Feb. 3, 2022

This paid piece is sponsored by Click Rain.

Somehow, we are almost midway through the first quarter of 2022. Your new marketing plans are most likely in motion, but how do you know if they are hitting the mark? At Click Rain, we always fall back on a few critical factors when ensuring that time and money are well spent. Kate Kotzea, vice president of products and services at Click Rain, provides a checklist for your 2022 marketing efforts.

Strategic alignment of marketing and business goals

This may sound obvious, but it’s an important foundation to keep in mind throughout the year. Every business has specific priorities and goals; how is the marketing plan helping to achieve them? For example, if you have a big sales push in Q2, what are you doing now in your marketing plan to build up awareness and trust to make those sales asks easier?

Metrics that matter

Here, less is always more. Yes, in digital we can measure almost everything, but it’s more important to understand those few metrics or data points that are relevant to your goals. By having meaningful metrics, your entire team can rally around your successes and clearly understand how those marketing metrics impact the business goals noted above. Quick side note: This year will be full of ongoing tracking and data changes within digital marketing. This makes your website and Google Analytics tracking even more important. Know the actions you want people to take on your website – form submission, email sign-up, purchase, etc. – and how those align with achieving your business goals.

Know – and respect – your audience

Is your marketing plan set up to align with your various audiences? It’s no longer enough to just know who they are; they should have a unique message and method of being communicated with as well. How are your various audiences’ specific lifestyles or needs being addressed within the marketing plan? If you don’t have segmented marketing plans already, don’t worry! Start by picking one audience segment and build out tactics unique to them — does the copy and imagery align with their interests and decision-making process? Are the marketing channels aligning with where they spend time? Start small and build out from there.

Good mix of tactics

The best marketing plans include fundamental tried-and-true marketing tactics as well as new, more advanced tactics. You shouldn’t be repeating your exact marketing strategy from last year — too many factors will shift and evolve — but you should be carrying through those tried-and-true elements. The channels and campaigns you always see great results from should be a staple in your plan, but you also should layer in new tactics, maybe to reach one of those specific audience segments you just established. By having a good mix, you continually are testing to see if any new channels can enter into your tried-and-true elements, and if any newer efforts don’t succeed, you are able to test with a minimal investment or impact to your goals.

Shared buy-in and expectations

The best success throughout the year comes from setting clear expectations at the start. Do your best to ensure everyone on the team understands and agrees on the primary goals. Make it easy for everyone to track and see progress toward goals, whether through a real-time dashboard or a monthly report. By establishing a cadence to review marketing progress and focusing on consistent, meaningful metrics, you keep everyone on your team informed and empowered.

Here’s to an impactful marketing year for your business!

If you have any questions, the team at Click Rain is here and offers a simple marketing audit to help get you started.