- "2023 is almost here and it's time to refine your marketing strategy.
As the saying goes, there’s always room for improvement, and this is especially true for a company’s marketing strategy. The world of marketing is constantly evolving, so you need to get ahead or get left behind.
With that mind, we’ve outlined some of the best ways you can refine your own company’s marketing strategy in 2023.
1. Re-evaluate your target audience
Your target audience doesn’t necessarily remain the same forever, particularly if your business has been evolving. There are so many examples of companies that have shifted their customer focus over time. Take McDonald’s, for example, which traditionally marketed primarily towards children but began marketing towards families as a whole in the ‘90s. Gucci has done the opposite, changing its target market from high-income adults to progressive young people.
Perhaps your own business has started selling new products or services, your audience’s interests or behaviours have changed, or you’ve reached a stage where you can target more potential customers than before. Whatever the reason, it’s important to regularly assess whether your marketing strategy makes sense for your target audience, and tailor it accordingly.
How to re-evaluate your target audience
In order to do this, you’ll need to review your customer base to learn who is interested in your products or services, why they’re interested in them, and which marketing methods they prefer.
The key to translating all of this into an actionable marketing strategy is consumer insights, which is the analysis of information on customer behaviour. As marketing agency Pitch puts it: “Consumer insights allow businesses to draw insightful conclusions from customer data. Through this window into the thinking behind purchasing behaviour, brands can use consumer insights to develop new marketing strategies, enhance customer service, and improve revenue.”
Also Read
2. Embrace new marketing methods
Even if your audience hasn’t changed, it’s still a good idea to explore new marketing methods to help you target both existing and new customers. You probably already use the same channels as everyone else does, so what are some examples of unique marketing methods that can give you an edge?
Podcast marketing
Nearly a fifth of Brits listen to podcasts every single day, so podcast marketing is a great way of getting your business’s name out there. This can offer you numerous advantages, from directly interacting with your customers to helping you build an authoritative presence. You don’t need to make your own podcast either — you could simply advertise on others.
Event marketing
Event marketing is a fantastic way of engaging with your audience, building brand awareness and educating your customers. In fact, almost a third (31%) of marketers say that it’s the most effective tool they have. There are lots of routes you can go down here, from running large scale conferences and trade shows, to smaller scale pop up shops, workshops, and launch parties.
Stealth marketing
Stealth marketing refers to when you market something to a person without them realising it. Common examples include product placement and undercover marketing, which is a subcategory of guerilla advertising. Advantages of stealth marketing include driving product interest prior to launch, building a brand image, and cost-effectiveness.
3. Learn from competitors
If your competitors are thriving from their marketing efforts, why wouldn’t you want to take a leaf out of their books? This entails competitor analysis, but how do you do this exactly?
Identify your competitors
Your competitors might not be who you think they are, which is why it’s crucial to first work out exactly who you’re competing against before attempting to analyse them. There are so many ways you can do this, including market research, Googling the keywords you’re targeting yourself, and asking your customers.
Sign up for competitor newsletters
Your competitors’ newsletters show a lot about their email marketing strategy, from the content sent to how often they message customers. Not only this, but signing up to these updates yourself
keeps in the loop with what your competitors are doing generally, something you can take advantage of in ways outside of marketing.
Assess their SEO performance
Search engine optimization (SEO) is an essential tool in the modern business’s marketing arsenal, and there’s a lot you can learn from your competitors’ SEO efforts. There are plenty of tools you can use to find out things like what keywords successful competitors are targeting and which of their pages are performing well so you can take on board this information yourself.
