Chasing The New Hot Channel Or Technology Without A Strategy

Discovering new marketing channels or technologies can be great for generating new business growth. Just remember that vendors & agencies have product marketing teams that have honed their pitch to get you excited about the possibilities and potential ROI gains from leveraging these products or services. But before leaping in, it is important to determine where this new shinny object fits into your larger strategy. Here are some things to consider:

• Where does this new opportunity fit in terms of my funnel? Is this an upper funnel tactic aimed at generating demand across new audiences, or a mechanism for continuing to foster demand among existing prospects? Make the effort to understand the application and if this can help drive success where you currently need to generate greater performance.
• What would my messaging strategy be? Does it need to be refined based on the audience in that funnel stage? Understand who are you trying to reach and develop the right messaging for those specific audiences based on where they are in your funnel.
• Example - For upper funnel tactics consider, "Does this new channel effectively reach my target audience based on the demographic and psychographic profile I’m looking for? Is this where they are actively engaged?" We see far too many brands wasting time and resources activating channels where their target audiences simply do not exist to any meaningful degree. Is your target audience is typically over 50 years old? Please stop spending your marketing dollars on TikTok.
• Ask yourself, "Can I effectively measure my ROI?" Don’t be swayed by case studies highlighting surface-level metrics. Before committing to an investment, determine how you will measure success. If you can’t, for whatever reason, you’re not ready to invest in this new channel or solution. Work on solving your measurement gaps before taking a leap.
• Will this activation put me in a position where I am over invested in a specific funnel stage? Will I be reallocating dollars to fund this, potentially starving other critical funnel stages and impacting my overall marketing success? Never pull funds away from what is currently working to test an unproven new solution or service.

The Perpetual Test

Testing is always a smart approach. How else can we discover potential new channels, tactics, or solutions that provide meaningful results. But all too often we see cases where an activation or campaign that was originally intended to be a short-term test to gauge results becomes a fixed line item on an organization's marketing budget. That wouldn’t be a problem if it provided measurable return. The problems arise when there is an absence of proven performance. Here is our advice when it comes to testing.

• Always keep a budget reserve to test new strategies. Never reallocate funds from proven tactics to test new solutions, channels, or campaigns. That is a great way of sabotaging your current growth trajectory.
• If you can’t measure the ROI then what exactly are you testing? Never jump into a new investment without a means of effectively measuring your success.
• If you do move forward with a test, demand proof that the results are there and measure frequently.
• Be ready to pull the plug. Yes, campaigns and tactics are worth optimizing to determine if you can generate better results. But trust your gut and know when to get out. Those dollars might be better spent elsewhere.

Agencies can be a great resource for businesses. They have in-house expertise that can make the most of your marketing investments and optimize your campaign ROI. Unfortunately, we’ve seen far too many instances of agencies hyper focused on campaign specific performance, or worse – surface-level metrics, rather than looking at the broader picture. There must be someone at the helm considering how it all works together to achieve the overarching business objectives. Here’s what we mean.

• Agencies will always suggest increasing spend across channels, campaigns, and tactics that are, “performing.” But what does that mean? Don’t rely on surface-level performance metrics. Hold your agency accountable to proving measurable business results. Being able to attribute incremental business growth to marketing activations should never be negotiable.
• High performing campaigns are great, but how does the current investment or proposed increase fit into the larger strategy? Are you overfunded at one funnel stage but starving others? Closely monitor your budget allocations across funnel stages to ensure the level of investment is appropriate based on the audience size in each stage.

Let’s start with some mental imagery to help set the stage here. A marketing funnel, by definition, starts wide and gradually tapers down. The intention is to first cast a wide net in the upper funnel to generate awareness and demand. Next, you want to take the audiences you’ve captured and foster that demand, accelerating touchpoints and refining your messaging to facilitate conversions. Seems obvious right? The problem we often see is that budgets are not allocated appropriately based on audience size or performance in each stage. The ratios are off, impacting the performance of the entire funnel.

• You need to stay on top of how much you are spending in each individual funnel stage, monitoring and adjusting constantly. Set it and forget it doesn’t work here. Understand your current audience size and performance in each funnel stage and adjust your budgets accordingly making sure the ratio of investment is adequate to efficiently facilitate demand through to conversion. Always remember that your funnel stages need to be working together to generate and foster demand.
• Ensure you are adequately funded in the middle and lower funnel to account for the demand you’ve generated in the upper funnel. Example – Your upper funnel tactics are crushing it and are generating a ton of interest in your product or service. Meanwhile, your middle and lower funnel stages are underfunded and/or underperforming. While you might be doing a great job of generating interest across your target audiences, you are dropping the ball when it comes to fostering that demand. Far too many of your leads, that you’ve paid real dollars to generate, are slipping through holes in your funnel because your budget allocations have become top heavy. Focus on honing your middle and lower funnel campaigns to improve conversion rates. Once honed, consider increasing spend through new campaigns or through increased frequency across high performing tactics to remain top of mind.
• Another problem we often encounter is the inverse of what we just discussed. Far too many times we see clients with a swollen level of investment across the middle and lower funnel wondering why they are starting to see diminished marketing returns or slowed business growth. In some cases this happens in response to organizational budget cuts, where the instinct was to, “cut back on brand awareness.” In other instances, this was due to your marketing team or agency having the best intentions, “let’s increase our spend in retargeting and convert more of our leads!” What tends to happen is what we call audience starvation. Yes, these lower funnel audiences are incredibly valuable, and you should make every effort to convert them. Just always remember that your lower and middle funnel tactics will only continue to perform if properly fed with a new pool of users to connect with.

Lack Of Strategy Or Cohesion Across The Prospect Journey

One of the most common problems we see is a lack of strategy around a prospect’s journey. This is how random acts of marketing start to create waste for businesses and will impact ROI. Organizations need to take the time to ask, “Ok, then what happens?” Don't leave your prospects hanging.  Build campaigns and automated communication strategies that will facilitate a user from one funnel stage to the next, effectively fostering demand.

• Build out a plan on each specific marketing touchpoint and ensure prospects move seamlessly from one stage of the funnel to the next.
• Hone your messaging for each funnel stage. Far too often we see the same messaging strategy regardless of where a user is in their journey. As a prospect moves deeper into the funnel consider how you can elaborate on your value proposition or key differentiators to further foster their demand. This is also where it is important to have a robust testing strategy. Test, test, and test again to optimize your results for greater yield.
• Deploy increasing levels of personalization across the journey. Countless studies have shown improved conversion rates with the use of personalization. It makes the message more relevant and impactful for the prospect.
• Don't ignore opportunities to deploy retargeting or reengage with prospects via automated email journeys. Taking full advantage of what is already in your pipeline is the single most effective way to improve your marketing ROI. It's like mining for gold in your own backyard.

Marketing Strategies Detached From Business Objectives

This is without question the most common problem we see. This happens when business objectives are finalized without taking the time to develop a coordinated plan to achieve them. The objectives for the business have changed but the marketing strategy remains stagnant.

• Don’t develop your business objectives in a silo.
• Bring your business leaders and marketing resources together and take the time to review and breakdown specific business goals.
• Leverage your business performance data to isolate profitable products or services where you want to grow your market share, or to isolate new growth opportunities you want to capture.
• Then, take the time to develop a plan around audiences, messaging tactics, & geographic areas to target for each objective. Growth is not a strategy, it's a goal.

In Conclusion

A robust and well-orchestrated marketing funnel is core to creating a scalable and profitable growth engine for your business. Mistakes can be corrected and avoided if we know what to look for. It’s also important to recognize that the work is never done. You must continue to optimize your messaging, budget allocations, and campaigns to account for both your successes and disappointments.

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