FYO! Spending LUSH-iously on SEO? We wish we spent zero on advertising too. (And so what if #AOMOGYTMTFYO isn’t trending!)

Dynamic Marketing Communiqué
Thursdays: FYO! Find You Optimization

LUSH Fresh Handmade Cosmetics has a zero-spend policy on advertising.

ZERO!

Imagine how much they saved to reallocate the budget to other areas of the business.

Lush Cosmetics uses organic social reach to promote their brand. They create content that revolves around issues and events that they and their consumers care about.

Veering away from the usual methods of advertising, the brand focuses on their mission and values to raise awareness on the environmental and social issues that we (and their consumers) are exposed to.

Animal welfare, fair trade, ethical buying…

Even spreading the cause of controversial campaigns such as anti-fracking and the Guantanamo prisoners.

Because of this, people REALLY talk about them.

Their marketing strategy is to build customer favor and loyalty. It’s proven to be effective.

Effective = worldwide sales increased 26% YoY in the year 2016.

On top of their marketing, the shopping experience they offer is unique. Another layer of their brand identity is to make sure that their customers have a great time shopping in their stores.

The design and layout of their stores are colorful and fun, and they give their customers the chance to touch and smell the products. Their friendly and chatty employees give product demonstrations, too!

People love this set-up and they also love the cause that the brand stands for.

People buy things or are loyal to certain brands because they all have an important cause behind them.

It makes the consumer feel that they are contributing more than just buying a product.

Lush Cosmetics has definitely created “an almost cult-like following” without spending for advertising and by creating a great in-store experience.

Doing all that made people talk about them.

Word of Mouth (WOM)

It’s free.

It’s natural.

And, you make your customers do the marketing for you.

They’ll be happy doing it, too, because why won’t they want to talk about something they love and are loyal to?

Customers have friends and family. Friends trust other friends. Family members trust other family members. One person will tell another, and that person will tell someone else.

It’s a chain of events.

With the right strategy, you can turn your brand into something viral. Much like what Lush did.

Your target market will talk about you both online and offline.

They’ll want to know more and they’ll want to buy more.

With the right strategy and planning, you can successfully promote your brand by using WOM to:

– Make your brand and your brand’s cause interesting

– Create a trigger for customers to notice you

– Gain value through happy customers’ experiences

– Provoke emotion (people share something that makes them happy)

Like Lush Cosmetics, are you ready to take your business or brand to the next level and utilize the power of WOM?

Word-of Mouth is one of many tactics of FYO, Find You Optimization. Lush provides us a great example of how we need to think beyond SEO and into FYO.

About The Dynamic Marketing Communiqué
Thursdays: FYO! Find You Optimization

Why should you stop thinking SEO and start thinking FYO?

We’re not saying that you should abandon Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

Don’t get us wrong, of course we know this is something very important, especially in today’s digital marketing age.

The internet landscape is vast, and a world of its own. You really need to distinguish yourself and make your brand/company/website known and easily searchable.

Better yet, get to the top of page one for Top Results on Google or any other search engine.

However, what is the purpose of SEO? It’s that customers Find You!

That’s what matters. So, while SEO is one factor of FYO… it really is only one, and we ought not abandon all the myriad of ways digitally and offline for improving your FYO.

How can we look at this from a different and better perspective?

Let’s say you have it in the bag! You and your team are experts in SEO. Awesome. But did you ever wonder what else you could do to push it further and give your SEO skills a boost?

FYO! Find You Optimization!

Every Thursday, we publish content on how you can get your target market to find you, beyond the typical “type and search.” There are other things you can do along with your SEO to give your online advertising process a boost.

We LOVE WOMO (Word Of Mouth Optimization).

Let’s not forget RO (Referral Optimization)…

and the sometimes forgotten however very powerful AOMOGYTMTFYO! (Of course, we’re referring to “All-Other-Means-Of-Getting-Your-Target-Market-To-Find-You” Optimization)

OK, so maybe that last acronym hasn’t been trending recently…

Or has it?

#AOMOGYTMTFYO

Regardless, part of a great marketing strategy is knowing how to adapt new methods and make use of different types of marketing and promotion that best fit your business goals and give you the results you want.

Hope you’ve found this week’s insights interesting and helpful.

Stay tuned for next Thursday’s FYO!

Cheers,

Kyle Yu and Joel Litman
Head of Marketing & President and CEO
Valens Dynamic Marketing Capabilities
Powered by Valens Research
www.valens-research.com

This content is used with permission from The I Institute and The Business Builder Daily.

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