Ah, the consumer; the smart, socially-savvy potential customer that has you and hundreds of other companies after their business. Oh, and there are millions and millions of consumers out there, only some of whom are interested in your products and services. Some businesses don't narrow their target marketing at all (which is a huge mistake). More commonly, businesses don't have a good handle on how to define a smaller audience that has a higher than average interest in their offerings. And that's where this month's WSI Digital Marketing Video Series can help!
There are businesses and marketers out there - and maybe you're one of them - pulling out their hair because digital marketing isn't working how it's supposed to. So you switch it up, try shorter content, more frequent social media posts, a PPC campaign - but nothing works. Well, what if you didn't have to change your strategy or tactics? What if all you had to do was improve targeted lead generation? Hey, it could happen, and it's a lot less work than changing your whole strategy. Take a look at these four ways for Improving Targeted Lead Generation:
1. Pay-Per-Click and AdWords Advertising
Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns delivered through Google AdWords are a great way to narrow your target market. Since you will determine the search phrases for which you'd like your ads to appear, you're already engaging with a form of targeting. And once you're plugged in to Google's Display Network, you'll begin to see patterns and trends in the behaviour of the consumers who are showing the most interest in your brand's products or services. With PPC and AdWords advertising, not only do you get a steady stream of targeted traffic to your landing pages, you also receive insight on which phrases are converting at the highest rate. For simplicity's sake, PPC campaigns are one of the easiest ways to begin improving your targeted lead-gen.
2. Focus In With Micro Targeting
It's no secret that data is important to marketing teams and strategies, especially in 2015 and beyond. But companies often think about data the wrong way. When something doesn't work, marketers move on to the next tactic in hopes that it performs better. Everything a marketer does - whether it's successful or not - generates data. Learn to use every piece of information you have access to. For example, use old data from a failed marketing tactic to intensely micro-target your next campaign. Meaning that if the you have data on the target group for an old, failed campaign, make sure that your new campaign does not reach any of the same people. The more granular and focused you can be with targeting, the better your results.
3. Boost Display Ads Using Retargeting
Retargeting is like magic (no, seriously). There's no better way to target an audience than to focus on people who have explicitly shown interest in a product you offer (as in they've contacted you about it, looked at your page online or had an item in their cart). These people want to become your customer, they just aren't ready, or maybe they have a question. You should be converting this group of consumers at a pretty high rate, and retargeting will boost conversions and help you excel at capitalizing on the interest your brand generates.
4. Zoom in With Location Targeting
You've heard it before: "location, location, location!" A growing component of digital marketing is focusing on the location of your consumers. In addition to local search, social and content campaigns, you can also target ads at your potential customers based on their location. If you're a brick and mortar business, this is a massive opportunity for you to get the jump on your sluggish competitors. With consumers becoming increasingly mobile (which also means reliant on their mobile devices for information), you can boost your business with some mobile marketing savvy and zoomed-in location targeting.
