Test. Analyze. Adjust. Repeat. It’s the best way to find what works for your brand–within reason.
When you’re trying to scale your marketing efforts, specifically with digital channel choices, the sky’s the limit. We’re all familiar with the Google ad, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube and TikTok options. And while these might be major marketing players, there are at least 100 other active social media sites where consumers live.
Some cater to a very specific audience, which may make the selection process easier or more difficult depending on your industry, geography and marketing goals. But what it really means is you may not have the resources (time, people, money) to go broadly if you’ve set dozens of channels in your sights.
The solution? Scale smarter to go farther. And like so many things, operating “smart” means arming yourself with data to set your strategy. Because you won’t know what to test if you don’t already have a good starting point.
Where does your target audience spend meaningful time–that is, actively engage with a platform? What’s the intersection with your current digital footprint? Start there.
- Test to see which channels perform best for your brand. Performance can mean you’re looking at qualitative measures like increasing brand awareness or that you’re looking at something more quantitative, like the number of new members joining your club or consumers who have completed a financial transaction. Be clear from the start what you’re measuring so you can apply the appropriate parameters to your test and map the results back to meaningful KPIs.
- Analyze the results of your performance testing. Most social media channels provide metrics you can use to track activity. Sparkfly can help you take it further. Our technology shows you what’s happening from engagement all the way through to a transaction–giving you a full picture that doesn’t stop at intent, but carries through to impact on revenue. Not only will you see what’s working so you can prioritize those channels, but you can better validate your spend in order to budget for future initiatives.
- Adjust as needed. Pay attention to best practices across social media channels. What works on one will not be as successful on another–you have to cater your approach to each audience. Think also about how consumers behave on different channels due to differences in traffic and how content is presented. And be bold in changing up the offers you make to engage with customers. When in doubt, it’s probably not them, it’s probably you. Keep trying until you find what resonates.
- Repeat your testing. As many times as it takes, across as many channels as you’ve identified. The more data you have to work with, the better positioned you are to not only optimize how you’re operating now, but to review trends and be proactive about changes to make in the future.
As exciting as it may be to jump in and start mixing, matching and measuring, it’s important to remember that efforts to scale your marketing should not come at the expense of sales. In other words, it’s not “smart” scaling if you’re gaining customers by cannibalizing your brand with discounts or free offers for people who were going to patronize your business anyway.
That’s another way Sparkfly can help–by shining a light on customer habits and how you can best engage with those customers to bring them fully into the fold. When you’re looking for the best way for your marketing initiatives to have the most impact, it just makes sense to scale your efforts to reach a larger audience. And when you can leverage available resources and expertise in order to scale strategically and effectively, that’s just smart.
Learn more about how to start smart with Sparkfly:
- Read the previous blog post in this series, focusing on smart acquisition
- Explore our white paper on how offer management can power your smart acquisition strategy
Take the next step and contact our highly experienced team to plan the solution that’s right for you.