Before Google and social media, the marketing strategy was to spread the word about products and services through what is now known as traditional methods or outbound marketing. These outbound techniques included things like trade shows, radio ads, TV commercials and telemarketing. While these techniques were great at generating leads for companies at one point, that’s no longer the case more often than not.

Buying Has Changed

In the 90’s, you could buy email lists and send thousands of emails to people who had no idea who you were, and it worked well. Now, the CAN-SPAM Act has been implemented to protect people from getting unsolicited messages. It’s important that when you possess an email address, you have permission to use it. (Stay tuned for our future blog, Best Practices for Building an Email List).

With social media becoming a more significant part of our lives as we speak, consumers are leaning on it more and more to help make their buying decisions. They’re following companies and thought leaders to experience their brand and opinions, and to see what others who have used their product and service are saying. They’re asking their friends “who’s the best place in town to get a custom cake?”, “which daycare is the best and has openings?” and so much more. Several generations have turned to social media for guidance when making small and major purchases.

Not only is there social media, but there’s Google now. Google is the king of search and if you’re company isn’t showing on Google search results, whether it be on maps, images, videos, etc., chances are that you’re probably missing out on the bigger piece of the pie that your competition is getting.

Ditch Your Old Marketing Strategy

When is the last time that you sat down and evaluated your marketing plan? Better yet, when is the last time you sat down and looked at your return on investment for all of your marketing efforts? Can you tell how many leads you get or that you convert to sales? Does you current strategy give your website visitors what they want or does it just say want you want to tell them? If you answered no at any point and that you just push information out, you have a serious problem and need to start addressing it now.