Quels défis de stratégie marketing rencontrez-vous ?

If you don't have a specific business goal, your marketing strategy is bound to fail. Are you trying to: • gain more market shares • retain clients for longer • generate more leads There are more options but those are the general three directions your marketing strategy should explore. Furthermore, you need to get as granular as possible in describing the desired destination with as many numbers as you can.

In the world of marketing, clarity is power. When your objectives are crystal clear, every decision, tactic, and dollar spent has a purpose and a measurable outcome. While chasing metrics like website traffic or social media followers might seem appealing, they can be misleading if not tied to tangible business outcomes. Instead, focus on objectives directly impacting revenue, customer retention, or brand loyalty. For instance, instead of merely aiming for ‘more website visitors,’ target ‘increasing qualified leads by 20% in the next quarter.’ Such specificity provides direction and sets the stage for measurable success.

🎯 Setting clear objectives is the cornerstone of a successful marketing strategy. It's the guiding star that aligns every campaign, content piece, and communication with your overarching business goals. By defining what success looks like, you can tailor your efforts to not only reach but exceed your targets. Whether it's increasing brand awareness, boosting sales, or enhancing customer engagement, your objectives should be SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. With these in place, every step you take is a calculated move towards business growth and success.

I'm big on objectives. They are the foundation of your business. Your business and your marketing plan are built from there. Objectives provide direction, focus, and give you a purpose - a reason to get up in the morning. They can form from your "why?". Objectives don't need to be all hard numbers. You can have soft objectives too. Just make sure they are realistic and achievable, so you don't give up.

Defining clear objectives is the base of an effective marketing strategy and crucial for achieving business success. 1. Clarity and Direction: Well-defined objectives provide a roadmap. They clarify what you are aiming to achieve, ensuring that your marketing initiatives aligns with your commercial goals, whether it’s increasing brand awareness, generating leads, or driving sales. 2. Measurable Outcomes: By establishing specific, measurable goals, you can track progress and adjust tactics as needed. This data-driven approach leads to continuous improvement. 3. Resource Allocation: Understanding your goals helps in allocating budgets, manpower, and time to the most impactful initiatives, maximizing your marketing ROI.

Start by asking: What specific outcomes do you want to achieve? How will you measure success? Ensure your objectives are SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Remember, vague goals lead to vague results. Be precise in your targets, whether it's increasing market share, boosting brand awareness, or driving sales. Identify key performance indicators (KPIs) that directly reflect these goals. Without clear objectives, you risk wasting resources on ineffective activities. Well-defined goals keep your team focused, enable accurate performance measurement, and ensure every marketing dollar contributes to your desired outcomes. Invest time in setting robust objectives – it's your first step towards marketing success.

Setting objectives is step one when developing a plan or strategy for marketing initiatives. There is a clear distinction between goals and objectives based on a chosen and successful framework I have used in the past: while we have SMART goals, they should be broad whereas objectives are narrower in focus and constitute tighter timeframes than a SMART goal. Some marketers are provided a general objective with campaigns such as "awareness" or "traffic" but these more general objectives should be more detailed before implementing the strategy. For example, an objective may look like: Increase brand awareness by 15% within 3 months on a 5% increase in digital marketing spend.

If a person doesn't have a clear goal for what he wants to do, the topic is finished already. Whatever he does afterward is a waste of time, money, and trust given to him for the work.

The marketing strategy challenges I face include: 🎯 Targeting Precision: Ensuring campaigns reach the right audience segments, especially as preferences evolve. 📈 Measuring ROI: Accurately tracking the effectiveness of each campaign and channel to optimize spending. 🔄 Keeping Up with Trends: Adapting quickly to new digital platforms, trends, and consumer behavior shifts. 💬 Maintaining Consistent Branding: Aligning messaging across multiple channels without diluting brand identity. 🤝 Balancing Short-Term and Long-Term Goals: Meeting immediate targets while staying focused on the brand’s bigger vision.

It's been mentioned before, but if the objectives aren't clear and agreed upon by other departments within the business, the Marketing Strategy will fail. If you do have that clear objective, then work though the "how" on what you will do to support those objectives. Use what you have learned to be successful in the past but always try to interject new ideas and find what resonated best with your customers.

Centralize your marketing strategy around your audience, not your product. When you have a complete picture of the people who can use your service — including what are their pain points, how they are purchasing, etc. — then you'll be able to create a plan that connects with them and drives your ROI.

Analyze the customers that have been successful with your product. What do they have in common? Hone in on what they share (certain industries, technologies used, challenges and use cases, regions, etc.) so you can expand your market there. Focusing on a few before trying to go broad is the best way to understand your audience.

Marketing is all about creating confidence. In order to create confidence in the minds of your audience, you need to understand them at a deeper level. With the advent of various digital tools, this has become much more easier. However, the goal is to understand the 'signals' of your audience and interpreting them. For e.g google or any other search engine will provide you with intent signals. Where as social channels such as meta might provide volume based data and potentially a bit of intent too. And then there are hybrid channels such as tiktok that will provide you with intent + demand + social info. Then there are aggregators such as Momentro that will give you a full on view of things. Embrace these tools to understand your audience

The way I see marketing strategy is a circle (and I'm sure so many other marketers can visualize the same). The audience is ALWAYS at the core of each strategy with well-defined parameters and personas outlining each target audience that a brand may wrap product benefits around. Discovering your target audience starts with pinpointing a need and willingness to pay, willingness to pay likely requires some additional research.

Focus on developing a data-driven strategy. You need to have the data to identify your most profitable market segments and capitalise on them. Strengthen your product for that segment and make sure it addresses all of their pain points. That positions you as a brand that understands its customers and can offer them a valuable solution.

Understanding your audience starts with customer research, but that's only possible in two ways: • A) Survey anyone interested in the topic • B) Interview people who have the domain knowledge Where A) is a quantitative approach and B) a qualitative approach depending on your goals and how broad or specific data of your audience you want to get. In all cases, it's useful to spend time putting yourself in your end consumer's position to see their hopes, dreams, challenges, and drives.

You have to interview customers one-on-one if you are going to market for people (customers) you don't know almost anything about. That includes demographic and psychographic marketing research but there are two approaches to doing those - A) qualitative and B) quantitative. It always depends on what would be a better route for your business as to weather you are going after a broad or a niche market.

Take the critical steps to walk in your customers' shoes. And not a generic sense of "customer" or a definition that complies with your product, but a deeper role-based and human-oriented segmentation that seeks to understand CFOs, FP&A, Operations, Risk Officers, CPOs, CTOs, etc. Immerse yourself in what they go through, what they may worry about, what are their new possibilities. Empathy takes time and work - but the investment pays off.

💯Understanding your audience is crucial for crafting a successful marketing strategy. By delving into the psyche of your ideal customers, you can uncover valuable insights that inform the creation of detailed buyer personas. These personas then guide the development of targeted marketing messages and offers, ensuring they resonate with the specific needs, preferences, and behaviors of your audience. This tailored approach not only enhances engagement but also increases the likelihood of converting prospects into loyal customers, fostering long-term business growth.

Put your clients first. When it comes to Corporate Strategy putting people first in general is what's needed - whether employees or your clients. But when we dive into marketing strategy then your clients are your focus. Build around their needs and wants. Their pains and gains. If you don't know who they are and how they operate, how can you expect to get results? It's not enough to create a PowerPoint presentation with a slide saying "this is Diana, aged 35, etc. etc.". You need to know everything there is to know about her. Why she does the things she does and the choices she makes. Her buying decisions, the emotions that you can show her that will make her relate and reflect upon her situation. It's vital to really know your customer.

Agree with all of this and I'll add one other point. Remember to tune in with your intuitive gut. Does it feel right? Your value proposition needs to sit right with you too. Be unbiased for a moment and ask yourself: Would I buy from me over my competition?

So many clients when I ask about their UVP either can't define it succinctly, or can, and I ask where does that appear on your website. Nowhere! It's critical for someone to be able to make a decision over why to choose you, so be clear what that reason is. Make it easy to find, and clear to them so they can choose YOU!

When it comes to communicating your value proposition and establishing your brand around it, I like StoryBrand's process. They suggest identifying and labeling your customer's biggest pain points, that your product or services can solve, as the "antagonist". In your value prop, you should communicate YOUR company as the hero in the story so customers view you as the one who can come save the day from the bad guy. A classic example of this that we all know and love is the Allstate Mayhem guy. Allstate's value prop is they can protect you from "Mayhem" with good insurance. Pretty simple.

People seldom want “cheap” but always want value for money. I have sold premium products which represented great value for money and would struggle to sell the cheapest (probably due to the fact that if I don’t believe in the product/service, I’ll have a devil of a job convincing you the buyer!!!).

📍Crafting a value proposition is akin to distilling the essence of your brand into a clear, concise, and compelling narrative. It's not merely about stating what you do, but articulating why what you do matters to your customers. A strong value proposition resonates with your audience's needs and desires, positioning your offerings as the ideal solution. It's the promise of value to be delivered, a declaration of intent that invites your audience into a relationship built on the foundation of mutual benefit and trust.

A strong value proposition requires clear insight into what truly resonates with your audience and how your offering stands out. Testing and refining it ensures alignment with customer needs and keeps it relevant in changing market conditions.

Is your value proposition truly "unique" or not; that's the question. 🤔 Knowing your strengths and weaknesses, and what your target customers want, is not enough. Your research must include intimately knowing your competitors, not just who they are, but also their strengths and weaknesses. What do they do better than you...what can't they do better than you. Why would your customers choose your competitors over you. If your value proposition is not a "unique value proposition", you risk not being competitive enough to win.

Developing your value proposition shouldn't be an exercise in wordsmithing. The goal is to establish 100% clarity on what it is that we offer and what the benefits/pain points addressed are, not to sound smart and sophisticated. You should be able to distill the value proposition into a single sentence that you can put onto your homepage (a compelling example might be Calendly with their sentence being: Calendly is your scheduling automation platform for eliminating the back-and-forth emails to find the perfect time.) A good way to measure its effectiveness is the five-second test, where you show your homepage just for five seconds to your target audience and ask them to explain what the value proposition is.

To develop your value proposition you have to distill your brand fundamentals first. That's a big step most marketing strategists miss because it's not taught in business school. After you get your mission, vision, values, and goals defined, you can spend time perfecting your offer. Your value proposition is tied to your audience's ultimate desired outcome. Assuming that, if you know exactly what someone wants and you give it to them - they don't have a reason to reject it - you win the sale. So all you need to do for that to happen (assuming you know exactly what your audience wants) is to translate your product/service features for clear benefits for your customers.

Frequently, a value proposition is crafted by the marketing team, yet its true effectiveness lies in its integration into the entire business culture. It's crucial for the entire team to not only understand but also actively embody the value proposition. Without achieving this internal alignment, effectively conveying the value proposition to customers becomes a significantly more challenging task. In my opinion, ensuring that the entire team embraces and comprehends the value proposition is fundamental before attempting to communicate it to customers.

The marketing landscape offers a myriad of channels to connect with your audience: social media, email, content marketing, SEO, PPC, video, podcasts, webinars, events, and more. However, it's impractical to utilize all of them. The key lies in selecting the most relevant and effective channels that align with your objectives, target audience, budget, and resources. Choosing the right marketing channels can be a complex task. It requires thorough research, careful evaluation of the pros and cons of each option, and consistent performance monitoring.

Choosing which channels to utilize can be tricky, but understanding your target audience is key to determining the most effective formats for engagement. In my line of work, I closely work with the Legal Sector, which is predominantly influenced by an older generation. It is imperative to appeal to our audience in a manner they prefer to receive information. When targeting this audience cold emailing wouldn't be an effective strategy as we needed to demonstrate value upfront. Reputation is very important to our audience and so we needed to utilise channels that would allow us to show this It's crucial to understand your target audience and identify the mediums where they are most likely to engage with you

One of my greatest challenge is balancing the marketing mix investment. The tug-of-war between brand building and performance marketing, along with the digital vs. traditional divide, can be particularly tricky. Marketers today are pushed to show immediate results specialy in bearish markets. While performance marketing provides immediate, measurable results, brand building is essential for long-term growth and customer loyalty. Striking the right balance requires a deep understanding of your target audience, business objectives, and the ever-evolving marketing landscape.

Focus on the channels where your audience spends their time, and which show the best results. Pick only as many as you can comfortably manage. Better to have 3 well managed channels than 10 mediocre ones.

The biggest deviation in choosing the right channels for your brand's marketing is: • search or • social My approach, for the last 6 years, has been always social first for new businesses because it's a no-brainer. Consumers show us that they check brands on social they hear from word of mouth to see if they like them or not (what they stand for). But if you are only competing on volume and quality, don't be surprised when customers judge you only by price.

Choosing the right marketing channels involves aligning them with your objectives, audience, and budget. Research each option's pros and cons, and monitor their performance. Focus on a few key channels to create a consistent customer journey. This strategic approach helps avoid missed opportunities, overspending, or underperformance, ensuring you maximize your marketing impact.

☝️In the dynamic world of marketing, selecting the right channels is akin to setting the sails in the right direction for your brand's journey. It's about striking a balance between reach and relevance, ensuring each channel resonates with your audience and contributes to a harmonious symphony of brand interactions. By meticulously researching and aligning your channels with your marketing goals, you craft a narrative that not only captivates but also converts. Remember, the art of channel selection lies in the harmony of choice and strategy, creating a customer experience that's as seamless as it is impactful.

Marketing channels cause the biggest confusion when it comes to digitalised marketing. Choosing our Products ↳ Choosing our Solution ↳ Choosing our Audience ↳ Choosing our Proposition ↳ Choosing our Value Offers ↳ Choosing our Marketing Channels This is how it can be achieved without disrupting the entire marketing strategy.

To help devise your strategy and determine which channels are most appropriate for your business, consider the following five factors. 1.Consider your goals 2. Know where you customers hang out 3. Talk to your consumers throughout their journey 4. Talk to your consumers throughout their journey 5. Work your strategy + analyse the results What is the primary purpose of a marketing channel? The primary purpose of marketing channels is to connect producers/manufacturers with prospective customers.

I often see marketers evaluating channels from a last-touch attribution perspective, which can be misleading. This means that channels in the bottom of the funnel (e.g., paid search) get prioritised. However, in many cases, there are multiple touchpoints before the actual conversion, and when they're taken away, the comms effectiveness drops altogether. As per LinkedIn's research, 95% of B2B prospects aren't ready to buy immediately (for B2C it will be a bit different depending on the product). So, the role of marketing communications isn't just to capture demand, but to build memory structures so that the brand is considered in relevant buying situations. Your choice of channels should therefore always reflect the actual customer journey.

The biggest mistakes in measuring results are: • analyzing too early (with little to no data) • A/B testing multiple parameters at the same time • chasing vanity metrics (and big shiny objects) that don't contribute to the success of your business goals

As for me, it is the most important step. And actually it's not a final step. You need to determine your metrics in the beginning. You can not create successful marketing strategy without targets of metrics. And you need to understand how can you measure your targets.

What you can't measure, you can't manage. Data is key. Every business needs a CRM to track the customer journey from the marketing and initial point of contact all the way to the sales and after-sales of your product. That's how you can optimise and make decisions based on data rather than your gut feeling.

Measuring results should be done on a weekly basis with review of being on track or not on track statuses every two weeks or monthly. Measurement of your results should tie back into the OKRs and EOS approach when you set your marketing objectives. Rather than only thinking about traffic and clicks, its really important to think about revenue attribution per channel in a specific period of time. While its not possible to have perfect channel attribution, its important to look at the trends and various indicators to measure your results. Killing channels and strategies which do not work quickly is very important.

➡️Measuring the effectiveness of a marketing strategy is crucial for continuous improvement and success. By implementing a robust analytics framework, businesses can track key performance indicators (KPIs) aligned with their strategic goals. Utilizing tools like Google Analytics, social media insights, and customer relationship management (CRM) systems, marketers can gather actionable data. This data helps in understanding customer behavior, campaign performance, and overall return on investment (ROI). ✔️Regularly reviewing and adjusting strategies based on these insights ensures that marketing efforts are not only effective but also evolve with changing market dynamics.

Actually I disagree it's not the final step this step is ongoing and we should have regular checkups to adjust the strategy accordingly.

Analysis is the key to the Brand's Growth Success..! Analysis of results = Improvement in our action plan..! When we improve, we automatically grow..!

The data is everything...WHY. You cannot effectively change what you cannot measure. Whether its content imagery, messaging, targeting, split testing, we need to measure the metrics, and tweak and change accordingly. Sitting and hoping that the same content that has not worked in the past will yield results will only payout on one thing, disappointment and frustration, ok that was 2 things but you get the idea.

Measuring results is the final step in executing a marketing strategy. It involves tracking progress, identifying what works, and optimizing over time. By using the right tools and aligning measurements with objectives, you can prove ROI, learn from mistakes, and celebrate successes, overcoming common challenges along the way.

Measuring metrics is a continuous process. If you see a drop in results, you can quickly make changes to bring things back on track. It's also important to get customer feedback via surveys and by being in sync with teams who are on ground speaking to customers on a regular basis.

Do you have a strategy or merely a plan? Whilst many people use these terms interchangeably, there's a significant difference. Strategy is really about making bold choices (what to do and most importantly what *not* to do), defining actions that are coherent and reinforcing each other. What we often see in marketing are just plans (e.g., we will adjust prices, run PPC ads, create social media posts etc.), which in fact lack a strategy, an internal logic that would tie all the actions together.

I think one challenge companies face as they strive to ensure their marketing strategy remains relevant is threading the needle to decide when it's time to completely overhaul their marketing strategy and when only modifications are required. A strategy that is changed too often becomes confusing and unclear while one that resists change altogether and clings to the status quo will quickly become a dinosaur in a dynamic and evolving competitive environment.

As a marketer, the challenges you may encounter include adapting to rapid technological changes. So, marketing is all about: Developing Strategy ->Trying -> Analysis -> Improving...!

Some common marketing strategy challenges include: Identifying Target Audience: Accurately defining and understanding the target market. Differentiation: Standing out in a crowded market with unique value propositions. Budget Constraints: Allocating resources effectively within limited budgets. Measuring ROI: Tracking and measuring the return on investment for marketing efforts. Keeping Up with Trends: Staying current with rapidly changing marketing trends and technologies. Content Overload: Breaking through the noise in a saturated content landscape. Maintaining Brand Consistency: Ensuring consistent messaging across all channels. Customer Retention: Building and maintaining long-term customer relationships.

When devising marketing strategies, I consider: Understanding Target Audience & Navigating Changing Consumer Behavior Engaging in Content Creation for Brand Awareness while Addressing Short Attention Spans Analyzing the Competitive Landscape for Effective Positioning Strategic Resource Allocation for Maximum ROI Managing Data Overload to Extract Meaningful Insights Staying Abreast of Technological Advancements Rigorous ROI Measurement for Informed Decision-Making Establishing Marketing Attribution for Effective Campaign Assessment Adapting to Algorithm Changes Globalization Challenges Ensuring Brand Consistency Across Channels Adhering to Regulatory Compliance in Marketing Practices Combating Innovation Fatigue in Content Strategies

In an economic landscape where the era of growth at any cost has ended, marketers face the challenge of shrinking budgets and rising expectations. So, what can marketers do? My advice: Establish a precise definition in collaboration with the leadership team (CEO+) regarding the role of the marketing function. It is your responsibility to establish realistic boundaries. You cannot assume that non-marketers know what strategies are effective. You need to assert your position and establish practical expectations. As a marketer, you understand that leads gathered through a simple lead gen form may not be well-qualified and may lack purchasing intent, making conversion very uncertain. But does your CEO know this?

Understanding the target audience and choosing the right marketing channels are the basic steps for any individual in marketing. Some of the other marketing strategy challenges are: creating content that your audience is looking for is the key. Some of the crucial elements of effective marketing are: Your solution should be visible at the "right time" in the "right place" in order to create the "right impact" on the audience. If you have successfully cracked this with your marketing strategy, then you can undoubtedly beat the marketing competition in your market and rise as an undisputed king!

By adopting an experimental mindset, marketers can rapidly iterate on their campaigns, learn from both successes and failures, and quickly adapt to changing market dynamics. This approach enables them to stay ahead of the curve, seize emerging opportunities, and capitalize on new trends before their competitors. Additionally, by fostering a culture of innovation and risk-taking within their teams, marketers can cultivate a spirit of creativity and resilience, empowering their organizations to drive meaningful results and maintain a competitive edge in today's dynamic marketing landscape.

Marketing strategy must align with company’s overall strategy and C-level executives must understand it and its importance. If not, the marketers don’t know which way to go nor what is the actual goal.

One of the major marketing challenges is the 'Executional Challenge'. Execution challenge can arise from following - 1. Customer selection - Despite robust customer segmentation, if the team lacks in depth customer knowledge, the strategy execution can fail due to wrong customer selection. 2. Resource allocation - Improper resource allocation may lead to suboptimal ROI. 3. Time management - Delay in strategy execution can also impact the desired results. 4. Lack of performance measurement system - Challenges in tracking the performance metrics can prevent the team from understanding the effectiveness of the marketing strategy.