Marketing is essential for attracting customers. Most companies understand the basics, however when implementing a marketing strategy it can often be a bit of a mess. Below are a few signs that your marketing strategy could need some improvement.
You Don’t Do Any Research
Don’t just base your marketing off of your own intuition - especially if you don’t have any experience in marketing. There are tricks to things like social media marketing, email marketing and SEO that require research. Take the time to research marketing tactics at blogs such as this one owned by Joey Armstrong. This could prevent you from making rookie mistakes.
Make sure that you’ve also researched exactly who your audience are and what types of marketing tactics appeal to them. Consider consumer surveys, focus groups and competitor research.
You Don’t Plan Ahead For Your Marketing
It’s worth planning your marketing ahead rather than being spontaneous with marketing ideas. For example, you may have a great idea for a social media post or a great idea for a blog post - before you post it, consider whether now is the best time to publish it. You could get more leads by scheduling your post for a specific day and time when more people are likely to be online.
Planning ahead isn’t just good for targeting key times - it can also give you time to research and prepare. Whether you’re creating a video advert or putting on a marketing event, it’s useful to have lots of time to prepare so that you can make it as successful as possible. If you only give yourself a couple weeks - or worse a couple days - your marketing strategy will be rushed.
You’re Not Tracking Performance
It’s important that you take time to assess the performance of your marketing strategies. If you’ve launched a PPC advertising campaign, you ideally want to be able to tell who clicked on your ad and how many of them converted into leads. This can help you to determine whether or not to run the advert again and what improvements you may want to make to your next campaign.
Analytics can be used to track the performance of many digital marketing strategies. When it comes to offline marketing strategies, there may be other ways of tracking performance such as using follow-up surveys (such as asking people who attended your marketing conference to give feedback via email).
You’re Trying To Target Too Many Marketing Channels
While it can be worth dabbling in different types of marketing, you should try to keep a focus on a few specific types of marketing so that you’re not spreading your time and resources too thin. When getting involved in social media marketing, don’t try to conquer every social media platform unless you’ve got dedicated staff members that can do it for you. Instead, use your time to focus on specific social media sites that are likely to have the best results. For example, if you run a cake making business, it might make sense to focus on image-heavy sites like Instagram and Facebook.
These tips should keep your marketing strategy optimized and organized leading to much better results!
Marketing can be so hard sometimes! As a food blogger, I try to work on recipes a few months ahead of seasons so I have them ready. For example, we were eating soups in the summer and already have had a "Thanksgiving dinner" since I was working on recipes for November.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely. Marketing is not easy and it's something that we need to think through and give plenty of time to. Nice post.
ReplyDeleteThese are all true, The things you mentioned here really made me reflect on my marketing strategies. I gotta plan ahead, do more research and track my performaces
ReplyDeleteI am a blogger and I post in major sites, making me not doing other things. I geuss, it is time to focus my energy more in one or two sites only.
ReplyDeleteThese are all great tips for marketing. I know I am guilty of these at one time or another. And it can vary depending on the industry. My degree is in Marketing, but I got that back in 2004! Marketing has changed a bunch since then, but a lot of the same principles still apply.
ReplyDeleteNot tracking performance and working without making prior research are two huge mistakes I did in my past, trying to see some hand-made crafts. It's an experience I never want to be in again.
ReplyDeleteSOmetimes when we get too excited about things, we tend to ignore things that matter. These tips can really help starters with marketing..
ReplyDeleteI personally find it too complex.. While i know how marketing strategies can be extremely beneficial to my blog to make it more visible online, i just don't know where and how to start. I would love to enter some webinar about this to learn more about marketing.. Some of the things you mentioned herr, however, has already been part of my regular routine including the use of analytics to monitor my progress.. Thank you for these tips.. I will definitely keep them all in mind
ReplyDeleteI don't think it's a mess but I feel that it's not enough or excellent. Thank you for the tips. Will take your advice on not to conquer all social media platform. It actually makes sense.
ReplyDeleteI just discovered this blog. The timing of this post is *perfect*. I've decided to self-publish a book of essays, and I have no clue how to market it. Apparently, I need to get the marketing plan set up WAY in advance of publishing.
ReplyDeleteGreat to see you Steph!
Hey, Joe! I'm so glad you're writing again!
DeleteThanks for sharing this wide knowledge with us. I really liked it. It will be helpful to each reader.
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