Working With a Marketing Budget
As managers, company owners and small business owners, it would be great to have an unlimited budget, however the reality is, even for the largest corporations, there is still a balance between the budget and the results that need to be generated for it to remain viable.
Not all results are supposed to be instant, however most budgets demand decisions that will require instant action, so let’s talk about priorities when it comes to a marketing budget and what we would suggest you to consider when making these decisions.
Brand and Marketing Strategy
I would almost always recommend a strategy development to be the first priority when it comes to any marketing plan. Specifically, a marketing strategy either created by, or with input from those that will be implementing the projects. This is important because these people often know the limitations of each area, and are able to ensure that the strategy is sufficient to reach the businesses goals. This strategy will cover your brand and if changes are needed, as well as your conversions tools such as your website, and content creation. Ensure that all ducks are lined up before even thinking about advertising and marketing.
Ads for those that are ready to buy
It’s nice to advertise to everyone that may potentially use your business at some point, however next in line after strategy development, I would suggest to consider having a bold advertising campaign that heavily targets those that are on the edge of their seat looking and hunting for exactly what you offer. This may be a male swimwear brand advertising to men one month out from the warm season hitting. And if timing isn’t ideal, consider targetting men about to go on a tropical holiday elsewhere, as an example. This mindset is very important as apposed to running generic ads, to anyone in an area, at any given time.
Free brand awareness
Consider ways that you can increase brand awareness that may not have ongoing costs. This may include creating Instagram Reels, TikTok videos, running a podcast, asking to be a guest on other podcasts and sharing the content as they are sharing it to their audience also, or being involved in networking events. These options, as examples, are powerful ways to increase brand awareness, while gaining interesting content to share and promote.
Advertising your most successful organic content
It can be tempting to create an ad campaign based on a strategy without testing it first. Consider testing anything that you’re going to promote organically in some way to see what the response is. This may be posting an ad on your Instagram Feed first to see how the engagement is, or it may be sending a marketing email out to your email list with the same message as the billboard you’re about to pay for, to see how people respond. This is a great way to proof test something before you put dollars and cents behind it.
Whatever your budget, I would encourage you to consider these steps to ensure that you can make the most of what you have, and to safe guard your process moving forward.
