Consistent Social Media Posting
Brand Visibility and Recognition
Consistent social media posting keeps your brand visible and top-of-mind for your audience. Even if it doesn’t directly generate leads or sales, it helps in brand recognition. When people are ready to make a purchase, they are more likely to think of your brand if they’ve been consistently exposed to it.
Building Trust and Credibility
Regular posting allows you to showcase your expertise, share industry insights, and interact with your audience. Over time, this helps build trust and credibility. When potential customers are educated about your field, they’re more likely to trust your products or services.
Audience Engagement and Relationship Building
Social media allows you to engage with your audience on a personal level. You can build a loyal community by responding to comments, questions, and messages. This community is more likely to spread the word about your business and recommend it to others.
Educating Your Audience
Social media is a great platform for educating your audience about your industry, product, or service. Through informative content, webinars, or how-to guides, you can demonstrate the value of what you offer. While this might not generate immediate sales, it does create an informed audience that is more likely to consider your offerings when they have a need.
Staying Competitive
In most industries, your competitors are also on social media. Regular posting helps you stay competitive. If your competitors are educating their audience and you’re not, you risk falling behind.
Blog Writing on Your Website
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
Blog writing is crucial for SEO. Search engines reward fresh, relevant content. Even if blog posts don’t lead directly to sales, they can attract organic traffic to your website. Over time, this can lead to an increase in potential customers.
Educational Resource
Blogs provide a platform to educate your audience about your industry, product, or service. By addressing common questions or providing in-depth guides, you can position yourself as an expert. When your audience seeks answers, they’re more likely to turn to your website for information.
Establishing Authority
Regular, high-quality blog posts help establish your authority in your field. This can indirectly influence potential customers, making them more likely to trust and consider your offerings.
Long-term Value
Blog posts have a longer shelf life than social media posts. A well-written blog can continue to attract traffic and engagement for months or even years. This sustained presence can’t always be directly tied to sales, but it contributes to brand visibility and trust.
Lead Nurturing
Blogs are an excellent tool for lead nurturing. While a single blog post might not lead to a sale, it can be part of a lead’s journey toward making a purchase. By providing valuable content, you keep leads engaged and informed until they’re ready to buy.
Both social media posting and blog writing are about building a strong online presence and nurturing an audience. While it can be challenging to directly attribute sales to these efforts, their indirect impact is significant. They create a foundation of trust, credibility, and education that influences potential customers when they’re making purchasing decisions. Ultimately, they are essential components of a holistic digital marketing strategy aimed at long-term growth and brand recognition.
Social Media Posting
Establishing Authority
Regular and informative social media posts allow you to demonstrate your expertise in your industry. By sharing industry insights, trends, and thought leadership, you position yourself as a knowledgeable authority. When your audience sees you as an expert, they’re more likely to trust your recommendations and consider your products or services.
Reassurance Through Engagement
Engaging with your audience on social media provides reassurance. When you promptly respond to questions, address concerns, and acknowledge feedback, you value your customers and their opinions. This level of engagement can reassure potential customers that you are a business that cares about its customers and their needs.
Building Your Brand
Social media is a powerful branding tool. The tone, style, and consistency of your social media posts contribute to your brand’s personality and identity. By sharing behind the scenes content, customer stories, and company values, you create a more relatable and humanised brand. People are more likely to support and trust businesses that they can connect with on a personal level.
Blog Writing
Establishing Authority
Blog writing is an effective way to establish authority in your niche. In-depth, well researched blog posts demonstrate your expertise and ability to provide valuable information. When potential customers see that you consistently offer informative content, they’re more likely to trust your brand and consider it a credible source in your industry.
Reassurance Through Information
Blogs can address common concerns, questions, or doubts that potential customers might have. By providing comprehensive answers and solutions in your blog posts, you offer reassurance to your audience. They can make more informed decisions, knowing that you’ve taken the time to address their needs and issues.
Building Your Brand
Each blog post contributes to your brand’s identity. The topics you choose, the style of writing, and the values you express in your blog content shape your brand’s image. A consistent and well-crafted blog can help define your brand’s personality and values, making it more appealing and relatable to your target audience.
In both cases, social media posting and blog writing play essential roles in establishing authority, providing reassurance, and building your brand. They help you connect with your audience on a deeper level, demonstrating your knowledge, care, and personality. This, in turn, fosters trust, which is a crucial factor in the decision-making process of potential customers. Building a strong brand identity and authority in your field can set you apart from competitors and lead to long-term customer loyalty.
Overall – you need to have consistent, well written online content to help build your brand and look credible. Not sure how? Get in touch HERE
Patient research update from the last 3 months.
My research with UK & Ireland patients this quarter suggests that post covid, hearing aid patients now have even more specific goals and expectations. Here are my key findings below, ranked by them in order of importance. You know all this inside out but it’s interesting to keep on top of their mindsets and behaviours overall, in their words.
Improved Hearing Abilities
Unsurprisingly, the primary goal of the interviewed patients, seeking hearing aids is to improve their overall hearing abilities. They want to be able to hear clearly in both quiet and noisy environments, engage in conversations without difficulty, and regain the ability to enjoy various social activities (as expected).
So that they can have a…
Better Quality of Life
Patients commented that they aim to reduce the impact of hearing loss on their relationships, work, and daily activities. By improving their hearing abilities, they hope to participate more actively in social interactions, feel included in conversations, and avoid feelings of isolation or withdrawal caused by untreated hearing loss.
Which gives them…
Enhanced Communication
Effective communication is a major focus for these people seeking help for hearing aids privately (mix of patients who had never had hearing aids and ones who had experience of them). They desire improved speech understanding, especially in challenging listening situations like group discussions or crowded environments. Clear communication with family members, friends, colleagues, and healthcare professionals is important for them. It was interesting that some said that they didn’t want to struggle in a healthcare environment – that hearing any form of feedback from a professional was of high importance.
Then they wanted something unique to them…
Customised Solutions
Patients said that they expect highly personalised solutions for their unique hearing difficulties and lifestyle requirements. This hasn’t been a priority in previous research. They want access to a wide range of advanced hearing aid technologies that can be tailored to suit their specific needs (e.g., discreet design options, connectivity features with smartphones or TVs). We advertise and lead with this in terms of manufacturer content but it’s not to be underestimated still. They commented on a ‘fear’ of having something off the shelf that wasn’t ‘really for them’.
Professional Expertise and Service
The trust and respect for you as professionals is still very high. They trust professionals who can conduct thorough evaluations, provide accurate diagnoses, recommend suitable devices based on individual needs and preferences AND offer ongoing care such as follow-up appointments, adjustments or maintenance services. Ongoing care is becoming more important it seems.
Convenience and Timely Assistance
They want everything at their fingertips but also appreciate that for the expertise, they may have to wait. They were more demanding with high street providers but for ‘the real deal’ (patient words not mine), they were willing to wait up to 14 days to be seen by the same professional. They appreciate flexible appointment scheduling options that fit around their personal commitments. They are also interested in a smooth process of hearing aid fitting and ongoing support services with relatively shorter waiting periods.
These insights emphasise the importance of still delivering personalised, effective solutions, providing exceptional customer service and prioritising improved communication abilities and overall quality of life. We know it all, right, but still good to confirm and validate Contact me here
There’s nothing mysterious about the role marketing plays in business. It’s not enough to open a storefront or get a website and wait for people to come.
You need to create a voice and make it persuasive enough to influence customer decision-making. That is what marketing is for, and your business can’t be successful without it.
You also can’t expect your marketing strategies to hold up forever. Markets change, trends change, people change, and so your marketing strategies should too. Here are four ways to uplift your marketing.
1. Be Purposeful
You don’t need to use every marketing strategy ever invented to market your brand. Be selective when thinking about your product or services and potential customers. Today, social media is the obvious and one of the least expensive marketing tools you can use.
2. Invest in Brand Advocacy
Brand advocacy is using your existing customers to gain new customers. For example, you could incentivise current customers to use a branded hashtag promoting your latest product or service with a percentage off their purchase total. Potential customers take recommendations from friends seriously, so use your current customer base to grow.
3. Go Deep Undercover
While business owners want their competitors’ customers all to themselves, you might be at a loss of how to gain that competitive advantage. Take a cue from industry giants and head undercover.
When Airbnb started, it had many default competitors including every national hotel and motel chain. But they were smart about it. They launched an email campaign that targeted Craigslist users, offering their homes to travellers, pretending to be just another nice and helpful Craigslist poster. That was a bold move with the potential for controversy, but the company pulled it off and attached their competitors’ customers.
4. Analyse and Improve Your Performance
As a business owner, you know how important it is to analyse your performance to make the necessary improvements. But did you know that you don’t have to wait for your campaign to end before you do that? Savvy marketers know that analysis and improvements are an ongoing affair, which means you need to do them while your campaign is happening, not after.
Marketing is what gets people in the door and keeps them dedicated to your brand. Keep adjusting your strategy, looking for trends and market shifts. A strong campaign will help you stay on top of your game and in your customers’ minds.
Chat with me today HERE
Read my latest article in Startups magazine here #startupbusiness #marketingsuccess #marketingconsulting
READ THE ARTICLE HERE
Between buzzwords and trending gimmicks, marketing is often misunderstood. There are too many misconceptions floating around about what it is and what it can achieve. Marketing is so much more than just advertising and promoting products. Effective marketing involves deeply understanding your target audience and creating a strategy that resonates with them on a personal level. Let’s explore some common marketing misconceptions and debunk them once and for all.
Marketing Misconceptions
Here are a few of the biggest marketing misunderstandings and why they’re wrong:
Marketing is Selling
While it’s true that marketing can help you sell more products or services, it’s not the only goal. Marketing can also help you build customer relationships, create a positive brand image, and increase brand awareness.
Marketing is Advertising
Advertising is a form of marketing, but it’s not the only one. There are many other ways to market your business, such as public relations, social media, and content marketing.
Marketing is Expensive
While marketing can be expensive, it doesn’t have to be. There are many affordable ways to market your business, such as using social media or creating content.
Marketing is Only for Big Businesses
Marketing is for businesses of all sizes. In fact, small businesses can often benefit more from marketing than large businesses because they have a smaller customer base to reach.
Marketing is Easy
Marketing can be challenging, especially if you aren’t familiar with the latest trends and strategies. However, learning how to market your business effectively is possible. Our favourite marketing tips include:
- Using positive language and imagery.
- Focusing on the benefits of your products or services.
- Telling stories about your customers and how your products or services have helped them.
- Be yourself and have fun with it!
Marketing Can Help Your Business
Now that we’ve debunked some of the biggest misconceptions about marketing let’s talk about what marketing can do for your business. Marketing can help you:
- Increase Brand Awareness: Marketing can increase brand awareness by creating a strong brand identity and consistently promoting it through various channels. Using targeted messaging and visuals, businesses can effectively communicate their brand’s value to their target audience and build a loyal following.
- Generate Leads: Marketing can generate leads by using email campaigns, social media advertising, and search engine optimisation to attract potential customers and encourage them to take action. Offering promotions or incentives can also effectively capture leads and nurture them into paying customers.
- Position Your Business as an Industry Expert: By consistently providing valuable content through blog posts, webinars, and social media, marketing can position your business as an expert. This can increase brand credibility and attract more potential customers seeking industry expertise.
If you want to grow your business, marketing is a powerful tool to help you reach your goals. So don’t let the misconceptions about marketing hold you back. Start marketing your business today and see the results for yourself! Contact me TODAY
Every good business strategy must include marketing. When securing your company’s success, a decisive marketing strategy can make all the difference in today’s cutthroat marketplace. Making informed, data-driven decisions to target your ideal consumer and boost your return on investment are critical components of a powerful marketing strategy.
Advantages of a Decisive Marketing Approach
Let’s examine the advantages of a determined marketing strategy and how it may make your company successful.
Enhanced Effectiveness
Increased efficiency is one of the main advantages of a determined marketing strategy. Ensure your marketing efforts reach your chosen audience by concentrating on your target demographic and making data-driven decisions. This might simplify your marketing strategy and reduce money wasted on pointless advertising initiatives.
Maximises Marketing Budget
A decisive marketing approach ensures that every pound spent on marketing is put to good use. Businesses can streamline their marketing approach and reduce needless spending on unsuccessful initiatives by leveraging data and insights to make informed decisions.
Greater ROI
An aggressive marketing strategy can also boost return on investment (ROI). You may improve the efficacy of your marketing initiatives by focusing on your ideal client and adjusting your messaging to fit their unique requirements and preferences. This could lead to a better ROI through more conversions, increased revenue, etc.
Higher Brand Awareness
A well-executed marketing campaign can improve your brand’s awareness and exposure. You may attract potential clients and establish brand recognition by focusing on your ideal client and presenting captivating messaging. As a result, you can position your company as a reputable and renowned leader in your sector.
Enhances Customer Engagement
A decisive marketing strategy can increase client involvement by focusing on the target market. Businesses may increase consumer trust and loyalty and generate more repeat business and favourable word of mouth referrals by giving them a more tailored experience. This can aid companies in becoming recognised as authorities in their field.
Advantage Over Rivals
A focused marketing strategy can give your company a market advantage. You may outsmart your rivals and stay ahead of the curve by concentrating on your target market and making data-driven decisions. This may result in a more significant market share and profitability in the long run.
Typical Reasons Businesses Put Off Marketing and the Possible Solutions
Adopting a decisive marketing approach can significantly advance your company. Even with this, many small businesses put off marketing for various reasons. Let’s look at some typical reasons why people frequently put off marketing and provide recommendations for getting around these challenges.
Lack of Technical and Marketing Knowledge
A significant factor in why people frequently postpone marketing is a need for more technical and marketing understanding. Despite being subject matter experts in their businesses, many business owners need more technical know-how or marketing skills to implement successful marketing initiatives. Also, some business owners may lack the time or finances to learn new skills.
Business owners can invest in marketing education and training to overcome this challenge. Examples include online classes, webinars, or engaging a marketing consultant. You can accomplish these tasks with little to no money if you play your cards well. Business owners can develop more successful marketing campaigns and promote company growth by expanding their knowledge of marketing strategies.
Budget Restriction
A budget restriction is another common reason people tend to refrain from marketing. Implementing successful marketing campaigns for small firms can be difficult because they sometimes have constrained budgets. In addition, some business owners can only be willing to spend money on marketing initiatives if they see an instant return.
Business owners might concentrate on low-cost marketing techniques to get beyond this challenge. This can involve email marketing, content marketing, and social media marketing. Business owners may maximise their marketing spending and spur growth by putting the best ROI marketing initiatives first.
Lack of Confidence
Another frequent justification for people delaying marketing is fear of failure. When new marketing tactics have not worked, business owners may be reluctant to adopt them again. Also, it can be difficult for some business owners to advertise their company due to potentially receiving negative comments or evaluations.
To overcome this difficulty, business owners must understand that failure is a necessary component of the marketing process. Not every marketing effort will be successful, but every setback is an opportunity to grow and learn. Business owners can overcome their fear of failure and design more successful marketing efforts by adopting a growth mindset and being prepared to experiment.
Limited Resources
The final significant barrier to marketing is the need for more resources. Small businesses might need more staff, tools, or software for sophisticated marketing efforts. Furthermore, business owners might need more time or energy to dedicate to marketing initiatives due to other business commitments.
Business owners might look into outsourcing methods to get around this problem. This can involve working with a marketing firm, contracting out marketing work, or collaborating with other companies to help with marketing. Business owners can execute more successful marketing efforts and stimulate growth by leveraging the resources of others.
Marketing is crucial to operating a successful business, yet many individuals put it off for various reasons. Business owners can develop successful marketing campaigns that spur company growth by identifying and overcoming common challenges like a lack of technical expertise, a tight budget, a fear of failure, and a lack of resources. Any company may implement effective marketing strategies and accomplish its objectives with the correct attitude and assistance.
Put a Decisive Marketing Approach Into Practice
Now that you know the benefits of a decisive marketing approach and some ways to overcome its roadblocks, let’s discuss implementing it. A powerful marketing strategy requires careful strategy in planning and execution. These are some actions that companies can take to put into practice a determined marketing strategy:
Identify the Target Market
Identifying the target market is the first stage in adopting a strategic marketing strategy. To do this, you must understand your ideal client’s characteristics, wants, needs, and problems. Businesses can thoroughly understand their target market by establishing customer personas and performing market research, then using this insight to guide their marketing approach.
Establish Marketing Objectives
After defining your target demographic, businesses must develop marketing objectives that complement their goals. These objectives must be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART). Companies may monitor results and decide on future marketing initiatives by setting clear targets.
Put Together a Marketing Strategy
Once the target market and marketing objectives have been established, organisations can create a marketing strategy specific to the target market’s needs and preferences. The goal of this strategy should be to reach the target demographic using a variety of channels, including social media, email marketing, content marketing, and advertising.
Make Informed Decisions with Data and Insights
Using information and insights to guide decisions is part of a powerful marketing strategy. This entails evaluating the effectiveness of marketing campaigns and making changes in response to the outcomes. Businesses may plan their upcoming marketing campaigns by monitoring key performance indicators (KPIs), including website traffic, conversion rates, and consumer engagement.
Improve the Marketing Strategy Over Time
Last but not least, companies need to consistently improve their marketing approach based on the outcomes of their initiatives. This entails choosing strategies, channels, and messaging based on data regarding which appeals to the target demographic the most. Businesses may boost productivity, raise ROI, and remain competitive by consistently refining their marketing strategies.
Be Decisive
Putting into practice a strong marketing strategy entails identifying the target market, establishing marketing objectives, creating a customised marketing plan, leveraging data and insights to guide decisions, and continuously fine-tuning the approach depending on the outcomes of marketing campaigns. These methods can help firms create a marketing plan that produces results and promotes growth. To have a chat with me about getting your marketing moving, click here CONTACT ME
Transparency in the workplace is essential. It helps both your customers and employees understand how your business operates. While a lack of transparency can frustrate employees and leave them out of the loop, well-established transparency sets expectations and values for your business.
Why is it important to have transparency in the workplace?
Transparency is about honesty. This happens through open and direct communication. When your employees can count on their colleagues to tell the complete truth, they will be more productive (and happier). However, telling the whole truth is sometimes difficult. This includes addressing challenges and mistakes within the business.
Another aspect of transparency is owning up to your mistakes. In the long run, this will earn the respect of your employees. When lines of communication are open, this fosters a comfortable environment for having those tough conversations. Such conversations may propose a creative solution, leading to a better work environment.
Ways to Foster Transparent Communication
Good things take time, yet, the company’s cultural benefits will be worth your effort. Some practices to instil a transparent work environment include:
- Working to address complicated situations. Transparency means fostering open communication. For example, if employees have challenges, you want them to feel comfortable enough to bring them to you or other leaders.
- Trusting your team members. It is critical to define employee roles and set goals. However, once a team member is working on their task or project, allow them the freedom to work independently. Unnecessary “micromanaging” can be an inefficient use of your time and cause your employees to second guess themselves.
- Providing regular opportunities for employees to ask questions. Periodic meetings help your team feel united and comfortable with one another. These meetings are an excellent time for you to give instructions and for your employees to ask questions or make suggestions. A discussion with the whole group can increase transparency and ensure everyone is on the same page.
Benefits of Transparency
Transparency in your business is essential, but it will take consistent work. It is important to stick to the task at hand because the benefits of a transparent company will be worth it! Some of the benefits you may see include:
- Increased innovation. Employees will feel more comfortable suggesting new and bold ideas in a transparent environment.
- Improved trust within your team. Trust is the foundation for teamwork. If you want your employees to work well together, they should trust one another. What is the best way to build trust? With a transparent company culture.
As you and your team work to create a transparent work environment, you will see the benefit in all aspects of the brand. Contact me today HERE
Dreadful marketing is not just a waste of money – it can also be counterproductive as it turns customers off to purchasing your products or services. To avoid dreadful marketing efforts, my advice is that you audit your current marketing in its entirety. I’ve seen so many businesses who think they have their marketing sorted but that now doesn’t resonate with the customer, they have no plan for the future and customer churn is high and unmanageable.
Audit Your Marketing
It does not matter how big or small your business is; you should take a good look at your current marketing efforts. During your review, you may find these common and often repeated mistakes that you can start to rectify immediately.
Stop Talking Down to Your Customers
It is surprising how many marketing programs treat potential customers as if they are clueless. Unless your product or service is cutting edge, your customer will know the general function of your product or service offerings.
Always treat your customer with respect.
Avoid Being Insensitive
If your product or service has a broad appeal, your publicity should reflect this. You don’t want to reduce your target audience by appealing only to a narrow audience segment.
Avoid Too Much Information
Some marketing efforts assume that by providing more information, the better off the customer will be. This tactic runs the risk of bogging down the customer with unnecessary details.
In your marketing, you should emphasise what distinguishes your product or service from the competition. An interested customer can then ask for more information if they need it.
Make yourself distinctive and make it easy for the customer to see why they should choose you – you’ll be amazed at how many businesses think they do this but they actually don’t.
The More Marketing, The Better
Use every avenue available to reach your target market. This may include social media, print media, theatre ads, promotions, etc. Adding additional marketing tactics will reach a wider audience, which may translate to sales.
Update Stagnant Marketing
Customer tastes change, and so does the market. Your marketing should always be up-to-date or even ahead of the curve.
Up-to-date changes may need to include your brand designs, logos, staffing practices, etc. Efforts to update your company will impact your appeal to the general public in both gaining employees and customers.
Create an Impact
Marketing should engage the customer, and it should be visually attractive and informative. A lasting impact may create a life-long customer. Don’t be shy about who you are and what you offer!
Spend Money on Market Research
Some companies use guesswork when it comes to designing their marketing programs. Thoroughly research your target audience and spend accordingly. If you ‘think’ you know what your customer wants, why not confirm it. With my clients, this often brings up valuable new insights that we can use to drive activity for growth.
Conclusion
When promoting your business, products, and/or services, you need to ensure that your marketing is focused, relevant, and engaging. Poor marketing is a waste of money and does not help to make you money although you feel like you are ‘ticking a box’.
Let’s stop ticking boxes and work together Contact me here
A well-designed marketing plan will help your business reach your target customer. Markets, however, are dynamic, and your marketing plan should reflect this. You can’t set your plan in stone. You will need to adapt it as markets change. I do this with all of my strategy clients.
What does a marketing plan contain?
A good plan may be hard to craft, but it is necessary for your business to succeed. Remember that a good plan should:
- Describe your present position in the market.
- Give a clear description of your target customer.
- Give a breakdown of how much of your advertising budget you’re going to spend on different advertising strategies.
- Your objective. For example, increase sales of XYZ by 10% in mainland Europe within twelve months.
You will also need to research your market, study the competition, decide on your strategy, and set up means of monitoring the results. This doesn’t just apply to new businesses in fact, many of the strategic clients I have, have been in business for over 30 years but still need a plan to accelerate growth rather than just winging it!
Why would I re-evaluate my plan?
In today’s highly competitive business world, there are many reasons why you might not meet your goals. Perhaps your product is too expensive. Perhaps a competitor has launched a rival item or perhaps you have misjudged demand. These, and other factors, will directly affect your marketing strategy. You will need to look at your marketing plan again and re-evaluate its practicality.
How often should a business re-evaluate a marketing plan?
It is always tricky to forecast the future. Therefore, plans rarely work smoothly. A business might prepare various marketing plans, one for the business altogether and others for different products. You might design a plan for a new product and others for established lines.
Under normal circumstances, it is a good idea to review your marketing plan every few months with a deep review annually. However, “under normal circumstances” rarely applies to the business world. A business should always watch the market closely. You might feel that it is a good idea to re-evaluate your plan under the following circumstances:
- Your sales do not match your forecast. You will need to evaluate issues and change your plan accordingly.
- Your competitor(s) launch new products in direct competition with yours.
- Unforeseen events affect the overall market. i.e. economic changes
- A new advertising avenue opens, or current ones change. For example, you advertise on a social media platform that loses its audience to a new arrival.
A business needs to be nimble and dynamic. You should regularly review your marketing plan and always be ready to re-evaluate it as conditions change.
Contact me today to get your marketing moving! Chat with me here
Dear Gemma,
We have spent thousands of pounds on marketing with over nine agencies in the last three years. We still don’t know what we had from it can you change this?
It is utterly disappointing when you put so much money and trust into a marketing agency only to be left with seemingly zero results. For whatever comfort it may provide, you aren’t alone in this.
Businesses strike deals with ineffective agencies all the time for one reason or another. Maybe you thought the marketing agency was a good match, but they didn’t quite understand your product or mission. Maybe you didn’t give the agency enough information about your goals. Or maybe they promised you the sun, moon, and stars, but all you got was a rock.
The difference between a mediocre service and your case, however, is that something is missing. The marketing agencies should have reviewed with you what changed, what worked, and what didn’t work. And, if there was no change, why? It seems you didn’t get that, and here you are now, scratching your heads, wondering what all that money spent got you?
Fortunately, there’s a way out of this enigmatic state. You’ll just need to put your best investigative foot forward.
Step One: Go Back into the Archives
For each marketing agency you’ve worked with, create a separate desktop folder. See if you still have any email records of your correspondence with them and sort accordingly. If you have any meeting notes, add those to the appropriate folder, too. Compile anything you might have from when you worked with them.
Step Two: Review Your Documents
Have someone from your in-house marketing team, front of house, or the person who was the main point of contact, look through these documents and find what strategy you and the marketing agency had agreed upon.
For example, did marketing agency one, promise to create social media campaigns? Did marketing agency two, promise to optimize your email CTAs? Were there any changes in plans along the way? Follow the paper trail and see what it tells you.
Step Three: Compare Promises with Campaigns
Take a look at your marketing campaigns from when you employed those marketing agencies. If they didn’t align with what they promised they would do, then there’s your answer. You don’t know what you got from this experience because they actually gave you nothing.
If they did follow through with the plan, it’s time to turn your attention towards your company.
Self-Analysis
Sometimes marketing agencies repeatedly fail to deliver results because something about your business does not translate to marketing success. This doesn’t mean that your business is broken and doomed. It just means that how you’re presenting and organizing your information and product, and perhaps what you’re asking for from the agency, may not be ideal for market optimisation.
Consider if any of the following applies to your business:
- You haven’t optimised your SEO.
- You are not consistent with your online presence.
- Your brand is underdeveloped.
- Your audience focus is “everyone,” i.e., too wide.
- Your audience focus is too narrow or unusual for your local market.
- You don’t have a customer service/support team to follow up on leads.
- You don’t like the idea of developing a social media presence.
- Your view of marketing is strictly advertising.
All of these things can limit how effective marketing efforts can be. And an agency will only do what you ask them—they aren’t going to do extra work for free. If I were to go into your office today, I would look for signs of all of these things, particularly SEO. If you haven’t updated your SEO, you aren’t showing up on people’s radar. Period.
Step Four: Before and After
If you want to see where you are after nine marketing agencies, take a look at your numbers three years ago and today. And look at all the numbers. Revenue doesn’t always tell you a marketing campaign was successful. It just means that you made more money that year. Look at the number of visitors to your webpage; clicks on CTAs embedded in emails; engagement on social media posts; how many leads you captured; conversions.
If your audience engagement has improved, then something worked or is working. Pinpoint your most successful campaigns and repeat.
Step Five: Follow Through with the Sales Funnel
When a marketing agency steps back and returns the reigns to you, you need to pick the reigns back up. An agency will set you up for success after they’re long gone, but if you don’t follow through, it’ll be like nothing happened. Marketing is not just putting your name out there. It’s telling a story, converting customers, and building trust with your clients. Marketing is about generating interest and loyalty, both of which fall on either side of your sales funnel.
The Strength of Your Business
Before you look for another marketing agency, try to develop in-house solutions to solve internal discrepancies first. Marketing strategies aren’t going to work if your brand is inconsistent with what you are, you don’t know your target audience, and you’re not even showing up on search engines. It’s worth the month, maybe two-month-long, process. Don’t forget key foundations and traditional marketing tactics – these are often the lifeblood of your business and help provide reassurance for customers.
Try putting someone on this task. Once you’ve cleaned up here and there, then consider launching some stellar marketing campaigns. Perhaps go back to the strategies that the marketing agencies you hired came up with and see how they fare. You already have a first draft of the plan—now it’s time for your team to bring this to the finish line.
Gemma Angharad Chat with me here
