Marketing – Everything You Need to Know
What is marketing?
Most people have heard the term marketing before and will usually have an idea of what it is. Although, whether they can give you a solid definition of marketing and all it entails is a very different story. When talking about marketing, we like to think about it as a large umbrella with lots of different categories underneath. All of these categories are equally important, but in terms of your business, some may be more important than others. Don’t worry, we’ll get into that in a bit more detail, but first…
Do you actually need marketing?
Yes, yes and yes. Promotional activity is the glue that continues to strengthen the relationship between company and customer. As a business owner, it can be easy to dissociate from how customers think, act and process information. This, in turn, can lead to under or over marketing. However, marketing is built around an understanding of basic human psychology. In other words, if you understand how people think, you can better market your products or services to them.
This leads us into a discussion about the formulation of a strong marketing strategy.
Strategic Marketing
Similar to most aspects of business, marketing requires well-thought-out, strategic planning. Marketing budgets are usually quite tight and therefore as a business owner, you need to make sure you’re not wasting it unnecessarily. That’s why when we begin a marketing project, we ensure the strategy is detailed, that way we know exactly where, why and how the budget is being spent.
A good marketing plan will have several months to a year planned out ahead with room for adaptation. This plan will give you a good idea of what needs will be done and what results can be expected.
Target Audience
Understanding your target audience is one of the most important steps in making a strong marketing plan. Different demographics will respond to your marketing efforts in different ways. For example, if your target market is those aged 75+, an interactive Instagram Story campaign isn’t likely to be very successful, even though that’s one of the most popular marketing strategies of 2019.
Marketing Channels – Social Media
Luckily, there are lots of different marketing channels available, but choosing the right one for your company is important. As we mentioned before, different channels will be more successful than others depending on the audience you are trying to reach. So, what are the options?
Some of the most popular marketing channels, especially in recent years, are through social media. For example, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Snapchat, Pinterest and Youtube are all platforms that are frequently used by businesses to connect with their audiences. These platforms are seeing such great success because they are leveraging apps and websites that have become an integral part of so many peoples lives. For example, the majority of people will actively spend hours and hours per day scrolling through and toggling between these platforms. So as a business, you would be silly not to use this to your advantage.
Email marketing is a great way to send your audience high-quality, tailored content. It’s easy to measure its success and when executed correctly, it can have amazing effects on your website traffic. Regular communication between you and your customers will help establish a strong sense of brand loyalty and will continually express your brand personality. This is a popular method of marketing for businesses of all sizes, especially those with a smaller marketing allowance. Email marketing can be a simple way to optimise your time and budgets while still delivering great content.
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
Search engine optimisation, also referred to as SEO is becoming increasingly important when trying to improve the visibility of your website on different search engines. Search engines aren’t able to read the content of your website in the same way that you or your customers can. Instead, they quickly index the site looking for different keywords and phrases that summarise its content. If you don’t optimise these keywords and phrases, then your website won’t be seen by potential customers.
Want a more detailed look at SEO and how it can help increase website traffic? You can find that here.
Pay Per Click (PPC)
If your budget allows, PPC marketing is a great option. It’s highly measurable and there’s no guesswork in terms of which ads are performing well and which aren’t. This means, if you see a particular service isn’t being advertised as well, you can quickly change the way it’s being displayed. With PPC advertising you can easily cast a large net to potential clients with platforms that are easy to navigate.
Blog Content
In order to build trust between you and your customers, you need to demonstrate your knowledge and ability to exceed their expectations on different projects and services. For example, on Design JD you can read all about things like: sustainable design, making people fall in love with your brand as well as how to step it up if you’re already established as a business. It’s important to have a steady stream of relevant, insightful and interesting blog content reaching your customers. This content is not only great for building credibility on your website but also for use within your email and social media campaigns.
Video
Our last suggestion to keep in mind when making your marketing strategy is to include content-packed videos. Video is an exciting medium that not only helps show your brand personality but helps show you truly know what you’re talking about. With the easy to use, readily available video editing software, this is a great option if you’re looking to keep your marketing costs low. It also makes for great social media content and is also perfect for spicing up an email
For example, you can check out a video we did on our Wayfinding process, here!
All in all, marketing is essential, but executing it properly is even more important. There is a lot to take into consideration when developing your marketing strategy. This can get overwhelming, especially as a small business with so many different things to be thinking about. That’s why outsourcing your marketing efforts may be something you want to consider.
If you want to learn more about how we can help develop the perfect marketing strategy for your business, get in touch today. We’d be happy to have a chat.
