Every business owner knows the significance of marketing. Proper marketing helps organizations large and small to convey messages to a large demographic. Marketing is essentially how consumers learn about new brands. It ultimately helps them to determine whether your company has products and services they’re interested in, and more importantly, if they’ll do business with you. Failure to use the right marketing methods and communication channels could significantly reduce your brand’s exposure, therefore decreasing sales and your company’s success.
Knowing Your Customer
Outside of knowing what your company goals are, knowing who your customers are is the key to developing a strategic marketing plan. Who are you advertising your products and services to? What is their age? Where do they live? What methods of communication do they use? Which method is often used for research, shopping, or social interaction? Finding the answers to these questions is vital to utilizing channels that will not only reach your target audience but draw them into your business.
Common Channels Used
Not every business will benefit from every communication channel available when marketing to consumers. Though the channels you use will depend on your target audience, here are some of the most common and popular marketing channels used to convey messages to an array of audiences.
Content – In this data-driven information world, content is crucial to the success of a company’s marketing efforts. Content, whether in the form of a social media post, blog post, or website, provides instant data to consumers on your industry, brand, products, and services. Content marketing strategies, such as search engine optimization (SEO), can help businesses reach higher online visibility while also informing, engaging, and entertaining their target audience. An SEO company who specializes in digital marketing can help you create compelling content that will bring in new business and brand awareness.
Videos – As technology becomes more convenient for the mobile consumer to use, their attention spans seem to shorten. When trying to convey a message to the average online user, saying it through video can often be the best solution. Videos are free to create and post on social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and LinkedIn. They can be how-to guides, customer testimonials, demonstrations, and even creative about the company videos. Short yet interesting videos are easy to listen to while on the go and are also fairly easy to share with others, which is how many companies end up going viral in a matter of days.
Social Media – Social media is a platform that most internet users use as a means of communicating, learning, and sharing data. In fact, there has been a 365% increase in social media use in the US. Businesses who have effectively utilized social media as a channel for marketing have seen an increase of 24% in sales. With statistics like these, you can see how investing time in company pages, social media posts, comments, and other marketing tactics through social media pays off.
Images, content, video, and social media are all forms of marketing that can be used to communicate a message to your target audience. After you’ve clearly defined your own marketing goals and determined who your audience is and what they’re needs are, you are ready to begin putting together the pieces to your campaign. The right platform can make all the difference between continued growth and stagnation so choose wisely and most importantly, be sure to evaluate and alter as necessary as time passes and trends change.
