If you haven't heard the news, Terabyte has just turned 30 (hip hooray!) and we're in a celebratory mood! So, we thought it would be a great opportunity to share with you 30 timely marketing tips that you can easily implement for your business.
With all that's been happening in the world around COVID and now with the move to Alert Level 2, now's the perfect time to alter your marketing strategy if you need to, implement some of these tips into your day-to-day and reap the rewards.
We're starting small and while this may seem simple, it's a must-do! No matter how many times you've read that post, blog or article, re-read before you hit publish. It's a sure-fire way to pick up on any pesky errors and give you peace of mind your content is on point.
Identify your key messages and then get to know them inside out. They should be echoed through all your content - social, advertising, eDMs, the lot! We're not saying harp on the same exact sentence over and over but let the key thought ring true thought, so your audience knows who you are and what you're about, always.
We're all about planning (and more about that later), but don't be afraid to jump on a timely event, news article, study - whatever! - and tailor some marketing material to drive back to your business. Leveraging timely content is a great way to grab your audience's attention and work your magic on them.
Sit down and work out who your audience is and what platforms work best for you. Does selling always work best on Instagram as opposed to Facebook or Twitter? Then channel your sales efforts there. At Terabyte, we're big fans of using the social platforms together to create a wide brand awareness but working out which platform generates the best return on investment will allow you to really target your audience best. Not every channel works for every brand, so taking time out to identify your key platforms will save you time and money.
What do you really want your marketing efforts to achieve? Defining what's important to your business and platform will allow you to better create content to suit. Do you want to increase followers, bookings or sales? The content you produce will differ depending on your goal, so take it right back to the beginning and outline what it is you want to achieve before you start writing.
Whether It be social handles or your website, add your platforms to your website, business cards and tell people about them in person. That's how we see growth!
Search Engine Optimisation has come a long way and it's now not just about your keywords and web-page manipulation, but about organic content-lead experiences and having SEO woven into your CMS. Confused? Don't panic, we're SEO experts and you can dive more into what we do for SEO here.
Optimising hashtags on your social posts are a great way to increase the reach of your content. Hashtags first originated on Twitter back in 2007, but since then many other social platforms have adopted the practice, such as LinkedIn and Instagram. Add relevant hashtags to your content that your target audience could be searching for to allow them to find your brand and posts with ease.
Understanding your audience in a granular way can help you uncover insights about them and make it easier to tailor specific content to them. Personas are fictional and generalised representations of your audience and their behaviours. We chat all about persona development here. If your target audience is everyone in New Zealand aged 18-60, you might need to re-evaluate!
When was the last time your dug into your Google Analytics and took a look at how many users were landing on your site or coming from certain marketing platforms? Raw data can tell you so much about your marketing efforts and audience, allowing you to continue what's working and stop what's not. Need a hand? We've got just the people in mind!
Yep, social posts, blog posts, EDMS, the lot, should all have a clear call-to-action to drive your audience where you want them to go. If you're struggling to define what the CTA should be, we can guarantee your audience will too.
You can pour time and effort into SEO but if your headlines aren't optimised in H1 and H2 tags and use on point keywords, you may find yourself back at square one.
We know it's cliché, but the old saying rings true - if you fail to plan, you plan to fail! Nut out your marketing efforts including social media, blogs, advertising and more in the form of content calendars. This then makes it easier to align all platforms and activities to make sure everyone is working towards one main goal.
This one goes hand-in-hand with planning, but if you're constantly working ahead not only will you have ample time for approvals and to manage your stress levels, but you also buy yourself some time to be agile when new projects or topics pop up.
We wrote all about this last month and it's a must-read! If you're an eCommerce business and aren't already maximising social commerce, then why the heck not? Read all about it.
Now we're not just harping on about SEO here (even though we love to!). Keywords are important to all marketing efforts, even blogs, headlines and social captions. Before you start a new piece of content, jump over to Google Trends and run a quick (FREE) search to find relevant keywords that are popular and that will help your content stand out.
As a brand, you should always strive to be seen as a thought leader in your industry. Making sure you know your facts before talking sounds like common sense but trust us, it's important!
No matter your marketing activities and platform, reviewing the data from previous activities and implementing changes to suit is a great way to make the most of your time, effort and even budget. Was that post type or topic a flop last month? Well, don't do it again! But whatever did go well, repeat, repurpose and evolve into more content your audience will LOVE.
Using language your audience relates to is a great way to hook them in and get them to relate to your post and ultimately your brand too. Once you've defined your personas, think about how they talk to their friends, what they say over a coffee and HOW they say it. Once you've identified your brand tone of voice, chatting to your audience becomes much easier and more effective - trust us!
User-generated content (UGC) comes in many forms and is something that we're big fans of here at Terabyte. Technically it's defined as any type of content that has been created by unpaid contributors or fans, but on social we see this in action day-in and day-out. Has someone ever posted about your brand and you've reposted it? Bam, that's user-generated content! A testimonial? That's another! Photos, videos, captions, blogs or mentions created by real users are all user-generated content and are little nuggets of gold. With 68% of social media users saying that they take into account what others are sharing on social media, UGC is a very powerful marketing tool.
While we're still on the UGC train, aggregation tools like Crowdriff and Stackla are great ways to aggregate all digital assets that are talking about your brand or something relevant to you. These tools can help you find this content for starters but then can also be utilised to help you grow your social footprint.
If you've ever seen your favourite people on Instagram talking about a certain product and then thought about buying it, you've experienced influencer marketing firsthand. And with stats showing 74% of people trust social media to make their purchasing decisions, utilising influencer marketing is a no brainer. Engage with influencers or micro influencers that would genuinely use your product or service and reach out to them to strike a deal. You've got nothing to lose and a whole untapped audience to gain!
Are you TikTok famous yet? You should be! Jumping on trends like TikTok definitely ticks that timely box we were talking about earlier and can open up a whole new way to get creative and build an audience. Plus, TikTok has in-app ads now (hello, advertising opportunities!).
Always marketing through digital or traditional mediums? Then it's time to explore the others! Opening up to a new medium can bring in a brand-new audience to your business. There are plenty of avenues through print, digital or out-of-home, you've just got to know how to utilise the medium to your advantage. Check out some of our successful campaigns that maximise both.
When utilising digital ads it can be a little disheartening to see low click-through rates (CTR), which may put you off running ads altogether. Since ads work a little different on different platforms and for different industries, what is considered a low CTR' can differ drastically. For example, on Facebook, the average CTR for travel and hospitality businesses is 0.90%, while it's 1.6% for retail stores. Alternatively, the CTR for travel and hospitality through Google search ads is 10.13% and 6.57% for retail. Knowing the benchmarks for your industry and platform can help you put your success in perspective.
While it can sometimes feel like your inbox is inundated with emails every 30 seconds, 86% of consumers prefer contact through email for business purposes, so we definitely see it as an essential gear in the marketing machine. To ensure your emails are performing at their absolute best, make sure you have
(A) a punchy subject line,
(B) an eye-catching design and
(C) a call to action.
Competitor research is hugely important when planning out your own marketing strategy. Without knowing what offers, products or customer service your competitors are offering, you can't be sure how you stack up. Don't be afraid to use what your competitors are doing for inspo or to improve your offer in some way. (P.S. They too have probably researched your company too!)
Hosting competitions across social platforms can be an amazing way to quickly build a following and spread your brand far and wide. Don't think of competitions as giving away free product, but instead as a quick and effective way to build an audience. Just make sure your entry mechanics are driving back to your overall goal!
The saying goes that a picture's worth a thousand words and it's true! Invest in your creative content across all channels and platforms while making sure they align too. There's no point having a killer ad campaign and pouring budget into it if when the audience lands on your website they arrive at something completely different.
If you've read this article and you're still thinking, “where am I supposed to find the time?” we'd recommend chatting to our marketing team. Experts in everything that's in this article and more, they're the right team to help you. Find out what we do in the digital marketing space here.
Got a project in mind? As an innovative digital agency in NZ, we'd love the chance to challenge our creativity and grow your business.
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