV

Cost of Acquiring Customer (CAC) vs.
Lifetime Value of Customer (LTV)
CAC > LTV
CAC = LTV
CAC < LTV Great Business
Bad Business
Bad Business
$10 $1
$10 $10
$10 $11

You are a No, until you are a Yes
● Hustling
Things your competition won’t
do, what is necessary
● Search Optimization
Find you through search*
● Content Marketing
Blogs, videos, social media,
infographics, influencers, etc.
(feed SEO)
● Email Marketing
Direct access to people’s inbox
● Online Advertising
○ Search
○ Social Media
○ Banner / Display
○ Affiliate
● Mobile Downloads
Mobile specific networks
● Branding
Large Ads, Sponsorships
If No, then... If Yes, then...
Credit for model - https://youtu.be/MKxRs2vpsog

Rule #1 - Start Hustling
“Do things that don’t scale”
- Paul Graham
● Paganza - taking stacks of invoices to pay centers
● QuieroInfo - client Qs → Small Business Owners
● Airbnb - door to door, founders taking pictures
● Stripe - “instant” merchant accounts manually
● Buffer - handwritten letters to early users

Getting first users → Whatever it takes
● There are NO QUICK WINS, best option is to start yourself
○ Going to be expensive (time and money) at first
○ Gain more exposure, knowledge from users → easier/cheaper to acquire later
● Cannot be lazy or have any fear
● The “Big Launch” does not exist
○ Can you remember any big startup launch?!?!
“A person’s success can usually be measured by the number
of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have.”
- Tim Ferris

“ You Make What You Measure”

If you measure your weight everyday...
… it might affect your eating
decisions
… you might be able to
correlate cause and effect
… if you make a goal, you
might better understand how
to reach it

The Funnel (AARRR Framework)
Acquisition Activation Retention Referral Revenue
https://www.slideshare.net/dmc500hats/startup-metrics-for-pirates-long-version

The Funnel (AARRR Framework)
https://www.slideshare.net/dmc500hats/startup-metrics-for-pirates-long-version
Visit to Site Signed Up
Download
Multiple Visits
MAU / DAU
Told Someone Paid
MRR
Acquisition Activation Retention Referral Revenue

Marketing ↺ Metrics
● Acquiring clients can be constant drain of time and money
○ But, if there is no growth, there is no business
● You need to find which actions and channels are working
○ Which are creating the most volume? ⭐
○ Which are creating the most impact?
○ Which are using the most resources?
● Marketing has iteration cycles - how long to test? KPIs?
● Then, which messages work best with each channels...

For Example - Looking at our Marketing
Volume Impact Resources
Pitch Night ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Noche de Miercoles ⭐
Prensa ⭐⭐
Contenido ⭐⭐
Canales Online ⭐⭐
Comunidad ⭐⭐⭐
Channel
We can start to make decisions based on estimates of volume, impact and
resources. Later we can use analytics platforms to optimize.

● Get out of your head → a founder’s mind is already corrupted
● Remember that messaging and copy is for your audience
○ And remember their “job to be done”
● Discern Features vs Benefits
Best Practices
● Active Voice > Passive Voice
● Make it skimmable (get the impact at top / headings)
● Play with scarcity / urgency
● Always give them a clear call to action
Messaging
More - http://theheureka.com/marketing-copy-startup / https://blog.kissmetrics.com/75-copywriting-resources/

"Here's what our product can do" and "Here's what you can do
with our product" sound similar, but they are completely
diferent approaches."
Jason Fried

Remember what clients are interested in...
● Product / Service - What is it, actually?
● Benefits - Faster? Cheaper? More Money?
● Incentives - Do they know what’s most important to me? Do
they know I don’t care about that?
● Process - Do they know who would be using this and what the
process is?
● Confidence - Is this too risky for me right now? Who else is
taking that risk?
● Team - Do I want to work with this team? Can they do what
they say they can do?
● Price - How much does this cost - money / time?

What assets do we have?
Elements of our pitch
WHY - Show the user that we understand
their context and know their incentives
HOW - One Liner, Explainer video, etc.
Product or Prototype
WHY - To let the user see the potential
benefits, how easy it is, etc. Not to show our
impressive it is on the tech side
HOW - Screenshots, Demos, Video
Walkthroughs, “How it Works”
Traction
WHY - Show them that we are already doing
it, that others are trusting us, and that there
is value in paying for it
HOW - Numbers, Client List, Case Studies
Press Mentions
WHY - Show more “social proof” and what
others are saying about us
HOW - Links to articles, Interviews
Team
WHY - Raise confidence, put faces on
project, more expectations about service
HOW - Team section, introductions, culture

Testimonials
WHY - Let the user see their potential
outcome and feeling when the job is done
HOW - Quotes from happy users (with
photos), videos
Partners / Integrations
WHY - To meet their requirements (if an
integration), to let them know they can get
started, to build confidence
HOW - List of available partners and
integrations
Support
WHY - To give them answers to extra
details and doubts, to set expectations about
customer service
HOW - FAQ, Chat, Knowledge Base, Phone
Number
Pricing
WHY - To establish a value, to create
scarcity and urgency, to guide a user to pick
a certain offer
HOW - Pricing pages, comparisons,
discounts, billing options

Unique Content
What stories, experiences and immediate
value can we share with our users / sector that
others don’t have access to?
WHY
● Let people see if they want to get
involved in your story
● Give the audience an exclusive reason to
be here
● Establish your brand and team as a
“thought leader”
● Extend reach for SEO
HOW - Blogs, live demos, e-books and reports,
simulators, infographics, transparency in
offers, etc.
Community
WHY - To centralize the mechanics of an
entire community, to foster peer to peer
sharing and feedback, to give a sense of
“belonging”
HOW - Slack Channels, Github, Facebook
Pages, Twitter Lists, Spotify Playlists
Content Marketing Examples:
Zillow - How much is my home worth?
Hubspot - Inbound Marketing Blog
Jason Lemkin (Investor) - Saastr / Blog
Intercom - Product Management Blog
CityCop - Statistics

Value Proposition Online
How far can you go?
Mobile App
Website / Platform
E-Commerce
Consumer Goods
Offline
Customer Segments
Hardware Installation
Digital Services /
Goods
Offline Services
Generating
Leads
Sales & Full
Delivery Online

Questions for every marketing channel
● Do we need to have this?
○ How deep into my value proposition can clients get?
○ Is this easily replaceable by another channel?
● Who is my primary audience for this?
● What are core messages / “jobs to be done”?
● What do we want visitors to do on our this?
● What does success look like?
● If successful, how can I take more advantage of this?

What do we need to have?

Make Sure You...
● Get the most important stuff above the fold
○ Clear messages
○ Calls to Action (CTAs)
● Make them skimmable, easy to digest, and naturally flowing
● Get necessary confidence builders and social proof in there
● Set user / client expectations on next steps
● Don’t use one landing page for every campaign
○ Must match messages with campaigns (bad expectations, lazy marketing)
● Have an idea of your market baseline
● Start with just good enough, then iterate to optimize
https://blog.optimizely.com/2015/12/21/landing-page-best-practices-debunked/

Analyze your competition
● See how they prioritize their content / assets
● What are they showing above the fold?
○ Ask yourself why? Does that mean it’s important for their clients?
● What are their calls-to-action?
● Core messages?
● What are they showing that you aren’t?

Examples
Good References
● Wistia / Sign Up
● Slack / Why Slack
● Airbnb / Host Sign Up
● Transferwise
● Robinhood
● Intercom / Early Stage Company
https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/landing-page-examples-list
https://medium.com/early-stage-startup-validation/how-to-setup-a-landing-page-for-validating-a-business-or-product-i
dea-d72c35fc012c
https://wistia.com/library/video-inspiration/demonstrating-the-perfect-landing-page
https://www.useronboard.com/onboarding-teardowns/
More Local UY references (mixed)
● CityCop
● Hipotecalo / Landbay
● Sagal / Producteca
● Grial Kit
● Quiena
● PetHelp

More Channels and
Metrics Coming Up...

Marketing for Startups - Incubadora Sinergia

More Related Content

What's hot

Similar to Marketing for Startups - Incubadora Sinergia

Recently uploaded

Marketing for Startups - Incubadora Sinergia