What other marketing activities should I do?

​I've been asked this question twice in a week. It's always preceded by "I'm currently doing A and B and C and D marketing activities..." and the assumption in the question is that if the current marketing activities aren't delivering the sales the business owner needs, the only answer is to add another marketing activity. 
 
The problem with this assumption is it means that, by working on adding another marketing activity, they'll miss the potential goldmine of opportunity they could unlock by improving the marketing activities they're already doing.
 
This is why an engineering approach needs to be taken.

When an engineer starts to design something, the first concept idea is rarely the best. Unless the Design Engineer is extremely skilled and experienced, there's always a period of prototyping, testing and improvement that has to be done before the product is ready to be launched.
 
What many business owners do, in comparison, is they design their marketing machine, build it and then decide it doesn't work as well as they'd hoped so they scrap it and try something completely different.
 
Engineers look at the components of their design to work out which bits are working well and which need improvement. This is what marketers need to do too. If you're "doing LinkedIn", for example, but it isn't generating leads, that doesn't necessarily mean that LinkedIn is the wrong tactic, it could be that the way you're doing it can be improved. A tactic like LinkedIn isn't one "thing". Its success depends on many things including what you're posting, how often you're posting, what images you're using, how you're growing your connections, how you're using Inmails to reach out to prospects... I could go on.

The same goes for any marketing activity, whether it's advertising, social media, PR, SEO, or anything else.
 
If you're looking at your marketing thinking "This isn't working as well as I need it to" ... stop.
 
Before you scrap it and start doing something else entirely, break down the components of the activity into as many elements as you can. Consider the strategy, the headlines, the messaging, the imagery, the schedule, the frequency, and anything else you can think of. Then plan how you can test the effectiveness of each of those elements so you can improve them.
 
Most of the time, the biggest impact I make to a business is not by finding one big problem that needs to be fixed. The impact is from many many small improvements to every marketing activity, which all add up to a big increase in sales. I wrote a blog on this a few years ago about the marginal gains that led Team GB to cycling gold and how the same approach is crucial in marketing.

Need more help?

I explain this concept in more detail in a video in my free Facebook group. Pop in there to watch it and ask me any questions you may have about this.

If you need to get clarity on your own marketing activities and whether they can be improved on, book a Discovery Call with me today. I look forward to hearing from you.