There are a lot of questions when it comes to business marketing, and that’s because it can quickly confusing and overwhelming, especially if you’re hearing different things from different people and places. It’s enough to make you want to throw in the towel and forget about marketing altogether — but because marketing can be such a critical aspect of business growth, we encourage you to find what works.
At Business Builders, our team strives to cut through the noise and help you figure out exactly what you need to be doing when it comes to marketing for your business.
As we’ve previously covered, the amount of money you put into your marketing depends on how long your business has been around. On average, most businesses spend about 12% of their total annual budget on marketing. Once you know how much that is and how much you need to put toward your marketing, that’s where things get a little more tricky. With so many marketing avenues you can go down, it’s hard to know where to begin!
Traditional Marketing vs. Digital Marketing
Before you know how to spend your marketing dollars, you have to know the difference between the two main kinds of marketing. For clarity’s sake, let’s start by defining the two.
Traditional marketing includes things like billboards, radio, television, newspapers, magazines, direct mail, and robocalls.
Digital marketing includes everything from social media to emails, texting, online ads, websites, and search engine optimization (SEO).
Everybody says digital marketing is the way to go these days, but that’s not always true — traditional marketing has its place, too. However, digital marketing tends to be easy, effective, and helpful in that it makes tracking ROI much easier.
Which Should You Do?
In most cases, you should probably do a combination of both traditional and digital marketing. Although we primarily do digital marketing, we also do some traditional marketing for some of our clients. It’s all dependent on your needs.
The reason we focus so much on digital is because, like we’ve mentioned, it’s a lot easier to track your ROI! It’s also a lot easier to track data in general.
For example, if you do paid ads, you should be able to look at it and say, “We spent X number of dollars on ads, which resulted in X number of leads, which resulted in X number of customers, and X number of profit.” Then, you can say, “I made this many money on this much ad spend. Was it worth it? Or was it not?”
Not all marketing is that transparent, but much of digital marketing is, which is why we really like it.
Making Marketing Decisions for Your Business
Many times, when businesses are ready to dive into marketing, they want to know what they should do. And many times, the answer is, “It depends.”
Most people don’t like that answer, but the reality is that marketing is not one-size-fits-all. It simply can’t be. Your business is unique; your goals are unique; and therefore, your marketing needs are unique, too. What your friend or competitor is doing with marketing isn’t necessarily what you need to be doing.
Marketing requires a lot of work and a lot of decisions. One place where businesses get stuck is hiring someone to help with marketing and thinking they’re going to be a unicorn.
If you can afford to hire someone onto your business to help with marketing, that’s great! They can really help you gain some momentum and see some results. And while they can probably do a lot of things, they can’t do everything, and they can’t do everything extremely well.
For example, if you need your social media to stay up-to-date, you need your website to stay up-to-date, and you need videos and emails and ads… that’s too much for one person.
That’s why many businesses hire a marketing team member and work with a marketing company. When you have the two working together, then you have someone to manage all of the work and all the work gets done at a high level by specialists. This produces the best results and ensures your money is being well-spent and providing a good ROI.
Choosing Where Your Money Goes
When you have to decide where to put your marketing dollars, it’s not a question of “Is digital marketing or traditional marketing better?” Rather, it’s a question of “Where are my customers?”
You have to know the most effective way to get in front of those people, so you can get attention and acquire customers, and that could be done via digital marketing, traditional marketing, or both. Speaking with a marketing expert can help you determine this if you’re not sure.
Almost all customers are online (another win for digital marketing). The great thing about this is that when you know the type of person who’s buying from you, you can target those specific people. This means you can reach your ideal customer, those people who are buying from you.
Grow Your Business With Results-Oriented Marketing
Marketing is more than a buzzword — it’s really a method of helping your business succeed. If you’re interested in getting your name out there, bringing in more revenue, and taking your business to the next level, don’t wait. There’s no time like the present, and your marketing isn’t going to fix itself. Take time to work on the business, not just in it, and watch what happens.
Our StoryBrand Certified Agency has a team of industry experts who are here to work alongside you to set business goals and reach them with results-oriented marketing.
