Choosing the Right Marketing Platforms for Your Business
As a small business owner, marketing can often feel like the bane of our existence. With SO many options and platforms to choose from, it can be overwhelming to decide where to focus your time and energy.
However, the key to effective marketing is not about showing up everywhere, but rather finding the right channels that align with your business, your strengths, and your personal preferences.
In this blog post, we'll explore the different marketing platforms available, the pros and cons of each, and how to choose the best ones for your business. By the end, you'll have a clear strategy for building a marketing plan that works for you and your unique business.
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Understanding the Difference Between Marketing and Sales
Before we dive into the specifics of marketing platforms, it's important to first understand the difference between marketing and sales. While the two are closely related, they are distinct and serve different purposes within your business.
Marketing is all about getting the word out there and attracting potential customers to your business. It's about creating visibility, building your audience, and positioning your brand in a way that resonates with your target market. Marketing is the process of raising awareness and generating interest in what you have to offer.
Sales, on the other hand, is the process of actually converting those interested leads into paying customers. This is where you make the pitch, present your offer, and close the deal. Sales is the more direct, transactional part of the equation.
Separating these two concepts in your mind can be incredibly helpful, especially if the sales aspect of your business is the part that feels the most daunting.
By focusing first on the marketing side of things as a separate task, you can build momentum and attract the right people, making the sales process much smoother and more enjoyable.
Exploring the Marketing Platform Options
When it comes to marketing your business, you have a wide range of platforms and channels to choose from. Let's take a closer look at the different options and the pros and cons of each:
Short-Term Marketing Platforms
These are the platforms and strategies that can deliver relatively quick results, but may have a shorter lifespan in terms of their impact. They tend to be more focused on the "ever-growing consumption" side of things, requiring more frequent content creation and engagement.
Social Media: Platforms like Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and others can be great for building a following and reaching a wider audience. However, they also require a consistent, almost daily presence to see results.
Collaborations: This can include things like guest posting, podcast appearances, participating in product bundles, and other ways of tapping into someone else's existing audience. These can provide a quick boost, but the results may not last as long.
Long-Term Marketing Platforms
These are the platforms and strategies that take more time to build momentum, but tend to have a longer lifespan in terms of their impact. They are often more focused on creating valuable, evergreen content that can continue to attract and convert leads over time.
Blogging: Maintaining a high-quality, SEO-optimized blog can be a powerful way to attract and nurture leads over the long-term. The content you create can continue to drive traffic and generate leads for years to come.
Podcasting: Starting your own podcast or appearing as a guest on other shows can help you build authority, credibility, and reach a highly engaged audience.
YouTube: Creating video content and building a YouTube channel can be an effective way to showcase your expertise, connect with your audience, and drive traffic back to your website.
Pinterest: While often overlooked, Pinterest can be a powerful long-term marketing platform, especially for visually-driven businesses. The platform's search-based nature can help your content continue to be discovered over time.
Collaborations: In the long-term bucket, this could include things like being a guest expert in someone else's membership program, participating in a summit, or forming a joint venture with another business owner.
Choosing the Right Platforms for Your Business
Now that you have a better understanding of the different marketing platform options, the next step is to choose the ones that are the best fit for your business, your strengths, and your personal preferences.
The key is to focus on quality over quantity. Rather than trying to be everywhere at once, it's better to choose one or two platforms and really commit to them for at least 90 days. This will give you enough time to see if the platform is a good fit and start to build some momentum.
When evaluating your options, consider the following factors:
What Excites You Most?
The most important factor in choosing your marketing platforms is to select ones that you're genuinely excited about.
If the idea of showing up on Instagram every day fills you with dread, then that's probably not the best platform for you, no matter how effective it might be for others.
On the other hand, if the thought of creating video content or starting a podcast fills you with enthusiasm, then those could be great options to explore. Lean into what energizes you and aligns with your natural strengths and preferences.
What Aligns with Your Business?
Another key consideration is how well the marketing platform aligns with the nature of your business and the products or services you offer.
For example, if you have a highly visual product, then platforms like Instagram or Pinterest might be a great fit. If you're selling digital products or services, then a blog or podcast could be an effective way to showcase your expertise.
Take a close look at the strengths of your business and how different marketing platforms could help you highlight those strengths.
What Can You Commit To?
Regardless of which platform you choose, it's important to be realistic about what you can commit to. Marketing takes time and consistency to be effective, so you'll want to select a platform that you can realistically maintain for at least 90 days.
If the idea of creating daily content on Instagram feels overwhelming, then that's probably not the best choice, even if it's a highly effective platform. Instead, consider a platform like blogging or YouTube, where you can create content on a more manageable schedule.
Putting It All Together: Crafting Your Marketing Strategy
Once you've identified the marketing platforms that are the best fit for your business, it's time to start putting together your overall marketing strategy. Here are the key steps to follow:
Choose Your Primary Platform
Start by selecting your primary marketing platform - the one that you're going to focus the majority of your time and energy on. This should be the platform that you're most excited about and that aligns best with your business and your strengths.
For example, if you're really passionate about creating video content, then YouTube could be your primary platform. Or if you have a highly visual product, then Instagram might be the best choice.
Complement with a Secondary Platform
While you'll want to focus the majority of your efforts on your primary platform, it can also be beneficial to have a secondary platform that complements your main strategy. This could be a short-term platform like social media, or a longer-term platform like blogging or podcasting.
The key is to find a way to leverage the strengths of both platforms to create a well-rounded marketing approach. For example, you could use your social media presence to drive traffic to your blog, or use your podcast to promote your YouTube channel.
Commit to Consistency
Regardless of which platforms you choose, the key to success is consistency. Marketing is not something that you can just "push through" and make happen - it requires a sustained, ongoing effort.
Commit to a regular content creation and promotion schedule, and stick to it. Whether that's posting on Instagram 3 times per week, publishing a new blog post every Monday, or releasing a new podcast episode every Thursday, consistency is key.
However, consistency doesn’t mean you have to ALWAYS be working on your marketing! Test out content creation routines that work for you like set marketing days, content batching and repurposing to see what works best for you.
Measure and Adjust
Finally, don't forget to regularly evaluate your marketing efforts and make adjustments as needed. After your initial 90-day commitment, take a step back and assess what's working, what's not, and where you might need to pivot.
Pay attention to metrics like engagement, traffic, and conversions, and use that data to inform your decisions going forward. Marketing is an ongoing process of experimentation and refinement, so be prepared to adapt and evolve your strategy as your business grows and changes.
