Marketing is a big part in growing your business and the many options out there to get the job done can leave you feeling overwhelmed. There’s social media, advertising, content…oh my! While marketing can be a very broad topic to explore, we’re breaking it down into 6 simple to-dos for the new year with the help of MyCity4Her Graphic Design Enterprise Expert Jessica Watson of JWatson Creative.
Take a look at 6 simple tips that can get your marketing for the new year started the right way!
1. An increased focus on ‘inbound marketing: With the growth of social marketing, marketers now must invest in adding a new kind of value. Enter “inbound marketing,” a type of marketing in which brands spend resources to create content, conversations and valuable resources that draw customers to their products or websites without paid marketing.
Your budgets this year should include more spend on amazing content, beautiful web design and inbound analytics. Expect to see new software, and upgrades to existing tools, to help you better manage your inbound marketing efforts and prioritize your next steps.
2. More loyalty marketing: By now, we are all pretty aware that it is more costly to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing one. Add to that how consumers have never before been so connected and willing to share opinions of purchases and experience. Guess what you get? Marketers brainstorming creative ways to make customers feel appreciated and satisfied. What was once an afterthought should now find its way into the early stages of marketing roadmaps.
3. Brands as social influencers: Thanks to platforms such as Pinterest, Facebook and Foursquare, we’ve seen brands build followings of unparalleled size, which has left them with legitimate influence over consumers. In 2013 we will see brands continue to grow their communities and the reach of their voice, opinions and products.
Marketers should be asking themselves, “Where are we participating?” and “What value are we offering?” It’s ideal for a brand to build an audience of engaged participants around the great content it shares. If you’re not sure where to start, go to the sites you know where people are already talking about your brand. Jump in and engage.
Create the experience. Clean up and align your online presence.
4. Using Design to Stand Out: Tell your story, be unique. Establish a personal connection. Piggybacking the growing importance of inbound marketing and the trend in improved data visualizations comes a rising of the bar around web design. We’ve seen the design community grow in leaps and bounds. Beautiful design has never been so affordable and in demand. To stand out in 2013, strengthen your in-house resources or contract a team to get your website design up-to-speed.
5. Put Your Brand Out There: We’re all connected… So Leverage the Resources You Already Have Around You. Once you have a strong story, a well designed brand, and consistency with your online presence, use that to your advantage. You are an extension of your brand, and a very powerful one. Make sure you are putting yourself out there by attending valuable events, seminars, and making it a point to connect and align yourself with other good people. This isn’t about selling or pitching your business to everyone you meet, it’s about being yourself, being comfortable with what you’ve created, and attracting genuine people to you.
6. Test, measure and test again: Just because you’ve found a marketing strategy that seems to be working doesn’t mean that you should blow your entire budget on one or two projects. Test, measure and test again before rolling out your campaign. Google Analytics will measure your traffic for free and tell you where your site visitors are coming from and which search terms they’re using to find you. Test every piece of your marketing campaign, once you’ve found the right formula, follow it. And then create a schedule for checking back in on your original strategy, testing/measuring again, and then tweak as needed.