In my last post, I talked about business marketing strategy from a “channel” perspective. Choosing the most effective channels is critical, especially when your marketing budget is tight. Your business website and direct email marketing are the most effective channels when it comes to reaching your target audience. That’s why it pays big dividends to maintain your business website, and invest in effective website design.
Business marketing: What else can you do?
After you’ve deployed an effective business website design, and developed an email marketing strategy, what else can you do to ensure that your business marketing strategy is generating a good return for your business?
Video works. Video turns out to be a very effective channel for business marketing, and used correctly, it can also be one of the least expensive ones, too. In the same line, motion graphics video can add a very professional touch to your communications, and make a strong positive impression on your customers and prospective customers. Motion graphics video is highly cost-effective and can be deployed in a number of ways, from eye-catching full motion “bumpers” at the beginning and end of a video, to effective and memorable how-to video demonstrations.
Search engine optimization works. Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of making your website easy-to-understand by the search engines. It is a “behind-the-scenes” effort to influence search engines to prefer your website over other similar sites. This is important from a business marketing perspective because the better the search engines understand your website, the more web traffic they will refer to you. Consistent SEO practices have a strong positive influence on the number of visitors your website receives, and over time, good SEO will earn preferential treatment from the search engines.
Social media works. If your business doesn’t have a social media strategy, you should begin working on one. As more consumers move to mobile devices for Internet access, social media becomes more important as a word-of-mouth referral system. It also allows your business to emerge as a “thought leader” in your industry. Thought leadership tends to catch the ears of decision-makers – a ripe target for business marketing.
Targeting audiences works. In the same way that choosing different marketing channels (website, email, social media, etc.) works, targeting different audiences works, too. Select a few target audiences to direct your message toward, and craft an appealing message for each audience. An audience might be existing end-users. Another audience might be new end-users. Depending upon what your business does, you might target buyers or purchasing agents as a third audience. Diversifying your audience has the same effect that diversifying your marketing channels does. Spread your message using different paths to reach multiple audiences with complementary messages.
If you would like more information about business marketing strategy, or would like to incorporate video, SEO or social media into your business marketing plan, please contact our Creative Director, Dave Ramsell or give Dave a call at (330) 243-0651 to set up a consultation.
Photo Credit: sheela2010, via FreeImages.com
