Entrepreneurs attempting to manage marketing on their own often make common mistakes that can critically hurt the reputation of a new company.
We’ve observed them all and have assisted many business owners in the pursuit of avoiding them. Here are nine of the most frequent, in addition to tips on preventing them from happening to you.
- Taking specific action because an expert said you should.
The internet is bustling with information on how you should market your business.
You don’t intrinsically trust online information about your health, finances, or relationships. So why should you trust information when it comes to the reputation and function of your business?
Even the most well-versed expert marketing strategy may not work for you specifically. The perfect plan for one business may not be applicable for another. It’s crucial to the thriving of your business that you remain up to date on the newest marketing and communication trends, tips, and technologies. Although, you have to implement your own best judgment—and possibly advice from a marketing professional who knows your business—when creating marketing plans and implementing tactics for your company. Take action because it’s the correct steps for reaching your goals, not because a self-proclaimed “expert” who doesn’t know about you or your company explains to you it’s the right step to take.
- Giving insufficient advice.
There’s a reason why there are countless articles and blogs giving business advice in tip form: They’re seemingly valuable, they provide expertise, and people enjoy them. Entrepreneurs will often use them to convey that they know how it should be done and their business is legit. Plus, they’re relatively simple to create. The problem: a large majority of the tips in these pieces are too imprecise to be of any value. Before posting any content in tip form, ensure that people can act on the tips. Readers regularly abandon content they don’t find beneficial or actionable. Even worse: They most likely will never revisit the source of the tips that wasted their time and money.
- Cavalier attitude toward B2B marketing.
Are you the owner of a business-to-business (B2B) company?
If you think B2B marketing can’t be as creative and refreshing as marketing targeted directly to consumers, you’re binding the potential success of your business. Business customers don’t leave their brains at the entrance when they go to work. Marketing to them must be as new and refreshing as the content they see as they experience through their non-work lives. If you aren’t keeping consumers engaged, your competitors certainly will. You owe it to yourself to get agency’s support to aid in the creation of a B2B marketing program that will get your company on the map, resonate with people in your consumer base, and get them to take action.
- Inefficient use of technology.
A large portion of start-ups and newer companies attempt to save money by maintaining and organizing their marketing and sales operation in documents and spreadsheets. An endless number of project management, storage, communication, and file transfer tools have been introduced in the last couple of years. Many are relatively cheap (or free), simple to introduce, and proven sufficient. They decrease the time you and the people who work with you spend searching for lost files, sorting through many different versions of the same things, locating email addresses and other contact information, and resolving missed communications. Leveraging this information enables you to focus more of your valuable time on what’s important: marketing your business and selling things.
- Fear of branching out.
If your business has discovered an effective marketing skill, congratulations, you’re ahead of other new businesses.
Obviously, it’s a good idea to continue to do what’s been working sufficiently for you. It’s a surefire avenue to reliably achieve your sales goals.
Although, are you aware if you could be doing even better? You won’t be until you try!
That’s why it’s vital not to stop there. You’re losing your opportunity to boost your results and have substitute campaigns ready, should your current marketing become less worthy over time. Always A/B test new strategies, tactics, and creative types for any type of content you are sharing. You truly never know where you could find success that could take your marketing up a notch. You owe it to the growth of your new business.
- Differentiate yourself from the competition.
Many new companies make the frequent mistake of copying branding and marketing aspects from their competitors. After all: If it works for them, it will work for me.
Yes, it’s important to know what your competitors are doing to brand and market themselves. Although, you shouldn’t just copy and paste it directly. You’ll confuse your customers because they won’t be able to differentiate. Conversely, try to look outside your industry for branding and marketing ideas. After that, you can apply them to your business in a way that’s specific to it and reflects your brand and its values and will help you reach and surpass your goals. If you find it difficult to develop a brand and marketing assets that stand out, it could be worth working with a firm like Sales Maven, which has a proven track record of helping businesses like yours figure out what makes them unique and help them stand out.
- Reluctancy to high commitment efforts.
Many people don’t want to delegate their time to reading or watching long articles and videos. But depending on the type of startup, it could be a great way to convey your knowledge and expertise. It might be just what it takes to convince prospects who aren’t aware of your business into clients or consumers.
- Drive toward micro-content.
This is a more acute version on the previous entry. Many startups put a lot of time into creating tiny bits of content for platforms like TikTok, Snap, Instagram stories, and more. Yes, the right micro-content posted to the ideal market in a sufficient medium can generate a lot of reach and impressions. But is it enough to transfer them to clients or customers? Likely not. Delegate time to discover how to leverage the initial buzz from the micro and get people through to your sales and marketing process using more industrious content.
- Social media stretched.
Does your company try out every new social media platform that is trending? This is a regular mistake. It only seems logical to be on the platforms the people in your target audience routinely connect with. If you’re targeting teens, chasing the newest social trend could be a great look for your brand. If you’re going after lawyers, Linkedin is more than enough for your business.
