Across industries, business leaders have been re-evaluating best-practices in wake of new social and workplace norms and have also heightened their focus on ensuring financial responsibility and sustainability and marketing departments aren’t immune. There’s no denying it, 2021 will be another year unlike any other. So here are a few tips for ensuring your B2C marketing campaigns are up to the challenge this year and into the future.
Be bold and creative but don’t forget the basics
The proliferation of e-commerce and huge increases in online social media activity driven by lockdowns and social distancing during 2020, has increased the value of digital marketing campaigns, particularly SEO, SEM and paid social. In fact, 75% of marketers we surveyed increased spend on social last year. This means that the already crowded digital marketing space has become even more so with hundreds, if not thousands, of brands competing for attention across customer segments.
So, in order to stand out from the crowd and generate meaningful leads, marketers must ensure they up their creative game and craft campaigns that are memorable, impactful and enticing for consumers.
On one hand, this means thinking outside the box in order to find new ways to secure attention targets and draw them into the sales funnel. However, a creative idea is nothing without proper execution. Even the most out of the box campaigns rely on getting the basics right:
- Consumer Segmentation: Know your audience through and through. This means up-to-date profiles that are developed from customer data, profiles that use third-party data just won’t cut it
- Content Marketing: Ensure copy, visuals and themes are punchy, on brand and to audience
- Measuring Results: Make sure ROI and budget are tracked appropriately so you can show off the fruits of your labour
Use the right digital marketing tools for the job
The only way to truly give consumers want they want, when they want, is through a deep, insight driven understanding of not only targets, but also current customers. So, make sure you utilise the right marketing technology that affords these insights to maximise results.
Thankfully, digital consumer marketing has come a long way from the mass email distribution campaigns of old. Over the past few years in particular, marketing technology and data analytics solutions have enabled marketers to refine and segment profiles to never before seen levels of detail and sophistication. We are now at a point where high-end marketing automation solutions are moving beyond the “targeted” realm and into a new world of “personalised” consumer marketing that sets and adjusts consumer outreach based on individuals known habits, in store and online.
This makes sense, as marketers we understand that empathy and understanding are key building blocks of sales and customer loyalty. Personalised marketing allows brands to build a more human connection with customers via digital channels. However, balance is key.
If you bombard targets with intrusive suggestions it can come across as creepy. The trick is to use personalised messaging to invite the customer into the sales funnel, rather than try to implicitly force a sale. Remember, you want customers to make return purchases so customer experiences must be positive from first interaction to post-purchase.
Let the elements align and integrate
Consumers interact with brands across multiple channels and touchpoints, from in-store, online, social media, traditional media, email and more. For this reason, it is absolutely fundamental to ensure campaigns are consistent across all channels and if budget/scope allows, integrated into customer touchpoints. The most successful consumer campaigns link brand, product and customer experience to generate more meaningful customer connections and in turn drive sales.
In order to do this, marketing strategy must combine the efforts of SEO, SEM, Paid, PR, Field Marketing and sales touchpoints to ensure consumers are fed the same marketing experience no matter how they choose to interact with the brand. Consistency is key.
For more insights on how to reach customers and prospects, download our Marketing In 2021: Pushing Forward In Uncertainty guide here.
