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Local Marketing vs. National Marketing: What’s the Difference?

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Two main factors influence any company’s marketing strategy: its size and its target audience. If the local population is your target audience, your marketing strategy will be quite different from a  national company. But just how different are these two types of marketing strategies? Why is it so crucial for you to know about them?

By learning the differences between national and local marketing, you can decide which marketing tools will provide the best results. Here are the key differences between local marketing vs. national marketing.

Social Media

One difference between these two marketing strategies is the way social media is involved in advertising.

When it comes to local marketing, social media is an excellent resource. This is because social media can provide you with a way to interact closely with your customers. Making references to local events or news in your posts will attract customers’ attention within your community. Employees of a local business understand the community’s culture and how to keep the content relatable.

For those trying to reach a national audience, social media strategies are different. Instead of focusing on local events and happenings, these social media managers create more generic posts. Likewise, managers only refer to national events relevant to the product or service in their marketing. While local companies can respond to most of their customers, national companies can only reach out to a small percentage.

Advertising Methods

Local and national companies use quite different advertising methods. In most cases, national companies focus more on promoting their brand and getting their name out there. They want their target audience to know their brand and logo in any way they can. This helps create trust between the company and its customers.

Local companies place their focus on marketing their products or services and providing excellent customer service. They promote their brand to their local target audience by using small business marketing tactics. For example, they participate in local events and build a solid reputation by using word-of-mouth advertising.

Types of Mediums

The mediums that are most effective for national companies are different from those that work best for local companies. Marketing locally relies heavily on local TV stations, radio stations, and small-town newspapers. These businesses also depend on their customers recommending their products and services to their friends, neighbors, and co-workers.

National businesses have access to much larger mediums to ensure they reach all their customers. While they also advertise on TV or the radio, it will be when a popular show or large event occurs.

The Cost of Marketing

Marketing costs vary considerably between national and local companies. National brands pay thousands for ad spots during national television. For example, it is common they advertise at events like the Super Bowl. Meanwhile, to advertise to a local audience, brands use less expensive mediums like the radio or newspapers.

National marketing campaigns need to reach their target audience, which can be all over the country. It makes sense for their marketing efforts to be more expensive. Advertising on a local TV station or using other local services such as billboards is much more affordable. It can provide the same effective results for small businesses.

Learn More About Marketing Locally by Contacting Web Content Development

Marketing plays an essential role in every type of business plan. To ensure your company is reaching the right audience, get in touch with our marketing experts at Web Content Development today. We offer an abundance of marketing services to ensure your brand’s success. 

5 Business Marketing Moves That Made Puma One of the Fastest Growing Companies in the World

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Puma is a German company, founded in 1948 by Rudolf Dassler. It currently operates on a multinational level. However, Puma was born when Dassler and his brother began their own footwear company in 1924. Puma has maintained growth since the beginning and is now among one of the fastest-growing companies in the world. In just 67 years, Puma has employed 12000 workforces that span across the globe, reaching more than 45 nations. What makes Puma a marketing powerhouse and how has the company grown so quickly? Great business marketing! Here’s a look at how. 

Puma’s 3 Segmentation strategies

To increase profitability, a business should find a target market or maybe multiple target markets. Imagine how difficult it is to sell diapers or baby clothes when advertising is tailored to appeal to athletes. It would make much more sense to appeal to parents, right? It is also beneficial to cater to the needs of this target market. If the target market for an automobile company is buying more pickup trucks, it wouldn’t make much sense to make and advertise sedans. Instead, the company would be better off making and advertising trucks. Segmentation helps achieve this reciprocity between the target market(s) and the business. Think of it as each ‘segment’ of the market getting its own, unique, product and marketing strategy. Puma uses three different segmentation strategies.

  1. Demographic: This type of segmentation splits up the population according to age, stages in life, gender, income, religion, race, and nationality. Each of these creates a niche group for targeting.
  2. Geographic: Geographic segmentation is fairly straightforward. The population is split according to location, language used, and ideologies that coincide with different people groups across the globe.
  3. Psychographic: This form of segmentation takes into account lifestyle and activities, interests, and psychological aspects of the consumer and their purchasing habits and behaviors. 

Puma utilizes these three forms of segmentation to create target markets in an otherwise overwhelming population of consumers. Segmentation is, however, only the first step in Puma’s business marketing plan. After segmentation, the next step in marketing is targeting. 

Targeting Strategies

Different groups of people buy products in many different ways and for many different reasons. Therefore, advertising and product development should evolve alongside each group. After noticing trends or patterns in market ‘segments’, tailor advertisements and product development to each group respectively. Simplistically; Puma sells more soccer cleats to certain ‘segments’. Therefore, those particular segments will see more advertisements for soccer cleats. Also, you must keep the segments informed of new cleats and soccer-related products.

Positioning and Recognition

‘Positioning’ refers to the place that a brand or company holds in the consumer’s mind. When you think of a quality computer, what brand comes to mind? How about a cheap and affordable computer? Quality products hold a reputation in the consumer’s mind, and this takes specialized marketing and then, ultimately, a quality product to back it. Puma has fought for and earned its reputation as a provider of quality athletic wear. This ‘brand positioning’ is the goal of rigorous marketing strategies.

Creating Successful Business Marketing Like Big Brands Such as Puma

These 5 elements set Puma apart from their slower-growing competitors. They can be achieved by any business. These strategies can also be applied to small business marketing schemes. Though flooded and quite overwhelming, the internet can be a great place to learn about a product market and employ the right targeting practice. To learn more about how to target the market for your small (or large) business, click here.