The Benefits of Creating a Successful Marketing Strategy

Successful marketing strategies can undoubtedly benefit your business, as growing your customer base can be a difficult and time-intensive task. Creating a marketing strategy with the goal of attracting your ideal customers will also steer the direction of content creation.

Today, we will explain and define what a marketing strategy is and how your firm may benefit from this. Read on to learn more.

Understanding The Function of a Marketing Strategy

A marketing strategy is, basically, the comprehensive plan that a company uses to attract and convert prospective customers. It is an applied and tested method that can be used by businesses to outline their marketing and sales techniques. When creating the strategy, it is critical for companies to keep their hard costs low, while still allowing scalability. 

Marketing is for growth and innovation, especially in today’s digital ecosystem. Using templates for your initial strategy can assist you in mitigating some of your costs while providing an understanding of where the business could benefit.

With that, the concept may actually be quite complicated at first glance. The good news is that marketing and creating a strategy are skills earned over time through practice, trial-and-error, and eventually, success. Fret not if you are new to the concept, as your In Front Marketing team is here to support you through this process. 

What You Can Get Out of a Marketing Strategy

A marketing strategy is necessary for several reasons. For instance, promotional and sales activity will be less likely to succeed in the absence of a marketing strategy. You’ll also have a difficult time expanding your audience base without one.

Here are other benefits you can get out of a successful marketing strategy:

1. It Reaches the Right Audience

A marketing strategy allows you to connect with the right people in your target audience. As previously stated, understanding the demographics of your ideal customers is critical to the success of any business. Developing a marketing strategy allows you to identify who your customers are, what they want, and how to approach them.

2. It Guides Your Spending Decisions

When it comes to connecting with customers, there are numerous marketing channels that you can use. Advertisements in print publications and on television can now be replaced by digital mediums such as social media, email marketing, and content marketing. Developing a marketing strategy allows you to maximize the return on your marketing investment. According to Gartner’s, marketing budgets have been trending in an upward fashion in 2022, moving from 6.4% in 2021 to a solid 9.4% of annual operating budgets. 

3. It Ensures Brand Consistency

Maintaining a consistent experience across all touchpoints, according to Forbes,  is critical when attempting to grow a brand and attract new customers. The communications and visuals associated with your brand should be consistent across all channels. When you use a marketing strategy, your message will be unique, crystal clear, and unmistakable.

Another strategy that you could include is a Customer Journey and Buyer Persona. This tactic really allows you to understand the intent behind the purpose of your website, therefore you can gain insight as to how your brand consistency speaks to your current customer base. Investing in these areas will allow you to understand how the customer feels, what material they are searching for, and their actions.

If you do not have a voice or buyer guide, reach out to an IFM team member today.

4. It Provides Measurable Results

Setting goals, with tactics to reflect this, with the assistance of a marketing strategy is beneficial. Once you have these, you will be able to gauge your progress. It is recommended to establish your KPIs to reflect your tactics and to measure and adapt your strategy as needed.

Having this data at your disposal can be extremely beneficial in refining and improving your marketing. There are many metrics to measure, yet utilizing these 15 key marketing metrics will allow you a full snapshot. 

5. It Sets the Tone of Your Brand

A marketing strategy describes how a company intends to acquire and retain customers. You are able to communicate with their buyer personas and understand their pain points. This way, you can better provide services and advertisements that cater to them. Really, develop a retention plan for your clients, because, at the end of the day, these humans are what keep your business going. 

Conclusion

Hopefully, we have provided you an overview of what a marketing strategy should include and the function, you can now create a base marketing strategy. Especially in this day and age of a fast-paced digital world, a carefully crafted marketing strategy may be the one thing your business needs. Simply see the results for yourself! Now, if you have come to the conclusion that this isn’t a step for you – reach out to one of our strategic success managers for assistance now.

Are you looking for marketing strategists in Calgary? In Front Marketing is here to put you ahead of your industry competitors. Get in touch with us today to learn more!

Why Calgary Marketing Agencies Must Prio Brand Consistency

Brand consistency creates a unified look, feel, and message for your brand across all channels. This means using the same colours, fonts, logo, and voice in all your communications. It also means staying true to your company’s values and culture in every interaction you have with customers. Brand consistency helps create trust and credibility with customers and ultimately leads to more sales.

A customer usually needs to interact with a brand around seven times before they start to consider using or purchasing from them. If a brand is inconsistent, those interactions don’t count towards that total. A consistent brand style makes the most of every customer interaction, making it more likely that the customer will engage with the brand. Over time, those consistent interactions build brand equity.

Creating a consistent brand begins with having a strong and defined brand identity. Establishing yourself as a company will allow your identity and mission to stand out. Once you have solidified who you are as a company, this allows you to know your market share and positioning. From there, you can develop a style guide that will serve as a blueprint for all of your future communications.

Find out why Calgary marketing firms need to prioritize this, stat!

Consistency vs. Inconsistency

The debate between brand consistency and inconsistency in marketing has been around for a while. The main argument for brand consistency is that it helps create a stronger and more familiar brand. On the other hand, brand inconsistency can be seen as a way to refresh the brand and keep it from becoming stale. 

A consistent brand is one whose logo, colours, imagery, copywriting, and tone are predictable. Becoming a reliable and valuable brand comes with time, consistency and reliability, as you will be able to create a narrative that walks your customers through your buyer journey. Thus, alignment is more trustworthy to customers than a less consistent brand. People naturally trust consistent things, making a company look more professional.

Perhaps add in photos of our branding book – to highlight proper use and improper use 🙂 

Brand Voice

A brand voice is a company’s overall tone and personality as it is conveyed to the public through various channels. This includes the language used in marketing and advertising materials and how employees interact with customers. A consistent brand or marketing voice helps create trust and credibility with consumers, making it easier for them to recognize a company’s materials.

Being able to write with the same words and personality regardless of the context is known as voice consistency. This skill is valuable for writers because it allows them to maintain their voice regardless of the situation. This can be difficult, but it is important to be as consistent as possible.

  • Your brand’s voice is the overall personality of your communications. It’s how you speak, write, and reflect your brand’s values to your customers. It should be aligned across all platforms, from your website to your social media to your email marketing.
  • Your brand’s tone is the attitude conveyed in teaching its messages. It can change based on the situation, but it should always be consistent with your brand’s voice. This can be adapted slightly depending on the audience or channel but should remain consistent overall.

Align and Get Results Now

There are so many factors that play a part in creating your Brand – ensure you include them all to set yourself above the rest. While establishing your Brand and building your audience, you will want to ensure that you take into account other variables that could assist with executing your strategy. You will also want to ensure that these goals align with your Marketing roadmap. 

Working with In Front Marketing, one of Calgarys best marketing agencies, will ensure that your goals align with your needs. Our team works hard to build clarity, confidence, and client satisfaction concerning your products and services. Call us at 403-861-9727 or visit our website to experience results-driven output!

Google Ads: A Good Way to Calculate New Product Demand

If you’re considering launching a new product, testing demand before making a big investment is important. Google Ads services in Calgary can be a great way to do this. 

By running a short, targeted ad campaign, you can get an idea of how much interest there is in your product and whether it’s worth pursuing.

Failure to properly test demand is one of the main hazards that small business owners and start-ups encounter when creating a new product or service. 

Even if you believe your product will be simple to sell, launching it without sufficient testing puts you in danger of finding no customers.

Spending a small amount of money upfront on marketing to ascertain whether you are meeting a need is a great approach to decrease your risk by using Google to evaluate online demand for your product. 

This article will examine how you can test the online demand for your goods and services using your AdWords account. 

What Is Google AdWords?

In a nutshell, AdWords refers to the small advertisements that surround and are displayed above Google’s organic search results. When posting these ads, you will choose the keywords, the ad wording, and the cost per click. 

Marketers frequently use AdWords to promote products or services already on the market. For instance, utilize AdWords to direct prospective customers to my website, where you offer training and account management services.

Google Ads allows businesses to increase website traffic by matching a user’s search query with relevant, user-targeted adverts. This is how Google makes money and is quite good at it.

You can easily determine if there is a market for your new product or service because so many people use Google to search for information and items. This is distinct from passively disseminating information to consumers via social media or other channels while they are presumably not actively seeking out or making a purchase. 

How to Calculate the Demand for a Product

Create a routine advertising campaign in your Google Ads account.

Select keyword phrases that customers might use to find the product or service you’re testing on search engines. Try out several strategies and elements to draw in any potential searchers. 

For your advertising, create text. Emphasize the advantages of your new product. Declare your product’s main advantage while stressing the customer’s benefits. Even if a potential visitor would be interested in visiting your website, poorly written adverts could skew the results.

Be Specific When Describing Your Area

Run advertisements only while the product or service is still available. If you don’t confine the campaign to a local or regional area, your results may be misinterpreted, and the degree of demand may be exaggerated.

Create a Budget

Comprehensive testing must be feasible. You must decide on your daily spending limit and how much you will spend every click. You risk using up your test money too quickly if you don’t set things up correctly.

Publish a Landing Page

Create a page with information about your product since it won’t be available for purchase. Use it to collect email addresses from prospective consumers if one is available. Give them a reason to sign up simultaneously; early updates, early access, or sneak peeks at your product are all excellent inducements.

Look at the Results

You will know that there is a market and need for the product or service you are developing if you observe a constant stream of traffic in response to your advertisements. When you’re ready to launch, try to gather email addresses so you may contact these potential clients.

On the other hand, if no one responds to your marketing, you can conclude that the difficulty in attracting customers outweighs the potential for your product. 

If online marketing isn’t assisting you in determining demand at the moment, likely, it won’t be after the product is made available. Do some keyword research and change your advertising.

Conclusion 

Getting Google Ads services is a great way to test demand for a new product. By targeting a relevant audience and using relevant keywords, you can get a good idea of whether people are interested in what you have to offer. If you see a lot of clicks and conversions, you know you have a winner on your hands. If not, then you can try tweaking your approach and testing again.

In Front Marketing is an advertising firm in Calgary focusing on client pleasure, clarity, and confidence. Contact us for Google Ads services in Calgary

The Most Common Content Marketing Mistakes to Avoid

Content marketing is not an easy industry, and neither are its related tasks as simple as posting your ads online. No, you have to be vigilant so that you would not commit any of the crucial mistakes that other companies have come to regret later on. That said, below are just a few more mistakes or demeanors you must avoid making at all costs, taking off where we left in the last article.

1. Only Focusing On One Type of Content

Don’t just stick to one type of content. Try different things and see what works best for you and your audience. You might find that blog posts are great for some people, but others might prefer infographics or videos. It’s important to have a variety of content so that your audience will notice, and the search engines will reward you with improved rankings.

If you want to make your content marketing more engaging, try filming live videos. This will give your audience a behind-the-scenes look at your brand and show them the office, staff, products, services, and quirks that make you unique. Be yourself, and your audience will appreciate it.

2. Only Focusing On Going-Viral

It isn’t always about online clout. That must never be your sole marketing goal. There’s no one guaranteed path to making your content go viral. The best way to ensure that your content has a chance of being seen by as many people as possible is to create content that your audience will enjoy and want to share with their friends. If you make content that resonates with your audience, they’re more likely to share it, increasing its’ chances of going viral.

3. Creating Content without Any Plan or Strategy

A content marketing strategy is a plan for creating and distributing content that will help you achieve your business goals. A content scheduling calendar is a tool that helps you plan and track when you publish new content. Consistency in content production is important because it helps you build an audience that knows when to expect new content from you.

Here are a few of our quick takeaways when it comes to building a marketing strategy:

Business Directive – What are we going to execute?

Marketing Strategy – problem with solution

Key Performance Indicator – Goals or Targets 

Marketing Campaigns – Product Timeline & Launch 

Monitoring – Analytics & Optimization 

4. Failing to Promote Your Content

The majority of B2B marketing content goes unused, which is a problem for content creators who don’t put enough thought or strategy into their efforts. A great piece of content will never reach its full potential if it’s not properly promoted. In the past, social media was a free platform for promoting content. However, nowadays, you need to pay to get your content seen. As a result, you should be prepared to budget for content marketing promotions on social media and search engines.

5. Failing to Create Mobile-Friendly Content

In a world where people are increasingly using their mobile devices as their primary way to go online, it’s more important than ever to make sure your website and content are optimized for mobile. This means creating a website that looks good and works well on smaller screens and making sure your content is easy to consume on the go.

Perhaps repurposing old blogs or social posts by using canva to transform the digital assets into a video. This is a quick way to repurpose for social media channels and creates engagement with your audience. You put a lot of time into creating content, so it makes sense that you would want to share it with your audience to relay your key offerings and solutions as a business. 

Conclusion

Overall, these are the few key content marketing mistakes businesses should avoid succeeding in the industry. Some of the most common mistakes are not creating enough content, not targeting the right audience, and not measuring results. By keeping these things in mind, businesses can create quality content that will engage their audience and help them achieve their marketing goals.

If you are looking for experienced digital marketing consultants in Calgary, look no further than our experts here at In Front Marketing. We are a results-driven advertising agency that is centered around clarity, confidence, and client satisfaction. Call us today and let us help establish a great strategy for your online content!

4 Ways Social Media Advertising Can Help Your Business

Social media is a powerful channel of communication. It is a place to not only post content, but also a place to engage with your customers.

It’s important to understand that social media is not just about posting content and waiting for customers to find it. You need to proactively engage with your existing and potential customers in order to stay relevant in their eyes.

There are many ways you can do this, including: posting content, engaging with others on social media, using ads on different channels, and re-engaging old customers.

Let’s discuss a bit further how these impact your digital channels.

1. Segment Your Target Audience

Typically, social media networks like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram all allow you to target specific groups of people. For example, you can target people in the same region, in a different country, with a particular interest, or a specific gender.

Segmenting your audience is key to remarketing. The first step is to identify who your business applies to.

It’s important to know the channels that your audience prefers. For example, if you’re a clothing retailer, you’ll want to know whether your customers prefer online shopping or in-store shopping. You’ll also want to know what media they consume and what their demographic and geographical information is.

Interests are also important because it helps you understand what type of content they prefer and how they want it delivered (text, video, audio). It will also help you keep up with the latest trends in their industry so that you can better target them with new products or services.

2. Access a Variety of Ads

Social media advertising includes a variety of ad types and formats you can use. So, you can use the different ad types and formats to target different people within your target audience.

Display ads are the most common type of online ad and they are becoming more popular. They are also the most cost-effective way to reach your target demographic.

Video is becoming more popular as well because it is much more engaging than text, which means that people will watch it for longer and it is easier to understand. Video ads also tend to have higher conversion rates than other formats because people are drawn in by the visuals and then stay for the message.

Ultimately, you just need to learn how to use the correct format and type of ad to your advantage. There is a strategy – so let’s collaborate today on yours!

3. Re-Engage Old Customers or Website Visitors

Social media is a convenient way to stay connected with your old customers or website visitors. You can use this to your advantage by offering them discounts, freebies, and other deals for re-engaging with your brand.

The internet has made it easy for people to find products and services from all over the world. This means that they can find what they want,  when they want it, and at a cheaper price. With the availability of so much information online, it’s hard for companies to retain their customers.

Companies need to put in more effort in order to stay connected with their customers. They need to show that they are still interested in their customers by sending them special offers or discounts. They can also use remarketing techniques to keep showing ads on other websites that the customer has visited before – this is a convenient way of engaging with old customers and website audiences.

What is working for you? and what is not? It is a discussion that is worth having for your business.

4. Gather Insights and Reports on User Behavior

If you use social media advertising platforms, you can learn about the behaviour of your customers. You can gather information about their demographics, interests, websites, and social media accounts.

Data and analytics are important for business growth, innovation and strategy. They teach us what works, what doesn’t work and how to improve our strategy – especially when it comes to our marketing strategy! 

Data is the key to success in today’s digital world. It helps us learn about our target market, understand their behaviour and needs so we can provide them with what they want. Data also helps us measure the success of our marketing campaigns and find out where we need to do more work so that we can achieve business goals.

Final Thoughts 

Social media advertising can be beneficial for your business. It can help you to gain awareness, traction and future projection.

Social media advertising is a great way to market your business, while offering an affordable and effective way to reach a wide audience. It offers real-time feedback and allows you the ability to curate to specific audiences. 

Including social Media Advertising in your Marketing strategy is an integral part of every business. It helps you gain recognition in the market, generate more revenue, and establish your brand image. Hence it is important to have a strategy that aligns with your goals and objectives so that you can achieve them successfully.

It helps in achieving the company’s goals and objectives by bringing in new customers, retaining current customers, and building loyalty.

With results-driven data to back our company mission – we work to provide you with a transparent approach to your social media needs!

Learn more about Essential Digital Marketing KPIs To Track In Your Next Campaign

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Nowadays, there are more metrics than ever that marketers can use to track and measure the effectiveness of their marketing campaigns or broader marketing efforts. Choosing the right digital marketing KPIs, then, is a critical first step in terms of measuring the return on investment of your various marketing efforts. From SEO to bounce rate, customer lifetime value, marketing ROI, customer acquisition cost, click-through rate (CTR), and many more, we asked several of our key partners and experts in various marketing activities to offer their thoughts on the essential key performance indicators for your digital marketing in 2022 and beyond.

Importance Of Choosing The Right KPIs For Your Marketing Goals

Our panel consisted of experts from several fields, including marketing strategy, social media, PPC, SEO, email marketing, and numerous other digital marketing categories. And most of them started their KPI advice for 2022 (and many years to come) by pointing out the importance of setting goals for your digital marketing metrics before you began measuring and analyzing the results. 

“One of the most important things to consider when tracking and measuring KPIs is how clear goals and objectives are to the entire process. Without a clear sense of what you want to achieve, it will be difficult to properly interpret the data. And KPIs should be used in conjunction with other data points to get a complete picture of your marketing efforts.” – Natalia Osorio Quintero, Digital Marketer at NataliaOQ

There can be as many KPIs and metrics as there are types of marketing collateral and outlets. If lead generation is your goal, for example, there may be different measures that help paint a clear picture of your campaign success than those you’d use if retention rate or brand awareness is the goal. Regardless of the specific goals, you have for your marketing investment, clearly establishing your goals will often dictate the right mix of KPIs and measures of success. 

“A business can’t accurately assess whether a marketing investment was viable or wise if there isn’t an observable benchmark for what kind of dent the campaign made for them. The right KPIs, collaboratively established during discovery, quickly and succinctly give business owners a clearer picture of the campaign so they can observe growth, then scale or pivot if things aren’t converting as they want.”

– Max Zoghbi, Founder & Creative Director at Loupe Theory

“Campaign success, while generally subjective, is based on whether or not a brand can meet or exceed its goals. KPIs are put in place to measure progress, hence the term. They’re meant to be adjusted over time.”

– Ceara Milligan, Social Media Manager at STIR Advertising and Integrated Messaging

And while your organization may tweak the important digital marketing KPIs that you set for your campaign, the types of campaigns you plan to run will help you narrow down the list of important metrics that matter. 

“It depends on the type of campaign you are running. For search engine optimization campaigns, it is important to measure the site health, organic keywords, organic keyword position, organic traffic, keyword ranking position, and so on. For ads, you want to know the impressions, clicks, conversions, and cost per conversion. And these are just two examples of how different KPIs vary depending on your campaign type.”

– Masha Kaprian, Principal at iMedPages, LLC

While different types of campaigns and marketing channels can have different goals, businesses still need to drive revenue. And measuring digital marketing KPIs for any kind of campaign will tell you exactly what’s working, what isn’t, and where you can make changes that strengthen your campaign.

“Even if the main goal of a campaign is not sales or conversions, the ultimate goal of any business is to make enough money. The ad can be beautiful, the landing page can be breathtaking, and the copy can be engaging, but if new customers and established customers are not taking the action you want them to take, the campaign is not generating the results you need.”

– Blake Nolan, Founder & Chief Operating Officer at Storm Brain

“Everything can be measured, whether it be phone calls, emails, form fills, account signups, app downloads, product sales, and cart abandonment. But many businesses and agencies are only reporting on total-number site metrics such as time on site, page views, new users, and so on. Proper conversion mapping will not only showcase real-time results (including customer engagement and sales), it will also show lost revenue opportunities and areas where conversion rate can be improved.”

–  Dave Taylor, Cofounder of In Front Marketing  

In addition, measuring your digital marketing campaign goals is important not because it will point out failings, but because they tell you about the opportunities that exist and ways that you can improve performance. 

“KPIs should come with goals that you want to reach. That will ultimately tell you whether or not your campaign is a success. But if you do not meet your goals, that does not mean your campaign is a total failure. Rather, it shows that you have an opportunity to continue to improve your campaigns, so next time you run a campaign you know to make small tweaks that can lead to incremental improvements.” –

Nick Mattar, Founder, and CEO at Digital Detroit LLC 

Specific Digital Marketing KPIs And Metrics To Consider In Your Marketing Campaigns

As you can see, our experts agreed that goals will play a huge factor in determining which KPIs matter the most. Just like your digital marketing strategy overall, choosing the right measures of success requires spending some time evaluating what your metrics for achievement are. From there, however, many of the panelists and marketing experts did have specific recommendations for the key marketing metrics and measures to consider for your current and upcoming campaigns. 

“Start with Customer Lifetime Value. CLV will dictate which prospects you should be focusing your campaigns on. From there you can move on to tactical KPI metrics, such as Return on Ad Spend (RoAS) and Cost Per Acquisition (CPA). CLV is key guidance in regards to determining who your campaigns should be targeting, while RoAS and CPA will empower you to judge the effectiveness of the campaigns.” – Alonzo Foreman, SVP of Marketing at OppGen Marketing      

Measuring the effectiveness of channels was a key takeaway from our conversations with marketing leaders and digital experts, as it fed into several other metrics and it can help determine the best places to increase or decrease spending. 

“Two metrics that help determine which channels are most effective are ROAS (return on ad spend) and CAC (cost of acquiring a customer). These metrics help us determine the LTV, or lifetime value, of a customer. Since we know how much it costs to acquire them, we can measure that against the average life of a customer or how much a customer spends with us. This helps us know how profitable each channel is.” –  Nicole Denson, Marketing Manager at Big Leap

Just as was the case with our discussion of goals above, your KPIs are very dependent on what you want your campaign to achieve, and what you consider to be a measure of success. Ecommerce campaigns will undoubtedly call for different metrics than a brand awareness campaign, for example. 

“From an SEO firm’s perspective, two primary KPIs to track in a digital marketing campaign include search engine keyword rankings and organic website traffic. If a company is executing a sound on-page optimization strategy, complete with value-add SEO tags that align with relevant industry terms and detailed, long-form content on landing pages, these factors can help improve search engine rankings.” – Asad Kausar, CEO at Dabaran Inc.                 

“I think that link CTR, CPA, and CPM are three of the most critical metrics to track in all digital campaigns. Your link CTR is the gauge that allows you to truly see if your creativity and messaging align with your market. Your cost per acquisition will help you determine if your campaigns are profitable and worth running depending on what a client is worth to you. Finally, your CPMs can help dictate if you have a fair bid in your advertising campaigns.” – Ashley Monk, CEO of Onya

With many different options and different places to start, the metrics you choose to track most closely may shift and change as you continue to develop and implement new campaigns. But certain measures provide anyone with a solid assessment of how your marketing campaign is impacting your business goals. 

“Total revenue and average conversion rate can act as the anchor of your marketing initiatives. When doing A/B testing, a simple comparison of these macro metrics will spotlight which campaigns performed better overall. It’s essential to track, define your goals, and build them out in your preferred analytics system.” – Edan Ben-Atar, Founder of WebLime

“Website traffic and lead-to-visitor conversion rates are two of the most important KPIs for digital marketing campaigns. It’s important to have a healthy mix of new and returning site visitors, as well as to make sure that the traffic we are driving is relevant traffic based on search intent and keyword targeting. And while website traffic on its own is a great metric, it only tells half the story. If you are seeing an increase in site visits but not an increase in conversions, this could mean that some adjustments need to be made.” – Ashley Ismailovski, CRO & Operations Manager at SmartSites

“My top nine most important and most essential KPIs that every digital marketer should use to measure the success of their campaigns are: Web Traffic Sources; Leads; Page Views; Cost per Lead; Returning Users; Conversion; Goal Completion Rate; Click-Through Rate; and Customer Acquisition Cost.” – Joe Smith, SEO Expert at Market Media Connect

Some of the most valuable metrics for your campaign may not be strictly numerical, too. There are some insights that you may not get from Google Analytics, but which are incredibly important for helping you see how well your marketing budget is being put to use. 

“Lead sources. You should investigate the source of your sales. This is one of the most crucial marketing KPIs for your company’s long-term success. If all of your leads originate from one source, a server outage or a store closing could be disastrous for your business. Diversifying your lead sources now may help secure your business in the future.” – Luca Tagliaferro, SEO Consultant at Luca Tagliaferro SEO Consultancy

“Qualified website traffic (or qualified leads) is always a primary KPI for any online campaign. This metric measures the number of website visitors (and potential customers) that result from your marketing efforts. By tracking website traffic, you can gauge the overall reach of your campaign and compare it with other marketing initiatives.” – Andre Kay, CEO at Sociallybuzz

And the quality of your leads, if that’s one of the metrics you choose, is even more informative than the raw number of people who found your site or the number of leads your form generated.

“Consider Profit Per Action rather than cost per action. Cheap leads are not guaranteed good leads. To assess the performance of a campaign, we should be looking at how much profit the campaign is bringing in, instead of focusing on the raw number of leads.” – Justin Chan, Senior Business Developer at Coding Bull Web Redesign Agency

“When looking at conversion rate, it is helpful to look at how many actions were real leads and not just bots or spammers. We look at where traffic is coming from, which pages they are taking action on, and what types of action are most often taken (e.g. phone calls, contact form submissions, email sign-up, etc.).” – Charity Maddox, Owner of Carve Digital Marketing

Finding Out How Your

Campaign Measures Up

Whether you’re launching an organic search effort, upping your content marketing game, or simply ramping up your social media efforts, the bottom line is that you need to be able to see your marketing performance in terms of what’s working and what isn’t, and then adjust with that information in hand. Our experts here have provided some great examples of key metrics and KPIs for you to begin your planning and strategy with, but this is only the beginning. Whether you need help with an inbound marketing campaign, lead conversion, or any other digital marketing and analysis project, our group of expert digital marketing partners is available to help you make the most of your marketing spend and see the results.

4 Notable Reasons Why You Should Hire an Advertising Agency

The world of marketing and advertising is changing and with it, the strategies that are used. As technology continues to evolve, so do the ways in which we communicate with one another. The way that we advertise has changed dramatically over the years.

Some people may think that because a company has a large budget for marketing, their advertising needs will be met. This is not always the case as there are many different aspects of advertising that need to be considered when creating an advertisement campaign.

There are four notable reasons why smart business owners understand they need to invest in marketing and advertising:

  1. it can save cost on hiring a new employee
  2. it can save you time
  3. it can help you develop your brand
  4. it can help you maximize your conversions

Savings is Key!

Hiring new and dedicated employees is definitely expensive, and if you are thinking of getting top-level talent – trust us when we say that it will cost you a pretty penny. But what if we told you that there was a way to get the same caliber of talent, with the same level of dedication, for a fraction of the price?

Enter agency freelancing.

Agency freelancing is the process of hiring an individual or company to fulfill your marketing needs

without having to take on any long-term commitments. With agency freelancing, your company can hire one person for one project or hire many people for many projects. You can even hire an entire team – your In Front Marketing Team

Time is Precious – Lets save you time!

Every business owner understands the value of time. Hiring an ad agency allows your team to focus on the areas it excels in. This way, your company can focus on what it does best and let the agency handle the rest.

In today’s world, the way we work is changing. Workplaces are becoming more dynamic and flexible. Businesses are looking for partners that can provide them with an edge in a highly competitive market. This is why many companies have turned to advertising agencies to help them with marketing and branding efforts.

An advertising agency such as In Front Marketing can help your business in many ways. We will be able to provide you with a new perspective and fresh ideas on how to promote your company, as well as give you access to their team of experts who have years of experience in this field.

Building your Brand – One digital step at a time.

Developing a brand is not an easy process, which is probably why even the most experienced businesses struggle to do it. An article in Forbes, “The 10 Steps to Building a Brand”, outlines the steps to developing a successful brand. The article states that one of the most important aspects of developing a successful brand is understanding your industry. This means that you need to take the time to research your competitors as well as identify what they do well and what they don’t do so well.

Generate business engagement is also another important aspect of developing a successful brand. Engagement can be done through social media posts, advertisements or customer reviews and testimonials.

Saving time is saving money!

Most companies are not getting the most out of their advertising budget. They are either not using it effectively or they are not spending enough on it.

Google Adwords is a great place to start because it can help you get more customers and make more money. It can also help you find new customer segments, understand customer behavior, and increase your conversion rates. In Google Adwords, make sure you choose the right metrics to measure your campaign’s success. But there is a lot to learn about Google Adwords before you can use it successfully, hence where we come in. Contact us today to learn how you can get your business In Front of your market.

Conclusion

We hope this article proves to be useful when it comes to helping you gain a better understanding of how advertising agencies can help your business grow. While it may seem like a significant investment, directing resources towards advertising will help you achieve your short-term and long-term goals. Be sure to keep everything you’ve learned here in mind so that you can make the most informed decisions for your business.

If you’re looking for an advertising agency in Calgary, In Front Marketing has got you covered, Digital advertising is an essential piece of almost every business today. What was once high traffic and low interest has now become a centerpiece in the world of marketing. We are able to track the value of each ad, and perfect its message and strategic placement for your audience. For top of mind awareness, and high converting performance, give us a call, and we’ll find the best solution for you.

Important Components of an Effective Marketing Plan

The internet has brought with it an unprecedented amount of competition. The internet of things is becoming such a large tool for so many businesses. This allows us to find, evaluate and choose products and services at our fingertips, which also means that businesses are having to utilize more of these tools to have the competitive edge to draw and engage their potential customers. By using digital marketing, companies can offer customers access to products and services that they simply could not get any other way.

Furthermore, digital marketing allows businesses to position themselves from the competition through niche targeting, often referred to as “micro-targeting.” By pinpointing certain groups of people within their targeted audience, businesses can cater their marketing campaigns directly to their consumers. Does your marketing strategy have focus pages? Do you know what the next 6 months brings?

If you want your business to have a successful venture into the online world, you need to ensure that your digital marketing plan has the following components:

1 – Responsive Website Design

Your online presence begins with an attractive and functional website. A user-friendly website is vital to building a powerful and long-lasting relationship with your potential customers. User friendly across different devices allow you to have the dynamic ability to reach your customer base.

A website is the first aspect of your digital marketing plan. The overall design of your website says a lot about your brand, as it’s usually where customers and clients first encounter your business. A professionally designed website will make consumers want to do business with you. Understanding your needs and budget is simple with a discovery call with our team. We can provide a quote based on your company and scope of work, while working to create a strategic plan that includes your website and potential marketing phases.

Responsive web design is a technique that allows designers to create a website that will look good on any device. This means that the user journey will be smooth and conversion points will be clean. It also means that the website will generate traffic and bring in leads for your business. See where this is going……..

Creating a smooth user journey is key when it comes to building your brand, audience and executing your marketing plan. Think Conversion rate optimization strategy while also realizing that you can not break the bank on the marketing plan – at least until we do our job and prove our return on investment.

2 – Solid SEO Strategy

A strong search engine optimization (SEO) strategy is a vital component of any digital marketing campaign. Your website exists only to convince your customers to buy a product or service. The only way to do that is to make your website visible to as many potential customers as possible.

SEO, which entails putting your website in the best position possible to be found in search engine results, is arguably the most effective way of reaching an organic audience. That search function on browsers comes in handy for so many reasons.

SEO campaigns include keyword research, website optimization, links, and other factors that search engines can utilize to determine your website’s relevance to a search query. Once again, looping back to that search function.

A good way to start an SEO campaign is by using the right keywords in your content, backlinks, and social media posts. Having a content strategy will help you create more compelling content that will rank higher on search engines. Optimizing your website can be done with various tools like Google Webmaster Tools or the Yoast plugin for WordPress. Lastly, technical SEO includes things like having a sitemap or XML site map and making sure your URLs are readable and not messy.

This is also not a short term goal – this strategy is a long term and solid foundation to your marketing strategy. We advise clients this phase is at least 6 months to see solid results, so with communication and transparency – you will have the opportunity to grow and build your brand on your website to achieve the goals that you want.

3 – Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing is an integral part of any digital marketing campaign.  With Social Media being widely accessible to the majority of people, across different devices and platforms, it creates space in the digital world for social media marketing. Platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn are valuable marketing platforms – especially for social advertising.

It is a great way for businesses to reach out to people and get their attention. Social media marketing has become one of the most popular ways for companies to advertise themselves, especially because it is free and easy to use. Businesses can use social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn in order to market their products or services by engaging with customers, building an audience or educating.

Companies can display their products and services through social media platforms, connect directly with consumers, and build a following of engaged and interested consumers.

4 – Paid Advertising

Paid advertising is a form of marketing that involves the purchase of space in media to promote a product or service. It is one of the most inexpensive and competitive platforms for driving traffic and lead generation.

The main objective of paid advertising is to increase sales by driving potential customers to a company’s products or services. Paid advertising can be carried out through digital channels such as social media, search engine optimization, and display ads.

Digital marketing campaigns that neglect to include paid advertising are incomplete. Paid advertising is cheap, simple to set up, and can provide a significant return on investment. Especially on large and competitive platforms such as Google Adwords, paid advertising can effectively drive targeted traffic to your website. There are so many tools when it comes to paid advertising – that it really comes down to asking your company:

How fast can we handle growth?

How much is our budget?

What are our goals?

Then it becomes the magic of creating a digital marketing strategy to execute the above – now that is what we call a win-win.

5 – Video Marketing

Video is another growing form of marketing that is valuable in a digital marketing campaign. Online videos, such as YouTube videos, can be a powerful form of communication and presentation. It can show consumers that your company is dynamic, engaging, and relatable. Videos are often an effective way of branding a company to engage consumers.

There are many different forms of video content that are used on a daily basis. Educational, introductory, short form, long form, documentaries, case studies, testimonials and personalized videos are at our fingertips – it just becomes the question of how do we use these to benefit our brand! 

Content Creation is crucial to building your website and other channels, which can also include blogs, social media management, and as mentioned – Video

Conclusion

In the modern business landscape, digital marketing is an essential tool. With the explosion of the internet, consumers have unprecedented access to products and services. To be successful, businesses need a competitive edge over the competition. By using digital marketing and having these key components, companies can offer customers access to products and services that they simply could not get any other way. 

If you’re looking to work with a reliable Calgary digital marketing agency, In Front Marketing has you covered. We develop effective strategies backed by data and make sure you get the results your business needs. Call us today so we can find the perfect strategy for your business.

In Front Marketing is moving into Commun-o

Community has always been a big part of our core values. What’s being built at Commun-o is a total game changer for the marketing community in Canada and we are pumped to be a part of it!

Feel free to stop by anytime for a tour of the building and our private office!

This also means a celebration is in order! Watch for the open house in July 2018 after this years Calgary Stampede.

Why a focus on data is key for your business and a standard for In Front Marketing.

Does this sound familiar?

You’ve purchased a display advertising campaign and a large number of impressions from a large corporation or local ad agency. After the campaign your agency has only told you how many “clicks” your ad campaign has received.

As a business owner what does “clicks” mean to you, and how are you supposed to determine if this has brought any revenue into your business?

When business owners ask this question, why is the answer always the same? “that’s just how we do things” or “we don’t have access to any other information”.

How are large corporations and major advertising agencies getting away with providing clients with such an insignificant amount of data and no one is holding them accountable to report more??

So let’s take a look at what happens when you book a Display advertising campaign with In Front Marketing.

First, we uncover data that is unique to your business. We create and install unique tracking codes called website pixels that allow us to compile information on the consumers who are interested in your business.

What behaviors led them to your website?  How is that behavior relevant to other consumers on your website?  What are they doing on your website and what is leading them to purchase or contact your business?

This information is being stored on every device that lands on your website and these website pixels create a pie chart to show you what interested every consumer on your website, and this pie chart is different for each individual product and service on your website.

The best part, this data doesn’t cost you a penny. This is your data, hosted on your website!  You just need a way to connect with it.

After 2 to 4 weeks of data collection, we now have an opportunity to create an ad campaign focussed around your target audience. We work to understand from your perspective, what does the ideal customer coming through the door look like, compare it to the data and strategically create an ad campaign.

Using a display advertising networks, we can now ensure your message is only being “displayed” to consumers who are performing a behavior that is relevant to your business.

They may be shopping with your competition, or doing research on your products, but regardless of how they are spending time online we have an opportunity to invite them to your business and monitor how they engage with you.

So let’s go back to the “clicks” — Did you know that a display ad typically drops a “cookie” onto your computer that is traceable by a website pixel?

This allows us to track consumers who do not click on ads (we are all afraid where the click is going to take us). These consumers see an ad, engage with the message, head straight to google and search for your business. The website pixels allows us to trace the cookie/pixel and determine which ad they saw. This is called a “conversion”.

The website pixel then allows us to determine what they do next.

Let’s say the ”consumer” views 6 pages on your website, placing a product in a shopping cart and then makes a purchase. The pixel stays with them, so we don’t lose them during this process. The pixel then shows us the pages they visited, the total revenue purchased by this consumer and relates that back to the individual ad they saw before coming to your website.

That “click” – it’s pretty insignificant now isn’t it??

With In Front Marketing you not only see “clicks” – You see Behaviors, You see Conversions and consumers who don’t click but still search out your business.  You see a full picture of website engagement, and best of all! You see performance, revenue, and real RESULTS!

Oh, and by the way, the website pixels will stay with a consumer for an average of 30 days once they leave your website. So, if they choose not to purchase or contact you today, but they continue shopping around and engaging with your competition, we stay top of mind with them and continually invite them back to your website. If their behavior changes and they no longer show interest in your products or service, the pixels will stop tracking them ensuring your ads never become annoying or spam!

Want to see real results for your ad campaigns?