BroadBased’s Mid-Year Digital Marketing Review

Many companies consider employee mid-year reviews to be an important part of helping their people stay on track with constructive feedback, so why not give your digital marketing strategy the same support?

As we round the corner on 2018, it’s already been a fast-moving six months in the world of digital marketing. To ensure your strategy is meeting expectations — and built to capitalize on evolving technologies and techniques — consider sitting down with your plan for a cup of coffee and an honest conversation about where it’s doing well and where it can be improved. (Invite your marketing team, too. We don’t want your colleagues to think you’re talking to the furniture.)

A few high-impact adjustments might be just what your strategy needs to ensure a strong second-half close. Here are some ideas to get you started, ranging from individual tactics that can be implemented quickly on a budget, to high-level strategic shifts that can be applied to an enterprise marketing organization.

Make sure your video strategy is shooting straight

More and more companies are incorporating video marketing into their digital mix, and the numbers back up its effectiveness across key digital platforms:

• Social media — Video posts generate 12 times more shares than text and images combined. (Responsive Inbound)
• Email marketing — Using the word “video” in an email subject line increases open rates by 19 percent and click-through rates by 65 percent, while reducing unsubscribes by 26 percent. (HubSpot)
• B2B content marketing — 59 percent of executives agree that if both text and video are available on the same topic, they are more likely to choose video. (MWP)

Now’s a great time to re-examine your video strategy and make sure you’re maximizing it’s potential. One way is to take a look at your analytics, such as total views, length of views, platforms viewed on, and highest click-through rates.

Another measurement that provides valuable insight is content topic performance across audience targets. Knowing which topics performed best and which audiences responded strongest can help guide your video strategy into the second half of the year.

The bottom line: Your customers and prospects expect video content on your digital platforms, and will use it as a differentiator as they research your company and move through the sales funnel. Make sure your strategy is built around consistently providing video content that addresses their specific needs and pain points.

Further Reading: Video Marketing: Get shooting or get left behind

Emphasize quality over quantity in your content marketing

As a business, the strongest connections you have with your target audience are made with content. It’s what attracts them to you in the first place, it helps them decide whether you’re a fit for their needs, and if they do move forward to become a customer, it’s what keeps them happy and makes them want to refer you new business. If your digital campaigns need a boost to finish 2018 on a high note, improving your content strategy could be your best tactic.

Producing high-quality content can be a challenge for any company, which is why the best way to do it is by focusing less on volume and more on substance. Here are some questions to help you do that:

• What challenges keep our target audience awake at night?
• How can our content demonstrate how we solve these challenges?
• What is our competition doing with their content?
• Does any of our content provide our existing customers value?
• Can we leverage content to get more business or referrals from them?

The answers to these questions should be the cornerstone of your content strategy in the second half of 2018 and help you create better content more consistently.

The bottom line: Your prospects are performing advanced research on your company and your competition before deciding to make contact. That decision hinges on the quality of your content and stresses the importance of making it stand out.

Further reading: Content marketing webinar: How to generate more leads at a lower cost

Social media success depends on flexibility

As social media sites like Facebook and LinkedIn continue to enhance their platforms and launch new features, companies need to stay nimble to continue to see success with both organic and paid campaigns.

On Facebook, the success of your organic post strategy will depend on how much your followers engage with your posts. Earlier this year, Facebook made a significant change that prioritizes content posted from friends and family versus the brands they follow. This means that to reach your audience, you have to post content that encourages them to like, share or comment on your posts.

How do you do that? Focus on content that provides an experience, so your audience feels compelled to interact. Staff features, office tours and product demos are a great way to offer value and promote engagement with your posts. Just make sure to feature what your company does clearly enough so that when it’s shared with family and friends that may not be familiar with you, it will be easy for them to understand your value proposition.

If you’re a company with a B2B focus, check out LinkedIn’s new carousel-style ad format. It allows you to use multiple “cards” to tell a story about your product, service or team members to drive traffic and convert leads. If you’re a large-ish organization and your LinkedIn content isn’t performing at a high level, here’s a stat to consider: Posts that include statistics along with a link to content get 162 percent more impressions and a 37 percent higher click-through rate. (LinkedIn Marketing Solutions)

The bottom line: Social media continues to be one of the highest-performing digital channels to connect with and convert your audience. As the platforms evolve, marketers can no longer “set it and forget it” if they hope to capitalize on social for the rest of 2018.

Further Reading: How will Facebook Zero affect your business?

If you’re interested in having the BroadBased team take a look at how your digital strategy has performed so far in 2018, and provide guidance on how to plot out the remainder of the year, get in touch to schedule a consultation.