Pull Marketing Strategy

A Pull Marketing Strategy is a marketing technique used for organic demand creation for products and services through increased customer engagement and positive brand experiences. It increases the demand and sales of a product or service and boosts profits. This not only attracts new customers but also helps retain existing ones.

It is also called inbound marketing since it starts internally by locating customers who are already looking for certain products or services. The primary objective is to create and refine a brand that appeals to new and existing customers. It is best suited for businesses trying to build a loyal customer base, keeping a target audience that knows what it wants in mind.

• A pull marketing strategy is a marketing technique that focuses on creating organic demand for products and services by attracting consumers through content creation and trust building. 
• Businesses typically use multiple methods to create demand for their products and services, which include search engine optimization (SEO), advertising, content marketing, social media marketing, and email marketing.
• By implementing a well-planned pull marketing strategy, companies can attract the right customers, build solid relationships, and achieve their business goals. 
• To choose between push and pull strategies, companies must follow a nuanced approach, focusing on goal and target audience identification and in-depth business analysis to reach specific conclusions.

A pull marketing strategy focuses on building brand value, attracting new consumers, and retaining old ones. It is primarily inward marketing and employs sustained, disciplined efforts toward building brand value and credibility. The general idea behind it is to have a product consumers want and market it in a way that makes them actively seek it. Several methods are used to create this demand, including advertising, word-of-mouth, and influencer marketing.

Certain factors help a business decide if it needs to employ a pull strategy, and they are:

• Identified demand: When the business knows its demand with certainty (to an extent), which is possible by analyzing past forecasts, this strategy can be useful.
• Premium products: If products are priced higher, businesses can employ this strategy.
• Low competition levels: If the competition in the market is relaxed and the business can afford to wait longer to test out its strategies to increase demand, it is suitable. In such cases, customers would wait long and not choose competitors' products immediately.
• Long product life cycle: Businesses can effectively use the pull strategy if a product's life cycle is longer than the general life cycle of routine products. It allows companies to build brand awareness and cultivate customer loyalty over a period, leading to repeat purchases.
• Product Variety: Businesses offering a variety of products can benefit from creating targeted content for different products. Driving sales by attracting customers interested in specific offerings is possible in such cases.
• E-commerce and tech products: It can be employed in e-commerce or when businesses deal in technologically advanced products. This marketing technique is specifically effective in e-commerce because customers typically base their purchases on research, and pull strategies allow them to research thoroughly until they arrive at a decision.

All the variables or indicators mentioned in the list above may not be applicable to every business. A pull or push marketing strategy should be chosen depending on the business environment or other relevant factors, including marketing goals, growth objectives, etc.

In some industries, companies may use a weighted mean score to decide on the best action plan. However, certain situations may make it impractical for organizations to adopt a single system. In such cases, a hybrid approach called the push-pull-based system is often preferred.

A business can create consumer demand for its goods or services via various pull marketing methods. The following are some methods companies employ:

#1 - Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

This strategy involves making a website’s content and placement for relevant keywords more favorable in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). Products and web pages organically appear to the target audience when a business optimizes its website and other content for the search terms its target audience is actively looking for. This leads potential customers to the company’s products or services, potentially resulting in engagement, inquiry, and sales.

#2 - Advertising

Advertising helps develop and distribute commercials through various media platforms, including print, radio, television, and the Internet. Content advertising, outbound advertising, and pay-per-click advertising are examples of this technique. Companies can communicate with customers in a persuasive manner through advertisements. One of the key benefits of this technique is that the company can control the message and brand voice in its advertisements.

#3 - Content Marketing

It is a strategy that entails producing and disseminating educational and entertaining information. This includes activities such as blog entries, videos, or social media updates. It promotes content that benefits the target market and subtly advertises a product or service. It enables companies to communicate informative and engaging content that attracts the target audience, improves brand awareness, increases website traffic, and facilitates lead generation.

#4 - Social Media Marketing

Social Media Marketing involves using popular social media platforms like Facebook (A Meta company), Instagram (A Meta company), X (formerly Twitter), or LinkedIn. They are used to create and distribute informative and engaging content to the target audience and promote a company's products or services. While social media paid ads are considered a push strategy, businesses can use social media marketing as a form of pull marketing in several ways.

For instance, creating how-to videos, collaborating with influencers to create engaging content, sharing visually appealing images and videos of the product, and co-marketing campaigns on social media platforms are effective ways to generate interest and demand for a product or service. Organic content distribution in this form increases brand awareness and recognition.

#5 - Email Marketing

This involves developing email campaigns and sending promotional content or newsletters via email to the target audience. It supports business or marketing goals related to enhancing customer reach, accelerating relationship building, and enabling quick scalability.

Let us study some examples in this section.

Example #1

Suppose Laura has an online shoe business. She decided to apply the pull marketing strategy. For this, the online shoe business started social media accounts to post updates and images of its items. Laura gave the followers of these accounts attractive discounts. Additionally, she wrote fascinating articles about shoes, their types, materials used, etc., for her website. Laura also sent email newsletters to attract readers and increase engagement.

She then offered a loyalty program and specialized referral promotions to turn leads into paying customers. Through such efforts, Laura was able to build a devoted customer base over time. By offering valuable content, she cultivated a relationship of trust with future customers and earned considerable profits for her business.

Example #2

Suppose David owns an automobile business. He used the pull marketing strategy to increase sales in the following manner. David's company started a blog that offers helpful advice on maintaining and repairing cars, discusses the most recent developments in the auto industry, and reviews new car models for its readers. Potential clients who are curious about cars and the automotive sector are attracted to such content.

David's company also set up social media profiles. It posts consistent updates with interesting information, such as images and videos of new car models, customer reviews, and exclusive information about the car manufacturing of specialized companies to engage potential customers further. He also hired a professional actor to advertise and promote his business.

In this way, David’s company earned significant revenue and reported profits in their financial statements.

Example #3

Apple has built a strong brand and a reputation for quality and innovation to generate demand for its products. Instead of aggressively pushing their products through typical advertising, their pull marketing strategies concentrate on generating interest in their items by emphasizing their special qualities and advantages.

The company promotes the appearance, features, and capabilities of various iPhone models on its website and through social media channels. It also promotes events like product launches to generate excitement among customers. Apple invests in developing a frictionless and delightful customer experience to promote repeat purchases and word-of-mouth recommendations.

Apple's products are known for their exclusivity and prestige, which creates a strong desire among customers to own and use them. In addition, Apple's trade-in program allows customers to trade in their old devices for credit towards the purchase of a new device. This is an incentive for customers to upgrade to newer Apple products, fostering loyalty among customers.

This shows companies of all sizes and scales use this marketing strategy to generate revenues.

The advantages and disadvantages of this strategy are listed below.

Advantages

• It enables companies to target clients who are interested and actively looking for products, services, or solutions.
• This strategy builds trust and results in higher conversion rates and greater customer loyalty.
• It can be affordable, especially for small enterprises, because it increases a company’s organic reach.
• It increases brand recognition, customer loyalty, and word-of-mouth recommendations, accelerating demand generation and relaying and reinforcing positive feedback.
• Pull marketing offers a more long-term and sustainable approach to marketing than short-term push strategies.
• It empowers customers to make independent and well-informed purchase decisions, which increases trust and sales.
• It allows companies to improve and optimize their marketing strategy gradually by giving them access to data-driven insights and continuous feedback.

Disadvantages

• As more businesses and competitors adopt pull marketing techniques, attracting customers and generating interest may become increasingly difficult.
• Customers may not always be aware of a specific brand, product, or service despite marketing efforts since attention spans can significantly reduce due to excessive pull marketing by various companies.
• This technique relies on customer engagement and organic reach, which are time-consuming activities. Businesses may struggle to reach a wider audience, particularly if they are competing with established brands.
• Certain complex products, big-ticket items, and premium goods, especially those that require a more direct sales approach, may not be appropriate for pull marketing techniques. For instance, financial products and services require a more direct approach because customers may not necessarily have expertise in the area, particularly when compliance and statutory regulations come into the picture.
• Pull marketing techniques could necessitate a longer investment period before benefits start to pour in, making them unsuitable for companies with short-term goals or limited resources. Also, the results of such efforts can be unpredictable.
• An over-dependence on pull marketing methods could result in a lack of marketing diversity.

The differences between these concepts are explained in the table below.

This article has been a guide to what is Pull Marketing Strategy. We explain its examples, difference with push marketing strategy, advantages, and methods. You may also find some useful articles here -

• Push Marketing Strategy
• Brand Recognition
• 5 Ps Of Marketing