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Stop wasting time and money on marketing tactics that don’t help.

Marketing is fragmented. It used to be that companies would have an advertising budget – split between TV, radio, and outdoor. In London (where I started my career) we called this ‘above the line’. Think of this as ‘brand awareness’. ‘Below the line’ largely included direct mail, promotions and trade shows – the marketing tactics that did the heavy lifting and actually drove leads and sales.

How times have changed.

Today, marketing is complicated. Very complicated. Just Google; “the marketing map”.

We still have the same proven channels and traditional marketing tactics from yesterday, but we also have streaming (OTT), video, social, telesales, SMS, PPC/SEM, digital advertising, geofencing, websites, thought leadership content, email (with regulations) along with many more channels to choose from. And within each of these paths, you have multiple individual tactics.

In 2019 ChiefMartech put out an article that showed the phenomenal growth of software solutions over the past 15 years. In 2021 that rose to around 8,000 various tech solutions you can spend money on and it’s only going up.

“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.”

That famous quote by John Wanamaker (1838-1922) still holds true for many companies today. They are still spending money on marketing activities without knowing which tactics and channels are working and which aren’t.

Does this sound familiar?

“We advertised last week and saw an increase in sales – so it must have worked”

Or this one?

“It was an awareness campaign. Web traffic went up 30%, so clearly more people are now aware of us”.

It’s time to stop operating as if it’s 1921… or 2001.

Marketing tactics have changed a lot. Especially over the last 20 years.

These days we can identify who to engage with, right down to individual. Advertising and messaging is personalized to each person, on a one-to-one basis, determined by where they are in their buying journey.

Attracting the right people (those that matter to you), engaging with and nurturing them, converting contacts into leads and closing sales, is all about setting marketing objectives that support the business goal — executed through strategies that use measurable tactics.

You can do this with the help of smart, intelligent, cost-effective technology and once you have that, all your marketing activity can be measured. This combination of inbound and outbound marketing, needs to be supported by a solid depth of understanding of the principles of marketing — not random acts of marketing.

With attribution you should know where to double down and where you should spend those dollars for greater ROI.

Whatever your budget is, you’re probably spending more than you should.

That [digital ad] campaign you’ve been running that drove traffic to your website… do you know which ads performed best? Which did nothing? Which platforms and websites were most effective? Where did that increased web traffic come from? Where will you spend your budget next quarter… or will you just do the same again?

It’s not just online advertising that’s measurable, it’s everything you do. Every tactic, marketing channel, and campaign, can and should be tracked and measured. You just need the right automation platform to help you do it.

Marketing Automation isn’t expensive. In fact, talking about ROI, used correctly it more than pays for itself.

You can get the high-priced brand name platforms if you like, but there are better options available. Ones that give you everything the others offer at a much better price… and if the goal here is to stop wasting money, why spend more than you need for a ‘name’ that no one cares about?

When you know what’s working and what isn’t, you can finally stop wasting money.

Marketing is complicated. Stop spending time and money (two precious resources) on the marketing tactics that don’t matter. The things that don’t move the needle but drain your resources. Instead, redirect that budget to the tactics and marketing channels that actually do make a difference — the ones that give you a return on your investment — and ultimately sales.

If you want to know what’s working and what isn’t, where you’re making money or wasting it — give us a call and let’s chat. We want to help… and it’s just a conversation, no strings attached.

 

#B2B #SMB #smbmarketing #b2bmarketing #marketingautomation #campaigntracking #campaignmanagement