The Found Gen

Marketing That Works.

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How Can I Speed Up My Marketing?

We get it – you want results, and you want them now! For all the Veruca Salts of the world, waiting for your marketing efforts to take effect can put you on the verge of a chocolate meltdown – and who are we kidding, don’t we all want a little instant gratification from our hard-earned efforts? Before Tantrum Town sets in, take a breath and know there are ways to accelerate marketing results when applied strategically and as part of your overall marketing plan. 

Stop, Wait a Minute

But first, we must qualify this post by saying that marketing is truly about the long game. When played well, consistent content marketing and SEO efforts will start delivering results in a few months, but the true power comes from the compounding value it delivers for years to come. Moreover, you can measure success in any number of ways, but without a goal to tie those results to, the numbers will be, well, just numbers.

As you attempt to speed up your marketing, it’s critical to step back and review the big picture. What are your short- and long-term goals? How will your marketing efforts help you achieve them? Once you have some answers, then you can dive in.

Smart Strategies to Speed Up Your Marketing

Marketing is about communicating and delivering value. Do more of this to the right people and you will see results. The challenge is connecting with those right people at the right time. To speed up results, you need to meet them where they’re at. This means having answers to what they’re looking for and providing them when and where they’re looking for them.

For faster results, do this:

  • Focus on high-impact channels – Review your marketing data. If you want to know if your marketing is working, look at key data points. Pay attention to your most effective areas. Is your website data trending positively? How about your emails or social engagement? If one channel (or topic) is pulling more favorably than others, double down your efforts there rather than spreading yourself thin on things that don’t have as much impact. 
  • Optimize for SEO – You can shore up some quick wins by focusing on long-tail keywords that have less competition. This is one way to move up the ranks in search engine results faster. Another is to jeuje up old content to keep things fresh and garner new attention by the internet bots.
  • Consider paid opportunities – Spending money can often (but not always) accelerate marketing results. You could start by taking a bite-sized chunk out of your marketing budget and try something like pay-per-click advertising to ensure your content gets in front of your target audience. 
  • Outsource your efforts – If you need to move the needle on your marketing, it may be time to turn to a team of experts rather than manage the task yourself. Not only will you gain immediate headcounts (including writers, designers and strategists), but you’ll also be tapping into their expertise. This can help speed up your marketing as they’ll be able to execute strategies more efficiently and effectively. 

Speeding up your marketing efforts doesn’t mean cutting corners—it’s about working smarter, leveraging the right tools and optimizing what’s already working. If you want help, give us a ring. That’s what we’re here for.

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How to Measure Success in Marketing

It’s easy to become hyper-focused on the numbers. Numbers pay the bills. Numbers keep your doors open. But what numbers really matter when you’re trying to assess the success (or failure) of your marketing efforts?  

Here are some things to consider when you’re trying to identify measurable marketing outcomes. 

Success is Relative, So Know Your Goals 

Before going down the road of measuring performance, you need to know exactly what you’re measuring and why. Define success based on the goals you’re trying to achieve. Are you looking to generate more leads, convert more leads, increase revenue or improve email marketing performance? 

You can measure just about anything. The point is that without understanding the goals and strategy behind your efforts, the data you pull will be nothing more than numbers. Make the data meaningful by tying them to strategic benchmarks. Then, once you’ve identified your priorities, you can then begin tracking data.  

Marketing KPIs to Track 

The key performance indicators (KPIs) you choose to track will be tailored to your goals, but below are several general metrics many marketing pros find helpful. 

  • Email marketing performance – Email is one of the most effective lead-generation strategies, and it can be even more effective when done well. Tracking things like open rates, click-through rates, bounce rates and unsubscribes can tell you how helpful (or not) your content is. 
  • Website traffic and performance – Another important place prospects learn about your business is your website. Paying attention to which pages people are landing on and how long they’re staying is insightful in and of itself. Tracking conversation rates is even better. 
  • Cost per lead (CPL) – Spend enough money and you can have just about any customer in the world, but that’s not a very cost-wise strategy. On the whole, you want to keep your CPL low. That means a lot of leads for not a lot of money. 
  • Lead-to-customer conversion – How many leads are turning into customers? An understanding of this data point will help your team know if you need additional support, better leads or a larger volume of leads to meet your targets.  
  • Marketing qualified leads (MQLs) – MQLs are those leads the marketing team hands off to sales. A lead is classified as “marketing qualified” if the person filled out a web form or took some other step toward conversion that was based on the marketing team’s efforts. 
  • Sales qualified leads (SQLs) – This is the number of customers who become sales opportunities. The data point helps you understand how well your sales team is doing overall, as well as assess the effectiveness of the tools and resources they have at their disposal.  

And the list goes on. As you look to measure success in marketing, consider how the data points you’re tracking are meaningful to your overall strategy. If your marketing efforts are not meeting the mark, refine them and remeasure. It may take time to see results, but a consistent, strategic approach will yield the results you’re after. To learn more about building a successful marketing program, give our team at The Found Gen a call today.

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How Long Does It Take to See Results from Marketing?

“Patience is a virtue.”

“Good things come to those who wait.”

“Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet.”

And so on, goes the list of adages touting the value of patience, but even when we know “patience is a companion of wisdom” (sorry, another one), no one who is trying to run a successful business has much time for it. We need to see results – and fast! So, just how long does it take to see results from your marketing efforts? Well, the answer is “it depends” but there are several factors that can influence results.

First, Your Budget Will Influence the Timeline

Not surprisingly, spending more money on marketing and advertising can accelerate results. But hurling money at a paid advertising campaign, though it can be effective, is not a long-term strategy. You need a sustainable approach, and that takes time and consistent effort. The good news is that with patience and persistence, you can build a successful marketing program that will deliver measurable results.

Consistency and the Compounding Power of Marketing  

The bread and butter of any successful marketing program is blogs, email and social media marketing. When done consistently and strategically, this trifecta can grow your web traffic and turn more prospects into customers, but here’s the deal – online marketing does not lead to overnight success nor does slapping up a few blog posts and calling it a day. 

For your marketing efforts to deliver results, you need to be posting content at least weekly. Why? Because if you want your site to show up on search engine results pages, you need to demonstrate to Google (and others) that you are here to play ball. Then, when the web crawlers come to index your site they’ll have fresh content to chomp on and that will boost your ranking in online search results. 

Even better, when you consistently execute your SEO marketing strategy and do it well, your efforts will compound. A blog you post today can continue to pull in leads for years to come, especially when you effectively leverage your site’s SEO power. 

Ready to See Results?

Content marketing and SEO efforts are long-term strategies, but they deliver real value. You should expect to start seeing results within a few months, but more realistically, it can take up to a year of consistent efforts for the compounding power to start delivering.

As you work to build a marketing strategy that will continue to work for you for years to come, keep these factors in mind: 

  • Know your customers – Who are they? Where are they most active? And what are they looking for? The better you know your customers, the more specific you can be with your messaging, so you cut right through the clutter and get to the heart of what’s on their minds. 
  • Be useful – Your customers are looking for answers. Give them what they want by creating a mix of useful content that will stand the test of time (a.k.a. evergreen content) as well as timely pieces that demonstrate your commitment to staying relevant.  
  • Stick with it – It takes time to build loyalty (and improve your Google ranking). Don’t stop 6-12 months into a marketing program and consider your job done. Sure, you should refine what isn’t working, run tests to compare ad strategies, but above all, remain consistent. Only then will you reap the biggest compounding payoffs. 

While some marketing efforts can deliver near-instant gratification, building a strong, sustainable marketing presence takes time and consistent effort. Remain patient and optimize as necessary to put yourself on the road to long-term success. If you want help, just ask. That’s what we’re here for.

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How to Tell if Your Marketing is Working?

When you dedicate a significant chunk of money per month to marketing, you want to know if it’s working – and at times, this can feel like a frustratingly futile exercise. Money is going out the door, but what are you getting in return? 

We get it. It can be hard to measure marketing’s effectiveness because of the tricky business of correlation versus causation. Are your leads increasing because of the email you sent out last week or because everyone suddenly needs their roofs replaced (thank you, hail storm)?

What’s more, marketing is about the long game, which can be particularly painful for new businesses looking to build their brands quickly. You need to know if your efforts are working, but how can you tell? Fortunately, there are ways you can successfully measure progress. Here are a few benchmarks you can track to tell if your marketing is working. 

  • Increased web traffic – What are your web analytics telling you? On the whole, if your website data is trending positively, you should feel confident that your marketing efforts are working. Google Analytics and other built-in web tools can illustrate month-over-month traffic increases and alert you to where your traffic is coming from so you can zero in on which channels are most effective. 
  • Increased number of leads – If your number of leads generated from marketing efforts is increasing and – even better – those leads are converting to customers, that’s another win for marketing.
  • Decreased cost-per-lead – Another way of looking at marketing success is to track whether your cost-per-lead is going down. Good marketing can help bring that number down either by saving you money on your marketing spend or increasing the number of leads you generate.
  • Increased engagement – More clicks on your emails or shares of your social media posts? This is a good sign that your content is resonating with your audience and your marketing strategy is working. 

Measuring marketing data is a key way to monitor its effectiveness, but even if you aren’t reviewing numbers as often as you’d like, you can often feel the steady boost marketing is having on your business – more calls, increased sales, that feeling of riding on a cloud…these are all good signs. 

If you’re unsure whether what you’re doing is working, give us a call at The Found Gen. We can take a fresh look at your marketing strategy to see how we can help further boost those numbers. 

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What to Expect in the World of Marketing in 2023

Change. The theme of marketing in 2023 is going to be change. So, buckle in and be ready to roll with it!

New Social, Who’s This?

Social media is going through some upheaval. Twitter, Meta… we can all see you! Be prepared that there will be some big changes on multiple platforms, and you won’t have any control over any of them. If you put time and effort into those right now you run the risk of losing your time investment when this firestorm causes your engagement and visibility to disappear. Social media might make a comeback, but it’s going to take some time before it is likely to yield the kind of results we’ve seen over the past several years.

Instead of relying heavily on social this year redirect your effort in blogging, email marketing, and more traditional methods. If you’re already creating great content that’s something you won’t need to change. Except that you should be doing more of it! Publish a minimum of four blogs a month. If you really want to make an impact, make it eight blogs. On the other hand, trying some really outside the box strategies is also a good idea. I wouldn’t advice putting a ton of time and effort into carrier pigeons or anything like that but investing a small amount in something no one has ever done before couldn’t hurt! Your future marketing efforts will thank you!

What Even Is Traditional?

Everyone has relied on social media for contacts for so long that “traditional” almost seems alien! That combined with the pandemic keeping people separated so much over the past three years it’s like none of us even knows how to act anymore. Think back, or ask someone older than you, to the time when we did almost all our networking at happy hours or coffee shops. I think going back to having fewer, yet more meaningful and fruitful contacts is what we should all be aiming for in 2023. Realistically even if you have 5000 LinkedIn connections how many of those see your content or feel that they know you well enough to recommend you? Probably not as many as any of us would like to think.

This doesn’t mean you should completely abandon your social media presence. It just means to shift focus so that it is just a minor supporting character, and you are stepping fully into that main character energy. Build actual relationships with other professionals who are natural allies. Maybe going back to a happy hour once a month or so could even be fun again!

While you’re out having a good time and making those connections it’s a great time to think about outsourcing your content creation, so you aren’t having to carve out time to handle that as well. That’s what we’re here for and we love it! Reach out if you’re ready to make some changes of your own!

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Give Thanks to Your Customers and Clients This Year

Life, and work, has looked a whole heckuva lot different these past three years than it has in…well, a while.

For most of us, just surviving the workday each week takes more effort and brain power than we even thought possible. We show up, we work hard, and we never punch out thanks to Zoom, email, push notifications and that WFH lifestyle.

If you’re anything like us, your clients are what drive you. They become your friends – where their successes become your ultimate goals. Before you know it, you look forward to those blurred-out-background zoom calls and new project requests.

Your customers and clients are a big part of your life and your success. So, when was the last time you thanked them?

A Little Gratitude Goes a Long Way

This year, we’d like to challenge you to take that extra step to show your clients, consumers, partners, vendors, you-name-it – that you are appreciative of the work and the relationship you’ve developed.

And no, we’re not saying to just toss a mini-muffin basket their way and call it a day. Although, who has ever refused a basket of mini-muffins? But is it really the best way to let your clients know you appreciate them? The short answer is probably not. The muffins get eaten, the card goes in the trash, and ultimately the message of genuine gratitude gets lost.

If Not Mini Muffins, Then What?

Handwritten thank you notes are just retro enough to be cool. Do it right – use quality stationary, a personalized note to them letting them know how much you appreciate them and look forward to their next project. It doesn’t hurt to include a gift card. It can just be enough to buy them a coffee or a smoothie. It really is the thought and effort that counts here.

So, You Want to Make a Bigger Gesture

Maybe you did an exceptionally large project or want to recognize a long-time customer specifically. Don’t feel like you have to give the exact same “thank you” to everyone. Each client is different and expressing your appreciation for them can be different, too.

Setting up a time to have lunch brought in for your customer’s office is a big gesture. If you can coordinate it to a time that you know is extra busy for them – when you know they’re likely to work through lunch – all the better. It not only lets them know you appreciate them as your customer, but you recognize how hard they work doing their own thing.

Giving out your branded merchandise might seem a little ten years ago, but if you do it right it can be a great gift. The trick to it is an item people will use with a version of THEIR logo. So many times, businesses send gifts of their own merchandise – but really, a bigger statement is to have something made for your clients. It’s a little extra effort and takes away the soapbox and impersonal touch of sending your own stuff their way. Our recommendation? You can never go wrong with a custom YETI travel tumbler.

The important part is making sure they know how much you appreciate them. If you need some more specific ideas we can help with that!