Refresh Your Marketing Strategy

Mid-year is always a good time to re-evaluate your marketing strategy, especially when there has been a period of downtime. Whether you are using direct mail, email, mobile, or social media, here is a quick checklist to make sure that, as you look forward to the rest of the year, you are hitting all of the basics.

1. Make a plan.  What are your marketing objectives? They are likely somewhat different than they were at the beginning of the year, and that’s okay. What are your goals now? Re-engage your audience? Recapture lapsed subscriptions? Build your e-commerce engine or delivery services? Have specific goals and apply numbers to those goals to help you measure success.
2. Target emotion.  How do you grab attention and get your audience to act? Now more than ever, people respond to how products make them feel rather than the details of what those products do. Insurance makes people feel secure. Freedom to travel makes people feel adventurous and independent. Developing personasrather than just demographic data can be a great investment.
3. Understand the journey.  Some sales happen quickly. Others are the result of a process that includes discovery and education before the decision is made. This is called the “sales journey.” Take the time to understand what your customers’ journey looks like. Also, take the time to understand the benefits of each communication channel. Where does print fit? Email? Social media? Video? Which channels work best to move your prospects from one stage of the sales journey to the next?
4. Market to the generation of “me.”  This is the “me” generation, so tailor marketing content to your target audience. This can be done through personalized communications that match images, messages, and offers to individual recipients. Or it can be done through strategic targeting and segmentation.
5. Create a timetable.  When and how do you intend to deploy the components of your marketing strategy? Success depends not just on getting the right message in front of the right audience, but on getting the right message in front of your audience at the right time. Create a plan for what content to deploy, using which channel, and when.

Print Still Works; Using print and digital marketing together will have better results.