Why Your Marketing Doesn’t Work And How To Fix It
TLDR:
The content is rarely the issue when a marketing campaign doesn't work. The more likely culprit for a failed marketing campaign is a lack of clarity on what is being sold and who is buying your product. But asking the right questions before you begin a marketing campaign can help you be successful.
Does your business have clear goals?
When a new client asks us why their marketing hasn't been working we always start by looking at the business first, and the marketing second. Usually, we find that the business doesn't have clear goals. We've pulled together some helpful questions to ask to help you establish clear goals for your business or clients.
What are you selling?
On more than one occasion a client has come to us and asked why their marketing isn't working. We ask them what they sell and they will say, "Our company sells X." However, when we look at their marketing it says, "We sell Y." If you were to do this exercise for your business what would your answer be? Are things consistent, or are you making things confusing for your potential clients?
The pushback we have received often comes in some form of: "But we have more than one product we are trying to sell. That is why our marketing doesn't completely match what we really do."
This is very common. Most businesses sell more than one product or at least multiple iterations of that product. So how do you combat this issue? Make sure you have cohesive branding and marketing across all platforms.
Building your website to accurately reflect all your services is incredibly important. If you have a construction business and primarily want to work on corporate projects, it won't be in your best interest to have a website that only talks about residential work.
Who is going to buy your product?
The second place we often see businesses struggle is deciding who their target market is. When asked who their ideal client is, business owners will often say, "Anyone who wants to buy our product." While they might be willing to sell to anyone who is interested in their product, not everyone will be.
Another way to think about this question is, who is most likely going to buy my product? Figuring out who this person is can really shape the messaging, creative design, and marketing platforms of your marketing campaign. If you are trying to market your construction business to corporate clients you probably won't find much success by creating memes about Minecraft. While Minecraft is tangentially related to building things, most business owners looking for building upgrades won't understand the humor (at least not for another 25-35 years).
What is your timeline?
The last main goal we have seen businesses struggle with is defining their timeline. The main things you need to try and understand about your business are:
How long does it take to deliver your product?
Is there any seasonality for your industry?
How long does it typically take to acquire a new client? (I.e. does your product fall into impulse purchase territory or planned purchases?)
If your product can be created in 5-10 minutes and is inexpensive, as an ice cream cone, then you will need a large volume of clients. Plus you have the added hurdle of the extreme seasonality of ice cream. But this information helps plan out the type of ad campaigns you need to create. The frequency should be high to keep it top of mind for people during the summer months. It doesn't take long to acquire a new customer for ice cream, because... well, it's ice cream. So, the marketing campaign can be simple "We have ice cream and it is hot out, so stop by today and cool off with a tasty scoop of chocolate ice cream."
But if your product takes weeks or months to finish and is expensive like office building renovations, it is going to take longer to acquire a new client. Clients will want to take time to do research to make sure they are getting the best contractor for their office space. This means you'll want to set up a tiered approach to your marketing by using something like a drip campaign sharing different customer testimonials. There isn't always seasonality to this type of service, so having consistent marketing year-round (like a blog or YouTube channel) is the best way to stay top of mind for business owners.
Are you consistent in your marketing efforts?
After you've ensured your business has clear goals, it is time to take a look at the foundations of your marketing campaign. Sometimes companies try and use an approach similar to throwing spaghetti at a wall. "I'll take one attempt to throw marketing out there and see what happens." We find that approaching marketing like building a brick wall, one brick at a time, yields much better results.
Brand Identity
The perfect "brick" to start with first is your brand identity. We have seen businesses struggle to have successful marketing campaigns because their brand identity wasn't cohesive. But what is brand identity?
"Brand identity is the visible elements of a brand, such as color, design, and logo, that identify and distinguish the brand in consumers' minds. Brand identity is distinct from brand image . The former corresponds to the intent behind the branding and the way a company does the following all to cultivate a certain image in consumers' minds:Chooses its name Designs its logoUses colors, shapes, and other visual elements in its products and promotionsCrafts the language in its advertisementsTrains employees to interact with customersBrand image is the actual result of these efforts, successful or unsuccessful." Source: investopedia.com
A great way to start developing your brand identity is by answering the questions about your business in the first part of this article. Understanding your brand identity helps you to quickly building marketing materials that are consistent with your companies goals and that will resonate with potential customers.
Post Frequency
Another place we have seen businesses struggle with their marketing is in their post frequency. For many business owners marketing means one of two things: paid ads or social media. Both require a consistent post schedule. Paid ads can be started and stopped more easily than social media. However, paid ads need time to calibrate. Facebook and Google are two of the most popular paid ad platforms, and both need at least 1-2 weeks to start to understand how the ads are performing. I've seen clients get frustrated at the ads performance after one or two days and stop the campaign completely. Sometimes an ad hasn't even started running in the first 24 hours depending on how you've set up the campaign.
Most ads are reviewed within 24 hours, although in some cases it may take longer. Keep in mind, ads may be reviewed again, including after they are live. If you want an ad to start running on a specific date or time in the future, you can schedule your ad. Source: https://www.facebook.com/business/help/204798856225114?id=649869995454285
With social media, post frequency can vary from once or twice a week to multiple times a day depending on the platform. Building a calendar out so that you have content planned ahead is a great strategy for ensuring you are meeting your posting goals.
Messaging (What are you selling?)
Messaging is the part of marketing efforts that most directly ties back to the goals that were defined in the first half of this blog post. If your marketing includes blogs, Facebook posts, a video script, billboard, magazine spread, radio spot, a booth at the county fair, bumper stickers, or literally anything else you need to focus on what you are saying to potential customers to get them excited about what you are selling.
It's a fact -- businesses that clarify their message and build a sales funnel are the ones that thrive in the marketplace. Source: storybrand.com
We recommend checking out the book Building a StoryBrand: Clarify Your Message So Customers Will Listen (affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3Ehzv0s) if you are looking to really zero in on your message strategy. But some simple steps for getting started are to create a client persona, or two, by writing down their interests, age, gender, and what struggles they have that your business is equipped to solve. Most businesses will take the opportunity to position themselves as the hero in their messaging, but StoryBrand talks about positioning yourself as the guide and the client as a hero. This is a great strategy and one we have seen work for several of our clients. While Building a StoryBrand covers this in more detail, a basic example is Nike.
Nike's slogan is "Just do it." A simple motivational phrase from a guide that encourages you to be the best athlete you can be. Trying to implement this strategy with your business can go a long way in helping your message to resonate with your clients.
Final thoughts
If your marketing isn't working as well as you'd like we recommend taking a step back and making sure your business goals and marketing objectives are clear. While it sounds simple, understanding how to communicate what your business does, in a way that potential customers will understand, is no easy task. But if you break the process down into the smaller tasks outlined in this article, it can help you market your business better.
Leave a comment below to let us know if there are other places you've seen marketing campaigns fail or if you have tips for improving marketing efforts. We'd love to hear from you!
