Purpose Of This Post – A Marketers Task List
This post suggests a ‘Marketers Task List’ of things you can do to continue marketing your brand at a time when the business is either non-operational or unable to deliver its product or service.
This can be used by marketers, business owners or anyone who is interested in digital marketing or self-branding.
Not all of the suggestions will be useful or possible based on your business type, job role or particular circumstances but I hope it offers at least a handful of useful suggestions for everyone.
This is in the hope that it keeps businesses going, staff employed and the mental health of us all in a good state; whilst we isolate ourselves from each other.
1. Market Research – “Why do you do, what you do”
Why do Market Research?
When was the last time you took a step back and had a look at the market segment you’re in?
If you’re like most people, then it was probably a while ago, or maybe even when you first launched. Sometimes when you’re trapped in the daily grind you don’t see what’s happening around you.
Take the time now to see if there are new competitors, new trends, has the market increased or declined, has it modernised, adapted or changed into something else completely. Is your offering still relevant? Are you positioned where you thought you were? Do you need to change or are you smashing it?
Actionable Task
Use the tools linked below to help you answer the questions above and save your findings in a presentation, document or a digital/physical scrapbook.
- Google Trends
- Google’s Keyword Planner
- AnswerThePublic
- Organic Search Ranking
- Alexa Ranking
- Google Analytics
- LeadBerry IP Matching (for B2B)
- HotJar Heatmaps
- Google Shopping Insights
- Survey Monkey Feedback Research
- Google Surveys
- Think With Google
- Google Mobile Site Test
2. Website Clean-Up & Expansion – “Time to dust off those digital cobwebs”
Why clean up your website?
With many of us self-isolating, the internet will be running on overload so it’s a great time to have fresh and relevant content on your site whilst people spend, literally, days online.
Have you submitted a blog post recently, added a recent testimonial, is your GDPR and Cookie policy up to date, do your product/service pages need updating or fleshing out?
You’ll likely find lots of areas to improve upon and when you do it’ll give you SEO points for adding fresh, up-to-date and relevant content. Plus, the hope is that the overall outcome is a more detailed website which better serves the needs of your current and potential customers.
Actionable Task
Do you have all of the content pages suggested below, maybe you do but maybe they need updating? Use these suggestions and pointers to work through them.
Create & Expand
- Blog Posts
- Product/Service Pages
- Case Studies
- About Us
- Our Team
- Accreditations
- Environmental Awareness
- GDPR Policy
- Cookie Policy
- FAQs
- Roadmap
- Community Work
- Press Kits
3. SEO Optimisation – “Let’s make Google happy”
Why optimise your SEO?
SEO is one of those unfulfilling tasks as you only see the results weeks or months down the line so they are often abandoned.
Well now is the time to take action, Google searches have already skyrocketed with more people going online to find social interaction and content.
Take time to read Google’s SEO best practices and begin implementing them on your website. The changes you make now could have positive implications for many years to come.
Actionable Task
Run through the suggested optimisations on the right to make your site a more appealing to search engines. Many of these optimisations seem complex at first, but once researched and practised they become super easy.
- Create & update site maps
- Index with Google & Bing
- Meta tag pages, images & content
- Optimise content to your keywords
- Optimise & Reduce image sizes
- Clean up URL query strings
- Improve load speed
- Improve navigation
- Use a CDN (Content Delivery Network)
- Use a third-party DNS service
- Build backlinks
- Update & Tag Headers Correctly
- Create Cornerstone Content
- Use Canonical links on external content
4. Social Media – “Turn it up to 11!”
Why bother with Social Media?
I’m sure you have probably seen, Social Media usage over the past few weeks has skyrocketed. This is because people have more time on their hands, they can’t see family and friends in person and they’re also using social media as a way to keep updated with the fast-changing situation.
This means there’s a hunger for content, so share it!
I’m not suggesting you ever try to sell off the back of the pandemic but there is nothing wrong with continuing to promote your brand by thoughtfully sharing content.
Actionable Task
Share, share, share everywhere. Social media isn’t just about having an Instagram account. You need content for every big platform out there. So create accounts for each platform below and share engaging, interesting and positive content designed for each.
- YouTube
- Tumblr
- TikTok
- Quora
- Medium
- Vimeo
- SoundCloud
5. Directories & Reviews – “Trust & transparency in a turbulent World”
Why work on Directories & Reviews?
90% of customers read online reviews before deciding to buy from a business. So it’s critical that your brand has an online review presence and… more importantly that it’s good!
This is even more important in this challenging time as people become more aware of where and how their money is being spent.
Cleaning up your online reputation can include creating accounts on trusted review platforms, replying to & resolving negative reviews and asking your current customer base to leave reviews if you don’t have any.
Actionable Task
The list below are all popular and trusted platforms for customer reviews, feedback and business verification. It’s important to have a presence on as many as possible and to also moderate & be seen actively replying on each.
- Google My Business
- Bing Places
- TrustPilot
- Yell
- Yelp
- Foursquare
- Facebook Reviews
- TripAdvisor (travel only)
- Reviews.co.uk
- Sitejabber
- Capterra (software only)
- Lib.reviews
- BBB (US only)
- Industry Specific Forums
6. Quality Content is King – “What can you give for free?”
Why should I give something for free?
The days of sell, sell, sell are gone. No one is interested. To capture interest you have to give something of good quality for free.
This doesn’t mean give your core product away for free but you can make educational videos, detailed blog posts, snippets of information and digital downloads of content, all for free. Plus in the current situation, social platforms and content outlets are hungry for new, quality content.
This has a HUGE impact on brand awareness, trust and loyalty which will pay for itself in the long run.
Actionable Task
The list below of possible freebies you could give away will hopefully spark some imagination of what you could create that would be appropriate for your industry. Once created, push it with every channel you have.
- How to guides
- Curated content
- Instructional videos
- Client testimonial videos
- Operational blog posts
- Inside company footage
- Downloadable free content
- Presentations
- Support & Advice
- Training
- News update service via email/sms
- Online calculators & tools
- What can you do to help your industry?
7. Email Isn’t Dead… Yet – “Make it honest, interesting & valuable”
Does anyone even read emails?
Yes. But only when it gives them value.
We have all been bombarded with sales emails which are all worded the same – “Buy, buy, buy now”… and we ignore them. Send an email out that adds value to someone and they’ll read it word-by-word.
With this being email, the value-added is usually in the form of information; for example, a tech company updating its customer base on the latest announcements and happenings in the tech world.
This earns brand respect and loyalty, and every so often, maybe every 10th email, you ask them to buy something.
Actionable Task
Below is a list of links to some legendary email campaigns that have a loyal, almost cult-like following, because the value that they offer is worth the time it takes to read. Subscribe to some and take notes.
- The Daily Carnage (Marketing)
- Money Saving Expert (Money)
- TheSkimm (News)
- NextDraft (Curated News)
- Mattermark (Entrepreneurial)
- HackerNewsletter (Tech)
- Sidebar (UX)
- Unsplash (10 free photos a day)
- Brain Food (Interesting things)
- Milkshake (Positive things)
- Two Cup House (F.I.R.E)
- The Minimalists (Minimalism)
Also check out MailerLite as a cheap, easy to use email platform.
Need any help?
I’ll be working as much as I possibly can through this pandemic to help my clients so we can all hopefully come out the other side of this unscathed and return back to normal.
If you need any help on working through anything mentioned in this deck or with paid advertising then let me know and I’ll be happy to help. Just drop me an email at [email protected]
Thanks for reading.
Stay safe, Stay at home,
Stu at Ditly