It’s never easy for a brand, a business, or an organization to break into a new market. And with the exponential growth of the Muslim market, you would be right if you decided to work with a Muslim marketing agency to do so.
Well-established mainstream brands, businesses, and organizations understand the potential of targeting the $3 trillion Muslim market but lack the know-how. Many times this has led to some of them repelling Muslim consumers instead of attracting them.
This leaves you with two choices: hiring in-house experts from the Muslim community or a Muslim marketing agency to help you target Muslim consumers efficiently.
In this article, we will be covering what to keep in mind and the basic dos and don’ts of hiring a Muslim marketing agency.
The Importance of Getting it Right
With the exponential growth of the Muslim market, many Muslim marketing agencies have popped up like mushrooms. Some good and some not so good!
If you search the web today you will find many Muslim or Islamic marketing agency websites and social media accounts that have been abandoned. The reason for this is that not everyone who is a Muslim and happens to know marketing can deliver on their promises.
The Muslim market is a very complex and at times complicated terrain to navigate through. It takes years of experience and occasionally lessons from failures to understand how to tame the beast.
As they say: “You only get one chance to make a first impression”. And just like any other consumer out there, the Muslim consumer will judge your brand, business, or organization based on that first impression and never look back.
That’s why it is vital for you to read up on and make use of the following tips when choosing your Muslim marketing agency.
Tips for Choosing the Right Muslim Marketing Agency
Let’s now look at the top tips for hiring a Muslim marketing agency:
Knowledge
Yes, knowledge! Make sure that the agency has a thorough knowledge of the composition of the Muslim consumer market. The Muslim market is made up of people from all ethnic backgrounds, and when we say “all” we mean “ALL”!
Muslims are also of different religiosity levels. And to make matters more complicated, those of the same religiosity level have different opinions about what is OK and what isn’t.
But one thing is for sure, most of the individuals in these different groups take pride in being Muslims. So if the agency you are talking to does not understand these variables, they may end up isolating many of the Muslims you want to engage.
Of course, you cannot please everyone, but you do want to get the basics right so that you don’t find yourself scratching your head as to why your marketing efforts are repelling Muslim audiences instead of attracting them.
This is huge! Get this right, and you are off to a great start!
Agree on the Type of Muslim Consumers to Target
Not all Muslim consumers are the same. Just because they all share the same religion it does not mean they have the same buyer behavior and attitude towards brands, products, and services.
“Religious, cultural, national, generational, diversity means the message you send out as a brand needs to be tailored to the exact Muslim buyer persona you have in mind.”
Source: How to Run a Successful Digital Marketing Campaign to Muslim Consumer
If you are still at the stage where you haven’t yet identified your product market for a Muslim niche, see how to do so by reading How Mainstream Brands Can Identify and Serve Muslim Niche Markets.
If you feel like the Muslim marketing agency that you are talking to does not understand or has no in-depth knowledge of your ideal Muslim consumer or the niche you want to target, that’s a red flag.
Try to Learn Everything About the Agency
It goes without saying that in any solid partnership, you should share common values. Think of corporate cultural beliefs; are their’s aligned with yours?
This is so important when selecting a Muslim marketing agency or even a multicultural one. Given the sensitive nature of the work, you must be able to agree on every aspect of the project you want to work on.
So try and get a feel for their work culture, energy, and the heartbeat of the agency. If it feels like a place you would like to work, you’re probably on to something.
A good tip is to try and speak to members of the creative team. You want to find out if they are empowered or feel restricted. Creatives that are free to express themselves produce more unique and innovative end products.
Ask Yourself How Diverse Their Team Is
A bit of a background story on this.
Muslim migrants settled in the West within the context of their ethnic communities. They saw themselves, for instance, as Sri Lankan, Somali, or Algerian, first and foremost.
Due to this strong focus on cultural identity, today, religious orientations include cultural pre-eminence. We also see each cultural ethnicity group comfortable in their own ethnic spaces.
This causes each group to look at Islam and fellow Muslims through different lenses.
If you hire a Muslim marketing agency you need to make sure that they have a team of Muslims from diverse backgrounds. If you hire an agency that is made up only of, for instance, Indonesian Muslims, your brand, business, or organization will be advertised to Muslims from an Indonesian Muslim perspective.
You do not want to isolate large sections of Muslim cultural and ethnic groups in your campaigns.
At Muslim Ad Network, for instance, we have strong cultural diversity that keeps our messaging neutral and relevant to the entire Muslim community. Currently, we are represented by:
- Pakistan
- USA
- UK
- Mauritius
- Afghanistan
- Kenya
- The Netherlands
- Philippines
As you can see, there is no one dominant ethnic culture in the team, and that’s what you want to see when choosing a Muslim marketing agency.
Conclusion
It is easy to fall into the trap of going through the usual process you go through when deciding to hire a Muslim marketing agency. However, there are certain nuances that you need to take into consideration.
Not doing so can lead to wasted time and money and a whole lot of frustrations. And that’s the good news. Getting it wrong could repel Muslim consumers as your marketing campaigns could:
- Isolate large groups of Muslim consumers
- Come over as tokenism
- Even offend certain Muslims
First impressions are everything, and in today’s cancel culture, first impressions are more important than ever for brands, businesses, and organizations.
Choose an agency that offers you the right balance.
Muslim Ad Network has been helping brands, businesses, and organizations for more than a decade. Yes, that’s way before advertising to Muslims became a thing.
If this article has helped you understand how to choose the right agency to help you advertise to the exponentially growing Muslim market, feel free to contact MAN. We can have a productive discussion about your needs and business objectives.
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