The secret of marketing success can be explained in just 14 words which are the 4 Rights of Marketing.
No matter what marketing initiative you’re pursuing, the 4 Rights of Marketing are critical considerations and components. They’re the foundation of marketing and without them, your marketing investments have very little chance of driving the results you want and need.
The 4 Rights of Marketing Are…
- Right message to the
- Right audience at the
- Right time in the
- Right place.
The hard part comes when you try to figure out what the right message, the right audience, the right time, and the right place are for each of your marketing investments.
1. The Right Message
You can’t craft a compelling message that hypes the benefits which truly matter to the target audience unless you can identify and understand that audience first.
Think of it this way—if your ad hypes your restaurant’s low prices but your audience cares far more about quality of food and service than prices, your ad won’t generate the return on investment you need.
2. The Right Audience
You have to research the audience to identify specific target segments because one size does not fit all in marketing. In other words, one message does not fit all in marketing.
For example, many people hire residential cleaning companies to clean their homes, but different audience segments do so for very different needs. A young, working couple might hire a cleaning company because they simply don’t have time to clean while an elderly person might hire a cleaning company because they’re not physically able to clean their own homes.
These disparate audience segments would respond better to different messages, but you’d never know that if you didn’t first know your audience and segment them.
3. The Right Time
You have to make sure your marketing campaigns get in front of people when they’re receptive to them or your efforts will be useless. Timing matters a lot in marketing and it’s probably the “right” that you’ll have to experiment with the most.
4. The Right Place
People need to see your marketing messages when they’re in a place that they’re not only receptive to receive them but also capable of responding to them.
Every person in the world is not going to see every ad in the world. It’s your job as the marketer to find the best placement to ensure the target audience sees it. Before you can write your ad, you have to place your ad.
The Takeaway
Make sure every marketing initiative is built on a solid foundation of the 5 Rights of Marketing, and remember, you’re unlikely to get it right the first time. Increasing the return on your marketing investments requires testing, revising, and testing again.
Susan Gunelius
Susan Gunelius is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc. and Founder & Editor in Chief of an award-winning blog, WomenOnBusiness.com. She is a 25-year veteran of the marketing field and has authored 10 books about marketing, branding, and social media, including the highly popular 30-Minute Social Media Marketing, Content Marketing for Dummies, Blogging All-in-One for Dummies and Kick-ass Copywriting in 10 Easy Steps. Susan’s marketing-related content can be found on Entrepreneur.com, Forbes.com, MSNBC.com, BusinessWeek.com, and more. Susan is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She has worked in corporate marketing roles and through client relationships with AT&T, HSBC, Citibank, Intuit, The New York Times, Cox Communications, and many more large and small companies around the world. Susan also speaks about marketing, branding and social media at events around the world and is frequently interviewed by television, online, radio, and print media organizations about these topics. She holds an MBA in Management and Strategy and a Bachelor of Science degree in Marketing.
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