Many companies are about to take their first steps into the world of online marketing. Building thought leadership, increasing online visibility, and generating leads are common reasons behind creating and sharing content online. But where do you start? Of course you want to have something up and running quickly. At the same time, you want to deliver quality content, so that you can actually get results. The danger is that you might start developing content purely "for the sake of it." Quantity over quality, rather than the other way around. My advice: start with a simple, clearly defined campaign. In this blog article, I will tell you how to set up a modern marketing campaign in a relatively short period of time that will actually yield results.
This is how you set up a successful marketing campaign [as of 2023]
Use the 8 steps below and create a successful marketing campaign!
1. Determine your budget
Before you can dive into the 'fun' part of the campaign, take a look at the numbers first. Because a campaign is not as enjoyable if you don't earn back its costs. Your key metric: cost per lead. The acceptable cost per lead strongly depends on your average order value. If it's low, you need to acquire many customers to recover the cost per lead. So always consider whether a marketing campaign is worth it and how much it is worth to you. At the same time, keep in mind that a modern marketing campaign has a long lifespan because it remains online forever. The returns from the first six months are often just the beginning.
2. Choose one product or service
Of course, you would love to promote your entire portfolio online. Unfortunately, it is impossible to set up a comprehensive and complete content campaign for all your products or services at once. Start with just one product or service and develop your first campaign around it. Identify which product or service has the largest market demand, the most urgency, or is highly searched online. This will be the central topic of your first campaign.
3. Dive into one of your target audiences
Now that you have chosen the campaign's topic, you can start working on the target audience. Especially for long and complex purchase decisions, there are often different stakeholders involved. Each stakeholder has their own challenges and needs to be approached differently. Therefore, choose one stakeholder and focus your campaign on them. To truly understand your target audience, delve into their professional world and create a buyer persona profile.
4. Determine the value proposition
In a modern marketing campaign, everything revolves around valuable and relevant content. But what is relevant? To find out, you need insights into the world and challenges of your target audience. With good content, you provide them with a solution to a problem or present new ideas that can benefit them. Therefore, you need to figure out how your product or service helps your target audience. A handy framework to determine this is the value proposition canvas. Using this framework, you identify which pain points you will address in your content and how you will surprise the audience with new solutions and ideas.
5. Develop the content
We are 4 steps ahead, and now we can finally start creating content! Begin with the central content offer of your campaign: an e-book or whitepaper that is so valuable that your target audience is willing to provide their information for it. Based on this content offer, start writing related blog articles. In these blogs, you can delve deeper into a topic from the central content offer or write about a more general problem or trend. Of course, always consider search engine optimization while doing so.
6. Set up the technology
The content is in development, now it is time for the technology. There is actually more to it than first thought. You need a blog module, a landing page, automated emails, and, of course, a CRM. In other words, you need to set up a conversion path. Smart marketing automation software can assist you with this.
7. Determine your promotion channels
A modern marketing campaign can no longer function without promotion. Organic search traffic and leads require long-term efforts. To achieve short-term results, you can utilise a mix of earned, paid, and owned media. Consider your newsletter, social media channels, and AdWords advertising, for example.
8. Consider the follow-up
Is everything ready? Then your first campaign can go live! Exciting, because no matter how prepared you are, it's always uncertain what is going to happen. However, it is still prudent to think in advance about the follow-up for potential leads generated by your campaign. You need to collaborate closely with the sales team. Will they follow up with phone calls, or do you need lead nurturing first? Have a plan of action ready before the leads start pouring in.
Get started with your first marketing campaign!
With the above 8 steps, sufficient budget, and some time and energy, you can have your first modern marketing campaign up and running in about 2-3 months. Let the campaign run for 3 to 6 months and then evaluate the results. The findings from this first campaign will provide valuable insights for developing future campaigns if needed.
