A marketing campaign must contain a well-targeted message that reaches and is understood by the company’s target audience, leading them to take an action (usually a purchase).
It is necessary that before launching this campaign, do previous research on your market, product, and consumer public so that you can define the entire marketing strategy. And get positive results!
To help you organize, define and create your next promotional message, here are some steps not to skip when producing a campaign. Enjoy them!
1. Find out what your target audience
First of all, define the target audience for whom the campaign is intended. For this, you should know the current and potential consumers or users of your product or service.
Once you know who to address, do some research around the needs of these people, defining the main potential of what you are promoting and how this will arouse the interest of consumers.
If you are promoting, for example, sports shoes and you display images of people sitting on the sofa, you will not be able to attract many customers.
That’s why, in addition to the obvious (in this case, people who play sports) you should also investigate other needs of your target market. Who are these people?
People with no time to tighten laces? Adults, youth, seniors? What is the profile of these people? Weekend sportsmen? athletes?
Are they opinion leaders? All this must be researched before launching a campaign.
2. Define your market and product/service
You also need to define your market and product/service to get results. In the case of sports shoes, you can operate in the sports market with a single product, a new pair of sneakers, for example.
But you can also enter the fashion market with a more glamorous line of sports shoes.
With this, you will be able to define the best means to advertise your campaign: email, social networks, news sites, newspapers, magazines, radio, television…
3. Review other campaigns
Before launching your campaign, view as many ads as you can.
Watch television ads, look at the internet and billboard ads, and see what catches your eye and what qualities the ads have that appeal to you the most.
Once you’ve come to some conclusions, insert them into your own campaign.
4. Analyze the competition
You already know that before launching the campaign you should take a look at the direct and indirect competition.
Understand which are the main rivals in the market in which it operates, how many there are and what they have to offer, which needs they satisfy that your company does not have to offer.
In the background, see what they are selling and how they are selling. Compare with your own methods and in the end highlight the items that make your company stand out as unique, innovative, or simply different.
Your proposal must contain a value for your target audience.
If you haven’t already, this is the best time to carry out a SWOT analysis, which includes four essential points:
Strengths = What your company does well, what adds value compared to the competition.
Weaknesses = The weaknesses of your company, brand, or product/service, that is, what you need to improve.
Opportunities = conditions outside your company that benefit your performance in the market.
Threats = conditions external to your company that jeopardize your performance in the market.
5. Decide which campaign you want to create
Now you have all the information you need to decide whether you want a simple ad (poster, flyer, banner, etc.) or a more complex ad (Internet, TV, radio).
Of course, financial availability can dictate the type of ad, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t evaluate all the possibilities, taking into account that whatever the type of campaign, be it a simple A3 size flyer or a TV ad, it must be suitable for your business.
For example, if the sneakers you’re promoting are for teenagers, involve something that’s trendy. If they are for children, make a bright and colorful ad.
If it’s in audio, use flashy features like a funny voice, sound effects, etc. We repeat: make sure the campaign is suitable for the audience you want to reach.
6. Determine objectives
It is essential to define what you want to achieve with the campaign, what are your main objectives: attracting new customers? Greater loyalty from existing customers? Increase in sales? Product flow? The hypotheses are many.
It is important that these goals are possible to achieve. Creativity is very productive, yes, but not all ideas can be effectively realized. Thus, you must adapt your objectives to the resources of your company.
7. Develop the content of your message
Now that you have the information you need to prepare the content of the campaign, meet with your team and think about the texts, structure, and format of the message.
It is important that they do content marketing. The message must be adapted to the selected target audience, and in this sense, the work is not easy because each type of audience has different tastes, different preferences, habits that individualize them, and needs that are in accordance with their experiences.
So it is important that you emphasize all these contents in the campaign message.
Don’t forget that there is always one piece of information that is the main one, make it stand out. It is the idea, the focus around which the entire marketing campaign revolves, that point where the product or service stands out the most.
Invest in a short, direct, objective, and relevant headline or highlight. Just say what you have to say! After all, this is the first element the reader sees.
That first line, that first sound that makes you get in touch with your company’s a product/service.
Once the idea is decided, it is necessary to write and create the campaign in a clear and appealing way.
Choose the right words and images, bearing in mind that the human mind only needs three seconds to show interest in a subject.
Together, words and images must lead to action on the part of the consumer. If they do, great, you achieved the goals and the campaign was effective.
If they don’t, it’s worse, the campaign was not effective and spent time and money without getting results.
At the same time, it must humanize the content. If you use mailing to send the campaign, for example, avoid robotic and impersonal sends.
Instead, address people by name, and show that your company offers personalized treatment, exactly what the consumer is looking for!
To improve your content strategy, you can also use a sense of urgency with terms like “now”, “today” or “already”.
The goal is to make people click on links, enter the store, and schedule a shopping trip later…
And if you have the chance and space, offer information that interests your consumer and adds it to your campaign. Give something else.
In the case of sports shoes, for example, you can complement the offer of sneakers with tips on how to combine them with clothing or give the possibility to download an ebook or film from your company on how to keep in shape.
8. Develop the budget
Be aware of how much you can and want to spend on the campaign. Determine the total campaign budget to better manage it and analyze what is going well and what is falling short of your goals and expectations.
This way you can stop and start over with a new budget investing more in what is going well.
It is equally important in the budget that you are aware of the purchasing power of your target audience and that you can quantify the consumption of what you are promoting.
If possible, estimate the return of what you will be able to achieve with the campaign.
Of course, to ensure a successful marketing campaign, it is important that what the company achieves in profit is greater than what was spent on the campaign.
9. Choose the means of communication
There are several ways to promote your service or product: TV, newspapers, magazines, flyers, online advertising, billboards, billboards, mailings, newsletters, etc.
The important thing is to decide which media best suit your campaign, your company’s image, and the product/service you want to promote.
The choice becomes easier if you have already completed all the previous steps, as you already know the objectives of the campaign, who you want to reach, and how the competition is acting, in addition to already having a plan of what you can spend on the campaign and what the intended financial return is.
10. Determining the effectiveness of the campaign
After all these steps are completed, you must define the promotional plan in writing.
This document should include the situation analysis, deadlines for the effective integration of promotional elements with MIX marketing elements, and determine how to measure the effectiveness of the campaign once implemented.
If possible, also keep a daily record with all the reports of your campaign in order to change or complement the course of the plan, if necessary.
If you monitor the campaign from the beginning – in order to correct or improve aspects over time you can achieve the defined objective.
The important thing is to choose a method that correctly evaluates the results of the campaign.
11. Track results
Track your campaign from day one to the last. It is essential to evaluate what went well and what went poorly, what could be improved, what should be eliminated, what should be kept, etc.
If you can’t do it yourself, use tools to measure the performance of campaigns (Google Analytics, for example) or marketing services companies. The data you will collect is essential for making decisions in the future.
And now, in possession of the main steps towards a successful campaign, gather your team, outline an efficient dissemination strategy and obtain incredible results.