​In one of the final hilarious scenes of Steve Martin’s 1979 movie, “The Jerk,” he staggers out of his mansion, telling his wife that he doesn’t need any of their possessions…except an ashtray. And a paddle game. And a remote control. And matches, a lamp, a chair, and a magazine.
 
The last four terms in our ABCs of Marketing may be some of the things you really need to make your business go places.

​(Hopefully, not like Steve Martin, with your pants around your ankles as you shuffle down a Beverly Hills sidewalk.)

Coming up with great ads for your company begins long before you write web copy or design a Google banner ad.

​First you must start smart by considering the identity of your audience, your own brand message, and the strategy in which you want to deliver it:

​A few years ago, a friend and I took a jaunt to downtown Minneapolis to attend a rally where someone we greatly admired was scheduled to speak. In search of refreshments, we separated, agreeing to meet up in ten minutes time at a designated spot. This would have been fine, except that when I arrived at the spot, he wasn’t there. What followed was 90 minutes of me frantically searching for him in a crowd of 92,000. (This was pre-cellphone days, so apart from sending up a flare, I had no way to contact him.) After the event ended, we did meet up again at our car, but I had missed the entire rally.
 
If you’re not applying proven marketing principles—whether online or in direct marketing—you may find that your business is going to get lost among the thousands and thousands of others out there.
 
Commit these words to memory this week. They are critical to your marketing success:

I’m not what you’d call “handy” around the house. I confess to hammering in a nail with the heel of my shoe, using duct tape to wrap gifts, and securing open chip bags with those little clippy things you use to bind reams of paper together.
 
If you read enough Buzzfeed, you might refer to these unusual practices as “life hacks.” But in all honestly, I think they just show that in matters of domesticity, I’m kind of just a “hack.”
 
It can be tempting to put together your marketing strategy with cheap apps or work-around fixes, but for long-term success, it’s best to follow the proven path to success.
 
That’s why I recommend using the following three tools or methodologies to make marketing magic for your business:

​It’s not just the kids who are distance learning these days. If you’re like me, you spend more time every day with your iPad than you do with any human.

And while we’re all hanging out in our lounge wear, eating copious amounts of Cheetos, binging Season 4 of “The Crown,” and wishing for a return to “normal,” we can still feel gratitude for the technology that allows us to continue working and learning.
 
Because the fact is, we’ve all had to adapt.

And if that means you’re searching for ways to build your business online, learning the ins and outs of marketing is fundamental to the process.