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  • What is a marketing strategy?

A clear marketing strategy is essential for business success. It defines the long-term plan for how a product or service will achieve and maintain a competitive advantage in an identified market. Establishing this upfront aligns the organization around how you will reach your target audience, explain the benefits of your offering to them, and encourage them to become customers.

Why is marketing strategy important?

Setting a marketing strategy is essential to keeping your team in sync and performing well. It aligns the entire company around shared market, business, and product assumptions. This is key to launching campaigns and promotional activities that effectively engage potential customers, drive revenue, build brand awareness, and strengthen the relationship with existing customers.

Your marketing strategy should establish:

Goals that determine how success will be measured

High-level efforts needed to achieve your goals

Who will get the most value from your product or service

What you know about the target market

Benefits of using your product or service

How to reach and communicate with your ideal customer

How to establish a sustainable competitive advantage

How to create a marketing strategy

Your strategy sets the direction for your everyday marketing activities. This keeps the team focused on what matters most — so you can successfully acquire, keep, and grow customers.

Set marketing goals

Before you define your marketing goals, you must have a clear understanding of your company’s overall vision and goals. This allows you to work backwards, setting marketing goals that serve business objectives. For example, if the business goal is to increase revenue by 30 percent, consider marketing goals around increasing the number of qualified leads or the trial-to-paid conversion rate so you can achieve this.

Here are some examples of marketing goals:

Setting goals that are measurable and time-bound helps you demonstrate how marketing will deliver against the company’s goals. It also helps the team plan campaigns and promotional activities that deliver against companywide strategic directives.

Identify the target market

Your target market is the group of customers most likely to buy your product or service because it provides a meaningful benefit to them. This is determined through an in-depth understanding of customers who want or need what you are offering. It is important to identify specific customer segments within your overall market so you can refine your marketing approach for each group.

Distill your analysis of each customer segment to include the following information:

Geographic, demographic, and behavioral characteristics

Market size and growth potential

Competitive activity

Risk factors

Approach for serving the segment

This exercise helps you evaluate market opportunities and target the people most likely to buy your products. Once you have defined your customer segments, create detailed personas that describe your ideal customer. Include key characteristics, such as their goals, challenges, likes, and dislikes. This helps the marketing team craft messaging that is tailored for each audience.

To help you get started, try this target audience template in Aha! Notebooks . It will help you document the defining characteristics of your target personas — so you can create a strategy that resonates.

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Define marketing initiatives

Initiatives are the high-level efforts you will implement to achieve the marketing goals. They should be set in a way that reflects the structure of your marketing team. For example, they might be organized by function (such as product marketing, content, and digital) or by market segment (such as consumer, small/medium business, and enterprise).

You likely have many options for initiatives based on market and customer opportunities that could move your business forward. Consider each one based on the potential business value and the effort required to accomplish it.

Here are some examples of marketing initiatives:

Lead mobile app launch

Enhance sales training

Start a webinar series

Launch social media campaign

Introduce referral program

Link your goals and initiatives to show how your marketing strategy ties together. This makes it easier to track progress as the actual work gets underway and keeps the team aligned around what matters the most.

marketing goals example

Conduct market analysis

Evaluate the current and future attractiveness of your target market. This is essential to build a sustainable business that connects the overall market need with what really matters to your customers.

Your analysis should consider a variety of quantitative and qualitative factors that address the following questions:

What is the current size of the market?

What is the projected growth for the future?

What are the current market trends and how could they impact your business?

How does your product or service satisfy a market need?

What external factors influence the need for your product or service?

What are the challenges that might get in your way?

What alternatives are available to your potential customers?

Who are the main competitors? What are their strengths and weaknesses?

What are your strengths and weaknesses?

What unique value does your product or service provide?

Considering these questions helps you assess market opportunities and threats — so you can define a marketing strategy that sets you apart from the competition. There are a number of models available to structure your analysis, such as SWOT , Porter’s 5 Forces , and PESTLE . Use these strategic planning techniques to help you gain an in-depth understanding of the market environment and establish where you fit.

Craft your positioning and messaging

Your positioning strategy determines what you will communicate in the market. It captures how you will explain your product’s unique attributes to customers, drawing on a deep understanding of what they value the most. This helps you establish a position in the market that aligns with what your target customers want.

Here are the key elements to include in your positioning strategy:

Market category

Customer challenges

Company and product differentiators

Core attributes you want to highlight

Distilling the problems your product solves and the value it provides helps the marketing team describe the product in a way that resonates with potential customers. It also allows you to create a concise positioning statement that explains how your product addresses customers’ needs better than any other solution.

Here is an an example of how to structure your positioning statement:

For (target customer) who (statement of the need), the (product) is a (product category) that (key benefit). Unlike (primary competitive alternative), our product (statement of primary differentiation).

Use the positioning statement as a guidepost to ensure your marketing strategy and tactics deliver on your promise to customers.

Identify the key benefits

Customers buy a product or service because it fulfills a want or need. Marketing is how potential customers learn about a product and determine if it might be a good fit. Your ability to articulate the key benefits your product provides is, therefore, critical to business success.

To communicate with potential customers in a meaningful way requires a deep understanding of your product and the problems it solves. Communicating the benefits gives meaning to features and helps buyers make an informed choice of the value they will receive by purchasing the product.

Including this information in your marketing strategy helps the team consistently describe why potential customers are going to love your product. This is key to launching integrated campaigns that reinforce the same value proposition across all social channels, advertisements, and company-published content.

Define your marketing mix

The marketing mix captures all the the elements needed to successfully promote your product. This is based on a model commonly referred to as the 10ps. It helps you formulate the best approach for bringing your product to market.

The elements included in the 10ps marketing matrix are:

Product: Primary way you satisfy your customer's needs

Price: Amount it costs a customer to purchase your product

People: Individuals who help to deliver your product

Process: How you deliver products to your customers

Promotion: Channels you use to communicate your product

Programs: The specific activities you use to promote your product

Place: Method of distribution for your product

Physical environment: Space in which you interact with customers to deliver your product

Partners: Other organizations that help you build or sell your product

Positioning: How you describe the key attributes of your product.

Use the 10ps of marketing to define and review your strategy. It helps you understand the variables you can control and how they interact so you can grow satisfied and loyal customers.

10ps matrix example

How to use a marketing strategy

A marketing strategy establishes how you will achieve your company’s vision, mission, and business goals. It brings together core building blocks that show a comprehensive understanding of the market and where your product or service fits.

Your strategy should be clearly articulated and easily accessible to the team. This keeps everyone aligned on the long-term plan and how success will be measured. You will need to review your strategy regularly as market conditions change and you learn more about what your customers want and need. This ensures that your marketing efforts stay in sync with the business and, most importantly, effectively engage your customers.

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What Is Marketing?

What is the goal of marketing.

  • What Are the 4 P's of Marketing?

Types of Marketing Strategies

  • Limitations
  • Marketing Essentials

Marketing in Business: Strategies and Types Explained

business marketing strategy is

Natalya Yashina is a CPA, DASM with over 12 years of experience in accounting including public accounting, financial reporting, and accounting policies.

business marketing strategy is

Ariel Courage is an experienced editor, researcher, and former fact-checker. She has performed editing and fact-checking work for several leading finance publications, including The Motley Fool and Passport to Wall Street.

business marketing strategy is

Investopedia / Lara Antal

Marketing refers to activities a company undertakes to promote the buying or selling of a product or service. Marketing includes advertising, selling, and delivering products to consumers or other businesses. Some marketing is done by affiliates on behalf of a company .

Professionals who work in a corporation's marketing and promotion departments seek to get the attention of key potential audiences through advertising. Promotions are targeted to certain audiences and may involve celebrity endorsements , catchy phrases or slogans, memorable packaging or graphic designs, and overall media exposure.

Key Takeaways

  • Marketing refers to all activities a company does to promote and sell products or services to consumers.
  • Marketing makes use of the "marketing mix," also known as the four Ps—product, price, place, and promotion.
  • Marketing used to be centered around traditional marketing techniques including television, radio, mail, and word-of-mouth strategies.
  • Though traditional marketing is still prevalent, digital marketing now allows companies to engage in newsletter, social media, affiliate, and content marketing strategies.
  • At its core, marketing seeks to take a product or service, identify its ideal customers, and draw the customers' attention to the product or service available.

Marketing as a discipline involves all the actions a company undertakes to draw in customers and maintain relationships with them. Networking with potential or past clients is part of the work too and may include writing thank you emails, playing golf with prospective clients, returning calls and emails quickly, and meeting with clients for coffee or a meal.

At its most basic level, marketing seeks to match a company's products and services to customers who want access to those products. Matching products to customers ultimately ensures profitability.

Formal Definition:

"Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large. " —Official definition from the American Marketing Association, approved 2017.

What Are the 4 P's of Marketing?

Product, price, place, and promotion are the Four Ps of marketing. The Four Ps collectively make up the essential mix a company needs to market a product or service. Neil Borden popularized the idea of the  marketing mix and the concept of the Four Ps in the 1950s.

Product refers to an item or items the business plans to offer to customers. The product should seek to fulfill an absence in the market, or fulfill consumer demand for a greater amount of a product already available. Before they can prepare an appropriate campaign, marketers need to understand what product is being sold, how it stands out from its competitors, whether the product can also be paired with a secondary product or product line , and whether there are substitute products in the market.

Price refers to how much the company will sell the product for. When establishing a price, companies must consider the unit cost price, marketing costs, and distribution expenses. Companies must also consider the price of competing products in the marketplace and whether their proposed price point is sufficient to represent a reasonable alternative for consumers.

Place refers to the distribution of the product. Key considerations include whether the company will sell the product through a physical storefront, online, or through both distribution channels. When it's sold in a storefront, what kind of physical product placement does it get? When it's sold online, what kind of digital product placement does it get?

Promotion, the fourth P, is the integrated marketing communications campaign. Promotion includes a variety of activities such as advertising , selling, sales promotions, public relations, direct marketing, sponsorship, and guerrilla marketing .

Promotions vary depending on what stage of the product life cycle the product is in. Marketers understand that consumers associate a product’s price and distribution with its quality, and they take this into account when devising the overall marketing strategy.

Marketing refers to any activities undertaken by a company to promote the buying or selling of a service. If there is a limited quantity of a product, a company may market itself in an attempt to be better positioned as one of the few who get to buy something.

Marketing is comprised of an incredibly broad and diverse set of strategies. The industry continues to evolve, and the strategies below may be better suited for some companies over others.

Traditional Marketing Strategies

Before technology and the internet, traditional marketing was the primary way companies would market their goods to customers. The main types of traditional marketing strategies includes:

  • Outdoor Marketing: This entails public displays of advertising external to a consumer's house. This includes billboards, printed advertisements on benches, sticker wraps on vehicles, or advertisements on public transit.
  • Print Marketing: This entails small, easily printed content that is easy to replicate. Traditionally, companies often mass produced printed materials, as the printed content was the same for all customers. Today, more flexibility in printing processes means that materials can be differentiated.
  • Direct Marketing : This entails specific content delivered to potential customers. Some print marketing content could be mailed. Otherwise, direct marketing mediums could include coupons, vouchers for free goods, or pamphlets.
  • Electronic Marketing: This entails use of TV and radio for advertising. Though short bursts of digital content, a company can convey information to a customer through visual or auditory media that may grab a viewer's attention better than a printed form above.
  • Event Marketing: This entails attempting to gather potential customers at a specific location for the opportunity to speak with them about products or demonstrate products. This includes conferences, trade shows, seminars, roadshows , or private events.

Digital Marketing

The marketing industry has been forever changed with the introduction of digital marketing. From the early days of pop-up ads to targeted placements based on viewing history, there are now innovating ways companies can reach customers through digital marketing.

  • Search Engine Marketing: This entails companies attempting to increase search traffic through two ways. First, companies can pay search engines for placement on result pages. Second, companies can emphasize search engine optimization (SEO) techniques to organically place highly on search results.
  • E-mail Marketing: This entails companies obtaining customer or potential customer e-mail addresses and distributing messages or newsletters. These messages can include coupons, discount opportunities, or advance notice of upcoming sales.
  • Social Media Marketing: This entails building an online presence on specific social media platforms. Like search engine marketing, companies can place paid advertisements to bypass algorithms and obtain a higher chance of being seen by viewers. Otherwise, a company can attempt to organically grow by posting content, interacting with followers, or uploading media like photos and videos.
  • Affiliate Marketing: This entails using third-party advertising to drive customer interest. Often, an affiliate that will get a commission from a sale will do affiliate marketing as the third-party is incentivized to drive a sale for a good that is not their own original product.
  • Content Marketing: This entails creating content, whether eBooks, infographics, video seminars, or other downloadable content. The goal is to create a product (often free) to share information about a product, obtain customer information, and encourage customers to continue with the company beyond the content.

In 1978, Gary Thuerk sent a message to roughly 400 people using ARPANET, the first public packet-switched computer network. With that message, the first ever recorded spam e-mail message had been sent.

What Are the Benefits of Marketing?

Well-defined marketing strategies can benefit a company in several ways. It may be challenging in developing the right strategy or executing the plan; when done well, marketing can yield the following results:

  • Audience Generation. Marketing allows a company to target specific people it believes will benefit from its product or service. Sometimes, people know they have the need. Other times, they don't realize it. Marketing enables a company to connect with a cohort of people that fit the demographic of who the company aims to serve.
  • Inward Education. Marketing is useful for collecting information to be processed internally to drive success. For example, consider market research that finds a certain product is primarily purchased by women aged 18-34 years old. By collecting this information, a company can better understand how to cater to this demographic, drive sales, and be more efficient with resources.
  • Outward Education. Marketing can also be used to communicate with the world what your company does, what products you sell, and how your company can enrich the lives of others. Campaigns can be educational, informing those outside of your company why they need your product. In addition, marketing campaigns let a company introduce itself, its history, its owners, and its motivation for being the company it is.
  • Brand Creation. Marketing allows for a company to take an offensive approach to creating a brand. Instead of a customer shaping their opinion of a company based on their interactions, a company can preemptively engage a customer with specific content or media to drive certain emotions or reactions. This allows a company to shape its image before the customer has ever interacted with its products.
  • Long-lasting. Marketing campaigns done right can have a long-lasting impact on customers. Consider Poppin' Fresh, also known as the Pillsbury Doughboy. First appearing in 1965, the mascot has helped create a long-lasting, warm, friendly brand for Pillsbury.
  • Financial Performance. The ultimate goal and benefit of marketing is to drive sales. When relationships with customers are stronger, well-defined, and positive, customers are more likely to engage in sales. When marketing is done right, customers turn to your company, and you gain a competitive advantage over your competitors. Even if both products are exactly the same, marketing can create that competitive advantage for why a client picks you over someone else.

According to MarTech, a digital marketing provider, the world will spend $4.7 trillion on marketing by 2025. This estimate includes an increase of $1.1 trillion from 2021 to 2025.

What Are the Limitations of Marketing?

Though there are many reasons a company embarks on marketing campaigns, there are several limitations to the industry.

  • Oversaturation. Every company wants customers to buy its product and not its competitors. Therefore, marketing channels can be competitive as companies strive to garner more positive attention and recognition. If too many companies are competing, a customer's attention may be strongly diluted, resulting in any form of advertising not being effective.
  • Devaluation. When a company promotes a price discount or sale, the public may psychologically eventually see that product as worth less in the future. If a campaign is so strong, customers may even wait to purchase a good knowing or remembering what the sale price was from before. For example, some may intentionally hold off buying goods if Black Friday is approaching.
  • No Guaranteed Success. Marketing campaigns may incur upfront expenses that hold no promise of future success. This is also true of market research studies, where time, effort, and resources are poured into a study that may yield no usable or helpful results.
  • Customer Bias. Loyal, long-time customers need no enticing to buy a company's brand or product. However, newer, uninitiated customers may. Marketing naturally is biased towards non-loyal patrons as those who already support the company would be better served by further investment in product improvement.
  • Cost. Marketing campaigns may be expensive. Digital marketing campaigns may be labor-intensive to set up and costly to maintain the scheduling, implementation, and execution of the plan. Don't forget about the headlines that promote Super Bowl commercial expenses in the millions.
  • Economy-Dependent. Marketing is most successful when people have capital to spend. Though marketing can create non-financial benefits such as brand loyalty and product recognition, the ultimate goal is to drive sales. During unfavorable macroeconomic conditions when unemployment is high or recession concerns are elevated, consumers may be less like to spend no matter how great a market campaign may be.

Marketing is a division of a company, product line, individual, or entity that promotes its service. Marketing attempts to encourage market participants to buy their product and commit loyalty to a specific company .

Why Is Marketing So Important?

Marketing is important for a few reasons. First, marketing campaigns may be the first time a customer interacts or is exposed to a company's product. A company has the opportunity to educate, promote, and encourage potential buyers. Marketing also helps shape the brand image a company wants to convey. For example, an outdoor camping gear company that wants to be known for its rugged, tough goods can embark on specific campaigns that embody these traits and make these emotions memorable to prospective customers.

What Is the Purpose of Marketing?

An important goal of marketing is propelling a company’s growth. This can be seen through attracting and retaining new customers. 

 Companies may apply a number of different marketing strategies to achieve these goals. For instance, matching products with customers' needs could involve personalization, prediction, and essentially knowing the right problem to solve. 

 Another strategy is creating value through the customer experience. This is demonstrated through efforts to elevate customer satisfaction and remove any difficulties with the product or service.

What Are the 4 Ps of Marketing?

A commonly used concept in the marketing field, the Four Ps of marketing looks at four key elements of a marketing strategy. The Four Ps consist of product, price, place, and promotion. 

What Are the Types of Marketing?

There are dozens of types of marketing, and the types have proliferated with the introduction and rise of social media, mobile platforms, and technological advancements. Before technology, marketing might have been geared towards mail campaigns, word-of-mouth campaigns, billboards, delivery of sample products, TV commercials, or telemarketing. Now, marketing encompasses social media, targeted ads, e-mail marketing, inbound marketing to attract web traffic, and more.

American Marketing Association. " What Is Marketing? "

World Economic Forum. " 40 Years On From the First Spam E-mail, What Have We Learned? "

Pillsbury. " How Well Do You Know the Pillsbury Doughboy? "

MarTech. " Worldwide Spend on Marketing to Hit $4.7 Trillion By 2025 ."

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Small Business Marketing 101: Using Email, Social, Video and More

Introduction to small business marketing 101.

Whether your small business has existed for years, or just recently started up, finding the most effective marketing strategies is critical. That’s because small businesses don’t have the same resources to execute as larger scale firms. In fact, you may be the founder and CEO who has also taken up the mantle of marketer.

That’s why Sprout Social worked with our amazing partners at HubSpot, Animoto and Campaign Monitor to put together this guide to small business marketing.

Together, we’ve covered some of the most frequently discussed topics among small business marketers. We’ll continue to work with more partners to expand on these topics over time. For now, keep reading for the following:

  • HubSpot on inbound marketing for small businesses
  • Animoto on video marketing for small businesses
  • Campaign Monitor on email marketing for small businesses
  • Sprout Social on social marketing for small businesses

Small business marketing with inbound

Would you rather have your customers searching for you instead of the other way around? Look no further than inbound marketing. In this section, HubSpot discusses the importance of inbound marketing for small business, the basics of getting started and how to choose the right channels for your organization.

Let’s talk about a framework for bringing the ideal customer to your website. It’s used by tons of businesses, big and small, and it can work for you as well.

What is inbound marketing?

One quick definition we at HubSpot use is to think of outbound marketing as “push” marketing and inbound marketing as “pull.” Rather than interrupt customers with disruptive ads or unethical sales tactics, you attract them via valuable content that helps them accomplish their goals.

To further elaborate, it’s about three pieces:

inbound marketing cycle: attract, engage, delight

You attract prospects and customers to your website and blog through relevant and helpful content.

Once they arrive, you engage with them using conversational tools like email and chat and by promising continued value.

Finally, you delight them by continuing to act as an empathetic advisor and expert.

The inbound methodology isn’t specific to marketing, by the way. The same process and mindset can be used in sales and services, too.

So, how do you actually do inbound marketing?

Inbound 101: The basics for getting started

There have been many books and courses on inbound marketing, so we won’t be able to comprehensively cover the idea here. Rather, we’ll give the 80/20 so you can start to take action. After you get your wheels on the ground, you can always go back and learn more about the methodology.

So what are the basic steps for getting started?

  • First, map out your ideal audience, aka your target market. Who do you want to sell to?
  • Second, map out the channels you can use to attract, engage and delight your customers. Where do they hang out and how do they communicate?
  • Finally, begin crafting content and messaging that will be used to attract, engage and delight customers. Make sure you have analytics in place, because you’ll need to constantly learn and update your strategy based on the results you get.

Let’s dive into each one of these individually.

Know your personas & target markets

It’s possible you know your target market and have already built your buyer personas , but even if that’s the case, it never hurts doing this work again and learning more about your customers. The more you know about your customer, the better you can craft your messaging and strategy.

In defining a target market, you narrow down your audience to the level that you can choose correct marketing channels and start to define a buyer persona for messaging.

In building a buyer persona, you create a representative model of your prototypical customer. As in machine learning, you need to split the difference between perfect accuracy and perfect utility . In other words, you should gather enough data and information to make a buyer persona largely accurate to the real world, but you shouldn’t gather too much information and make it too complex.

How do you gather data to inform your buyer persona? There are many ways, some easier, some harder, depending on the stage of your company:

  • Customer interviews (phone or in person)
  • Digital analytics
  • Surveys (on-site polls like Qualaroo and customer surveys )
  • User testing
  • Live chat transcripts and intelligence via sales and service teams

You’ll want to answer core questions about your ideal buyer, such as:

  • What are their motivations and fears?
  • How do they prefer to make purchases?
  • How much research do they do and what kind of content is useful to them?
  • How do they interact with brands? What do they prefer the relationship to look like?
  • Who do they look to when they’re making decisions? Who influences them?
  • Where do they hang out? How can you reach them?
  • What type of language do they use?

All of these things will help you a) choose channels and b) craft messaging.

Just don’t create a silly made-up buyer persona with a cute name just to go through the motions. Also, it probably doesn’t matter what your buyer persona’s favorite color of car is unless you’re selling paint or used vehicles. Stick to the stuff that’s important and knowable.

Map out your channels and tactics

When you have a target market and buyer persona, you can look into different channels. There are only so many inbound marketing channels:

  • Facebook Ads (suggested reading: Are ads inbound? )

Some channels won’t work for your business no matter how hard you try. For example, virality probably doesn’t make sense if you sell dish soap.

Similarly, some channels could potentially work but will take so much effort and risk to pull off, that you should probably table them for the time being in favor of higher impact channels. For example, if you’re a LawnStarter (lawn care) or ProTranslating (translation services), social media may not pay off.

MoonPie Twitter example

Though oddly enough, MoonPie kills it on Twitter

To identify your best channels, use this heuristic: “how does a customer buy this type of product?”

In the case of lawn care, it’s usually when their lawn grows too long and they need someone right away. SEO and search ads are perfect to capture this type of demand.

Some products, such as Chubbies or Airpods , are naturally viral. Just optimize the viral components and add a little wind to the sail.

Others make a perfect fit for content marketing, such as B2B software companies like Wordable or Mutiny . These products tend to require a little bit of upfront education, and their target customers are accustomed to learning via blogs, webinars and ebooks.

example of good content

Content often works well for SaaS products

In any case, just think about it and discuss with your colleagues before jumping into a channel. Don’t simply join a channel because your competitors have or because it’s new and buzzworthy. We don’t need more gurus or businesses trying to make it big on Snapchat, and we especially don’t need more businesses trying to go viral on Reddit. Do what makes sense for you.

Create content and execute on the playbook

Any inbound channel—nay, any marketing channel—will require some sort of messaging strategy. How you execute on messaging will largely determine how effective the channel becomes.

Let’s say, for example, we want to use blogging and SEO as our inbound channel. This usually forms the basis of such efforts, as it’s an owned channel, and you can generally compete with very large players and win some or much of the time on quality and 10x content .

Now, what do you blog about?

While you can answer this question many ways with some degree of validity, we like to follow the Pillar + Cluster model .

pillar content example

In plain English, your “pillar content” represents the big topic you want to rank for, and “cluster content” represents supporting content that relates to your big topic. Hyperlinking pages together shows Google they’re related to each other.

For example, let’s say your big topic is “personalization” For this, you might create a pillar page called “The Ultimate Guide to Web Personalization.”

Then you could create several cluster content blog posts to support the pillar page. These could be on topics like:

  • How to personalize email newsletters
  • Top personalization tools in 2019
  • Personalization examples
  • How to measure ROI from personalization

…And on and on.

We like to start backwards from our product and branch out from there. So, basically, what’s the end goal? Define that product page, and then come up with high traffic pillar page ideas that can support that. From there, break topic ideas off of your pillar page to create long tail blog posts. A good way to find long tail ideas is on Answer The Public .

keyword research tool

Soon, you’ll bring in tons of traffic, and then you’ll simply have to worry about converting that traffic into leads, users, demos…whatever your goal conversion is.

Unfortunately, that’s a huge topic, and one we can’t crack into here. So here are some resources on email marketing and conversion optimization to check out:

  • Lead Magnets – Ideas to get people to sign up for your list
  • Web forms guide – Best practices to get form completions, no matter the purpose)
  • A/B testing guide – Everything you want to know about running your own tests

Obviously this is a short primer on inbound, and there’s a lot more to talk about. But if we could boil it down to the simplest possible summary, we’d say, “Define your audience, go where the fish are and craft your messaging in a way that resonates with them.”

This sounds easy, but it takes a lot of work. In fact, we’ll end by emphasizing the need to keep learning and improving.

Make sure you have proper analytics in place, and continue to improve and optimize your inbound funnel.

When it works, it really works. And when it really, really works, you can build a moat that is hard to compete with.

Small business marketing with video

Is your growing business interested in taking advantage of the power of video? Then you have come to the right place. This section discusses the importance of video marketing for small business, how to overcome hurdles in video marketing. It ends with ideas to consider for your own strategy.

According to Forbes , 90% of consumers say videos help them with buying decisions. Sixty-four percent say that watching videos makes them more likely to purchase. Forbes also reports that businesses that use video in their marketing see a 41% increase in search traffic compared to those that don’t.

Video has taken social media, and marketing in general, by storm.

But for small business owners or marketers, it may feel daunting. Here at Animoto , we’ve spoken with countless small business owners that already wear a lot of hats. We know adding video to the mix may feel overwhelming—especially without the time, resources or technical expertise needed for video creation.

But guess what? Video marketing isn’t as time-consuming or difficult as you may think. We’ve put together a quick guide to help you get started (and show you how easy it can be). We’ll share:

  • Why video matters for small businesses
  • How to overcome the hurdles to video creation
  • Small business video ideas
  • Tips and tricks for small business video creation
  • How to get started with video marketing today

Let’s dive in!

Why Video matters for small businesses

Video affords marketers at businesses of all sizes a massive opportunity. We’ll take a quick look at what video can do for your marketing on social media, on YouTube, on your website, in your emails and even in your store or at an event.

Social video for small business

According to a recent Animoto survey , consumers rank video as their number one favorite type of content to see from brands on social media, and 93% of marketers using video on social media say it’s landed them a new customer.

Video has become increasingly important on social media, where it generates 1200% more shares than images and text combined. Video can be incorporated into your social marketing throughout the customer journey to maximize the success of your campaigns.

YouTube video for small business

You’ve likely already heard that YouTube is the second largest search engine, after Google. What does this mean for you? More consumers than ever (including your own customers) search YouTube for product reviews, how-tos and more.

Creating YouTube videos means that you’ll get in front of more customers searching for videos related to your industry and products or services.

Website video for small business

Did you know that the average customer spends 88% more time on a website if it has video? Pretty incredible, right? There are all sorts of ways to incorporate video into your website, including an introductory video on your

  • Product videos
  • A personal video for your about page that showcases your small business story

And guess what? These videos can also be repurposed to share on YouTube and social media.

Email video for small business

Including video in email can lead to an up to 19% increase in open rate and an up to 50% increase in click-through rate, according to Campaign Monitor .

The even better news? Adding video to your emails isn’t as complicated as it may sound. In fact, the videos don’t actually have to play in your email. Rather, you can simply link out to them and mention “video” in your subject line to start seeing results.

In-person video for small business

Video doesn’t have to be limited to the web. You can also use it for your in-person marketing—in your shop, at events and trade shows and in sales sessions. Loop a video on a screen to attract foot traffic or include videos to make presentations more engaging.

Overcoming the hurdles to video marketing

Our recent survey on the State of Social Video Marketing showed that marketers aren’t making as many videos as they’d like. The reasons? They say video requires too much time and budget and the tools and software seem too complicated.

As a small business owner, you likely face similar hurdles. We’ll break them down here and show you why video is easier to get started with than you may think.

Myth #1: Video is too time consuming

There’s a common misconception when it comes to video that it takes days (or even more) to create a single video. In truth, this may be accurate when it comes to professional productions with big production crews, designed to be run as television ad campaigns. However, creating videos for social, or to embed on your blog and website, doesn’t have to take a ton of time.

You can get started with as little as a couple hours a week, and as you get better at making videos, you’ll need even less. You can repurpose photos and videos you already have or use stock imagery to save time on production.

We’d also like to call out that even big brands with big budgets have started opting for less polished social videos for a more authentic look. You don’t have to spend hours to reap the benefits of video.

Myth #2: Video is too complicated

But even with the time set aside, a lot of small businesses don’t use video because they believe they don’t have the expertise. Yes, some video editing softwares require advanced know-how. But a wide range of video editing solutions cater to non-professionals. And you can use these to create professional videos on your own. We promise you.

We should also mention that, when it comes to social video especially, you don’t need heavy production. A lot of the most engaging videos are short clips with just a few shots, or even a single clip with text on it. Start simple and as you get more familiar with video creation you can try new, more complicated things.

Myth #3: Video is too expensive

Finally, video production doesn’t have to break your budget. As we mentioned above, you likely have the photos and video clips you need to get started. If you don’t, you can use your smartphone instead of an expensive video camera.

Add text over your video clips and you don’t need to worry about expensive audio equipment (85% of people watch with the sound off anyway). And you can tie it all together with an inexpensive, easy-to-use video editing tool.

Small business videos ideas

Okay, so now we’ve convinced you that you need video. But what types of videos should you make? This is one of the biggest questions faced by small business marketers looking to get started with video. We’ve rounded up some small business video ideas and examples for inspiration.

And to help you out, each of these video examples includes a template that you can customize to make your own .

About us video

Share the story behind your business. Who are you and what products or services do you offer? An About Us lets you show off the people and story behind your business, which can work especially well for small and growing businesses.

Product story video

A product video ad, which we’ll get to next, works when you want to close the deal and make a sale. But telling the story of your product or service can engage with potential customers on a whole other level. Telling the backstory of a specific product can make for share-worthy content, as you can see in this example. Do you offer a product with an interesting backstory?

We promised a product video ad, and here it is. A video ad should be short and sweet. It introduces your product to the target audience and provides a clear call to action (CTA) so they know how they can purchase.

Fun social video

Looking for a quick video idea for your social media pages? Try a quote. Quote videos take little time to make and rack up shares to boot. Just pair a nice photo or video clip with a quote that’s relevant to your business or industry.

How-to video

A how-to video lets you showcase your expertise. Answer a question you hear a lot from your customers or share an insider tip based on your industry expertise. Share it on social media and YouTube too, where potential customers are searching for answers. You can also share your expertise with a list or step-by-step instructional video.

Blog teaser video

If you’ve got a blog or other content on your website, try creating a short video teaser to promote it. Make sure to include a clear call to action with the link where viewers can go to read more.

Testimonial video

With testimonial videos, you can share social proof and help new customers feel comfortable doing business with you. While you can actually shoot interviews with your customers to create testimonial videos, there are some easy alternatives too. Try using quotes from Yelp, social media or customer emails, paired with accolades and imagery of yourself or your product.

Video tips and tricks for small businesses

We hope we’ve inspired you to start making videos. Before you dive in, here are a few tips to help you get the most out of your video marketing.

  • Get started with what you have . You likely already have photos and video clips you can use to create your first videos. Look on your phone, your desktop, your website, and your social media profiles for content to get started with.
  • Plan for sound off . When creating videos for social media, remember that 85% of people watch with the sound off. Use text to tell a story that translates whether or not viewers turn the sound on.
  • Keep mobile in mind . More and more viewers watch videos on mobile devices,. Make text large enough to read and go for a square or vertical format for videos designed for mobile or social media.
  • Target your video ads . With the targeting capabilities of Facebook Ads Manager and other social platforms, you can reach the audience most likely to engage with your business or product.
  • One size doesn’t fit all . Creating a video for Facebook? For the Instagram feed? Twitter? An Instagram story? Different types of formats and content work best on different platforms, so plan your video content accordingly. Here’s a cheat sheet to help you out.
  • Use your smartphone . You don’t need fancy equipment to get started. We’ve all got great professional cameras in our pockets. Your phone shoots better video than you think!
  • Pay attention to lighting . Good light (or lack of it) can really make or break the quality of your video. Don’t have professional lighting equipment? Try shooting outside in the sunlight, next to a window or simply turn on as many lights as you’ve got indoors.
  • Pay attention to audio . Similarly, the state of your audio can have a big impact on the quality of your video. When recording, listen with headphones to make sure everything sounds OK. And remember, even if you do plan on using audio you should plan for sound-off viewing and use text or captions.

Animoto for small business

Ready to dive in? We’re here to help. Animoto provides everything small businesses and marketers need to drag and drop their way to powerful and professional videos. With customizable video templates, designed with success in mind, Animoto makes it easy for anyone to create their own videos in minutes. With over a decade in the industry and partnerships with Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter and LinkedIn, Animoto is used by more than one million businesses worldwide.

Video templates for a variety of small business use cases, including all the ideas we shared earlier in the article, can be selected and customized. Add your own photos, video clips and text. Then, add your logo and update the colors to fit your brand and you’re done

We invite you to try it for free today. Happy video making!

Small business marketing with email

Email marketing is a must-have for business, but that doesn't mean it's easy to get right. In this section, Campaign Monitor discusses why email marketing is important for your small business, how to send amazing emails and, most importantly, how to scale your efforts.

When you started your own business or started working at one, there were probably a few hats you were expected to wear—like creator, CEO, founder or visionary.

But as your business grows, there will inevitably be a few more hats you have to put on—hats that may not fit quite as easily, like email marketing aficionado.

At Campaign Monitor we want to empower you with email marketing tools and tips that are powerful yet simple, so you can get back to doing what you do best.

Email marketing is alive and well

With so many options for marketing a new and growing business, you may struggle to decide where to focus. Research supports prioritizing email marketing. Let’s take a look at the stats:

  • There are over 3.7 billion email users in the world currently, which means the projected number of users by 2021 is 4.1 billion.
  • 59% of marketers say email is their biggest source of ROI.
  • Email marketing drives $44 for every $1 spent .
  • 89% of marketers say email serves as their primary channel for lead generation.

Before your first send

So you’ve decided to implement an email marketing strategy. Now what? First, you need to understand the purpose of email marketing: to create, secure and nurture relationships.

Yes, you’ll likely meet other goals along the way, like increasing customer engagement and ROI, but don’t lose sight of the people whose inboxes you’re sending to. With this in mind, we’ve compiled a few tips for maximum success.

1. Start with a plan

There’s no right or wrong formula for your first email marketing plan, as long as it answers the following questions:

  • Why am I sending emails?
  • Who am I sending them to?
  • What value can I offer subscribers?
  • What are my email marketing goals?

Once you’ve answered these questions, it’s time to map your customers’ journey. Think of this like mapping out a route for marathon runners; make sure the path is clear of barriers and the signs point the right way. You need to be familiar with the journey your customers take from lead to conversion so you can anticipate any needs or questions they will have along the way.

2. Segment your audience

When setting up your email subscription form, consider the information you’ll need long-term. Name and email address are the traditional fields, but collecting additional demographic information will help you to segment your audience into groups based on age, gender, location or another variable.

Rather than send the same mass email to your entire list every time, segmentation allows you to send customized and relevant content that your subscribers will more likely engage with. After all, proper email list segmentation can double email open rates.

As an example, Facebook segmented their list based on location and invited users to events in their area:

example of email from facebook

3. Personalize your messages

Once you’ve divided your list into groups based on purchase history, interest or other variables, it’s time to create content specifically for the people in that group. Maybe something they indicated interest in has gone on sale, there’s an event happening in their area or you want to address them by name and recommend something they’ll love.

One of our favorite ways to do this using Campaign Monitor is by inserting dynamic content into your message. This shows your audience that you understand and care for them, and it will add an extra “wow” factor that will surprise and delight them. And in case you needed additional convincing, MarketingSherpa ’s research shows that open rates increase by 41% when a personalized subject line is used.

See how Lyft uses the information they’ve gathered about their customers to create a pretty cool personalized email:

example of email from lyft

4. Scale your efforts

So you’ve mapped out a plan, organized your list into segments and created personalized content that drives engagement. It’s time to take all the tools and tactics that work and scale them to reach more people. At this point, automation is your go-to.

By scheduling emails to meet your subscribers at each point in their customer journey (which you already mapped out in step #1), you’ll continue to ensure that your content is relevant and fulfilling your customers’ needs. Plus, automated email messaging can increase open rates by 70.5%.

Paravel uses automation and personalization to send customized trip “postcards” to their customers:

example of email from paravel

5. Measure your success

You made it to the final step—see, that wasn’t so bad. The best way to continue to improve and refine your email marketing skills is to look at the data and find out what works, what you could do better and what you can live without.

Keep an eye on your metrics, try to retarget the subscribers who don’t engage and maintain good deliverability to ensure long-term email marketing success. Seventy-seven percent of ROI comes from segmented, targeted and triggered campaigns, so find what works for you and continue to help it grow.

What to look for in an email marketing platform

When it comes to email marketing platforms, there are a lot of options to choose from and ideas to consider. We’ve given you tips and tricks to begin creating your email marketing strategy, but choosing the right provider can make or break your business growth. Of course, you’ll want to choose a provider that can grow with your business in terms of subscriber list size and functional capability, but what about features to enhance your segmentation, personalization and automation?

If you’re looking for a service provider that will help you focus on your subscribers’ needs, design beautiful emails and scale your success, Campaign Monitor could be the perfect fit. With robust features for segmentation, personalization and automation, as well as 24/7 access to customer support, our team is here to help you drive engagement and increase ROI. Happy sending!

Small business marketing with social

Social media is a critical channel for growing your audience, showcasing your organization, and creating lasting relationships that will yield delighted customers. In this section, Sprout Social discusses the value of social for small business, how to get started on social and shares tips for advanced audiences.

Sprout Social works with thousands of small businesses to help them improve their social marketing strategy while also saving time online. Over the course of working with so many organizations, we’ve gotten good at helping guide their social strategy.

Here we’ve put together the essentials for small business marketing on social, but for a more comprehensive guide you can see our entire guide to social media for small business .

The value of social media for small business

Social is essential for driving your inbound marketing strategy, sharing your videos and increasing leads to email.

But social media is also important on its own.

Social media is valuable for businesses of any size or industry, and finding customers on social media has a direct impact on sales and your bottom line.

In fact, those individuals who follow you on your social channels are 57.5% more likely to buy from you.

likelihood of buying from brands you follow. 57.5% more likely

But it doesn’t stop there. If you can actually manufacture a great positive social media experience that number increases to 71%.

business marketing strategy is

These numbers prove your brand should capitalize on the power of social media for small business marketing.

We’ve broken the next sections down by where you may be in your social strategy, including information for those just getting started and more advanced tips for those with an established presence.

Getting started with small business marketing on social

1. define your social goals.

If you don’t know what you want to accomplish on social media, then you’ll never know when you succeed or fall short. Without this, you’ll likely struggle to maintain a nimble strategy.

Goals can vary wildly from one industry to the next. While a retail company may look for direct purchases from social, someone in higher education may look at new enrollment rates.

Our recent Sprout Social Index asked social marketers about their biggest goals. You can use their responses to help you choose your initial social media goals, then refine those as you get a better sense of what social marketing can provide your business. We’ve included a cheat sheet to define each item below.

  • Increase brand awareness: How familiar social users are with your brand
  • Increase community engagement: Authentic conversations you have with your followers
  • Increase web traffic: The number of website visitors driven from social channels
  • Generate sales/leads: Individuals who purchase your goods or services, or those who fill out a website form, from social channels
  • Distribute content: Sharing your content to your social channels.
  • Increase brand advocacy from customers: Getting happy customers to share their experiences on social
  • Support customers: Using social to respond to customer inquiries and create better customer experiences
  • Grow influencer marketing program: Increase the number of influencers discussing your brand on social

2. Define your core metrics

Think of your social goals as the destination and your core metrics as the map that helps you get there. Once again, we’ve provided a cheat sheet to some key metrics for social media marketing below.

Impressions : The number of times an individual saw your message

Engagements The number of times an individual has interacted with your message, including:

Engagement Rates : The number of engagements divided by the number of impressions

Site Visits : The number of times someone visited your profile page

Mentions : The number of times your handle or brand was mentioned on social. Followers : The number of individuals who follow you on social, usually shown as an increase or decrease over time

New Sales/ROI : The new revenue generated from social visitors, trackable with UTM tagging and website analytics

3. Target your audience and social networks

Social media provides one of the best ways to reach a targeted audience, but first, you have to identify that audience. Consider things like:

Remember the more specific you can get, the better. This will enable you to create a strong social media marketing strategy around these individuals and take a targeted approach to reach the right people at the right time.

Once you know who you want to reach, you’ll have to figure out where they are. Earlier in this guide, HubSpot noted that not every single inbound channel works for small business marketing. The same is true for specific social media networks—not every single one will make sense for your business. Social networks have varied user bases. Don’t invest in one network if your core audience is on another.

Before choosing a platform, ask yourself things like:

  • Which platform best fits your B2B or B2C interactions?
  • How often do you publish content?
  • What’s the lifespan of your content?
  • Are you using social media for customer service?
  • Are you engaging with user-generated content?
  • Can you automate parts of your social media?

The answers to those questions will inform the networks you should choose.

4. Figure out what to share

To figure out what content to post, look no further than what has worked best in the past. If you’ve published to social media before, tools like Sprout Social , Twitter or Facebook Insights can help you understand what resonated most with your audience.

Below is an example of how to view your Sent Messages with Sprout ( available with a free trial ).

sent message report in sprout

Sort your messages by your key metric and you’ll see the top posts for that metric. Look through a handful to find any consistencies and leverage that insight when choosing what to publish.

5. Build your publishing calendar

Once you know what kind of content works, you can create social media posts to automatically publish at the times and days of your choosing. Additionally, you can use a social media publishing tool like Sprout Social to visualize your entire Publishing Calendar, across all of your networks and profiles.

Sprout publishing calendar

Automatically export your calendar as a PDF to share with other key stakeholders throughout your organization.

6. Respond to inbound messages

Unless you sell the most niche product in the world, your customers likely post about it (and you) on social media. Whether they directly tag you or use certain keywords and phrases that relate to your company, it’s your job to respond to their messages to create a better user experience.

Monitor your social channels for conversations or posts that warrant a response. You can use a social media engagement tool to pull in the conversations that directly mention you or mention something relevant to your organization.

7. Analyze your results

Once you’ve established the metrics that matter most to your brand, and spent time on social channels posting and engaging, you can start to track the impact of your efforts.

The frequency with which you analyze your social media results will likely depend on your time and how much you utilize social. Remember that it’s important to track metrics to optimize your strategy. You can use a social media analytics tool to automatically run high-level or in-depth reports if your time is limited.

Advanced tips for small business social

1. search social for new opportunities.

We’ve established that small business marketers must respond to social media posts that tag or mention them. For a more advanced tactic, we suggest monitoring social media for conversations on topics related to your business, and then joining in.

Let’s say you own a pizza restaurant in Chicago that prides itself on its gluten-free offering. By using a social media listening tool , you can track everyone who mentions a term like “gluten free pizza” in the Chicago area.

monitoring

These conversations will populate in your inbox in real time so that you can reach out to anyone looking for a recommendation and suggest your restaurant.

2. Run competitive analyses

Keep an eye on your competition’s social media strategy. Doing so will help you understand the industry and how you measure up as well as develop unique ideas to stand out from the crowd. We’ve created this entire guide on running a competitive analysis , including a free template to help you conduct your research.

3. Leverage relevant hashtags

Hashtags help you get your content in front of new audiences on social media. Not sure which to use? Our free Hashtag Holiday calendar contains a ton of ideas. Just make sure that the hashtags you use actually make sense for your brand and you’re not forcing it.

hashtag holiday calendar

4. Create great visuals and videos

Earlier in this guide, Animoto shared the importance of video:

“Video has become increasingly important on social media, where it generates 1200% more shares than images and text combined. Video can be incorporated into your social marketing throughout the customer journey to maximize the success of your campaigns.”

They also shared some tips to make creating videos easier on your team. Now that you’ve bought in, make sure that you share any and all videos you create with their guidance on your relevant social channels.

5. Get your teammates on social

Social media poses so many opportunities for businesses that it can feel a little overwhelming at times. As a small business marketer, you may be in short supply of resources, but if there is anyone at your organization that can help you keep up, then invite them to join you.

social media team illustration

If your concern is in doubling efforts or reducing how secure your accounts are, then never fear. Social media collaboration tools can ensure that you effectively manage your presence as a team.

6. Boost your content with paid ads

If you don’t get the impressions you hoped for on social media, it could make sense to boost your views by putting some paid advertising dollars into your posts until your presence takes hold. Each native network has its own paid social functionality, or you can use a paid social tool to quickly boost your posts.

Using a social media tool

A social media marketing tool like Sprout Social saves you countless hours managing your presence. Long gone are the days that you should find yourself manually logging in and out of each social profile when it’s time to publish a message, respond to customers or get your social media analytics.

social media quote

Learn all about Sprout Social for your small business and start a free 30-day trial today.

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What is a Marketing Strategy and its Leading drivers of Change

What is a Marketing Strategy and its Leading drivers of Change

Is there a golden classic marketing strategy example that has served brands and businesses for years?

Successful businesses adapt their strategy constantly. The only way to survive and stay relevant is to embrace change.

It is driven by many factors, including the availability of new technologies, changing customer preferences, and transforming the competitive landscape.

Each crisis shows weak points of your business and opens new possibilities.

The global pandemic isn’t the only reason to rethink your marketing strategy, but a perfect incentive to finally start doing it regularly.

Let’s dig into it some more.

What is a Marketing Strategy?

A marketing strategy is a comprehensive business development plan including all issues related to increasing profits and sales. A good marketing strategy covers four main areas:

1. Market share: expanding the business or finding a perfect niche, getting more customers, increasing profits.

2. Manufacturing: the use of innovative technologies, the launch of new products, an increase in the volume of production, planning of the team’s work.

3. Organization: optimization of personnel management. For example, you can develop a clear hierarchy and define the responsibilities of each department.

4. Financial: all of the company’s goals are related to money. These can be a decrease in manufacturing costs, an increase in sales volumes, and an improvement in profitability.

Also, getting a marketing strategy is a way to identify priority business areas and plan activities. It allows you to:

  • manage resources in the best way
  • prevent possible marketing mistakes
  • improve the efficiency of the company

The marketing strategy can cover a long period, up to 20-25 years. But in small and medium-sized businesses, planning is usually done for up to 3 years.

It is important to remember that a marketing strategy is not a step-by-step action guide . If necessary, it can (and must) be adjusted according to the circumstances.

But is having a marketing strategy really necessary? This is the data from research by CoSchedule

  • the most organized marketers are 397% more likely to report success
  • goal-setting marketers are 376% more likely to report success
  • marketers with a documented strategy are 313% more likely to report success

Is it Time to Make Changes to Your Marketing Strategy?

The global pandemic shock is by far the biggest reason to rethink marketing strategy. We already know that the changed circumstances had an impact on the patterns of people’s behavior. Now we are more actively consuming content on the Internet, using online services for various purposes.

Analysis by GlobalData shows that 9 out of the top 10 global eCommerce companies (by revenue) experienced double-digit growth in 2020 as new consumer habits swayed in their favor.

However, the pandemic is not the only reason to think about adjusting strategy. Other signals might indicate that your marketing strategy is out of date:

  • decreased income
  • customer loss
  • less public interest

Even if you don’t see any of these signs, it doesn’t mean that change is unnecessary. We strongly recommend updating your marketing strategy if you implemented it over two years ago. Most probably, your business was different back then.

The Main Drivers of Change in Marketing Strategy

1. know your customers.

After the pandemic, some of your clients’ habits changed, so take it into account. Over time, distancing will become the new normal. Social commerce is becoming a new reality. Users are chatting in groups on social media, discussing general issues, and even shopping on social media itself.

This pattern of behavior can be applied to business. For instance, shopping online together with friends will allow them to get the same joy as the usual shopping. Provide your customers with this opportunity.

2. Emerging Technologies

Let’s say your clients prefer not to make phone calls anymore but to use messengers. Start supporting them via WhatsApp. Give them that opportunity. They will be more willing to chat with you and more likely to make a purchase.

Modern technology makes it possible to choose clothes online almost as conveniently as in a regular store. Users can try on clothes using their virtual doubles to see if it suits them or not. Provide them with such an innovation. They would gladly buy more.

3. Learn from Your Competitors

Learn and analyze the best marketing strategies examples from your competitors to better understand the market. Market analysis is necessary to understand whether your product is needed at all and the general direction the market is moving to. Studying business media and networking will help you here.

4. Use Data to Adjust Strategy

Analyze your data. This will help you not only understand what improvements the product needs but also create more personalized promotions for customers. It might also be a good idea to interview customers. Many of them will be happy to tell you what they would like you to improve. This will help not only to make the product better but also increase the level of service.

5. Corporate Culture

It might seem that corporate culture is an internal affair of the company, which has nothing to do with marketing strategy. However, it directly affects how customers perceive your business. Ask your employees if they are proud to work for the company. Do they feel comfortable in the workplace? If not, ask how you can fix the situation. Happy employees will be sharing their happiness with clients.

6. Explore New Niches

Explore your adjacent markets for new opportunities. Perhaps a slight modification to the product will help you find a whole new audience. For example, if you are organizing tourist trips, you could pay more attention to local tourism. Its popularity has skyrocketed as a result of the closure of state borders around the world.

7. Risk Management

It is impossible to be ready for every crisis, but you need to make at least some preparations. Always have a Plan B for your company. The global pandemic has shown that radical change can come suddenly. Any business must be flexible and ready for change. Can you move all your sales online if needed? How about quickly reorganizing production to make goods that are in demand in the crisis? Think about it.

5 Marketing Strategy Examples to Inspire You

Different companies choose different factors that help them build marketing strategies. Some of them, such as Zoom, take advantage of the situation — global lockdown.

Others, such as Spotify or Netflix, basically create new markets. Another marketing strategy example might be risky campaigns, like the ones Red Bull does. Let’s take a look at some of the stellar marketing strategies adopted by brands.

It has grown globally, with a presence in 34,000 cities worldwide, thanks to social networks. In January 2015, Airbnb launched a social media campaign with the hashtag #OneLessStranger. It was a “global social experiment”.

The company asked Internet users to make random “acts of hospitality” to strangers. The results were posted on social networks with a hashtag.

Airbnb

What you can learn?

  • Go experimental
  • Create a community around your brand

2. McDonald’s

In 2003, McDonald’s began selling McArabia flatbread sandwiches in its restaurants in the Middle East. Later it added a gourmet almond dessert range to the French market and McSpaghetti to its menu in the Philippines.

McDonald

  • Be attentive to cultural peculiarities
  • Think out-of-the-box
  • Think local to go global

Did you know H&M annually increases the number of its branded clothing stores by 10-15%? One of the secrets of their successful global strategy is optimizing the online experience. With its user-friendly, mobile, and multilingual online store, H&M has made it easy for users from all over the world to shop online.

HM

  • Communication should be omnichannel
  • Be accessible
  • Be aware of the trends

The streaming platform Spotify has been able to transform the way people consume music. It introduced innovative marketing approaches and became the leader in streaming audio. The company introduced the continuous playback of music, playlists for any mood, and artificial intelligence that knows what kind of music the user will like.

Spotify

  • Be innovative
  • Look for new possibilities in established markets
  • Use freemium mode to make users get used to your product

5. Harley Davidson

The brand always makes customers feel like they belong to a big family. People buying their bikes feel connected to other bikers. It’s like an inexplicable connection between all freedom-loving racers.

For instance, once the company sent out boxes of nothing but fresh air to some of the visitors of the motorcycle exhibition. More than half of those who got a mysterious black box bought a motorcycle immediately after receiving “the air of freedom.”

Harley-Davidson

  • Be creative
  • Get to know your client
  • A perfect present should not always be expensive

Without a strategy, a company’s marketing efforts would be chaotic and ineffective. A marketing strategy helps to focus efforts in the right direction and optimize processes.

And for it to work, the strategy needs to be regularly reviewed and updated. Only in this case will it fulfill its main tasks: strengthening the brand’s presence in the market, increasing the company’s profits and competitiveness.

This would not be possible without having a presence on social media. But then again, mere social media presence is not enough.

Effective management, timely posting, and performance analysis are of the utmost importance. Try SocialPilot , the all-encompassing social media analytics & reporting tool that will be a reliable partner in this challenge.

Frequently Asked Questions

🌟 What is a marketing strategy?

A marketing strategy is a comprehensive business development plan. It includes everything related to increasing profits and sales. It focuses on achieving the maximum output from limited resources.

🌟 What is market share?

Market share is the part of the total market owned by a particular organization for a given category of goods or an individual product.

🌟 What is big data used for?

Big Data is a set of continuously increasing volumes of information of the same context but different presentation formats. It allows companies to forecast demand and other metrics.

🌟 Why is having a brand important?

A brand is a complex of ideas, opinions, associations, emotions, value characteristics about a product or service in the consumer’s mind. A brand is used to form a bond between the company and the consumer.

🌟 What is brand culture?

Brand culture is a set of behaviors and values that a brand stands for. This is adopted by an organization externally, and internally. It defines and governs the brand experience and expression for both customers and employees.

About the Author

Picture of Yuliia Mamonova

Yuliia Mamonova

With 5+ years in Digital Marketing as a Head of Content, Yuliia is driving Lemon.io’s growth with her spot-on writing and clear messaging. A writer and a researcher at heart, Yuliia knows how to engage readers and build a story that’ll stand out.

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MARKETING INSIGHTS

11 best marketing strategies to accelerate your business (+ examples)

  • Lena Sernoff
  • Aug 2, 2023
  • 17 min read

Marketing Strategies to Accelerate Your Business Growth (+ Examples)

The first and most crucial step in your marketing strategy is marking your online territory. When you create your own website , you're claiming a digital space that's entirely yours. Next, you'll need to outline your company's growth plan using the right marketing strategies to generate more leads, web traffic and acquire new customers. From influencer marketing and PR to SEO, we'll explore precisely which types of marketing to focus on in the year ahead to fuel significant growth for your business.

Start building your online presence with Wix .

What is a marketing strategy?

The role of a marketing strategy is to map out how you plan to promote and sell a product or service. Its ultimate goal is to reach your target audience through marketing and advertising campaigns and then get them to buy or engage with your service. It can also help you map our your target audience, as well as the best ways to reach them with tracking and insights.

Essentially, a marketing strategy is an overarching plan that anyone deciding how to start a business , or working with an existing business use to increase visibility and ultimately their profits. It can involve anything from creating a strong brand identity to developing innovative products and services. Successful marketing strategies should be tailored to your specific goals and objectives.

Creating strategic marketing strategies starts with defining what is product marketing for your niche, understanding where you are now, identifying key areas of improvement and focusing on achieving specific goals.

Marketing strategy vs. marketing plan

While these terms are used interchangeably, marketing strategies are broader summaries of what your business does to overcome your pain points, meet your goals and reach your audience.

A strategy provides a larger picture of how you plan to stay ahead of your competition. It can reveal threats that you may need to consider for long-term sustainability . By contrast, the marketing plan methodically outlines details of how you will implement your strategies and how you will track your marketing ROI .

Additionally, your marketing plan is highly detailed and involves the four Ps of marketing : product, price, place and promotion. It helps to ensure a more integrated marketing approach—that is, a unified message across all of your promotional channels.

Why marketing strategies matter

There are plenty of benefits to defining your marketing strategies early on. Marketing strategies are essential for businesses as it helps them to identify their goals and objectives, understand their target audience, and develop an effective approach to reach out to them. A well-crafted marketing strategy can help you gain a competitive advantage , improve your brand image and increase sales and revenue. Setting clear goals and objectives and aligning the marketing strategies to achieve them best sets you up for success. To understand more about the theory behind why marketing matters, we recommend the ideas and work of Michael Porter . He is credited with developing the concept of competitive advantage, for example. There's a lot to be gained from understanding his research and incorporating it into your marketing management .

Furthermore, marketing budgets might be limited when starting a business , and a clear plan ensures you won't waste any resources. Besides, how will you measure success if you don't first establish what it looks like or how you'll get there?

The main elements of a marketing strategy

These may vary but generally include:

Establishing your target audience through market analysis

Deciding on your Unique Selling Proposition , Go to market strategy

Creating your market positioning , and establishing product differentiation, how customers will perceive you and your product

Establishing your pricing

Setting the budget for your marketing strategy

Implementation of your chosen strategy

Continuous tracking and improvement of your plan

For more information on what makes an effective modern marketing strategy, we recommend looking to Phil Kotler , whose work on marketing management and the importance of connecting with your audience, has been instrumental in improving marketing strategies.

11 best marketing strategies

One of the biggest challenges in marketing strategies is keeping up with changing market trends and consumer preferences. Developing an effective marketing strategy can also requires significant time, resources, and expertise; t he list of the types of marketing strategies out there is extensive. By analyzing the top marketing trends and doing in-depth customer and market research, we've narrowed it down to the top 10 strategies for you.

Remember that no matter which methods you decide to include, they will only be effective if your audience likes and trusts your business. As you carry out campaigns, aim to educate, inspire or entertain your audience, so you'll see the most impactful results.

Content marketing

Social media marketing

Search engine optimization (SEO)

Email marketing and newsletters

Influencer marketing

Earned media and PR

Landing pages

Advertising

Affiliate marketing

Retargeting

AI marketing

01. Content marketing

In the past decade, there's been a shift in the marketing mindset. Today we see a rise in blogs, podcasts and webinars that are engaging and inclusive to audiences—so they feel more connected with brands.

Creating valuable and informative content has become a win-win especially when it comes to developing and improving customer engagement . Content marketing creates a strategic opportunity for your business to connect with a customer meaningfully.

Content marketing also helps you generate awareness, become an authority and tell a story. Focusing on this strategy early on is handy for other marketing ideas , as you can share your content on social media or in email newsletters later. The most popular content strategies are:

Content writing

Infographics

Video marketing

Starting a podcast

podcasting as an idea for online marketing strategies

02. Social media marketing

71% of small-to-mid-sized businesses use social media for marketing . This high percentage comes as no surprise. Social media marketing is one of the most influential ways to use digital marketing to increase visibility and gain traffic to your website. More so, it can be a valuable lead generation method, a sales channel, an audience insights tool and a customer service outlet.

From Instagram Reels to TikTok, your options of getting in front of new audiences are endless. Ensure you strategically choose which channels you focus most on, based on your target audience. If you aim to reach a professional audience, LinkedIn is a must for creating a company page. Social media platforms are a great way to secure first-mover advantage , a concept in marketing and business when companies are the first to market in a specific product category. The speed at which its possible to generate and distribute multimedia content on social media is ideal for this.

Video marketing is a format that is becoming more heavily favored on social media as users consume more content on their mobile devices (this marketing strategy also works well if you're focusing on mobile marketing), so consider this as an important form of content creation in your marketing strategy. This marketing strategy also allows brands to tap into the phenomenon of viral content. While not easy to achieve, it can have a dramatic impact on key marketing metrics and KPIs, such as website traffic, and brand visibility.

Social media advertising is another component that should not be overlooked. For example, advertising on Facebook can drastically increase new customers. Want to try Facebook advertising for your business? Facebook Ads by Wix directly connects to your website to set up and optimize your campaigns. Remarketing on social media channels is a highly effective way to bring people back to your website to complete a purchase.

Popular social networks for promoting a business:

Instagram marketing

YouTube marketing

TikTok marketing

Facebook marketing

LinkedIn marketing

Pinterest marketing

Twitter marketing

Our recommended reading to improve your social media strategy:

Types of Social Media Content for Your Business

How to Increase Social Media Engagement

Ways to Improve Your Social Media Presence

social media marketing strategies

03. Search engine optimization (SEO)

Search engines are filled with micro-moments. These are high intent instances when someone wants to learn, buy or do something. By optimizing your chances of ranking higher on search engines to show up at these instances, you're practicing search engine optimization SEO .

Search engine optimization (SEO) can be used as a core marketing strategy or a marketing tactic. In either case, a solid SEO strategy centers around making a brand’s content desirable, discoverable and accessible for web users via search engines like Google and Bing. Like inbound marketing, the most effective SEO strategies will include a great deal of audience research (typically with keyword research) and will be designed to ensure the brand has competitive visibility within the target audience.

SEO strategists tend to focus on industry specialisms and niches, such as technical SEO . Taking this approach can help brands to concentrate knowledge, utilize the most effective SEO tools , and best satisfy user intent.

Using SEO techniques, you'll direct the right kind of traffic to your site. People who find you through searches already arrive at your business website with intent. Driving traffic to your website isn't the only significant benefit. Bottom line sales also improve with SEO. In fact, 70% of online marketers say that "SEO is better than PPC advertising for generating sales."

To implement an SEO strategy, start by learning how to do keyword research the right way. After selecting which high intent keywords you're after, you can begin optimizing your content and improving your online presence to increase your search ranking and visibility.

SEO example of a search result

04. Email marketing and newsletters

Recent studies show that 89% of marketers use email as the primary channel for generating leads . However, for email marketing campaigns to succeed, they need to deliver the right kind of message to your audience (no spammy "Buy now" emails). Good email marketing builds a relationship and acquires trust with readers.

You can still automate emails (check out marketing automation software ) but remember to always add value. These newsletter examples show how all-sized companies can communicate uniquely and interestingly with subscribers. When you make a newsletter , conduct A/B tests to maximize performance.

When done correctly, your newsletter and email marketing strategy can create a strong ROI, improve customer retention and influence purchasing decisions.

Email marketing tips:

To build your email list , add a pop-up to your website to collect user information.

Share engaging content in your emails, such as blog posts, user-generated content and videos.

Personalize emails by adding information such as first names and customizing content based on how the user engaged with your site.

emails shown as marketing strategies

05. Influencer marketing

According to author and entrepreneur Seth Godin, "People do not buy goods and services. They buy relations, stories, and magic. These wise words sum up the power of influencer marketing . As one of the quickest growing marketing strategies, influencer marketing uses real people to speak for your brand. Another side of it, is tapping into celebrity branding - using high profile influencers or online celebrities as part of your marketing efforts.

Influencers are individuals with high following or authority on a given topic or niche. This is one of the best marketing strategies because you get to expose your products and brand to a high follower reach without spending time building the audience. More than that, the influencer you've chosen to work with can use their authority to sway potential consumers to buy. Influencer marketing is not unlike word of mouth marketing or referral marketing.

The key is to find influencers that relate to your product and align with your brand values. Don’t be afraid to start with smaller partnerships with nano and micro-influencers . Interestingly enough, often their engagement rates and conversions are much higher than the ones with massive followers.

After reading these impressive stats below, you’ll further understand the lucrative power of a good influencer marketing strategy in helping your secure greater market penetration as part of a wider mass marketing strategy:

60% of marketers report better performance with influencer content vs. their own brand content.

Over 70% of marketers agree that the quality of customers and traffic from influencer marketing is better than other forms of marketing.

Influencer marketing yields between $5.20 to $6.50 for every one dollar spent.

06. Earned media and PR

After you've launched your business and website, it's time to spread the word. Gaining positive publicity and traction from media outlets will create the buzz around your business to get the attention of the masses. Business marketing strategies within this realm come in varying forms, including TV, newspapers, radio and podcasts.

Ideally, the press and publicity you acquire are organic (unpaid), but even if you’re considering working with a paid PR agency, the ROI can prove worthy. Bill Gates himself said, “If I only had two dollars left, I would spend one dollar on PR. It's an effective way to take your marketing communication to the next level.

07. Landing pages

What is a landing page? In simple terms—a marketer's best friend. This standalone page has one clear goal which is conversions.

No matter how successful your various online marketing strategies are, your landing pages and website must convert at a decent rate to make all the efforts worthwhile. Even just a one-second delay in page-load speed leads to a 7% drop in conversions.

Stay up to date with landing page best practices to increase your website conversion rate . By using Wix’s landing page builder , you’re already optimizing with best practices in mind. The landing page templates have customizable designs with CTA buttons placed strategically, built to be mobile-friendly, and critical information above the fold. Simply upload your images and change the text to fit your business.

image of a landing page used for marketing

08. Advertising

There are numerous types of advertising to consider for your business. From social media advertising to TV and print advertising , the options for advertising campaigns greatly vary. One thing is clear, online advertising is a powerful way to get your audience's attention. Its digital technology helps you better target, track and measure the results of your paid marketing investment.

Learning how to advertise on Google early on will significantly benefit your growth within digital advertising. Since Google is the largest search engine globally, you want to stay ahead of the competition and show up for strategic keywords related to your offerings with Google ads. Advertising on Google and many social media platforms is also known as Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising .

To choose the proper advertising methods for your business, consider:

Your audience

Costs and budget

Timing and length of your campaign

Creative assets available

09. Affiliate marketing

To answer the question, “ What is affiliate marketing? ” you can think of it as paid partnerships where others promote your brand for you. By creating an affiliate marketing program, you’re ultimately working with another affiliate that will distribute product promotions on their social media accounts, blog, or other platforms. Their sales get tracked with unique links called affiliate links, which allow the individual to get compensated based on performance.

This type of marketing is increasing in popularity, and more and more companies are rolling out their own affiliate programs. Due to this growth, today, 81% of advertisers include affiliate marketing as part of their overall marketing strategy.

10. Retargeting

Retargeting is a highly effective way to reach people who are already familiar with your brand and have expressed some level of interest in what you have to offer. It allows you to show ads to people who have already visited your website or shown interest in your products or services.

There are a few different ways to retarget people who have visited your website, from display and social media ads to email marketing, which can help you in the following ways:

Increase brand awareness. Make sure your brand is top of mind for people who have already visited your website. This can make them more likely to remember you when they are ready to make a purchase.

Generate leads. Showing ads to people who have visited your website and have done nothing else can encourage people to take the next step. Try offering free discounts or trials to give further incentive.

Drive sales. People who abandoned their shopping carts or visited your website but didn’t buy anything might just need a reminder, and you can make sure they get one.

Whichever platform you choose, just make sure you are tracking the results of your retargeting campaigns so that you can see what’s actually working.

11. AI marketing

Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly transforming the world of marketing. AI-powered tools and technologies are being used to automate tasks, personalize experiences and target audiences more effectively. As a result, AI is becoming an essential part of any successful marketing strategy.

AI marketing is still in its early stages, but is rapidly growing in popularity. As AI technology continues to develop, it's likely that AI marketing will become even more important in the future. Here are some specific examples of how AI is being used in marketing today:

Chatbots: Chatbots are AI-powered software programs that can simulate conversation with human users. Chatbots are increasingly being used in marketing to provide customer support, answer questions, and generate leads.

Personalized recommendations: AI can be used to recommend products or services to customers based on their past purchase history, interests and online behavior. This is a powerful way to increase customer engagement and drive sales.

Targeted advertising: AI can be used to target ads to specific audiences based on their demographics, interests, and online behavior. This is a more effective way to reach target audiences and improve the return on investment (ROI) of advertising campaigns.

AI website builders : There are a number of AI-powered design tools available that can help businesses create websites more quickly and easily. These tools use AI to generate templates, layouts and even content for websites.

These are just a few examples of how AI is being used in marketing today. As AI technology continues to develop, we can expect to see even more innovative and effective ways to use AI in marketing in the future (such as AI marketing automation ).

Marketing strategies examples (and why we love them)

Wix: content marketing with education in mind.

If you haven't yet heard—we launched a podcast. Now What interviews leaders to discuss the future of business, design and eCommerce. The episodes are filled with helpful insights on succeeding as an entrepreneur as technology keeps changing.

Podcasting is a content marketing strategy that centers around the listener. On top of educating and informing with this content, Wix also turns some episodes into blog posts and shares them on social media. We saw how helpful it could be to have all types of content that listeners and readers can consume in the medium that best fits them. And most importantly its not just about promotion—it can inspire and teach something new. Podcasts and other forms of marketing content can also be used as part of your customer relationship management, as they allow you the ability to engage directly with your users or potential customers.

Wix's Podcast as a content marketing strategy

Berta : Social media marketing that keeps up with the trends

Bridal company Berta didn't earn its 2.9 million followers for nothing. Their highly engaging, humorous and trendy Instagram Reels and TikToks take over social media feeds. In one of their Instagram videos , they used a trending voice-over of the Kardashian family speaking. They styled each Kardashian voice with a different Berta dress to playfully showcase their dress line to each unique personality.

Their trendjacking marketing strategy is not only clever and entertaining, but it also displays products naturally. Berta makes themselves relatable and likable, while also positioning themselves as driven by innovation, through social media—something all brands can learn from.

Berta use trendy videos as an example of one of the best marketing strategies

Etsy : Email marketing campaigns that add value

Etsy, a platform known for its handmade gifts, understands how to use email marketing to showcase products while also benefiting the reader. The sharp yet level-headed subject line "Next-level gifting" grabs attention immediately. Opening the email with the following helpful advice:

"A few tips for nailing their gift: 1) Try a pick that's unexpected—but so perfect. 2) Celebrate your connection, whether it's a shared hobby, a sweet message, or an inside joke. 3) Add a personal detail to make it completely one of a kind."

The email grouped different products, such as jewelry, cozy gifts, heartfelt art and more. As a receiver, you're happy you got some thoughtful gift ideas from Etsy. Instead of spamming product links into an inbox, Etsy added value and tried to find ways their marketing could be helpful.

Example of Etsy's email marketing efforts

Blue Apron : Influencer marketing with a niche

As a meal prep business, you can only imagine how strategic it was for Blue Apron to partner with a top chef like Sam Kass . Kass reaches 20,000 followers that are likely all food lovers. Blue Apron's use of influencer marketing and personalization has boosted engagement by hosting a virtual cooking class with Kass, helping them foster brand trust. They stayed focused on their niche within the foodie world and used leaders aligned with their values to represent their brand. While a highly effective strategy on its own, mass marketing is not necessarily the right approach in every situation. Understanding your market share within a niche that is more likely to convert is more important sometimes than focusing on a wider market grab. In essence, strategic marketing is where it's at.

Blue Apron's influencer marketing strategy example

How to choose and create a marketing strategy in 5 steps

Define your goals

Identify your target audience

Understand your customer’s pain points and your value proposition

Select your marketing channels and allocate budgets

Decide on the messaging, creatives and implementation plan

01. Define your goals

Data repeatedly shows that ​​those who write down goals achieve more than those who don't. There are several ways to set your objectives, such as using the SMART Goals method, broader SWOT analysis . You might also need to run a marketing audit of your current strategies to see what's working, what's not and how this will impact your new marketing goals.

Your business goals might be to develop your brand awareness, break into a new geographic area, or increase online sales by a given percent. The more specific and numerical these goals are, the better they can be tracked, measured and replicated.

02. Identify your target audience

After you determine exactly whom your business wants to reach, it will be clearer which marketing strategies to choose. That's because the messaging and platforms you'll use need to fit your target audience and target market . Audience parameters can be tied to demographics like age, gender, geographic region, likes, interests, etc. They can also be enhanced with competitor analysis . Create different l ightboxes or conduct market segmentation to assist you in the process.

Identify your target audience image of a woman buyer persona

03. Understand your customer’s pain points and your value proposition

To develop a marketing strategy that works, you must understand what your ideal consumer struggles with regularly. This awareness will align your product, place, price and promotion to solve their pain points and increase your chances of scalability. Once you’re confident in your value proposition , you’re ready to proceed.

Not sure where to start with this? Consider using the marketing mix, or 4p's of marketing . This is an approach that helps organizations develop and implement effective marketing strategies. It consists of four key elements that collectively shape a company's marketing approach - product, price, promotion and place or distribution.

04. Select your marketing channels and allocate budgets

Where does your audience spend the most time? Is it social media or reading publications and online magazines? Once you know where the people you want to be reaching are, you can best select the types of marketing you wish to implement in your strategies and the marketing channels to target. While niche marketing can be impactful, you can also consider the benefits of diversification in your marketing strategies - is offline marketing worth it for you, for example. Sometimes not putting all of your eggs in one basket is the better approach.

Likewise, choose which marketing tools will help you execute the campaigns. Allocating a specific budget for each channel and your KPIs is also important to do in this stage. Using a marketing plan template is a simple and effective way to document your process.

types of marketing strategies

05. Decide on the messaging, creatives and implementation plan

The final step in your marketing strategy is working on your messaging and creative formats. For example, if you plan to educate customers on product capabilities and spend a lot of time on YouTube, you might create a video campaign. The video messaging will resonate with your target audience in a relevant and meaningful way.

How to track marketing strategies

Tracking your marketing strategies according to their set KPI's is essential for understanding how effective they have been, and so you can optimize them as they run.

We've put together some of the main ways in which you can track your marketing strategies from planning to execution. The specific KPIs for each marketing strategy may vary, but in general they should all be tracked according to the following steps.

Set your goals and define what you want to achieve with your marketing strategies. Do you want to increase website traffic, generate leads, boost sales or improve brand awareness?

Choose the key performance indicators (KPIs) that align with your goals. If one of your goals is to increase website traffic, then your KPIs or marketing metrics would be page views, bounce rate and time on site.

You should use always tracking tools in order to collect the specific data you need to understand how close you are to meeting your KPI's, or not. The exact tool/s you use will vary according to your goals and specific metrics but some popular examples include Google Search Console, tools that track social media analytics and email marketing software. Make sure to fully understand what it is your tracking before choosing the right analytics tool for you. Some tools can measure multiple KPIs, such as traffic sources , traffic numbers and more. You may need to check that you have the necessary tracking codes installed on your website and landing pages to monitor your campaign's success.

Once you've collected your data, you'll need to analyze it. First of make sure to regularly review and analyze the data collected from your tracking tools, either on a weekly, monthly or quarterly basis. This will help you identify what's working and what needs to be improved. It should also help you plan better future marketing strategies and campaigns.

Don't be afraid to adjust your strategies. Based on the insights gained from your data analytics, you'll most likely need to adjust or optimize your marketing strategies to improve them. One example of this is if your social media campaign is not generating the desired engagement, try experimenting with different content formats or posting times.

Monitor your strategies and their progress both over the short and long term. This should be a continuous process that involves reviewing your KPIs and metrics to ensure that you're on track to achieve your objectives.

What is a marketing strategist?

A marketing strategist is someone, generally referred to as a professional, who develops and implements marketing plans and campaigns to achieve a company's marketing and sales goals.

Their responsibilities include conducting market research, analyzing consumer behavior and market trends, and identifying target audiences. From this information, they create effective marketing strategies and tactics, including product positioning, pricing, promotion, and distribution. The ultimate aim of a marketing strategist is to increase brand awareness and drive sales growth.

Marketing strategies FAQ

What are the main components of a good marketing strategy.

While the precise marketing strategy you choose will depend on your specific business, industry and marketing KPIs, the components of a good marketing strategy remain the same. These include clear goals and objectives, a well-defined target audience, a unique value proposition, a solid competitive analysis plan, a great marketing mix, a clear budget and metrics complete with a structured implementation plan.

Why is a good marketing strategy so important for your business?

What are best practices for marketing strategies, what are the 4 types of marketing strategies, related posts.

Marketing plan template: step-by-step guide plus examples

40 effective types of marketing to boost your business

A look forward: 6 marketing trends to embrace in 2024

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11 marketing strategies (+how to execute them effectively)

business marketing strategy is

Marketing is the foundation of how you communicate your value to potential customers and convert them.

Developing an overarching marketing strategy is all about understanding who your customers are , how your product fits into the market, and where to reach the right people.

The trick to building a successful marketing strategy is choosing the right one for your needs, and getting it down on (proverbial) paper. In fact, marketers with documented strategies are a whopping 313% more likely to be successful!

We’ll walk you through what a marketing strategy is, how to build a marketing plan based on that strategy, and how to oversee day-to-day plans and execution seamlessly.

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What is a marketing strategy?

A marketing strategy is your business’s game plan for finding your target audience — those people who are your potential customers — and turning them into such.

A marketing strategy should also support your business’s value proposition and communicate why you’re the better choice over your competitors.

It’s critical to get organized when it comes to your marketing strategy.

In fact, organized marketers are 397% more likely to report success, and goal-setting marketers are 376% more likely to report success — both practices are a natural part of building a marketing strategy.

One of the most critical parts of building a marketing strategy is documenting it and tracking its success, both of which can be done using monday.com’s Work operating system (OS).

Our marketing strategy template allows marketing leaders to easily keep track of campaigns by department or goal — including important elements like the project brief, status, priority, and timeline.

marketing strategy tracker template 1

This template can be adapted to keep track of projects by goal, or narrowed further to keep track of specific asset optimization.

marketing strategy tracker template 2

Finally, there are placeholder columns to help marketing leaders keep an eye on deadlines and target goals.

marketing strategy tracker template 3

But before you dive into actually documenting your marketing strategy, you might want to perform a marketing SWOT analysis. A SWOT analysis helps you think about your business in terms of its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Marketing leaders can use monday.com’s Work OS to document potential projects, goals, and needs in our marketing SWOT analysis template .

marketing strategy SWOT analysis template monday.com

This template organizes groups of tasks by the four pillars of a SWOT analysis and ranks tasks or goals in terms of relevance and priority.

Marketing strategy vs. marketing plan

It’s important to note that a marketing strategy is not the same thing as a marketing plan .

You might have one overarching strategy, and then sub-strategies for different areas of marketing — as we’ll see in a minute.

Similarly, you might have one overarching plan, bringing together all the steps that need to happen to achieve every strategy, or you might have a separate plan under each sub-strategy.

How you build it out is up to you.

Of course, using monday.com you can create a separate strategy and plan for each marketing area and link them all together, so you also have a cohesive overall strategy and plan.

But the important point to remember here is that strategy = what, and plan = how.

A marketing plan is often tracked and documented using a marketing calendar . These are most often organized by month, and include plans for campaigns, distribution, status, and due date.

marketing strategy calendar template monday.com

monday.com’s Work OS makes it possible to view your marketing calendar in both list and table format as well as using an actual calendar, as shown below:

marketing strategy calendar view template monday.com

Of course, you can’t execute a marketing plan without a budget. In order to track your marketing budget , use a template that allows you to estimate planned spend, record actual spend, and keep track of things like campaign status and media type.

marketing strategy budget template monday.com

What are the most effective marketing strategies?

After defining your overall marketing strategy, performing a SWOT analysis and setting up an overall marketing plan and budget, let’s dive into the various marketing strategies that you can use in support of your goals.

Digital marketing strategy

A digital marketing strategy encompasses all digital marketing platforms, including pay-per-click (PPC), search engine optimization (SEO), paid and organic social media, email , blog posts, web pages, and so much more. Pay-per-click is a marketing method that brings instant results, whereas SEO is usually a long-term project.

It’s often a catch-all for everything your business does online in support of marketing efforts, and excludes activities like in-person events, print sales materials, company swag, and out-of-home media buys like billboards and other ad types.

Including interactive content such as  flipbooks , polls, quizzes and AR advertisements in your digital marketing strategy is also important as it keeps people on your website  for longer and improves their experience.

To accurately plan and execute a digital marketing plan in support of your strategy, you’ll need to track the status of various campaigns, platforms used for execution, and various stakeholders.

digital marketing strategy template monday.com

From there, tracking allocated spend versus actual spend, target audience, and path to content creation in support of the campaign are crucial for an on-time and impactful launch.

To keep track of campaign performance, link your digital marketing strategy to a campaign tracking dashboard to easily view details like performance by platform and campaign duration.

digital marketing strategy campaign tracking template

If your campaigns aren’t organized by channel, try this marketing campaign template , which provides a broader overview of campaign success for marketers who might need it.

Content marketing strategy

A content marketing strategy is closely associated with inbound marketing , and is the process of building high-quality assets (pieces of content) for relevant target audiences, in order to move them down the funnel to purchase.

Content calendars are the core of a content marketing strategy, assisting marketers in planning, executing, and publishing various types of content to support this goal.

A content calendar is typically organized by month, and includes the status, stakeholders, audiences, and final publish link of each asset — as well as anything else your organization might need to track.

marketing strategy content calendar template

The terms content calendar and editorial calendar are often used interchangeably, but they’re not exactly the same.

A content calendar might include things like product webpages and sales one-sheets, whereas an editorial calendar typically focuses on things like blog articles, videos, bylines, and more.

Blogging strategy

Part of your content marketing strategy is likely going to be running a blog . Execute your blog plans with a tracking template that captures content type, category, stage of creation, publish date, and more. Make sure that your blog content follows best practices , i.e. it is well-structured, delivers a great user experience, and answers user intent. If search engine optimization (SEO) is a core part of your blogging strategy, our template is set up to make sure you’ve tracked whether or not your assets hit your SEO goals before they go live.

marketing strategy blog planning template

Video strategy

Content marketing strategies almost always include brand awareness and video these days. In order to track and manage the creation and distribution of video content , adapt this content planning template to include steps like storyboarding, production, editing, and more.

Organize your plans by date, or perhaps by channels — YouTube, Vimeo, Instagram (posts, reels , and stories), TikTok, Facebook, and LinkedIn are often popular channels through which marketers distribute video content.

marketing strategy video content planning template

Audio strategy

These days, your content strategy isn’t complete without an audio content or podcast strategy . Our podcast planning template allows you to track audio content creation, production, and distribution all in one place.

marketing strategy podcast audio planning template

Social media marketing strategy

A social media marketing strategy is your business’s plan to leverage specific social media channels to meet your needs.

Your social media strategy can sometimes overlap with your digital marketing strategy if you choose to plan both paid and organic social media efforts under one roof.

Much like a content calendar, marketers often rely on a social media calendar to keep operations running and track the success of various campaigns.

marketing strategy social media calendar

Outside of producing social media content and getting it live, you’ll also want to make sure you’re crystal clear on which efforts have been successful and which have not.

monday.com’s social media metrics template allows marketers to track campaigns by impressions, engagement, link clicks, and other metrics that matter to them.

marketing strategy social media metrics tracking template

Product marketing strategy

A product marketing strategy is the bridge between your product team and your marketing team, and includes the management of a go-to-market strategy plan for new products or features on your product roadmap.

Product roadmaps are often used to help business functions like marketing and sales plan for new feature launches and create supporting assets like sales decks, one-sheets, talking points for account managers and sales representatives, and much more.

product marketing strategy roadmap template

Email marketing strategy

An email marketing strategy includes everything that’s communicated via email from your business to your customers or prospects — including marketing messages , product updates, sales outreach, and more. Think of your email marketing strategy as the blueprint for targeting the right audience and the best route to speak directly to them.

Email marketing is often fragmented in the sense that ownership spans multiple different teams within marketing. It’s important to keep track of one master email marketing calendar, so you don’t lose sight of the overall customer experience, or worse, end up spamming your customers.

monday.com’s email marketing template allows teams to organize email communications by category, send date, audience, status, and much more.

marketing strategy email marketing template monday.com

Our template can be expanded to include important email metrics like open rate, click-through-rate , and website traffic, so you can determine which marketing efforts have been successful and which have not.

Event marketing strategy

An event marketing strategy includes the attendance or sponsorship of both online and offline events — conferences, webinars, trade shows, client dinners (if relevant), and more.

Event planning is easily planned and executed with monday.com’s event schedule template , which allows marketers to view task lists alongside a calendar. Marketing teams can assign event leads, assistants, status, dates, timelines, and more.

marketing strategy event planning template monday.com

PR strategy

A public relations (PR) strategy is an organized effort to target media outlets — including online, print and broadcast — for the purpose of reaching a broad audience and influencing brand perception and sales.

It can often be complex. Relationships need to be built not just with customers, but with journalists, government decision-makers, and other influential entities and institutions.

In support of your PR strategy, monday.com has an easy to use media coverage template that supports PR teams in tracking various types of coverage.

marketing strategy media coverage tracker monday.com

SEO strategy

Last, but certainly not least, an SEO strategy is one of the most important traffic drivers for any website or business.

This encompasses the creation of content that ranks for certain keywords through organic search engines, so that relevant consumers find your website and products.

The foundation of any SEO strategy is keyword research — which is the process of identifying relevant search queries in search engines like Google and Bing — and developing a plan for a web page or series of web pages to rank for those keywords. Check out this local SEO guide to learn more in-depth about the importance of keyword research!

monday.com’s keyword research template allows marketers to collect and analyze data across various long-tail keywords and clusters, and then build those content plans into a content calendar.

Your keyword research will include documentation and analysis of things like difficulty, search volume, average cost per click (CPC) if using paid advertisements, and landing pages which you plan to utilize in support of your efforts.

marketing strategy SEO keyword research template monday.com

Optimize your marketing tactics with the right tools

All marketing strategies need to be integrated with one another, and are often dependent on the successes and failures of one another.

For example, a blog post might not be successful without a social media or email campaign to distribute it. Or a PR campaign might not be successful without attending a flagship event where your team can meet multiple reporters at once.

For the best chance of success, you’ll want to build your marketing strategy on a Work OS that acts as everything you need all in one — a project management tool, performance tracker, communications tool, file storage system, and so much more.

monday.com has everything marketing teams need to execute their marketing strategies. Get started today.

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The Future of Marketing Is Intergenerational

  • Mauro F. Guillén

business marketing strategy is

Older consumers can’t just be an afterthought for brands — but that doesn’t mean just shifting the focus from one generation to another.

Demographics suggest that Americans over the age of 60 will soon become a larger consumer group in terms of income than 20-to-34-year-olds, yet companies still position their brands as if the bulk of the market is people under the age of 40. The answer, however, is not to shift marketing strategies from one generation to another. Research has suggested that boundaries between generations are fuzzy, if not arbitrary. Plus there’s a bewildering degree of variability across individuals within the same generation. Instead, marketers should aim to emphasize common values across different age groups and build “post-generational” brands.

Policymakers, employers, and marketers traditionally have concentrated their attention on people in their 20s, 30s, and early 40s. After all, these have been the largest age groups, the biggest spenders, the trend-setters, and — so we thought — the embodiment of the future of consumption.

business marketing strategy is

  • Mauro F. Guillén is a vice dean at the Wharton School and the author of the new book, The Perennials: The Megatrends Creating a Postgenerational Society .

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Marketing Strategy: In-Depth Guide [Plus 16 Proven Strategies]

business marketing strategy is

Quick links:

The marketing strategy is a critical factor that determines whether a business succeeds or fails. All companies know if they want to generate revenue and opportunities in today’s competitive world, they need to have the right marketing strategy. 

Yet, many organizations still think they can dive into marketing without a pre-established plan. A marketing strategy is how you define exactly how you’re going to reach your audience, how you’re going to determine whether a campaign has been successful, and how you’re going to generate consistent growth. 

It’s what keeps your employees and other contracted professionals on the same page when building promotional campaigns. Marketing strategies ensure you can develop a consistent presence (both online and offline) and generate a real, measurable ROI (Return on Investment) from each marketing effort. Without them, you’re essentially diving in blind.

Here’s everything you need to know about developing a compelling marketing strategy, as well as some behind-the-scenes insights into the top marketing tactics.

What is a Marketing Strategy?

Businessman points to a graph

Let’s start with the basics: What is a marketing strategy?

The term “marketing strategy” refers to any comprehensive plan for promotion. Your strategy maps out exactly how, where, and when you’re going to connect with your audience and what kind of goals you’re going to be trying to achieve. 

While the exact nature of a marketing strategy can vary from one brand to the next, it should always provide a detailed, structured set of promotional guidelines to follow. Marketing strategies align your team to specific goals, help you tie your efforts to specific objectives, and ensure you can identify and examine what resonates best with your target audience. 

Some of the core components of a marketing strategy include:

  • Your Marketing Mix:  Your marketing mix, otherwise known as the “4 P’s” of marketing, outlines the core components of what you’re going to be selling and how you’re going to be promoting it. You’ll use this document to define your Product, Price points, Place (Where you’re selling), and Promotional strategies ( which tactics  you’ll use for marketing).
  • Marketing objectives:  In a marketing strategy, your objectives outline the specific goals you want to achieve with your marketing efforts. They highlight exactly what you’re trying to accomplish, such as increased brand visibility and awareness, improved reputation, higher credibility, increased sales, and better audience retention.
  • Marketing budget:  Your budget defines exactly how much money and resources you’re willing to dedicate to each part of your promotional strategy. It looks at funds allocated to hiring the right talent, using the correct software, and promoting on various channels.
  • Competitive analysis:  Most marketing strategies will also provide insight into the competitors in your market. They can include insights into the marketing tactics your competitors are already using, their target audience, as well as their strengths and weaknesses. 
  • Segmentation, targeting, and positioning:  Marketing strategies also include “STP” documents, which highlight your target audience, and the specific segment of customers you want to reach, as well as the position of your brand in relation to other companies. In other words, they define what makes you unique in your industry.
  • Metrics and KPIs:  A good marketing strategy should provide insight into the key metrics and key performance indicators you need to track to determine whether your marketing campaigns are successful. They’ll give you behind-the-scenes insights into what you need to monitor and analyze when optimizing your campaigns.

Why is Marketing Strategy Important?

So, why is it so important to learn how to develop a marketing strategy? The simple answer is that marketing strategies give you focus and direction. A robust strategy will ensure you can effectively reach your target audience and get the best ROI (Return on Investment) from each campaign.

Without a marketing strategy, you’re really just “guessing” at what might work. You won’t be able to effectively monitor whether your  influencer campaigns  are driving results or determine why one campaign might work better than another. 

In fact, marketing strategies are so effective at generating positive results studies have shown companies with a documented strategy are  538% more likely to report  being successful. 

Marketing strategies:

  • Help you define your customers:  They give you a behind-the-scenes insight into your user personas, their pain points, and their goals, so you can design more relevant and engaging campaigns. They ensure every message you create is tailored to the right customer. 
  • Refine your brand:  With a marketing strategy, you define exactly what makes your company special, why it stands out in a specific market, and what it can offer. This can help you to position yourself more effectively in relation to other companies.
  • Ensure consistency:  With a marketing strategy, you’re more likely to convey your value in a consistent, relatable way. You can set up comprehensive plans for each marketing tactic which help to preserve the identity you want to build. 
  • Keep you within budget:  A marketing strategy also helps to reduce the risk of overspending by ensuring you know exactly what resources you can allocate to each part of your strategy. This ensures you don’t have to worry as much about unexpected expenses. 
  • Ensure you reach your goals:  Marketing strategies help you to define your goals and create clear, consistent plans for reaching them. They ensure you have the right metrics to track and that you know which analytics you should be monitoring when generating campaigns. 

How to Develop a Marketing Strategy: Step by Step

business marketing strategy is

Now we’ve determined what a marketing strategy is and why it’s so important, it’s time to start looking at how you can develop your own. As mentioned above,  marketing strategies  can differ depending on your unique approach to promotion. However, there are some core steps virtually every business should consider. Let’s dive in.

Step 1: Define Business Goals and Objectives

The first step in developing any successful marketing strategy is understanding exactly what you want to achieve. The goals you set for your marketing efforts can vary from one campaign to the next. For instance, you might decide your core goal for a content marketing campaign is to raise brand awareness and visibility, while your influencer strategy is designed to  boost your credibility .

Setting goals is crucial because it provides you with a clear vision to work towards. With the right goals, you’ll know how to monitor your progress and define when your campaigns are successful. 

The best marketing goals will always be SMART; in other words, they should be:

  • Specific: Don’t just say you want your marketing strategy to increase sales. Determine exactly how much of a profit increase you want to see, what products you want to promote, and how you’re going to convert and attract customers. 
  • Measurable: Your marketing strategies should always be easy to measure. Define the core KPIs and metrics associated with success in each campaign. For instance, if your goal is to increase engagement, you might track likes, shares, and mentions across social media. 
  • Achievable: Setting lofty goals for your marketing campaigns is great, but it’s important to ensure you can really achieve them. Ensure you have the resources you need in place to actually accomplish your targets. 
  • Realistic/Relevant: Your marketing goals should be connected to your wider business targets and brand vision. They should also be realistic, based on the resources, budget, and abilities your team and employees have. 
  • Time-Bound: Part of making sure your goals are specific is choosing a specific deadline or date for when you want to achieve them. A good SMART Goal might be: We want to increase our social media engagement levels by 20% in the next 3 months. 

Step 2: Conducting Market Research

Market research is one of the most important and  time-consuming components  of any marketing strategy. It involves collecting as much information as possible about the “market” in which you operate. This means you need to understand not just who your customers are but also what kind of trends are affecting your industry, who your competitors are, and where opportunities lie. 

A good way to conduct market research is with “PESTEL” analysis. This stands for: Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Environmental, and Legal. To conduct a PESTEL analysis, you’ll need to consider how each of these factors can influence your position in the market and your strategy for reaching your audience. 

PESTEL Analysis (PEST Analysis) EXPLAINED with EXAMPLES | B2U

For instance, from a social perspective, you might note your customers are more likely to collect information about brands from social media than they are to use search engines (this is true in the Gen Z landscape today). From a technical perspective, you may need to consider what kind of tools and resources you’ll need to use to conduct your marketing campaigns, such as social media listening tools, email automation tools, and SEO software.

A good approach to market research will also involve taking a closer look at your competitors. In other words, identify who your core competitors are, and find out exactly what kind of customers they’re trying to reach and which marketing strategies they’re using. For instance, in the marketing landscape, you may identify HubSpot as a competitor and note they produce content to attract their audiences, such as webinars, blogs, videos, and podcasts.

Step 3: Identifying and Understanding Your Target Audience

Audience analysis is sometimes included as part of a comprehensive market evaluation. However, identifying and understanding your target audience is often a significant task in its own right. Every business has a specific audience, or target market, made up of people most likely to benefit from their services or solutions. Knowing  your target audience  is how you ensure you can create personalized, relevant campaigns which resonate with your chosen market.

The best way to ensure you fully understand who you’re going to be serving is to create a set of buyer personas. These are documents outlining the psychographic, demographic, and behavioral attributes of your ideal customer. 

For instance, a sustainable fashion company like Lululemon may specifically target people in their  mid-teens to late thirties  with interest in active lifestyles and sustainable living. 

Bar chart from Statista

Your buyer personas should outline as much information as possible about your customers, including:

  • Their location:  Where are your customers most likely to be located? Are you running a small local company only capable of supporting nearby consumers, or do you operate a global brand? If your customers are located in different regions, does their cultural or geographical background influence their buying behaviors in any way? 
  • Demographics:  How old are your customers, on average? What’s their gender identity, and how do they define themselves? Do they belong to a specific educational or income group? Do they have a certain occupation or family life? 
  • Behavioral information:  What are the key behavioral characteristics of your customers? How do they research and buy products? Do they prefer to shop offline or online? Are they driven by certain factors, like sustainability or price? 
  • Goals:  What do your customers want to accomplish? More importantly, what can your business help them achieve? When buying your products or services, what will be the main value your customer will be looking for? 
  • Pain Points:  What kind of pain points do your customers need to overcome before purchasing from you? Are they concerned about pricing, convenience, or customer service? Do they have specific issues that aren’t being addressed by existing companies?

Step 4: Determining your USPs

Based on your market research and customer personas, you should be able to identify some core areas where your business can separate itself from existing companies and brands. Your “Unique Selling Points” are essentially the core values you’re going to be drawing attention to whenever you create a new marketing campaign. They’re what you use to constantly convince your customers you’re the best solution for their specific needs. 

The best USPs revolve around customer pain points and goals. For instance, if you know your target audience is concerned about high prices for products, but they still want to access sustainable, high-quality items, you may focus on highlighting your ability to deliver eco-friendly items on a budget. 

Take a look at AllBirds, for instance. The rapidly growing footwear company built its brands around the core values of sustainability, transparency, and comfort. They promise consumers access to high-quality clothing which can stand the test of time without having a negative impact on the environment. Apple, on the other hand, built its USP around delivering innovative, unique technology to consumers which is easy to use and accessible. 

An image of iPhone 14 Pro

Ask yourself exactly what you want to deliver to your target audience. What kind of benefits can you offer that no other business can provide?

Step 5: Budgeting and Allocating Resources

Budgeting can be one of the more challenging aspects of developing a marketing strategy. For the most part, small businesses tend to allocate approximately  2 to 5% of their annual revenue  to marketing and promotion in the B2B world. In the B2C world, this percentage is often higher, ranging to about 10%. However, there’s no one-size-fits-all strategy for budgeting. 

The first and most important thing to realize is that marketing will always cost money. However, some marketing strategies are more cost-effective than others. For instance, content marketing and SEO can be some of the cheapest ways to generate long-term results for your business. However, they won’t provide the quick results you can expect from more expensive PPC campaigns. 

The best way to ensure you’re using your budget correctly is to define exactly which forms of marketing are most likely to generate the best ROI for your company. To begin with, you might allocate a small portion of your budget to a range of different campaigns, so you can test to see which options are most lucrative for your brand. 

As you learn more about things like cost per acquisition and the average lifetime value of customers acquired from different marketing strategies, you’ll be able to update your budget. 

Step 6: Crafting a Messaging Strategy

Marketing is really just another form of communication. It involves using carefully crafted messages, in a range of formats, across a variety of platforms to connect with your target audience. Your messaging strategy determines exactly how you’re going to communicate with prospects. It can also outline your strategy for connecting with employees and investors. 

A good messaging strategy considers more than just how you’re going to  talk about your products  in videos and in marketing blogs. It should outline the core personality that will be baked into everything you produce for your brand. In other words, what do you want people to think and feel when they’re interacting with your business?

National Geographic’s messaging strategy revolves around delivering highly informative, entertaining, and educational messages to customers. The company uses storytelling and artistic language to create amazing visuals with words. Innocent, the Smoothies brand, uses humor and playfulness in its messaging strategy to make it appear more approachable to customers. 

Based on your desired personality and tone of voice, create a set of editorial guidelines your employees can follow whenever they’re crafting messaging for your company. 

Step 7: Choosing the Appropriate Channels

Once you know how you’re going to send your messages to your target audience, the next step is figuring out where you’re going to cultivate your presence. There are numerous marketing channels a business can use in today’s landscape. We’ll cover some great strategies below; however, in the meantime, here are some areas you can consider:

  • Social media:  Social media marketing can include both organic and paid advertising. The right social channels are excellent for building stronger relationships with your target audience. However, it’s important to ensure you’re active on the right platforms. LinkedIn is excellent for B2B interactions, while TikTok is ideal for younger customers. 
  • Paid advertising:  Paid advertising campaigns usually consist of PPC advertisements, banner ads, and paid promotions on other websites. These tools can be great for rapidly increasing  your online presence . However, you’ll need to ensure you’re positioning yourself on the right channels with the correct strategies. For instance, if you’re advertising on Google, which keywords will you be targeting? Will you be focusing on banner ads or Google shopping?
  • Influencer and affiliate marketing:  Influencer marketing involves working with other credible professionals to boost your online presence. You can connect with social media influencers, bloggers, vloggers, or just thought leaders in your industry. Influencer marketing can also go hand-in-hand with affiliate marketing, which involves paying professionals every time they generate new opportunities for your business. 
  • Email marketing:  Emails deliver an average ROI of around $ 42 for $1 spent , which makes them one of the most lucrative marketing tools out there. Email is a great way to draw attention to new products, sales, and promotions hosted by your business. However, it can also be a phenomenal tool for nurturing relationships with customers over time. If you’re planning on using email in your marketing campaigns, you’ll need to think about how you can use webinars, landing pages, and other tools to collect contact details.
  • SEO and content marketing:  Content marketing involves creating high-quality content designed to capture the attention of your audience and provide them with entertaining, valuable insights into relevant topics. It can boost the thought leadership and authority of your brand, as well as help you to rank higher on the search engines. SEO campaigns can require more extensive planning and may require you to think about things like backlinks, technical SEO, and off-page optimization. 

For an example of a company that knows how to use marketing channels correctly, check out Airbnb – which takes full advantage of the visual capabilities of Instagram:

Airbnb Instagram profile

On top of all those common options, you can also consider a range of other marketing channels, such as push notifications and chatbots designed to proactively reach out to customers when they’re already on your website. You might use video marketing and podcasts to connect with audiences more interested in listening to or watching content. Plus, you can experiment with offline advertising, too, using direct mail, banner ads, and even event marketing campaigns.

Step 8: Create Your Marketing Plan

As mentioned above, a marketing plan is a core component of a strong marketing strategy. However, they’re not exactly the same thing. Your marketing strategy provides an overview of your reasons for advertising and how you’re going to accomplish results. Your marketing plan outlines exactly how you’re going to leverage each marketing tactic. 

For instance, if, like many companies, you plan on investing in content marketing, you’ll need to consider the following:

  • Who will be responsible for creating the content?
  • What type of content will you produce? (videos, blogs, podcasts, webinars, whitepapers, infographics, etc.)
  • When will the content be published? Do you have a specific content calendar in mind? Scheduling your content can help to ensure it reaches customers at the right time.
  • Where will your content be distributed? Alongside your website, do you want to publish your content on other platforms, such as podcast directories?
  • Why are you using this marketing strategy? What are your goals, and what are the core KPIs and metrics you need to track along the way?
  • How will you promote your content? What will you do to ensure you get eyes on your pieces? 

Depending on your situation, you may need to start by auditing your current content plan, and determining what topics you need to expand on, what types of content are already effective, and what channels you’re currently using. If you’re starting from scratch, you’ll need to set up editorial guidelines for how to produce your content, decide who will be responsible for creation, editing, and promotion, and build a content calendar for publication.

Step 9: Implementing your Marketing Strategy

Digital marketing media in virtual screen

At this point, you should have everything you need to start putting your marketing strategy to the test. This means it’s time to begin implementing your campaigns – carefully. 

Start by creating a document that outlines all the steps you need to take to complete your campaign. In other words, define your strategy and who in your team will be responsible for which steps. Outline who is going to create content and when it needs to be completed. Define which marketing channels you’ll be using, and define how you’re going to measure success along the way. 

For example, imagine you’re running a video software company. Your first marketing strategy might involve promoting a software update due in the middle of the year. At the start of the year, you could create a content marketing strategy that highlights all of the core benefits you’ll be bringing to your customers. After this, you could launch a video campaign, walking users through the new features. 

You might use an online webinar to teach customers how to use the new features, with advice from industry experts and appearances from influencers. After the launch of your new software updates, you could promote user-generated content from your customers, highlighting how they’ve benefitted from the updates. 

Step 10: Measuring and Analyzing Results

Your marketing strategy doesn’t end when you implement your first campaign. Once you’ve started rolling out your marketing strategies, you’ll need to monitor their results. If you’ve set your goals carefully (as mentioned above), you should have an insight into the core metrics and KPIs you need to monitor to determine whether your campaigns are successful. 

Using tools to help you track crucial metrics, from engagement levels to conversion rates and revenue, can give you some more useful statistics to work with as you’re developing your marketing plans. Once you have your analytics, you can start using your findings to implement changes. 

Use A/B testing and split testing strategies to determine how certain changes to your campaigns enhance or optimize your marketing campaigns. Make notes about how different call-to-action buttons in your landing pages or copy in your blogs lead to more revenue and sales. 

16 Proven Marketing Strategies 

Now we’ve covered all the steps involved in learning how to develop a marketing strategy; the next step is deciding what kind of marketing campaign you’re going to start with. As mentioned above, there are numerous amazing ways you can get started with marketing. 

Here are 16 proven marketing strategies, sure to work for all kinds of brands. 

Best for:  Brand awareness, growth, and visibility

Search Engine Optimization is perhaps the most effective and versatile marketing strategy there is. After all,  68% of online experiences  begin with a search engine. Making sure you have what it takes to appear at the top of the search result pages for the terms your customers are searching for improves your chances of sales significantly. 

Search Engine Optimization is about more than just researching the right keywords for each campaign. You need to ensure every aspect of your site is tailored to appeal to both your target customer and the search engines. This means investing in everything from technical SEO (such as making sure your site loads quickly) to off-page SEO (guest-posting and back-linking). 

Fortunately, there are numerous tools you can use to help you boost your SEO strategy. If you’re building a site on WordPress, plugins like Yoast can help you to instantly optimize each piece of content you produce. Ahrefs is ideal for keyword research, and SEMRush can help you to analyze your competitors and look for keyword opportunities. 

Not sure exactly how effective SEO is?  Gymshark , a leading athletics clothing retailer, ranks fourth in the search engines for the keyword “workout clothes” and generates around 90,500 searches per month as a result. If you need another great example of how well SEO can work, look at “OptinMonster,” it ranks number one for the keyword “Email marketing” on Google, thanks to its comprehensive content marketing campaigns:

Google search results

2. Search Engine Marketing (PP)

Best for:  Quick visibility and conversions

Often used in  conjunction with SEO , PPC, or Pay Per Click advertising is a way of boosting your position on the search engines with paid ads. While search engine marketing (SEM) can be difficult to master for beginners, it can generate fantastic results. 

Depending on the keywords you choose to target, you can start marketing for as little as $5 and pay only when someone clicks on your ads. Plus, Google Ads allows customers to target very specific customers with each campaign. You can choose exactly where you want to reach customers, what sorts of sites you want your content to appear on, and so on. 

Excelling with search engine marketing does require some experimentation. You’ll need to explore the benefits of various different campaigns, from text-based ads to image ads and even Google Shopping ads, which show up as a carousel with different products and reviews. Like most campaigns, you’ll need to pay close attention to your results to ensure you can consistently optimize your campaigns and increase your ROI. 

Leveraging additional tools, such as Google Trends (to track customer interest), Google’s Keyword Planner (For finding target keywords), and SEM Rush, can help to boost your results in SEM campaigns. For an example of how effective SEM can be, check out this case study. Deliveroo used a combination of  17,000 campaigns in 6 languages  across 12 countries to boost its online presence and boosted its visibility on a massive scale as a result. 

3. Email Marketing 

business marketing strategy is

Best for:  Nurturing customer relationships 

Email marketing might not be the newest promotional tool on the market, but it offers some phenomenal benefits to virtually all kinds of business owners. As part of your marketing strategy, email offers a unique way to nurture customers, generate higher customer lifetime values, and more. 

According to some studies, email marketing can have an average return on investment of around $42 for every $1 spent, making it one of the most lucrative forms of advertising. It’s also a relatively simple tool to take advantage of. 

With an email marketing automation platform, such as Omnisend, GetResponse, or ActiveCampaign, businesses can set up a range of promotional campaigns to achieve different goals. For instance, you can send transactional emails to customers to improve brand credibility and trustworthiness or use promotional emails to draw attention to a specific sale or offer. 

To ensure success with email in your marketing strategy, you should always:

  • Segment your customers : Arranging customers into different segments will help you to deliver more personalized, relevant messages to every client. 
  • Experiment : A/B testing and other experimentation strategies can help you to ensure every subject line, call-to-action, and an email message is driving the right results. 
  • Automate : Automation ensures you can deliver the right messages at the perfect time to increase engagement and conversions. 

In  this case study , TechSoup Polska used automated email newsletters to share insights with customers on recent achievements and customer experiences. The newsletter led to a 1200% increase in order value over the course of a year and increased click-through rates to the company’s website.

4. Growth Marketing

Best for:  Rapid experimentation and optimization

All businesses want to cultivate and enable growth. However, developing and growing your brand with traditional marketing methods can be time-consuming and expensive. A growth marketing strategy could be the perfect alternative. 

Growth hacking is a data-driven marketing strategy that involves using rapid experimentation and analytics to pinpoint the best ways of increasing revenue.  Growth hacking and marketing experts  leverage a range of tactics, from promoting companies on under-used social channels to referral marketing campaigns to unlock new opportunities for lead generation. 

One of the reasons growth marketing is such a compelling solution for today’s business leaders is it ensures they can try out new forms of advertising quickly and cost-effectively, allowing for rapid transformation and optimization. 

There are plenty of tools companies can use to unlock the value of growth marketing too. For instance, referral apps can be added directly to Shopify and WordPress websites. Companies can also work with digital marketing experts and influencer consultants to discover new marketing methods. In fact, you can find a  growth marketing consultant  right here on Growth Collective. 

For an insight into how effective growth marketing can be,  just look at Groupon . Considered one of the fastest-growing companies of all time, Groupon used referral campaigns and partnerships to rapidly become one of the biggest apps in the digital world. Companies like HubSpot have also leveraged growth hacking techniques, such as giving away free services to boost their credibility and generate brand loyalty. HubSpot allows users to access a free website grader in exchange for their email address, ensuring the team can continue to connect with and nurture new clients.  ‍

Hubspot Website Grader page screenshot

5. Social Media Marketing

Best for:  Long-lasting customer relationships 

Nearly  5 billion people  worldwide are using at least one social media channel. If you’re not including social media in your marketing strategy, you could be missing out on some incredible opportunities. Not only does social media give you an excellent way to connect with highly targeted audiences, but it can also help you to boost your brand reputation. It offers brands a new way to serve clients, answer questions, and share valuable information. 

There are dozens of ways to leverage social media as part of a comprehensive marketing strategy. Companies can take advantage of organic posts to showcase thought leadership and nurture customers. With paid ads, you can use targeted campaigns to specifically capture the attention of certain audiences with unique promotions. 

Social media marketing can also correlate with a range of other marketing tactics. You can use it as part of an influencer campaign, content marketing strategy, or SEO campaign. There are even tools companies can use to make social media marketing easier, such as social listening tools, for capturing insights into how customers feel about your brand. Social media calendars and automation tools help you to build comprehensive schedules and plan how you’ll interact with clients. 

Platforms like HootSuite, Sprout Social, and many others can even give you behind-the-scenes insights into your target audience, so you can develop customized campaigns and boost your chances of a higher ROI. Just remember, making the most of social media means not only creating the right content but also choosing the right channels – where your customers are already active. 

For an insight into how successful social media marketing can be, just look at Starbucks. 

Starbucks Instagram profile

The company uses its presence on  channels like Instagram  to keep customers engaged with regular posts, share insights into new products, and even build brand credibility. In 2019, the company even partnered with the “Born This Way” foundation to raise $250k for LGBTQ+ rights, earning it the respect and support of its customers. 

6. Content Marketing

Best for : Boosting brand presence

No matter what type of business you’re trying to run or what kind of goals you hope to achieve with your marketing strategy, it’s  important to invest in content . Content is perhaps the most valuable tool businesses have to engage with their audience, form stronger relationships, and demonstrate thought leadership. The more content you produce, the more you benefit from higher SEO rankings, increased credibility, and greater brand visibility. 

Currently, around  82% of marketers  use content marketing as part of their core promotional strategies. The great thing about content is you can use it to connect with your customers at every stage of the buyer journey. Creating useful blogs that answer critical customer questions is a great way to grab attention during the “Awareness” stage. 

As consumers search for solutions to their problems in the “Consideration” stage, you can provide them with guidance and behind-the-scenes insights in the form of videos and infographics. Even after you’ve acquired a customer, creating educational content can help to boost customer retention and keep your customers coming back to your store. 

There are various valuable tools that can help you get the most out of your content marketing strategy. BuzzSumo is great for finding topics to write about and pinpointing keywords to rank for. ClickFunnels is fantastic for building comprehensive sales funnels with content that engages customers through every stage of their journey. You can even use tools like ChatGPT and GPT 4V to help writers research interesting topics. 

For a great insight into just how valuable content marketing can be, look at Salesforce. The company consistently commits to creating rich, engaging content across a range of channels to help educate and inform its target audience. The company even promotes live events across channels like LinkedIn to help boost its position as a thought leader. With one  LinkedIn series , Salesforce achieved a 3% engagement rate, 600,000 organic viewers, and increased customer loyalty.  

7. Influencer Marketing

Best for:  Increasing authority and credibility

Interest in  influencer marketing  has skyrocketed in recent years. As consumers become less receptive to traditional marketing methods, influencers have taken over as perhaps the most reputable form of guidance for consumers in search of new products and solutions. 

Influencer marketing involves partnering with experts, thought leaders, and other individuals who have an existing connection with your target audience, to build brand awareness and boost your reputation. While it’s commonly considered a form of social media marketing, there are numerous ways companies can connect with influencers, from asking people to mention their organization in blog posts to paying for a review on YouTube.

Around  9 out of 10 marketers  say they believe influencer marketing is effective. Perhaps the main reason for this is that influencers generate higher engagement and stronger emotional connections than brands producing their own content. 

When leveraging influencer campaigns for your own marketing strategy, there are various tools you can use to boost your chances of success. Solutions like Upfluence and the Influencer Marketing Hub can help you to pinpoint the kind of influencers you want to work with. You can also use social media and content scheduling tools to keep track of the campaign. 

There are tons of great case studies demonstrating how successful influencer marketing can be. One definitely worth mentioning comes from the partnership between  Subaru and Zach King . Zach created a video where he tried to impress his date with a Subaru car with the help of the Subaru team. The video generated over 9 million views, as well as an engagement rate of over 9%. 

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Zach King (@zachking)

8. Affiliate Marketing

Best for:  Increasing product reach

Affiliate marketing shares a lot of the same benefits as influencer marketing when done correctly. Similarly, influencer marketing involves partnering with other people who already have a connection to your target audience. Affiliates can refer customers to your products by sharing insights in their blogs, social media platforms, and other channels. 

Every time an affiliate brings a new customer to your company, you reward them with a commission, often based on the value of the generated sales. Affiliate marketing has proven to be an effective way for companies to improve brand awareness and unlock new revenue. In fact, around  15% of all digital  media industry revenue is attributed to affiliate marketing. 

The key to success with affiliate marketing is choosing the right partners to work with and building long-standing relationships with each person on your team. There are numerous tools you can use to track down and work with affiliates, such as CJ, iSpionage, and Hunter. Once you find your affiliates, make sure you’re rewarding them with the right bonuses and commissions to keep them on your side and provide them with marketing assets to boost their chances of sales. 

Companies using affiliate marketing tools have reported some exceptional results. For instance, BoardRoom Socks partnered with the Refersion affiliate marketing company in 2019 and benefited from a five times higher conversion rate. Today,  BoardRoom Socks  says its affiliate program contributes to more than 10% of its regular revenue. 

9. Video Marketing

Best for: Building human connections

Video marketing is often referred to as a form of content marketing. For companies investing in a high-growth marketing strategy, video can be an extremely valuable solution. We’re living in a world where the demand for visual content is growing. Every day, more consumers access content across TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and countless other channels. 

According to some studies, around  92% of businesses  say they believe video is critical to the success of their content marketing strategy. Similar to many forms of content, video is a highly versatile tool, ideal for connecting with audiences through various stages of the customer journey. You can use videos to provide customers with behind-the-scenes insights into your products and services. 

Video is also an excellent way to generate leads, as you can capture contact information through the creation of video events and webinars. Taking advantage of trends like short-form videos on TikTok and other social media channels also allows you to keep your brand top-of-mind with your target audience. Video is particularly effective at generating human connections with customers through face-to-face, emotional content. 

There are plenty of tools companies can leverage to make the most of video marketing campaigns today, including Filmora for video editing , Canva, and Animoto. The key to success is creating content that delivers genuine value to audiences, whether it’s an explainer video, how-to video, or video review. 

Zendesk creates a number of fantastic videos as part of its comprehensive content marketing campaign. They include demonstrations of the Zendesk software, how-to guides, tutorials, and more. Plus, the company even leverages different styles of video to connect with unique videos, using tools like YT Shorts to connect with customers within a limited time. 

10. Podcast Marketing

Best for : Reaching audiences anywhere

While podcasting might not be as popular of an addition to the average marketing strategy as video quite yet, it’s quickly gaining steam. As of 2021, there  were already 120 million people  listening to podcasts in the United States alone. 

The great thing about podcast marketing is it essentially gives companies a way to connect with their audience anywhere while requiring minimal effort from the consumer. Where customers generally have to stop whatever else they’re doing to pay attention to videos or read a blog, they can listen to podcasts on the go, when they’re at work, or when they’re exercising at the gym.

There are two ways companies can take advantage of podcast marketing these days. The first option is to create a podcast brimming with valuable information for customers to take away, using tools like Podbean and Buzzsprout. The second option is to simply become a guest on another podcast. 

Running a podcast is a great way to expand your company’s reach, and it doesn’t require a lot of technical expertise. Alternatively, appearing on another company’s podcast is a great, low-effort way to reach a new audience and drive them back to your website or products. 

For a great example of a successful podcast campaign, take a look at “ The Distance ” from Basecamp. This collection of 58 podcasts tells the story of various companies running and building their own businesses. The inspiring collection helped to capture customer attention and highlight Basecamp as a company committed to ensuring the success of entrepreneurs.

11. Mobile Marketing

Best for:  Staying connected with customers

Let’s face it; smartphones are pretty much everywhere today. Over  7 billion people worldwide  have their own smartphones, and they’re using them for just about everything. People use smartphones to connect with loved ones, stay productive at work, and even do product research. 

If you want to ensure you’re connecting with your customers wherever they are, adding mobile campaigns to your marketing strategy is a great way to get started. There are numerous ways to connect with customers through mobile too. You can leverage tools like Buffer, GetResponse, and SendinBlue to send automated SMS campaigns to customers, just like you would email campaigns. 

Another option is to take advantage of pop-ups, sending your customers instant adverts and offers through apps they download onto their phones. Most agencies that offer telecommunications consultancy will even suggest the use sensors and beacon-based technology to deliver ads to customers through location-based marketing.

Super Bowl campaign

Let’s take a look at an example of how successful mobile marketing can be. When Pizza Hut became the official sponsor of the Super Bowl, Dominos needed a way to connect with its target audience and stay relevant. It created the “Piece of the Pie” Rewards program, which allowed customers to earn points whenever they scanned an image of any pizza into the app. 

The simple but effective marketing campaign contributed to not just massive customer engagement and increases in brand loyalty but also tons of newly generated user-created content. 

12. Native Advertising

Best for: Authentic-Looking ads

Part of building a great marketing strategy for your business is thinking about how you can promote yourself across multiple different channels and environments. Having your own blog and social media presence is great, but you can significantly increase your reach by connecting with customers on other websites and existing channels too. 

Native marketing is the art of customizing an ad or promotional campaign to fit the feel, function, and look of the platform on which they’ll be published. Many social and community platforms already have tools companies can leverage to utilize native marketing. For instance, with Meta, companies can create native filters and AR tools for Instagram. 

The great thing about native advertising is it allows you to draw attention to your company in a way that feels less obtrusive than traditional ads. Native advertising feels fun and natural, and it boosts your chances of sales without being overly aggressive. 

For an example of how effective native advertising can be, check out some of the Spotify playlists produced by leading brands.  Netflix once teamed up with Spotify  to promote the show “Stranger Things” by allowing users to enable a “Stranger Things” mode on the Spotify app. When the mode was activated, it assigned the user a playlist based on a specific character. 

The strategy not only drew more attention to the Stranger Things show but also helped to highlight Netflix as an innovative, playful, and customer-focused brand. 

13. Cause Marketing

Cause marketing written with golden letters overe black background with magnifier

Best for: Gaining customer loyalty

Studies show that today’s consumers don’t just look at a company’s pricing and product features when deciding who to shop with. Modern customers want to interact with companies that share their beliefs and interests. In fact,  82% of customers  say they want the brands they buy from to have values that align with their own. 

Cause marketing is a way for companies to convince their audience that they care about more than just making profits. Through cause marketing, brands tie themselves to specific social issues and campaigns relevant to their customers. For instance, a company might sponsor a local charity or run a campaign connected to a specific social movement. 

Some brands develop entire identities based on their focus on a specific issue. For instance, you might have noticed a number of fashion companies focusing on eco-friendly and sustainable practices these days. Luxury jewelry brand Civil  even donates 20% of its profits  to under-supported founders and entrepreneurs. 

Cause marketing works best when it’s authentic and focused. It’s not enough for a company to simply say it cares about specific issues. Businesses need to prove that they’re willing to take a stand to make the world a better place. 

For instance, Mythical Kitchen, Binging with Babish, and First We Feast teamed up to create the #LeftOversChallenge and donated 50% of the money they made directly to people dealing with financial insecurity. The other 50% went towards non-profits serving restaurant workers and zero-interest loans for struggling companies. 

14. Event Marketing

Best for:  Memorable interactions

Events are an incredible tool for modern marketing strategies, but they’re still highly underutilized by many brands. Events are more than just stuffy conferences and demo halls; they’re a chance for businesses to interact with their customers on a human level, form new connections, and even improve their thought leadership and authority levels. 

There are numerous ways to get involved with event marketing in today’s world. One of the simplest options is to simply hire a booth at a relevant industry event, so you can network directly with customers. You can also volunteer to speak at an event if you have valuable information to share with potential customers and partners. 

Another option is to create your own event, either online or offline, where customers can get to know more about your brand. The best events provide attendees with access to valuable information, guidance, and entertainment, all at the same time. Thanks to tools like Zoom and Microsoft Teams, you can even host entire events online for anyone to attend. 

One excellent example of how event marketing can drive excellent results in a marketing strategy comes from Oracle. The  Oracle Code One  event brings together programmers and software experts from around the world to share ideas, network, and learn about Oracle technology. The conference doubled up as a way for the company to show its values in 2022, thanks to the use of plant-conscious menus and carbon footprint reduction lessons.

15. Referral Marketing

Best for:  Leveraging existing customers

Word-of-mouth marketing is probably one of the oldest forms of promotion there is. For years, consumers have relied on recommendations and insights from people they know to help them decide which products and services to invest in. Even now,  referral marketing contributes  to around $6 trillion in annual customer spending. 

Implementing referral marketing campaigns into your business strategy is much simpler than it might appear. All you really need is a few happy customers and the right referral app. There are numerous tools like ReferralCandy and Yotpo which can help you to build your own referral campaigns in no time. Once you have one of these tools, all you need to do is encourage customers to refer your service to their friends and colleagues in exchange for a reward.

Rewards for referral campaigns can range all the way from discounts on new products to free gifts and more. Even some of the world’s biggest companies, such as Gousto and Blume, use referral marketing campaigns to allow their customers to give discounts to friends and earn rewards in return. 

Referral campaign from Hello Fresh

The strategy works because your existing customers think they’re doing something nice for their friends by giving them a discount or code, and your new customers trust the recommendations of your existing clients. Just look at  Hello Fresh, for example ; it’s become one of the biggest food companies in the world thanks to its referral campaigns, which give discounts to new customers, and reward existing clients with money off their next delivery. 

16. Direct Mail Marketing

Best for:  Connecting with local customers

In a world of digital transformation, it’s easy to focus all of your attention on strategies for online promotion. However, overlooking the benefits of offline marketing could be a bad idea, particularly for some companies. If you run a local business serving a specific area, for instance, it makes more sense to target local clients with your campaigns than to create global online ads. 

Direct mail marketing is one of the easiest ways to connect with your target audience when they’re close by. You don’t need to spend a fortune on the strategy. You can simply design leaflets or basic mailers, which can then be delivered by third-party delivery companies. There are even tools like Sendoso and Interable which can help you automate your direct mail campaigns. 

Like most marketing campaigns, the key to success with direct mail marketing is delivering genuine value to your audience. Don’t just overwhelm customers with junk mail. Use your direct mail campaigns to invite them to an exclusive event or give them a discount on their first purchase.

An example of direct mail marketing from Kitat

You can even use direct mail marketing to showcase your company’s unique personality. That’s what Nestle did when it sent out direct mail flyers allowing customers to request a free “KitKat Chunky” sent straight to their doorstep. The  playful design of the ad  was intended to look just like a “You Missed Your Delivery” card from the local mail. 

Finishing Thoughts

Clearly, learning how to develop a marketing strategy does take some time and effort. However, it’s also a crucial component of making sure your business can generate as many sales and conversions as possible. With the guidance above, you should have a complete insight into everything you need to know to cultivate the ultimate marketing strategy and put it into action. 

However, if you’re still struggling to unlock the best results from your ad campaigns, it could be worth seeking out some extra help. Here at Growth Collective, you can hire digital marketing experts versed in every kind of marketing strategy to help you kickstart your promotions. 

Reach out today to find the perfect professional to bring your marketing campaigns to life. 

What is the difference between a marketing strategy and a marketing tactic?

A marketing strategy defines the priority markets, products, and target audiences involved in your promotional efforts. With a comprehensive marketing strategy, you define every aspect of how you’re going to reach your audience and what goals you want to achieve. With marketing tactics, you leverage specific types of advertising to achieve your goal. 

What is the fastest-growing form of marketing?

The marketing landscape is changing and evolving all the time, but some strategies do seem to grow faster than others. The online video advertising landscape is currently the fastest-growing environment for online marketing. However, other strategies like influencer marketing, podcast marketing, and social media marketing have grown more popular in recent years too. 

Why would a business want to develop a marketing strategy?

Simply put, a marketing strategy helps to give you direction and guidance when implementing promotional campaigns. It ensures you can stay in sync with your customer base and their needs and communicate more effectively with your target audience. A good marketing strategy will also help to keep all of your employees on the same page. 

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What Is Strategic Marketing?

Flori Needle

Published: April 14, 2021

Marketing is the actions you take to attract an audience to your business. You aim to get people interested in what you have to offer and share content with them to help them decide to do business with you.

marketers working together during a strategic marketing process

However, since marketing helps you attract people to your business, it’s essential to know how to attract them, and even more so who the people are that you want to attract to begin with. Without this critical information, it will be challenging to be successful in your marketing processes.

The way you can get this information is through strategic marketing. In this post, we’ll define strategic marketing and explain the different phases of the process that will help you effectively market your business, attract customers, and drive revenue.

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What is the strategic marketing process?

The strategic marketing process involves conducting research and establishing goals and objectives that will maximize the effectiveness and success of your overall marketing strategy.

This process is beneficial as it helps you be more intentional with your marketing. You’ll be able to ensure that you’ve targeted the right audience, entered the right markets, and used the correct mediums.

You can think of it like this: strategic marketing is the butter you spread on toast. You can have plain toast as it is, but the butter enhances the flavor and makes it better. Strategic marketing ensures that your marketing campaigns are well-planned, effective, and shown to the right people.

Essentially, strategic marketing is the act of uncovering the information you’ll need to create an effective marketing plan and execute successful campaigns.

Strategic Marketing Process Phases

Given that strategic marketing directly influences many elements of your overall marketing strategy, it’s important to approach the process carefully. Below we’ll discuss the different phases of a strategic marketing process.

1. Planning Phase

The first stage of strategic marketing is the planning phase. It’s the most critical step, as it is the basis of your efforts. You’ll want to identify your business purpose, needs, and the goals and objectives you want to accomplish, as the entire process will help you achieve them.

Without this information, it will be challenging to progress to the next steps as you won’t understand the purpose behind your marketing efforts, which makes it even harder to create a solid plan that helps you succeed.

2. Analysis Phase

The analysis phase involves taking an outward look at how your company measures up to your competitors and your industry. During this stage, many businesses will conduct market research and competitor analyses .

Market research will give you an understanding of what your industry looks like, like current trends, market share , and an overall sense of the playing field. The information you discover should also validate your goals and objectives and let you know if they’re achievable. For example, if your overall business goal is to bring a new type of fork to market, but there is no industry or consumer demand for this new type of fork, your efforts won’t be worthwhile.

A competitor analysis will teach you the ins and outs of how your competition works, their position in the industry, and any possible gaps in the market that you can take advantage of to out-perform them. You can look at competitors’ customer testimonials to get a sense of what your target audience is looking for that they don’t provide and use that insight to build a product that your ideal customer already wants.

You’ll also want to take time to study your target audience and create buyer personas . Aim to gain a well-rounded understanding of who your customers are, their needs, desires, interests, and where you’ll find them within the market.

All in all, your analyses should give you an understanding of how competitive you are, and how competitive you’ll need to be in your final strategy to outshine similar businesses and become a viable market competitor.

3. Development Phase

Once you have a clear picture of your industry and how you should present yourself in the market, the next step is to develop your marketing plan. This stage is more closely related to the aspect of marketing you may be most familiar with, as you’re establishing the marketing tactics that are informed by your strategic marketing process.

This stage involves defining your marketing mix, which is how you’ll meet the objectives from phase one concerning the information you discovered during phase two.

A marketing mix is composed of four Ps: product, price, place, and promotion. Let’s go over some brief definitions of each:

  • Product: This is what your business is selling. Product marketers or managers typically do this work, but it involves researching (from phase two), development, and creating a product launch timeline.
  • Price: The price point at which you’ll sell to consumers. Pricing should also be informed by market research and reference to different pricing strategies .
  • Place: Where your product or service will be sold, like online or in-store.
  • Promotion: How you’ll advertise your product and introduce it to the market. For example, the different promotional channels (like social media) you’ll use to get your audience excited and entice them to do business with you.

You can think of it like this: say your end goal, developed during phase one, is to create a full-service CRM. Your discoveries in phase two have shown you that the current CRM your customers use isn’t scalable, which is a consistent pain point. They also want a more reasonably priced option.

This current phase would help you create, price, market, and promote your full-service, scalable, and affordable CRM to the correct audiences that are ready and eager to purchase what you have to offer.

4. Implementation Phase

The final phase of the process is when you begin to act on your marketing efforts. As the name suggests, you’ll start implementing the strategy you’ve developed based on your planning and market research. You’ll launch your product and begin seeing sales.

After implementation, it’s also important to take time to review your processes and make changes as necessary. As the market is constantly evolving, you may need to re-address certain things from phase two due to new trends or changing consumer interests.

Strategic marketing is a full circle process.

Although each phase has its unique requirements, it all comes full circle; the marketing mix you created during phase three is based on research from phase two. And, if you’ve put time and effort into your overall strategic marketing process, you’ll attract customers, drive revenue, and meet the goals and objectives you identified in phase one.

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