The most useful yet toughest habit to keep in marketing
“Marketing used to be simple then came something which is called ‘new age’ marketing and it all began to change.” this was mentioned to me by someone recently.
My initial response was, “Really? Are you sure you’re not overthinking it?”
I’m a realist when it comes to making a marketing strategy work. Personally, I was never into viral marketing. While I don’t deny the efficiency of viral marketing, I was just never into it. (P.S. I don’t hate it, it’s just not my jam perhaps.)
But here’s a question for you, has the core of doing marketing changed?
Being a marketer that started alongside the boom of social media, I’ve seen so many new tactics and strategies pop-up throughout the years, in light of trying the get a better audience engagement. But one thing remains the very same. You need to be consistent.
Nowadays, consistency is rarely preached around. I’ve attended quite a numbered of ‘new age’ marketing seminars and most of the time, I’m only hearing topics on “How to make your content attractive”, “What are some of the best ways to create an attractive visual, topic and etc”, “How to use minimal budget to do mass marketing”, and the list goes on and on. But, rarely people talk about consistency in marketing.
Perhaps this is a publically known thing, especially for experienced marketers. However, there are more and more new people stepping into this field and I believe that this topic should be highlighted again.
Why consistency is important in marketing?
When we talk about consistency in marketing, it’s more than just consistently doing your work. There are a few elements that need to be practised constantly to achieve a somewhat decent marketing end result.
№1 Consistent in creating contents
This is one of the first few things I’ll advise my clients to do. It’s one thing to create tons of content, it’s another to create and post it with consistency. One of the main reason a consistent content posting is important is that it helps boost SEO indexing.
For example, if you’re posting a blog on a Tuesday and you do it constantly every week, search engine bots will start to pick up your content hence providing a better indexing for your site. (This, of course, must be paired along with proper content that Google loves)
Aside from the benefit of having a better indexing, being consistent in providing content helps to build confidence for your audience as well. Imagine if you only post random blog posts once in a blue moon. People will less likely follow your page.
However, if you can constantly provide them with a steady flow of good content, chances are you’ll pick up a good number of followers in the long run. This is just like how the comic strip in the newspaper works, I personally love them a lot and it was my daily routine to read those before I start my work.
Hence, consistent in creating your content. If you don’t have the luxury of creating a content every day, set aside a specific day to do so. It can be once a week or a few times a week. The key is to make it consistent, that way it’ll help build your profile in the long run.
№2 Consistent in conducting market research
Another thing that a marketer should apply consistency to is market research. Market research can be tedious at times, but I assure you that it is rewarding.
As a marketer, one of the things I do on a daily basis is to visit some of the great marketing agencies/gurus web pages. I would check out their blog for their latest insight and most of the time, I was able to learn new things that would improve my own practice.
Aside from that, I would also visit the pages of my client’s competitors to understand more on what they are doing; what did they do right and what can I pick up to improve our marketing strategy.
“If it works, it works.”
I’m a realist when it comes to marketing, if the strategy is ethical and it has proven to be useful, there’s no reason not to use it for my own projects. I would always remember the advice from one of my mentors; he would always remind me that a good idea is only good when executed properly.
So by getting a inspiration and good ideas from others, there are still tons of work to do to make the strategy work.
During research, one of the things I do is whenever I see a good ad that prompts me to click onto it, I would screenshot the ad and review it later. I also collect emails that intrigues me, if there’s a follow-up marketing email that is well written; It would be saved as a source for generating ideas for my campaign.
No 3. Consistent with conducting A/B testing
Marketing is hardly a one time off thing. In order to create a solid and stable marketing strategy, there are tons of testing and experiment needed to be done.
In my personal experience as a marketer, I’ve done countless A/B testing on all of my marketing campaigns. And it is those consistencies in doing the A/B testing that helped me build a solid strategy for my clients.
However, A/B testing isn’t limited during the initial phase of the marketing. Even when the campaign has been proven workable, these testing are still being done in a constant manner. This is to ensure that the marketing content stays relevant to the audience at all times.
Has the core of doing marketing changed?
I would confidently say NO. Indeed the method of executing marketing strategies have changed drastically thanks to the advancement of technology. Research analysis, data collection, surveys can be done easily through the use of modern technology.
However, the core value on how to make a marketing strategy work, persistence, discipline and consistency, these are some of the values that have been overshadowed by the technicality on the ‘new age’ marketing.
My core belief is that to make a business successful is never about how fancy or how amazing we can WOW our clients. It is more about providing value to them, and knowing that we don’t just want to earn but we care for them as well.
