into new marketing options—become active in a new channel or execute some new “best practice” tactic for the sake of staying current, only to exhaust yourself without any results to show for it. That’s an easy way to find your entire marketing program losing its focus.
Instead, the answer is to take a strategic approach to all the new opportunities out there: new social media platforms; new ways your prospects are willing to engage with you; new ways you can get your marketing messages out via your website, email marketing program, and more.
There is a way to keep pace with the rapidly evolving marketing world, see continuing positive results, and most important, do so while keeping your sanity.
The game of marketing is no longer about which digital marketing tool is the most effective. It’s not even just about push versus pull anymore. We are operating in an entirely new ecosystem, a digital paradigm in which ever-changing digital tools play a key role, but are not the sole drivers of success. While the novelty of the new marketing tools at our disposal can be captivating, it is important to remember the real goal: using those tools strategically, in a way that builds marketing momentum.
There are a number of key differences between the old model of marketing and the new ecosystem:
Old Paradigm: Fixed marketing
New Paradigm: Agile marketing
In the old model of marketing, campaigns were developed and then executed as planned, no matter what the response was during their run. Now, real-time analytics tracking during campaigns allows marketers to turn on a dime and shift gears instantly to avoid disaster or take advantage of new insights or opportunities.
Old Paradigm: Brand-led
New Paradigm: Customer-driven
Marketing messages used to be based on what a company wanted to convey about itself. Now they’re based on what a product or service allows customers to convey to others about themselves. And not only that—a modern marketer’s entire strategy is based on the information he gathers about his audience and is customized to fit their preferences.
Old Paradigm: Focuses on push versus pull marketing
New Paradigm: Integrates all marketing channels
Where once marketers would choose between various distinct options—outbound versus inbound, traditional versus digital—now, companies are strategically integrating their marketing methods and channels. Marketers have realized that integration yields a much higher ROI than any single method or medium could ever hope to.
Old Paradigm: Quantity dictates strategies
New Paradigm: Quality dictates strategies
In the old marketing paradigm, frequency of posting was the key to success; quality was secondary. Now, quality is the guiding principle for content, and determines its success in search and social media, as well as with its readers.
Old Paradigm: Branches out to whatever is new
New Paradigm: Utilizes relationships to grow
While it used to be common for businesses to jump on the bandwagon and try every new platform that gained some popularity, novelty does not equal effectiveness, and spreading marketing efforts too thin is never a good idea. Now, smart marketers understand that instead of branching out, looking within can be the key to success. Some of the most effective digital marketing strategies can come from collaboration and integration with partners, customers, and vendors.
Old Paradigm: Forces old metrics on new platforms
New Paradigm: Successfully decodes digital data points
Just as the marketing ecosystem has changed, so have the data points that determine success in the digital arena, and trying to force old push marketing metrics onto these new platforms is just setting yourself up for failure. Understanding how these new digital metrics affect overall goals is a vital part of the new model of marketing.
Old Paradigm: Uses digital marketing
New Paradigm: Embraces digital mindset
Using digital marketing means including digital marketing activities as part of a marketing strategy. Embracing a digital mindset means rethinking your entire approach to marketing. Doing so can mean major change—but it’s the only way to find success in this new ecosystem.
The old marketing model focused on choosing and pursuing just one marketing methodology—traditional or digital, inbound or outbound, push or pull. But in today’s world, where the line between the two is quickly blurring, that forced choice is one that no longer makes sense. Marketers embracing the new ecosystem recognize that, rather than choosing between options, we have to integrate them strategically.
Take event marketing, a very traditional marketing method. You invite prospects and customers to your event and hand them swag bags full of marketing messaging—a very “push” approach. But today, throughout the event, those attendees are also active on social media, using your event hashtag on Twitter and other platforms, interacting with other attendees and hopefully your marketing team—a very “pull” approach, as it relies on the willingness of those customers to engage with your message online.
Your traditional event marketing channel also is no longer limited to just reaching attendees. Simply by collecting some materials from presenters and setting up cameras, you can now have a virtual, digital audience that is downloading speakers’ slide decks, watching live streams of event presentations, and engaging with attendees via social media in real time. What was once a marketing campaign restricted to a single physical space is now a marketing campaign that is global.
Some companies are even taking event marketing completely digital. SafetyLine is a Canadian SaaS, or Software as a Service, that offers a safety monitoring solution for people who work alone. It ran a campaign in which it threw an online “launch party” for its new website. The digital event mimicked a more traditional in-person event, with presentations in the form of webinars, and even provided attendees with “virtual swag bags” with coupons and e-book downloads.
One caveat in this new ecosystem is making sure you aren’t running a campaign just because it’s new or different, but rather because that campaign is the best way to meet the particular goal at hand. In SafetyLine’s case, a fully digital event marketing effort made more sense than a physical event, because the main goal of the campaign was to get its email subscriber list to reconnect with the company and take the steps necessary for SafetyLine to become compliant with Canada’s new anti-spam law. It just happened that the team decided a fun new marketing tactic would be the best way to achieve that goal.
Organizations that follow the old paradigm of marketing let tools dictate their campaigns and strategies. Often, they ask, “What can we do with this new tool?” when they should be asking, “Can this new tool help us with our existing business goals and strategies?”
SafetyLine’s marketing team realized that a new tool—the ability to host a virtual event
