The new year is upon us and so are many fantastic opportunities.  To turn these opportunities into reality will require the same consistent, thorough and robust online marketing efforts as before, and at the same time, businesses will need to continue innovation in messaging and sales pipeline strategy.  The effectiveness of new marketing strategies from 2018 and 2019 will begin to fade as clever new approaches start to take over. 

Our approach at Content Savants is to continuously innovate online marketing while building – step by step with proven effectiveness – on tried and true methods that have made sustainable business growth possible for ourselves (including our internal products and services) and our clients.

Trends

First off, there are some key trends in areas that are near and dear to our hearts that we will briefly mention.  These trends are in four key areas, which are areas that Content Savants specializes in regarding our customers and helping them to achieve their business goals. 

• Content Style:  the first category is content.  It is in our name!  While some businesses which focus on specialty advisory or traditional services such as audit and advisory may continue with their persona of formality and traditionalism – which is what clients tent to expect from these types of companies, most other businesses will do best to follow a more conversational style and approach to messaging.  This style can be applied to imaging (imagine people in relaxed settings with non-staged scenes), short-form descriptions, headers and bylines, as well as long-form descriptive text.  Vocabulary should remain within a list of 2,000 commonly-used words, and verbiage written to replicate a conversational tone, of the type that a business people would have at a coffee shop, but not at a formal dinner or conference.
• Content Substance:  flowery language and scare tactics popular with so many sales funnel developers will not be enough.  In continuation of long term trends, as information becomes more easily and readily available, consumers will continue to expect specific examples and data to back up assertions.  That is why the research portion of your online messaging development will be ever more crucial in the coming years.  2020 will be a great chance to get ahead of the curve without significant expense in custom-tailored research requests. 
• Content Types:  video content will continue to grow, as will the online platforms which enable video content creation.  Facebook has already launched their Video Creation Kit, which enables advertisers to create “mobile-first” video ads which draw upon images already uploaded into your Facebook account.  We have seen Facebook do similar types of automated video production in the form of commemorative and anniversary videos.  With the Video Creation Kit, users can choose templates for basic customization and to adapt the advert according to your end goals, such as selling products or building brand value through unique messaging or stories.  These can then be applied use in both Facebook or Instagram ads.
• Leveraging Content:  along with a rise in competitive efforts needed to push ahead of your competition, a key priority for 2020 should be to leverage your existing content into other channels.  By this, we mean going beyond just online marketing opportunities, but also making sure that your business gets the broad range of exposure that will be critical to giving your business an added advantage.  Print more business cards, attend more conferences, and get out there in a way that uses the content assets you have already generated.  Here, we’re speaking involvement in speaking engagements, making guest posts on popular forums, and obtaining media coverage for your expertise.  Use what you have and leverage that to the max!

These are just a few of the many developments that are shaping up to make 2020 an amazing year for online and social media marketing.  These were selected based on their importance to small and medium-sized businesses, with a prioritization based on areas where Content Savants can be of direct service. 

Six dial-up strategies

Now, as promised in the header, here are six actionable steps your business can begin to take right now, which can help boost your online presence and convert viewers to customers. 

1. Use your email lists:  have you asked customers to join your email list?  Aside from the advertising funnel strategy, it is amazing how many businesses fail to take advantage of information they already have right in front of them.  Email is still an extremely powerful means of communicating directly with customers.  The key here is to offer them value.  Customers see commercial email and will automatically assume it is junk.  Or they see a newsletter and automatically assume that it will have no relevance.  Why do they make these assumptions?  Because that is what we have all come to learn and expect from the rash of absolute junk that comes to our in-boxes.  Rather than promoting your business, give your customers real information that they can use, and write it in a way that sticks in their minds.
2. Up your blogging game:  is your business a once-per-week blogger?  (Even us, we try to be, but customers come first!  …and lately we’ve been very busy – but that’s NO EXCUSE, not for us, not for you or for anyone).  Time to ante up and increase your messaging.  Let customers know that you are serious about building a relationship with them, increase their trust in your brand, and let them know that you are an ACTIVE business.  One more blog per week goes a long way.
3. Entice interaction:  a quick and simple step you can take now is to ask your customers about their experience with your product or services, either through a photo or a short paragraph.  Encourage their participation through a reward for the best entry, and posting that (and all of them) online.  This approach gives them value and helps to build your own set of testimonials, while creating a fun and interactive engagement.
4. Speak to customers directly:  while you’re at it, combining this step with the previous one can enable you to receive vital feedback on your business activities directly from your most valued customers.  Choose a handful of customers (as your time allows) and get them on the phone.  You can tell them you are the owner, tell them how valuable their business is, and ask if they can answer a few survey questions – or just start asking them some basic questions about their experience.  The most important part here is, among those who are positive with you, ask them kindly to post a (honest) review.  A kind, personal request can stretch miles beyond an email reminder in terms of getting their attention and earning their active support of your business.
5. Expand your business:  of course that is always the objective.  In this context, while you’re working on steps 3 and 4, go ahead and take the next baby step in the conversation and ask them for a referral.  While not all businesses offer products which lend themselves to referrals (you can think of your own examples), you can at least solicit their idea about the type of customers they think that you should be targeting.  Some people will respond by saying “well, I don’t know it’s not my business,” but if you have already developed a positive rapport, take advantage of the fact that people love to give advice and to be an expert.  They have already bought into your service or product, so they must know something about who is your best target.  At the very least, from this type of question, if they respond by giving you a profile of someone that does not match their own profile (as in, “someone else would be more interested in this product than I am”), that can give you a new perspective on what your selling, who your selling it too, and what value customers are getting from your offer.
6. Annual review:  take a couple hours and write down successful efforts and lessons learned from the past year.  So often it is easy to forget an idea that we thought about pursuing and then got distracted, or a mistake that lent itself to some important lessons, or otherwise small but important goals that got lost in the shuffle.  Take some time to reflect on the past year, identify some opportunities that may have fallen through the cracks, and put those back on the list for 2020.

Have a great year in 2020 and look forward to working with you to make your business ambitions a success!