Marketing Not Working? 4 Fresh Things To Try

There is no business without marketing. And yet, marketing seems to be a consistent challenge for entrepreneurs and businesses across the board. Last year, the State of Inbound reported that 63% of businesses struggle most with generating leads and traffic, and 40% reported challenges in proving the ROI of their marketing activities. 

It seems what all businesses could use is a few new marketing tactics to plug into their strategies. Here are four ways to rejuvenate your lead and traffic generation, whether you’re just getting started or needing a revamp in strategy.

1. Build a personal brand worth following on social.

Consumers go where they trust. Accordingly, entrepreneurs with large social followings typically find the most success in marketing their products - simply because their followers trust them. But, you don’t need to start with thousands of followers in order to make this work. Instead, focus your attention on establishing a rapport with the followers you do have. Lindsey Anderson, better known as “One Click Lindsey,” is a digital marketing expert, and she recommends utilizing Facebook Live to get in front of your audience in the right way. “No one is going to buy from you unless they trust you and getting on Facebook Live and making yourself visible to your audience is the #1 way to build trust,” she shared on Wishpond. Instagram Live works, too - and if you aren’t quite ready to set up the camera, at least start with sharing some details of your personal life. Potential customers want to see that you’re just like them: share pictures of your cats, your daughter’s piano recital, or the setup in your home office. These small personal touches will help them feel a deeper sense of trust with you - which will inevitably convert into lead if what you’re selling resonates with them.

2. Network, network, network - and take advantage of the connections.

Similar to the trust factor, the more that you can connect one on one with potential clients, the more likely you are to convert them to leads. So, take advantage of networking opportunities — all of them. They don’t just have to be the networking events (which may be a major relief for the introverts here), but they can even just be messages on LinkedIn. Kent Littlejohn, CEO of High End Client, shared a trick that always works for him: responding to Linkedin connections’ automated ‘Congratulations!’ messages. “This complete lack of actual human input didn’t put me off; instead, I quickly wondered how I could use these automated messages to my advantage. So, I wrote a short note back to all of them – a note that thanked them for the congratulations and added, “If you’d ever like to connect with qualified leads here on LinkedIn, I hear we’re pretty great with that!” Needless to say, we generated multiple deals from that,” he advised on Client.com. In addition to taking advantage of social networking connections, also consider floating your service or product to anyone you catch up with on the phone or meet at a dinner party. This more relational, one-on-one type of marketing is more likely to convert, simply becomes it’s more personal.

3. Continuously offer must-have content for potential clients.

Finally, make sure you or your team is allocating time to produce content on behalf of your company for clients to engage with. This content needs to be value-first, and created specifically for your target customer. For example: if your company sells dog shampoo, create blog posts and Pinterest pins about anything dog owners would love to read about: from must-have dog toys to ways to make your dog’s fur as soft as possible. Not only is this great for SEO as a website blog, but it also builds trust with a potential customer. If you give great advice with no strings attached aside from a one line call to action with your website linked, your target customer is likely to associate you mentally with other experts in your industry, and think of you next time they’re looking for what you’re selling.

Keran Smith of Lyfe Marketing recommends optimizing the headline of a blog post for highly ranked keywords related to your company, and also making sure there is content for every step of your customer journey. So, if you run an advertising agency, make sure there is content tailored towards a brand new founder who has never done advertising before, as well as content tailored to a longstanding corporate company that has done ads for years.

4. Consider working with a marketing mentor. 

Finally, consider bringing in some outside help if your marketing objectives and results are still nebulous. But, rather than outsourcing to a marketing agency that will charge you a pretty penny, bring in a marketing mentor to help you learn how to market effectively. “A marketing mentor can assess your current marketing situation, analyse your needs and goals, and...set KPIs so you can get a clear understanding of how well you are performing and what improvements are needed,” Scarlet Merrill shared on Engage Content Marketing. This way, you don’t have to be dependent on an agency for your marketing needs, and can have a full picture analysis of the ways to improve your marketing strategy. There are many websites solely focused on connecting companies to marketing mentors, or ask around to see if any entrepreneurs in your circle recommend a good one.

These four marketing tactics in tandem will revitalize the inflow of clients and new deals. Try them out and see which has the highest ROI for your business - and have fun, too! Marketing can be quite creative, and it can be fun to explore your company’s brand through this lens. Hopefully, you will be able to implement some of these Web Design tips to help you to improve website ranking. If you'd rather leave it to the experts, ADMS would be happy to help.