Without setting clear marketing objectives, you’re basically directionless – and working to achieve vanity metrics that don’t necessarily help you achieve your overall business goals
Digital marketing objectives underpin all marketing strategies. After all, how do you know what you're working towards without clear, actionable, and achievable metrics? Setting marketing goals should always be the priority as they will be the basis of your entire strategy.
By achieving your digital marketing objectives, you’re also helping reach your overall business goals, whether that’s boosting your overall sales or improving awareness of your brand.
Setting marketing objectives is, on one hand, a great way to motivate yourself and your team and work towards achieving better results for your business.
On the other hand, objectives and KPI-setting is about much more than just saying “I want to achieve that and that” – it’s how you can develop a plan or strategy that will help support your vision…
Review your campaigns and learn how you can improve your digital media performance with our marketing campaign analysis tools
The process of setting up, brainstorming, planning, and ultimately delivering digital marketing campaigns is an exhausting, challenging, yet fun and extremely rewarding process.
Once the campaign goes live, you can witness the fruits of your labor. However, all digital marketing campaigns must at some point come to an end and there is always one final step in the process: campaign analysis.
Every company, brand, or agency will approach the end of a campaign differently, with some going into detail and others taking a much broader view. However whilst digital campaigns can be quite simple and straightforward, perhaps with maybe just one or two channels, others may be more complex and multifaceted.
I, therefore, believe it’s always best to err on the side of detail so that you can get a true picture of how different…
Examples of how SMEs can use Porter’s 5 Forces to assess marketplace viability
Right now, Porter's 5 Forces is the most useful tool for owners and managers to stay one step ahead of the competition in a challenging market. The Porter's 5 Forces model has always been popular with SMEs in particular, looking to invest for growth and manage risk to their limited resources.
Earmarked as the best marketing model to help small businesses analyze the competition in the marketplace, balancing these 5 forces is a must for your 2022 marketing action plan.
What are Porter’s 5 Forces?
Porter’s 5 Forces is an analytical model that helps marketers and business managers look at the ‘balance of power’ in a market between different organizations on a global level, and to analyze the attractiveness and potential profitability of an industry sector.
Competitive rivalry
Threat of substitute products
Bargaining power of buyers
Threat…
The Ansoff Model is a matrix that helps marketing leaders identify business growth opportunities for their marketing strategies in a challenging market
What is the Ansoff Model?
Also referred to as the Ansoff matrix, due to its grid format, the Ansoff Model helps marketers identify opportunities to grow revenue for a business through developing new products and services or "tapping into" new markets. So it's sometimes known as the ‘Product-Market Matrix’ instead of the ‘Ansoff Matrix’.
The Ansoff Model's focus on growth means that it's one of the most widely used marketing models. It is used to evaluate opportunities for companies to increase their sales through showing alternative combinations for new markets (i.e. customer segments and geographical locations) against products and services offering four strategies as shown.
How to use the Ansoff Matrix
Strategic questions that can be answered using the matrix include:
Market Penetration:…
Tap into your customers' evolving relationships with technology and the financial services industry and seize new opportunities to strengthen your financial services digital strategy
Globally, the financial sector is facing significant challenges as new online services are created and improved. As consumers' demands and expectations continue to increase, marketers and managers must adapt their financial services digital strategy to stay ahead of the competition.
In this blog, we explore the latest innovations in the finance sector and how they apply to both business- and consumer-facing markets, ranging from established financial services brands and new fintech startups to IFA intermediary markets. And, more importantly, what you can do about it.
Opportunity, Strategy, and Action for financial services
Our simple OSA model helps marketers, managers, and business owners identify challenges and opportunities in their current situation, inform their strategy, and take action. As we discuss the latest developments, it can be useful to refer back to…
Branding means fully integrating your customers' experiences of your brand. We'll recommend marketing tools and training to show you how, as well as taking an in-depth look into the definition of branding
What's the definition of branding? Across numerous terms and definitions, one thing that rings true for pretty much all of them is a heightened focus on your customers' experiences of your branded goods or services, compared to your competitors. But what is meant by brand definition today? And what can brand marketers learn from this?
We've all seen that, to succeed in today's competitive omnichannel environment, it's more important than ever that brands champion their key customers (both potential buyers and those with existing lifetime value) in all of their marketing activities. You need a data-driven, customer-focused approach to marketing to outpace your competitors.
As a result, we guarantee that all our marketing training is integrated across our tried and tested…
How do you summarise a business model canvas or marketing plan for online startups using a single sheet of A4? Our top business model frameworks for you
Defining a clear online business model framework is essential for a new startup online business to help create a sustainable business and communicate the features of their new business to partners and within the company.
Reviewing business models is also important for existing businesses thinking about options to refine their business model or add new services to their offerings in the light of new opportunities made possible by the Internet.
As you know, I'm a big fan of simple frameworks to help communicate strategy. In particular, I love the Business Model Canvas which is a valuable framework for summarizing strategy for online businesses. It was published as part of a co-creation creative commons project involving 470 practitioners from 45 countries.
We feature it as part of our…
As digital transformation continues to shape the new relationship between healthcare providers and their customers, upskill your pharma marketing team with the key digital skills and tools to improve performance
The question of the key digital skills and tools in the pharma industry is an ongoing challenge. Pharma marketing generalists plan and optimize marketing strategies, campaigns and product launches, requiring a T-shaped digital skillset and continuous professional development to oversee all marketing activity. Pharma digital specialists manage day-to-day optimization of key digital channels, the new front-line of customer engagement. Investment in tools and training for these staff is crucial for your company's growth. Of course, the breakdown of these channels will depend on your pharma company's positioning and target markets, which we will visit further on in the article.
Why invest in digital marketing for pharma?
Improved distribution of, and accessibility to, pharmaceutical data and information is accelerating customer-centric disruption…
With the launch of our brand new Learning Paths - offering practical, strategic marketing courses online - discover which marketing training solutions have been the most popular
Deciding on a marketing course to optimize your strategy in 2021 is tough. With so many marketing training options, you need a solution that's practical, data-driven, and proven to generate results, quickly. Read on to discover our Smart Insights members' top Learning Paths and resources in each membership tier.
Top Business Professional marketing course: Manage change for digital transformation
Module from Digital Transformation Learning Path for Business Professional Members
Digital Transformation is the use of new, fast and frequently changing digital technology to solve problems. However, a Boston Consulting Group report found that only 33% of significant IT projects have been fully successful since the year 2000.
The danger is that the benefits of digital transformation are not being fully achieved as organizational barriers can hold…
Do you know your 4Cs from your 4Cs? Read more about these two marketing models, plus find practical examples to apply to your marketing strategy
What is the 4Cs marketing model?
Two groups of marketers have created the 4Cs marketing model. This often leads to confusion about what’s being discussed and where!
Let’s clarify the two models:
The 4Cs to replace the 4Ps of the marketing mix: Consumer wants and needs; Cost to satisfy; Convenience to buy and Communication (Lauterborn, 1990).
The 4Cs for marketing communications: Clarity; Credibility; Consistency and Competitiveness (Jobber and Fahy, 2009).
Lauterborn’s 4Cs: Consumer wants and needs; Cost to satisfy; Convenience to buy and Communication
What is it?
In 1990 Bob Lauterborn wrote an article in Advertising Age saying how the 4Ps (he didn’t address the 7Ps) were dead and today’s marketer needed to address the real…
