It’s December, and you know what that means: time to start planning out New Year’s resolutions to attempt in the coming year. While doing this in personal life seems second-nature to most, setting New Year’s resolutions professionally can help you develop good new habits and shed off some tired or inefficient practices as your business moves forward. While you might avoid trying to fix things that aren’t broken, there’s always room for improvement.
Here are some ideas for creating great resolutions for your marketing in 2017:
- Send more of your marketing emails to the inbox. Email marketing has one of the highest ROI’s out there, so it’s worthwhile to invest here. By invest, I don’t just mean in great subject lines or perfect copy. If you’re sending to bad email addresses, you’re lowering your send reputation and hurting your efforts in the long run. With a simple, three-step process you can run your entire email list through AccuValid and come away with a great send reputation. There’s also an API integration feature for this tool that allows you to check emails in real-time on your site. If your customer is downloading a whitepaper or other gated content on your site, and puts in a false email, this tool will prompt them to enter a valid email in order to receive your content. This neat trick can help ensure you’re getting only the best leads from your website throughout 2017!
- Maintain your data all year long. The idea of database marketing and “big data” gets kicked around all the time, and you probably already know it can help your results. However, if your data is old, decaying and completely out-of-date, it doesn’t matter how much of it you have. Data requires maintenance, just like your car. If you miss too many oil changes, your car is going to go up in flames, and if you don’t keep up your data it won’t do anything good for you either. Pick a date every few months and clean-up your database every time that date rolls around. If you want to make this insanely easy, just send it to us and we’ll do all the dirty work for you.
- Get friendly with mobile. This holiday shopping season has proved that more and more consumers are turning to mobile. Most emails are being read on mobile devices, and website visits are increasingly coming from mobile users as well. If you’re not already using a mobile-friendly website, it’s time to get an upgrade. By the end of 2015 the mobile share of global e-Commerce transactions was over 40%, according to Criteo, and is expected to grow to 70% by 2017. Likewise, when sending emails it’s important to keep the limitations and uses of a mobile device at the forefront.
- Make it a multi-channel campaign. If you’re looking for ways to increase response rates when sending out offers for your business or for your clients, the simplest way to do this is with a multi-channel campaign. Increasingly savvy consumers are expecting to interact on their own terms and if you’re still using only a direct mail marketing approach, it’s time to start reaching them where they spend much of their time – online. If your business handles clients, it’s also a great way to add additional revenue streams.
- Stop sending your offers to the same tired list. When consumers get hit over and over again by the same types of offers, you know what happens? They tune you out. Your response rates go down, and you’re still spending money to reach an unengaged group. Not great for anything you’re doing. In fact, if there’s one resolution you should definitely keep it’s this one: liven up your data with a fresh group of prospects. Identify potential new customers who care about your offer and are more willing to respond to it.
- Try something new to boost your results. Using the same methods isn’t necessarily a bad idea if they’re working for you, but trying a new tool or strategy can really kick-start your marketing for the upcoming year. For example, with predictive analytics, you can get 3 times more responses to your offers. Similarly, just making sure everything in your database is correct and up-to-date can help you reach a whole group of customers you were missing out on. Don’t be afraid to try a new tool for boosting your marketing in 2017.
- Don’t be afraid to ask for help. This last one is important both personally and professionally. If you’re trying to do everything on your own, you might end up stretched too thin and the same is true with your marketing. Sometimes, a little help from the outside is exactly what you need to do the job right. There’s no reason to struggle through mobile optimization all on your own if it’s not something you know how to do, for example. You have an entire year ahead and a brand-new marketing budget to use to get great ROI. Ask for help if you need help.
Remember to keep these seven New Year’s resolutions in mind as we move into January! By working on just a few of these, you can be sure to improve your results throughout 2017. AccuData is here to give you a hand with any of these as we move into the year ahead, so remember to contact us if you have any questions!
What do you think will be your most significant marketing challenge in 2017?