When it comes to marketing, we all want to get the most bang for our buck. But what does that actually mean? Marketing ROI (return on investment) is a measure of how much your marketing campaigns are costing you versus how much revenue they’re generating. There’s a number of ways to improve your business marketing and reach your ROI goal — so let’s deep dive into the realm of optimising marketing!
Ideally, you want a high ROI so that you’re making more money than you’re spending. But how do you actually achieve that?
There are a few key things to keep in mind:
1. Be strategic and know your target audience.
The more targeted your campaigns are, the more likely they are to reach the right people and generate leads or sales. When your campaigns are well-targeted, you’ll get more bang for your buck because you won’t be wasting your time and money on ads that no one will see or care about. Be strategic and fish where the fish are. What does this mean? It means, knowing your audience. For example, a university’s target audience would primarily be graduating high school students. The secondary target audience would be adults returning to study. This means the target audience age bracket would range from approximately 16 years old to 40 years old. A university shouldn’t focus its energy on advertising to above 60 year olds or retirees.
So how do you find your target audience? First, gather intel from your current clients. Ask them about who they are, what they do and why they approached you in the first place. This will give you a good foundation into your target market research. If you need finer details and don’t know how to find them, then you can always bring on some additional support — like a Strategist. These clever-minded people will be able to fill in the gaps in your marketing campaign strategy and determine what will work best for your target market.
2. Track your results.
If you’re not tracking your results, you won’t be able to tell how effective your campaigns are. Make sure to set up tracking methods so that you can see how many leads or sales your campaigns are generating. This will help you adjust your strategy and ensure that you’re getting a good return on investment.
There are a number of ways you can track results — with multiple online platforms and software now available with either free or small annual subscriptions. These can help you track your campaigns, whether they are digital, social, web, print or OOH (Out of Home billboards). However, keeping track can be challenging and time-consuming. So if you’re finding it difficult to manage yourself, then bring someone on board who can help. This could be a media agency or consultant who can keep you updated on your target market shifts, campaign success and areas of improvement.
3. Focus on quality over quantity.
It’s better to have a handful of well-made targeted campaigns than a bunch of poorly executed ones. When you focus on quality, you’ll be more likely to reach your target audience and achieve a higher ROI.
For example; you see 20 ads for a clothing brand campaign. All 20 of them are just static images with a white background and the clothing item in the middle — the target audience will most likely ignore it. But what if instead, that same clothing brand had one video campaign ad and 4 static photography ads. The ads would show models wearing the items of clothing at different locations, the consumer would be able to see the movement of the clothing in the video and the details of the fabric in the photography — the target audience would be much more invested in the ad content because the ad quality is of high detail.
4. Be patient.
Marketing is patient, marketing is kind (sometimes)… Good things take time, and marketing is no different. Don’t expect overnight results – give your campaigns some time to ramp up and start generating leads or sales. If you’re patient, you’ll eventually see a good return on your investment.
In conclusion…
By following these tips, you can ensure that your marketing campaigns are as effective as possible and generate a good return on investment. So go out there and start getting more bang for your buck! Oh, and never be afraid of throwing in a little bit of promotional merchandise into the mix.
