Often when people find out I am a Marketing Consultant they immediately ask me what they should do for their business (or walk sharpish the other direction, understandably). The first thing I tell people is that there is no easy answer, otherwise we’d all be doing it. The second thing is that effective Marketing is not free, and if you pay peanuts you will get monkeys. The third, slightly more insightful thing I tell them is that in my experience the most effective marketing comes from carrying out a range of activities, and not one single act.
Even though I’m not able to give them a one word answer, I do always run through a few of the basics with them to make sure there’s nothing that they’re obviously missing. So, if I met you in a lift and you picked my brains for 2 minutes, this is what I’d be telling you.
1. Is your website up to scratch? Whether you have an e-commerce website or not, ensuring the customer journey is good is absolutely vital. The rule is to try to keep the clicks down – strive for a maximum of 3 clicks to task completion. Stats suggest 36% of people visit a website before making a purchase decision. Also consider is your website accessible across multiple devices? 90% of people use multiple devices to complete a task, from phone to tablet to laptop to desktop. How does your website look on a phone? Are all the buttons visible? And clickable? And don’t forget to make it AA compliant. With around 20% of the UK population have some sort of disability, you’re missing out if you don’t make it compliant with screen readers or speech recognition tools.
2. Are you making the most of your social media channels? I get a lot of people who are quite despondent about social media, claiming it doesn’t really work for them. This is likely to be because you don’t have a strategy in place to make the most if it. True, not all businesses are suited to every social space, and I’m the first to warn people not to do it just because you think you should. However you cannot escape the fact that Facebook is the 2nd most used site in the world, only beaten by Google. Which leads me onto Google+. It’s frustrating, if feels useless, but Google’s Search algorithms puts a high emphasis on Google+ activity. So get your business a page, put it on the map, start posting and see your natural SEO magically start to improve.
3. What are you actively saying to people? This goes back to my dating analogy that you need to nurture relationships with your customers and clients. I often recommend email programmes because they’re very effective and one of the cheapest methods of engagement around. Also consider what content you’re putting out on social media. It isn’t easy to create content, so take some time to do it properly – write short news stories, write a few blog posts at a time, take photos, invest in video, or something well-designed. Whatever it is, sit down and work it out in advance, save yourself a daily headache and vacuous gaps between posts. (Btw, I am aware I am guilty of this!).
4. Are you doing a variety of activities? Social media, advertising, CRM, promotions, SEO, SEM, events, networking, advertorials, promotions, sponsorship, PR, press, apps, widgets, games, microsites – there’s so much you can do in Marketing it’s difficult even for marketers to know exactly what’s going to work and what’s not. But what I can say is if you use a variety of ‘touch points’, that your message remains consistent, and you repeat that message frequently, you’ll see a better result than putting all your money into an expensive ad in a single newspaper (for instance).
At this point we’d probably realise that the lift was broken as clearly Marketing isn't something that can be summed up in 2 minutes... The absolute bottom line is that you know your business better than any hired marketer, so go with your gut instinct. However if you ever need a bit of advice or guidance, then please do get in touch.
Visit the website at www.cherryfusion.co.uk , email us at info@cherryfusion.co.uk or call 0117 959 5198.
1. Is your website up to scratch? Whether you have an e-commerce website or not, ensuring the customer journey is good is absolutely vital. The rule is to try to keep the clicks down – strive for a maximum of 3 clicks to task completion. Stats suggest 36% of people visit a website before making a purchase decision. Also consider is your website accessible across multiple devices? 90% of people use multiple devices to complete a task, from phone to tablet to laptop to desktop. How does your website look on a phone? Are all the buttons visible? And clickable? And don’t forget to make it AA compliant. With around 20% of the UK population have some sort of disability, you’re missing out if you don’t make it compliant with screen readers or speech recognition tools.
2. Are you making the most of your social media channels? I get a lot of people who are quite despondent about social media, claiming it doesn’t really work for them. This is likely to be because you don’t have a strategy in place to make the most if it. True, not all businesses are suited to every social space, and I’m the first to warn people not to do it just because you think you should. However you cannot escape the fact that Facebook is the 2nd most used site in the world, only beaten by Google. Which leads me onto Google+. It’s frustrating, if feels useless, but Google’s Search algorithms puts a high emphasis on Google+ activity. So get your business a page, put it on the map, start posting and see your natural SEO magically start to improve.
3. What are you actively saying to people? This goes back to my dating analogy that you need to nurture relationships with your customers and clients. I often recommend email programmes because they’re very effective and one of the cheapest methods of engagement around. Also consider what content you’re putting out on social media. It isn’t easy to create content, so take some time to do it properly – write short news stories, write a few blog posts at a time, take photos, invest in video, or something well-designed. Whatever it is, sit down and work it out in advance, save yourself a daily headache and vacuous gaps between posts. (Btw, I am aware I am guilty of this!).
4. Are you doing a variety of activities? Social media, advertising, CRM, promotions, SEO, SEM, events, networking, advertorials, promotions, sponsorship, PR, press, apps, widgets, games, microsites – there’s so much you can do in Marketing it’s difficult even for marketers to know exactly what’s going to work and what’s not. But what I can say is if you use a variety of ‘touch points’, that your message remains consistent, and you repeat that message frequently, you’ll see a better result than putting all your money into an expensive ad in a single newspaper (for instance).
At this point we’d probably realise that the lift was broken as clearly Marketing isn't something that can be summed up in 2 minutes... The absolute bottom line is that you know your business better than any hired marketer, so go with your gut instinct. However if you ever need a bit of advice or guidance, then please do get in touch.
Visit the website at www.cherryfusion.co.uk , email us at info@cherryfusion.co.uk or call 0117 959 5198.
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