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Promotion Menu
Who is my audience? Where is my audience? How do I reach them? What attracts visitors: Nature of the Net: Product vs. Services: Marketing Techniques:
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Promoting your Disability Advocacy Previous information provided in this course has been offered as a means of preparing you for this all important marketing segment. Please note that concepts like "Content and Design" are as important to online marketing as are the specific promotional techniques found within this training segment. If you have not reviewed the other training segments in this program, I suggest you do so before reading this material. The goal of this segment is to teach you the fundamentals of promoting your advocacy service on line. We'll also help you to avoid many of the common mistakes made by other online businesses who are using the Internet as a marketing tool. At the bottom of this page, you will also find a menu bar for additional marketing techniques. For best results, view each of these marketing segments after you have completed this one. Before you can effectively promote your advocacy service, you must understand and have a clear idea of who you are in comparison to everybody else within the advocacy field. This inner comparison should be specifically made with other companies offering the same service. However, you needn't look to others in the field to answer this profound marketing question. As the premier educator of disability advocates, we often receive questions related to competition in this field. We have traditionally handled these inqueries by assuring our students that this field is far from being saturated. However, there is another competitive issue that is much more important to the bottom line than market saturation. That issue is the profound business fact that no two services are alike! Every disability advocacy service is different! This is true even if you and your competitors are in the same business, located in the same town, on the exact same street. It's impossible for two different services to be identical because each is headed by a different individual. Each individual brings a unique perspective to a business that is based on that person's personality, education, character, attitude, creativity and experiences. Most business owners believe that capital is the key to beating the competition. Nothing could be further from the truth! The key to successfully competing ( especially on the Internet) is your ability to communicate your uniqueness to a potential customer. This is not as difficult as it sounds! When starting an advocacy service, don't look to your competition for ideas. Look inward! Ask yourself what is it about (me) that will allow (me) to build a business that reflects my special virtues. This approach will open up a whole new world of creative possibilities that will take your business to new heights of success. I'm honest, sincere, hardworking, educated, experienced, determined, creative, friendly, focused, etc. Who is my audience? In disability advocacy, there are two basic customer types, also called the target market. One is the potentially disabled person who will actually use your services and the other is referral sources. Referral sources are any person, business, agency or service that can provide referrals of the first customer type. That's it folks! It needn't be any more complicated than this. When marketing online, you should develop and direct your marketing approach to: 1) Potentially disabled customers directly Because the Internet is a worldwide marketing tool, many businesses who use it immediately lose their marketing focus. They see the Internet as a way to reach the world and forget all about targeting their specific market. Keep in mind that your advocacy service is in-fact a local business. This is an extremely important point because the scope and character of your promotional campaign must also be local. It would be a complete waste of your time to try to reach the top of the search engines as a primary marketing approach. Why, because your market is local. The only search engine keywords you want to be concerned with are those that direct local business to your firm. To a savvy online marketer, there is much more to the Internet than just the Web. Online marketing opportunities abound not only on the Web, but also in the traditional marketing arena. On the Web, you have access to less traditional marketing forums such as e-mail, discussion groups, newsgroups, social networks and other online forums. We will talk about how to take advantage of these marketing arenas later in this segment. For now, I want to discuss in general terms, how you locate a disability advocacy market. Recall that there are two basic customer types for an advocacy service. These customer types are the (potential applicant) and any (referral source) who can provide access to more potential applicants. The Internet is a direct marketing tool for finding referral sources. However, right now, the Internet is not the primary tool you will use to directly find those applying for disability benefits. Why? Because most SSA disability applicants are not surfing the Web looking for advocacy services. Although this may change in the very near future, we want to keep our focus within the realm of today's reality. As the Internet becomes more and more integrated into the lives of ordinary citizens, your potential customers will seek advocacy services online. For now however, the Internet must be used as an information conduit that can drive disability applicants to your service. How can this be done? There are hundreds of different ways to promote your service online if you understand and properly use the incredible tool that is the Internet. The marketing value of the Internet for an advocacy service lay in three areas: 1) Attract new customers Reaching potential customers on the Web can be accomplished by creatively using traditional Web tools. The Web tools I am referring to are: Search engines Even though the above Internet tools can easily be used for a national marketing campaign, you should not use them in that manner. Once again, I want to remind you that your market is local! Therefore, when using any Internet marketing tool, its focus must also be local. The best way to reach new customers directly is still traditional off-line marketing. Many companies want to ignore this fact because they fail to see the benefits of using traditional marketing within an Internet framework. It's not at all difficult for a business to integrate traditional marketing into their Web campaign. However, many businesses act as if this concept is like pulling teeth. The question most asked by these reluctant companies is: If you're going to use traditional marketing, why use the Web? The answer is simple. Use targeted traditional marketing to attract customers to your Website. Use your Website inform new customers. Informed customers almost always pick the company that informed them. It is imparative that you use your Website as the central control center for informing and services your customer base. The stronger the alliance between your traditional and Internet marketing, the more successful your overall marketing campaign. Content attracts visitors! Not only does content attract visitors, it keeps them coming back. People visit Websites because they want information. They don't visit Websites to see fancy graphics or to be sold something. I'm not saying that you should ignore the basics of marketing and not offer your services for sale. What I am saying is that your site, first and foremost, should be a place where a potential disability applicant can go to receive information. The information should not only be helpful, it should also be psychologically reassuring. For more information on approaches to Website content, see the "Content" segment of this course. One of the biggest mistakes you can make in Internet marketing is to assume that it is no different from traditional marketing. The Internet is different and these differences must be understood before you begin your promotional campaign. The nature of the Internet should be the driving force behind everything you do with your Website. As discussed in the "Design" segment of this course, the nature of the Internet should direct not only your marketing techniques, but also the basic design and content of your site. The nature of the Net can be divided into two camps. Camp one is the traditional purpose of the Internet. The traditional purpose of the Internet was to provide a conduit whereby scientists and eventually anyone else could go to acquire free information. With the advent of the Web, this traditional purpose was commercially distorted. However, even today, most people who use the Net still view it as a free research and information conduit. Don't fight this perception, use it! Provide content that serves the traditional purpose of providing valuable information while also serving your objective, which is to offer your advocacy services. People do not mind being sold if you provide valuable information that satisfies their primary objective for visiting your site. That primary objective is free information on the subject of SSA disability benefits. The second nature of the Net is defined through utilization. That is, what your using the Net for. If you are using the net for business, then you must make an important distinction. Are you selling a product or a service? The answer to this question determines everything else about your site. One of the least understood characteristics of the Internet has to do with whether or not you are offering a product or a service. In order to produce an effective Website, you must understand the fundamental difference between Websites that offer products and those that offer services. Websites that offer products are much easier to create for a number of reasons. Some of these reasons are: Products are tangible Services are intangible These rather obvious differences are generally ignored, even by those who call themselves Web marketing experts. What few companies understand is that it takes a good deal more knowledge than is generally available to produce an effective service related Website. For information on creating an effective service Website, be sure to visit the "Web Design" and "Content" segments of this course. Below, you will find a discussion of six important Internet marketing techniques. It's important that you understand that each of these marketing techniques are inter-related on several levels. That is, each technique will in some way depend upon and affect the other. No successful marketing campaign is created or implemented in a vacuum. As you implement one marketing approach, you should try to consider how it might interact and support some other approach. Doing so will result in an overall marketing campaign that will provide a dynamic and lasting effect on your advocacy service. As we describe each marketing technique below, we will also discuss how these subtle inter-relationships work. We will also devote much of our discussion to technical advice that will help you to create a better Internet marketing campaign.
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