3 BIG Steps To Boost Business In 2020

IT’S TIME TO MOVE ABOVE THE NOISE WITH A POTENT MARKETING STRATEGY. Every year more competitors come into your space and make your marketing efforts more difficult. There is simply an overwhelming amount of noise in advertising and marketing. It’s too easy to be invisible, obscure, and even forgettable. Since most businesses can spend no more than 5% of their gross sales on marketing, it’s important to spend this budget wisely with a well-planned tactical approach.

Step 1- Get The Edge On Your Competitors In 2020
Understand who your competitors are and how they are positioned in your markets. It’s not enough to be trustworthy or competent these days, because your competitors may also be trustworthy and just as competent. The key is to understand the “perceived” differences between you and them and then highlight them if they can add leverage to your message. A great way to do this is to create a comparison chart. A comparison chart is a list of services and attributes that you place side-by-side against your competitors and the industry at large. This highlights in plain view where you stand compared to them, and how high your standards are versus the industry standards. We recommend that you be as honest as possible in portraying your strengths and weaknesses, and we also recommend that you give proper credit to your competitors. By this act of transparency, you build immense trust and increase your chances of your viewers contacting you for more information.

Step 2- Combine Digital Marketing With Traditional Media Marketing
I recommend breaking down your marketing approach into two main categories, Digital Marketing and Traditional Media Marketing. Digital marketing might include, Email Marketing, Google Paid Advertising, Search Engine Optimization, Digital Banner Advertising, Social Media Marketing, and all things internet related.

Traditional Media Marketing might include direct mail campaigns, letter-writing campaigns, magazine ads, posters, trade shows, radio, TV, flyers, billboards, and all things non-internet related. Please keep in mind that these marketing mediums might need to be coordinated to support each other. For instance, if you send out a direct mail piece, it might be prudent to back it up with an email campaign directing the same prospects to landing pages or your website.

A recent survey showed that 33% of consumers don’t trust in those brands that don’t offer printed communications and 69% would never choose a company with no printed bill option for transactions. Though digital marketing may be the most effective and efficient means for generating leads, it might not always be the best way to convert leads into clients. A hand-written letter to a prospect or a lead may be far more effective than a text message or an email. A brochure picked up at a car dealership with an insert providing useful pricing information and comparison charts may be more connecting and effective than information from a website. Every touch-point of the customer journey should be evaluated to see whether digital or traditional marketing should be used.

Step 3- The 12-Month Marketing Calendar
Once you’ve broken all of these down into estimated leads generated by marketing mediums, tiers, and services or products sold, it’s time to create a twelve-month spreadsheet showing what marketing mediums you are using each month, and how many dollars you are allocating to each medium each month. Also, you need to estimate how many qualified leads you expect to generate each month. Please estimate on the lower side of averages until you have dialed in each marketing program with A-B testing and tweaking.

Now that you have the twelve-month calendar organized by each marketing service or medium that you’ll use to get you to your goals, it’s time to get more specific about the strategies and actions you will need to deploy each quarter to get you there. It will be very difficult to plan for more than one quarter. Break down January through March, April through June, and so on. Once you have broken down all of these details of your goals, audiences, leads, marketing mediums, calendars, and activities, you are ready to move forward on developing targeted prospects for your business.

Cheers to your future success !