Marketing For 2015 What You Need To Concentrate On

Every year, the marketing 'trends' are released detailing the new, up and coming bandwagons we should all be jumping on! What's more, they're usually targeted at large, blue chip organisations who have a big marketing spend and a significant agency or internal team. So should you pay attention to them, or just do your own thing? Here we look at the trend predictions for 2015, as well as providing top tips for adopting some or all of the trends...

1. Micro-targeting: Getting under your customers skin...

Heralded as the age of personalised, individual content, micro-targeting can significantly increase the spend per customer, pushing up revenues and enhancing brand loyalty. Yet totally individual content can also be time consuming; you need to expertly mine your database, develop and tweak the content per category and stay on top of responses. You'll need the team to support it and the tools to make the most of it. So how, as a B2B organisation that isn't the size of Coca-Cola can you make the most of it?

• Do it on a small scale - don't be scared into thinking that everything has to be personal, or that you have to deliver it all at once. The art of personalisation is making sure that at least some content is relevant and meets their needs. This is easier for a B2C business that is product-focussed, than it is for a service industry business, but not impossible. Divide your database according to primary and secondary sales i.e. what they buy most of etc., then develop offers, added values and cross-sales that work with those primary and secondary sales. Added value which encourages cross-sale into new products, loyalty schemes, and one-off loyalty bonuses can be great for encouraging increased and repeat sales. The important thing is the content and focus must be relevant to your existing customer behaviour.

• Support it with good quality tools - there are plenty of tools which make personalisation simpler; for example, we offer an emailer system which allows adaptable content - the majority of content remains static, but key areas you select and use can adapt according to specific parameters. For example, a VIP can access one offer, while a relatively new customer sees another.

• Look for one-off opportunities - sifting through the database, there will be plenty of examples of customers making one-off or ad hoc purchases unrelated to usual behaviour. Focussing on these and encouraging customers to purchase them again can stimulate a new long-term revenue stream.
  

Whatever happens, be thorough, consistent and focussed; attempting personalisation but executing it poorly will be worse than not personalising at all. However personalise well and you can increase loyalty, penetration and turnover, without pursuing new businesses. 

Top tip: if you can, ask your customers what they want. If you don't know what they are interested in, or what else they may be considering, you won't know how to talk to them. Ask and you may be suprised at just what your customer's will tell you.

2. Focus on the content: never before has the phrase 'quality not quantity' applied so much

The last couple of years have seen business moving into an era of content; being more than just a sales machine, and instead becoming educators, valuable beyond just products and services; but the question of content is a contentious one. Many a business are making the mistake of putting quantity first. Whatever you do, focus on the quality.

The trend for content is about being helpful, useful, insightful and educational. It's about being more than just what you sell, and helping people to understand what you offer, make an educated decision and even compare you to your competitors. It can sound counter-intuitive, but those who provide valuable content benefit from better engagement, loyalty, increased sales and potentially exposure to a wider, more diverse audience. 

Now, quantity does have a little bit of relevance; whilst it's not all about the number of times you post, you do still need to be reliable. Try to say something informative and valuable, at least a few times a month so that you can benefit from improved search engine rankings, loyal readers and gain a reputation for valuable content. Of course, if you can say something informative every single day, you're on to a winner, but most of the time that's unrealistic! It's about balance, writing often enough to remain engaging, but not crippling the business due to lack of time.

Top tip: ask yourself 'so what'? When you have written something, re-read it and ask whether it is interesting and engaging. So you went fishing the other day - are your customers going to find that valuable? Only if you own a fishing tackle shop and were testing out a new product!

Other predictions:

Quality content and micro-targetting are set to be big trends for 2015, and indeed big brands have already been adopting them for months or even years, but they're not the only thing you should be good at for the next twelve months. Here's what else you should look out for:

• Mobile: get good at it - smartphones are simply getting better and better so if you haven't mastered mobile yet, you need to. Look at getting your website properly mobile optimised so that it isn't just resized, but is actually better suited to a smaller screen.

• Social Media: So many businesses have been slow to adopt social media and yet it's the perfect partner for content. Don't stumble because you don't know how you'll manage EVERY platform, just pick the applicable ones and focus on them. For B2B, the best short-term return on investment comes from Twitter, a blog and LinkedIn. Google+ offers SEO benefits but is less valuable in terms of sales and Facebook has a much more limited scope for B2B businesses.

There's much more you can take advantage of, but these will set you up for 2015; introduce them as part of your marketing & pr plan and if necessary, introduce them one at a time to get them under your belt.

If in doubt, call in the experts; a little plug for ourselves here guys, but appointing an agency can help provide skills, time and a dedicated resource to not only support the planning, but the implementation too! Call us on 01242 250692 for a chat if it helps!