If you’re looking to create a successful marketing strategy for your business, you need to decide which of these 8 pillars will help you succeed. These pillars form the foundation of any effective strategy and will help you to maximise your reach and drive conversions.

Pillar 1: Branding

Branding is super important for success in marketing. It makes customers recognise you and stay loyal.

Let’s check out how you can create a strong brand. Plus, it’s essential to have consistent branding across all marketing platforms.

Many business owners believe that they have a brand and brand identity in place, and if you do, that is a good thing, but I suggest that you run through these brand tips to make sure that you have developed a brand that is enticing to your ideal client profile and potential clients. If you meet the mark, that is great; if not, consider tweaking your brand to work better.

Establish your brand identity.

Your brand identity is formed by building a logo, website, tagline, and even voice tone. Customers get to know your company and what it offers; this leaves an impression. A strong brand identity makes clear the benefits of your product or service to potential customers.

Use design elements like colour, shape, and font to make an emotional connection with your audience. All of these should form a symbol that speaks to your target audience. Plus, include a unique tagline that shows what makes you different in the industry. Make sure you deliver the right message!

Combining these elements with website design, print materials, and other ads can create a recognisable image in consumers’ minds. This helps to stand out from the competition and build trust with your target audience.

Create a clear and consistent message.

Businesses must have a clear message and narrative about their services or products. To create this, they should focus on three parts:

1. What they are selling: Companies must explain why customers should buy their product or service. They should simplify complex ideas into easy-to-understand chunks. This will make them stand out to customers and help them keep customer loyalty.

2. How they are unique: Each product or service is unique. Companies must identify what makes them different from competitors. Then, they should tell people about it.

3. Their mission: Businesses should include an emotional component in their messaging to attract target audiences. They should use storytelling and visuals to communicate their brand’s mission, values and purpose.

Businesses can create messaging that meets customers’ needs and shows their unique value by focusing on these three areas. This will help them stand out from competitors.

Pillar 2: Content Marketing

Content marketing is a great way to access potential customers and grow your reach. It’s about creating valuable and helpful content to customers, and then spreading it via different online networks. This can help construct your business – connecting with potential customers, showing you’re an expert in your niche, and helping generate customer interaction and sales.

Let’s explore the 8 pillars of content marketing success!

Create content to engage your target audience.

To be successful at content marketing, create high-quality content that interests and meets the needs of your target audience. Engage and educate them to build trust. Content creation is a must.

Tailor messages to the right demographic. Content should include a call-to-action, state why your product or service is unique, and explain how it can benefit a consumer’s life. Don’t be too promotional; make it educational.

Make content interactive. Give readers options such as videos, podcasts, or webinars. Let them feel like they are part of the conversation.

Compelling and exciting content helps keep people on your site longer. Always have an editorial calendar outlining topics ahead of time to produce significant new material when they’re ready for it!

Utilise content to attract new customers.

Content marketing can be an excellent asset for companies. By providing interesting, useful, and engaging material, you can create brand awareness, reach potential customers, and make current ones stay. Content can come in different forms – web pages, blogs, images, videos, etc. It’s important that it doesn’t directly promote products/services but rather offer info that’s valuable to the target audience.

Organic search engines like Google/Bing can help you get new customers. You should create headlines with keywords related to their search query, and make sure content is accessible on mobile devices. Social media channels like LinkedIn/Twitter can be used to share content with target audiences by using relevant hashtags. Video content on YouTube or paid ads via Google Adwords can put your company in front of people who wouldn’t have found it otherwise.

Pillar 3: Social Media

Social media is essential for modern marketing. With more sites popping up every day, businesses must use this platform to connect with their customers and increase their reach.

Let’s explore the advantages of utilising social media for marketing and how to maximise its potential.

Utilise social media to build relationships.

Social media is an excellent asset for modern businesses. It presents a chance to grow and build relationships with customers and potential buyers. Social media marketing has steps, but all strategies should be designed to build relationships in time.

Post often and consistently on relevant channels while making sure the content is valuable. Aim to engage with people by responding to comments, questions and giving helpful feedback or product advice. This will help to make you a reliable source of info.

Also, use Twitter, Instagram, & Facebook Ads to reach new audiences through ads tailored to interests and demographics. Incorporating influencers can increase visibility & engagement in different platforms. This could expand your brand’s reach.

Integrate all components into your overall marketing strategy. This could lead to a boost in sales, improved organic traffic, & cost savings from traditional advertising. Investing resources into social media now will lead to better relationships & more growth later.

Engage with your audience on a regular basis

Engaging with your audience is a crucial part of successful social media marketing. Doing this keeps followers active and spreads your message.

To build relationships, ask open-ended questions and understand their interests. Respond quickly to comments and questions to show you care. Try different days and times to see when followers are most active.

Post frequently but not too much, or you’ll drive away viewers.

Pillar 4: Email Marketing

Email marketing? Incredible and so damn powerful but often forgotten because it is so simple.  Email marketing can help you develop customer relationships and keep them up to date on the newest products and services. Plus, it’s cost-effective. You can even target customers with accuracy based o their interests and how you segment your email lists.

Build an email list

Developing an email list is key for any email marketing strategy. This list is made up of emails collected from clients, customers, and leads. It can be used to send newsletters, announcements, offers, advice, and other marketing materials. It’s important to prioritise making a list of quality contacts interested in the content you plan to send.

Use existing contacts, such as current customers and social media followers, to expand your mailing list. Offer a subscription and exclusive discounts. Give discounts or prizes in exchange for their email address. Have sign-up forms on multiple pages of your website, and use ad campaigns like Google Adwords or Facebook Ads to target potential customers. Doing this will help your email list grow.

Create and send emails with relevant content.

Crafting and sending emails with relevant content is essential for email marketing success. Remember, people get emails from many sources – not just you. For this reason, an effective email strategy should make messages engaging, unique, and sent regularly.

When designing emails for a campaign, focus on four elements:

• Relevance: Content should be useful and not generic. This could include new products, sales and promotions, or advice related to the product or service marketed.
• Design: Each message should have an attractive design that represents your brand. Consider text colour, graphics, and layout to make sure emails look professional and easy to read.
• Personalisation: Messages should address someone’s interests or needs. Segmentation helps personalise messages by targeting users with specific content based on their activities or behaviours.
• Call To Action (CTA): Emails should provide a clear next step for those wanting more information or action from the message. CTAs help complete an email marketing goal, such as making a purchase or signing up for an event, by encouraging recipients to take action.

Pillar 5: Paid Advertising

Paid advertising: a must-have for marketing success.

Reach more leads in less time? Yes, but be aware of the risks. Pros? Cons? Let’s explore how to use it for your goals.

Utilise paid advertising to reach a larger audience

Paid advertising can be a great way to expand your business. You can do it through multiple channels, such as TV and radio commercials, SEM, social media ads, digital display and in-app ads. Have a well-thought-out strategy, and you can:

1. Increase brand awareness

2. Drive more people to your website

3. Promote offers or discounts

4. Connect with your target audience

5. Enter new markets

6. Increase customer loyalty.

When deciding on the right channel for your business, look at:

1. Objectives – what do you want to achieve?

2. Budget – how much are you investing?

3. Reach – which outlet has the right audience size?

4. Targeting – tailor communications to consumer behaviour

5. Creative – make something interesting

6. Measurement – use metrics like CTR, CPC and CPV

7. ROI Tracking & Optimisation – compare campaigns against original expectations

8. Platforms & Tools – choose the appropriate platform for content distribution.

Create effective ad campaigns.

Creating ads for paid promotions is an important part of any marketing plan—research keywords and phrases to bring in visitors. Knowing how to craft a good ad message is also key.

When crafting your ads, think of the 8 pillars of online marketing success:

1. Identify your target market. Understand who your ideal customer is and use this insight when creating ads.

2. Analyse your competition. Monitor what other marketers in the same industry are doing and adjust your strategy.

3. Make creative content. Make a one-of-a-kind message that speaks to your target market and their needs/desires.

4. Improve user experience. Create ads that look good and provide a good experience with elements like videos, interactive features, and mobile optimisation.

5. Use marketing automation tech. Leverage tech like SaaS for more efficient campaign management and testing, including A/B tests to determine which elements work best for each audience.

6. Do data analysis. Track KPIs for each ad group, keyword group, and channel to measure progress from pre-launch to post-launch.

7. Ad delivery. Ensure campaigns are sent out on time with the right creative assets for the device.

8. Track ROI/KPIs. Track ROI of your campaigns and fine-tune targeting efforts by adjusting budgets, segments, or messaging.

Pillar 6: SEO

SEO, aka Search Engine Optimisation, is key to marketing success. It helps to make your web pages appear higher in search engine results. This way, more customers can find you, and your business is more visible.

Other pillars of success are Social Media, Paid Advertising, Content Marketing, and more.

Let’s take a look at how SEO can help you with your marketing.

Optimise your website for search engines.

Search engine optimisation (SEO) is a process of making your website visible on search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo. This can help you gain more organic traffic, rank better and make your website attractive to potential customers.

To optimise your website, you have to be familiar with some elements, such as page title tags, meta description tags, header tags, content length, and content keyword density. Even so, there are easy steps you can take to improve your website’s search engine rankings.

Begin by ensuring all your site’s core pages have an SEO-friendly URL structure with keywords or phrases related to the content. Then, look at the structure of each page and create titles with target keywords. Also, fill meta descriptions with related phrases and write content with relevant keywords 2-3% of the time. Lastly, monitor link requests from other websites and use appropriate text links for both internal and external links.

Doing these SEO steps regularly will get more organic traffic and stay up-to-date with the latest SEO practices.

Use keyword research to identify target terms.

Keyword research is an essential SEO element. It helps you find the best terms to target for relevant website traffic. The process of finding key search words and phrases related to a business starts with researching customers and competitors.

Create a list of words that describe your products or services. Think of topics related to them. Brainstorm search words to use. Use online tools (like Google’s Keyword Planner) to get extra keywords. Make sure you select keywords that generate lots of searches and conversions.

Once you identify the highest-value keyword phrases, create content around them. Use the phrases in titles, headings and other media. Provide lots of value to visitors looking for solutions. This will reduce your bounce rate and help conversions from organic searches. Add heading tags to give users and search engines better context about what the page is about.

Pillar 7: Video Marketing

Video marketing is an awesome tool for marketing strategies! It boosts engagement with your audience and gives them a visually pleasing way to learn about your brand or product. The benefits of video marketing include driving leads, raising brand awareness, and increasing conversions.

Let’s zoom in on the power of video marketing and how it can help you with the 8 pillars of marketing success.

Leverage video to engage your audience

Video content is crucial for any successful marketing strategy. It has the power to engage and inform viewers. You can use it in many forms, such as:

– Short web videos – Q&As – How-to tutorials – YouTube series

Using video as part of your marketing gives you a chance to show people your product or service. It also helps make people loyal to your brand. Video marketing lets you target people based on their interests and location. This means your message will be more effective, and you’ll get more conversions.

To make sure your video marketing works, follow these 8 steps:

– Storytelling & messaging – Creative direction – Implementation & tracking – Distribution strategy – User experience design – Governance & compliance – Talent selection & budgeting – Optimisation & scaling

Combining these parts will help you make leads and get customers to stay loyal.

Create video content to promote your brand

Video content can be a great way to promote your brand. It can create captivating experiences that appeal to potential customers. It can also show that your company is professional and cares about customers.

For successful promotion, there are 8 key pillars to focus on:

1. Set a goal. Understand what you want to achieve before starting production.

2. Create an effective script. Make sure the video communicates clearly, and resonates with viewers.

3. Choose the right format. Consider which type works best for each video.

4. Use professional actors or employees. They should reflect your values positively.

5. Invest in high production values. Ensure the quality meets industry standards.

6. Use music appropriately. Don’t use copyright-protected music without permission.

7. Optimise SEO settings. Help viewers find the videos.

8. Repurpose the content. Use multiple outlets (social media, email list services) for maximum reach.

Pillar 8: Analytics

Analytics is a must for successful marketing. Track and measure campaign performance to make informed decisions. Monitor analytics to pinpoint areas for improvement. Prioritise campaigns and strategies, plus optimise budgeting. All thanks to analytics!

Track your campaigns to measure success.

To track and measure marketing success, analyse several metrics. Understand data behind campaigns and how they affect audience behaviour. Track each campaign’s metrics separately and evaluate their results. Shed light on working strategies, which ones require improvement and what new strategies need to be added.

To get an accurate picture of success, go beyond clicks, opens, and shares. Track online visits, page views and conversions. Analyse metrics over time to reveal trends and inform future decisions. Consider customer surveys and A/B testing for deeper insights. Regularly tracking campaigns will give better visibility into progress and guidance on where adjustments need to be made.

Leverage analytics to optimise your campaigns

Due to online tracking tools and data analysis, analytics are essential for successful digital marketing campaigns. Analytics help marketers improve their marketing initiatives and provide operational insights.

Analytics involves collecting, storing and analysing data about customer needs, behaviours, organisational activities, performance metrics, etc. Through analysis, marketers can identify trends in customer preferences, measure conversion rates, identify opportunities for improvement and optimise campaigns.

An effective analytics strategy should include 8 pillars:

1) Determining objectives – First, define the desired result from an analytical project. Goals include increasing website conversion rate or deepening customers’ engagement with a brand.

2) Setting up methods for collecting data – Equip systems with functionalities for appropriate data collection in terms of quality and quantity. Store collected data for analysis and meaningful results.

3) Analysing gathered data – Analyse data against set objectives to generate insights about marketing strategies, product potentials and technical/operational limitations. Use techniques like segmentation/profiling, predictive modelling/forecasting, and optimisation/simulation.

4) Developing key performance indicators – Define relevant KPIs to measure progress towards goal achievement and deliver timely alerts. Metrics can refer to product usage, contribution margin per product, etc.

5) Insights extraction based on results – Insights should allow an understanding of customer behaviour, existing business processes, and market needs. Segmentation models and root cause analyses should be used.

6) Designing targeted strategies – Map resources needed and target elements required for plan execution. Lay out actionable strategies. Monitor and measure efficacy qualitatively and quantitatively.

7) Implementing solutions – Test processes on smaller chunks before full throttle. Verify actual impact versus forecasted results. Ensure resources like know-how, people, products, and IT infrastructure are available.

8) Continuous monitoring & optimisation – Process fine-tuning based on periodic results comparison. Part of operations excellence. Promote agility when the business environment requires quick turnaround times. Apply a low-touch model when it comes to strategy adaptability. Proactively spot undefined dependencies. Define qualitative and quantitative results for inputs and outputs.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What else is needed for marketing success?

There are always many more parts to the story. The 8 pillars of marketing success listed in this webinar are presuming that you have many other elements in place. Businesses should focus on other core elements to create a successful marketing strategy. These pillars include defining your target audience, understanding your competition, identifying your unique selling proposition, developing a strong brand, creating valuable content, building relationships, measuring success, and adjusting your strategy accordingly.

2. Why is it important to define your target audience?

Defining your target audience is important because it helps you tailor your marketing efforts to reach the people who are most likely to be interested in your products or services. By understanding your audience’s needs, wants, and pain points, you can create messaging and content that resonates with them and increases the likelihood of conversions and sales.

3. How do you measure the success of your marketing efforts?

Measuring the success of your marketing efforts can involve tracking metrics such as website traffic, conversion rates, social media engagement, and sales revenue. It’s essential to set specific goals and KPIs for each marketing campaign, so you can evaluate its effectiveness and make adjustments as needed to optimise results. That being said, I like to measure the success of the marketing by calculating the money in the bank as a measurable return of your marketing and advertising spend.

4. How do you create valuable content for your audience?

This is a good question; a large part of your marketing process should focus on content creation. To create valuable content, start by identifying your audience’s pain points and needs. Offer solutions, insights, and information that are relevant and useful to them, and present it in a format that is engaging and easy to consume. Use a variety of content types, such as blog posts, videos, infographics, and social media posts, to cater to different preferences and interests.

5. Why is building relationships important in marketing?

Building strong relationships with your customers and target audience is important because it helps establish trust and loyalty. It also creates opportunities for feedback and engagement, which can inform future marketing efforts and strengthen your brand’s reputation. Cultivating relationships with industry influencers and partners can also help expand your reach and grow your audience.

6. How do you adjust your marketing strategy based on results?

To adjust your marketing strategy based on results, start by analysing the data and metrics from your campaigns. Identify areas where you may be falling short or underperforming, and look for opportunities to optimise and improve. Experiment with different tactics and approaches, and continue to track and measure results to refine your strategy over time.