The Top 3 Digital Marketing Pitfalls Most Businesses Make

When you run a business there are a lot of things that need your attention on a regular basis from sales to marketing to even making sure you have coffee in the break room. So really is it a big surprise that sometimes things get overlooked? Of course not, but at the same time regardless of what kind of business you are, everyone from web design companies to realtors should be aware of snares like the Top 3 Digital Marketing pitfalls most businesses make so that it is less likely there business falls prey to them.

It’s not always the big ideas or closing one big account that makes a business successful year after year; often it is a matter of minimizing or eliminating unprofitable mistakes that allows a business to thrive over the long term.

Common Digital Marketing Pitfalls

• Not Following a Plan – A plan of any sort is a very powerful thing. Why is that? Primarily the answer is because a plan is a result of a process that involves analyzing a problem and outlining potential solutions along with a method to enact those solutions. In Digital Marketing planning is very important because typically most problems have unique solutions that require multiple steps and actions to complete. For example, if you have a problem of not generating enough leads for your email marketing how do you fix that? What are the specific steps you will take, what are those steps expected to do, how long will it take to see results, and how will you measure if that was an effective action? Is the plan written down so everyone is aware of what their role is in the plan? The biggest digital marketing pitfall is having a problem or problems and then having people doing various things to try and fix the problem without actually formulating a plan to do so which often results in overlapping efforts, actions undertaken that might not affect the problem and difficulty in measuring results of what you did.
• Not Knowing Customers – Knowing and understanding your customers is absolutely vital to your success in marketing. Marketing itself is promoting and selling products and services and those people on the other end of the transactions don’t just line up by themselves. So to get them interested and engaged in what you are offering first you need to understand who these people are, what their problems are that you can solve and then find the time and place to be able to reach out to them with the right message that connects and resonates with them enough that they will take a step towards your rather than your competition.
• Not Prioritizing Existing Customers – The cost of acquiring a new customer is typically about 5x that of retaining an existing customer. Five times! That is a ridiculous statistic especially when you consider that less than 20% of companies put a priority on marketing to existing customers compared to focusing on customer acquisition. Sure, when you have very few customers the bulk of your time does need to be spent getting new customers, but after you have a decent following what is your excuse? Don’t make the mistake of thinking “we need to get more customers so we can make more money!” While that is somewhat true, you also need to retain as many existing customers as possible because not only is it cheaper, but also because every one of those people you lose is often a gain for the competition.

The bottom line is that people make mistakes in business all the time. Often we learn the most from these blunders, but those lessons can be painful and expensive. Rather than falling into these traps, taking the time to review our Top 3 digital marketing pitfalls most businesses make which will help you avoid a few of those things that trip up many others.

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