7 Reasons Your Marketing Isn’t Working

a businesswoman frustrated because she doesn't know why her marketing isn't working

In the fast-paced world of business, effective marketing is the linchpin that can either propel your brand to new heights or leave it languishing in obscurity. If you find yourself scratching your head, wondering why your marketing isn’t working the way you thought it would, or your efforts aren’t yielding the desired results you hoped for, you’re not alone.

At Paragon Marketing Group, we understand the intricacies of successful marketing. Let’s delve into some common reasons your marketing isn’t working and explore how you can unlock marketing success.

Cracking the Code: Understanding Why Your Marketing Isn’t Working

Here are seven reasons your marketing isn’t working (and what you can do to change that):

Do you know why your marketing isn’t working?

1. Not Defining Your Target Audience

One of the most common reasons your marketing might not be working is if you haven’t clearly defined your target audience. Marketing is most effective when tailored to a specific demographic. You can have an amazing, even life-saving, product or service, but if the audience who will most likely convert into customers isn’t receiving your message, then it can’t be effective.

Here are a few tips to define your target audience:

1. Compile Your Audience’s Demographic Information

  • How old is your audience?
  • Which gender is most likely to make the purchasing decision?
  • What place of life will your target audience primarily reside?
  • Is your audience married or single?
  • Where does your target audience live?

2. Get to Know Your Audience’s Lifestyle and Habits

  • Does your audience like to spend time at home, or go out?
  • What type of background will your target audience have?
  • What interests will your audience most likely indulge in?
  • What things are important to your target audience?
  • Does your audience shop more online or in-person?

3. Understand How Your Product or Service Solves Your Target Audience’s Problem

Without a problem, there’s no need for a solution. Once you know which problem(s) your product or service solves, go deeper to understand how your product or service can specifically solve your target audience’s problem(s).

Takeaway: When you know exactly who your target audience is, you can more effectively market to them.

2. Lacking Consistent Branding

Inconsistency in your branding efforts can dilute your message and leave customers confused. Ultimately, you want to employ a cohesive branding strategy that create a strong, recognizable identity across all channels, fostering trust and loyalty.

So how does inconsistent branding happen in the first place? Here are a few common suspects:

  • Lack of Team Communication: The larger your team becomes, the more opinions you have, and the more challenging it can become to ensure there’s clear communication among all team members. When everyone isn’t on the same page, guess what? Your branding won’t be either. At Paragon Marketing Group, we recommend having clear brand guidelines that can be shared among your entire staff.
  • Conflicting Online Listings: Have you ever visited a company’s Facebook page, and then their Google My Business page, and then their website, only to discover three different phone numbers or addresses? This confusion can lead to customers abandoning your site and giving their business to another company that has invested the time and effort into ensuring all their listings match and are up-to-date.
  • All Talk, No Action: Companies can pledge customer loyalty all day long, but if their marketing makes promises their business can’t keep (or offer services they can’t fulfill), people won’t just take notice: they’ll leave negative reviews and tell their friends.

Takeaway: Brand consistency needs to carry through every aspect of your business, from using the same color scheme and fonts, all the way down to how you treat your customers.

3. Neglecting a Digital Presence

In today’s digital age, a robust online presence is non-negotiable. If your marketing strategy lacks a compelling digital component, you’re missing out on a vast audience. While networking and word-of-mouth play pivotal roles in your marketing strategy, neither of those channels are replacements for a company website, digital ads, emails, or social media pages.

Not to toot our own horn (okay, maybe we mean to just a little), at Paragon Marketing Group, we leverage cutting-edge digital marketing techniques to enhance your online visibility and engagement through different digital avenues, including the following:

Takeaway: A complete marketing strategy will include both traditional and digital marketing channels.

4. Ignoring Data and Analytics

Marketing without a data-driven approach is akin to navigating a ship without a compass. If you’ve read our blog before, you’ll know this isn’t the first time we’ve covered this topic.

Similar to not defining your target audience, when you avoid or ignore data and analytics, you can’t know whether or not your marketing is working. Without context, your sales are just sales, neither improving nor declining. And even if you can determine an ascent (or descent) without tracking data, you’re still missing the biggest piece of all: the WHY.

At Paragon Marketing Group, we utilize advanced analytics to track and analyze campaign performance, which provide invaluable insights for strategic adjustments and continual improvement. Whether you hire a marketing agency to do this for you, or you utilize programs yourself, we can’t emphasize enough how important tracking and analyzing your data is to the success of your marketing.

Takeaway: Tracking and analyzing your data will provide invaluable insights into your business.

5. Not Updating Your Content

Oftentimes, it’s easy to think that once your website (or social media page or listing) has been completed, you’re good to go . . . forever. Unfortunately, not updating your content can lead to more problems than you might think, such as:

  • Customers might drive to the wrong business or call the wrong number from outdated listings.
  • Website visitors may consider a competitor instead if they find your site boring or outdated.
  • Potential clients might not understand what type of business you have if your logo doesn’t well represent your business.
  • Social media visitors might think your business isn’t active or open if you’re not posting regularly to your social media pages.

Takeaway: Your content doesn’t just matter five years ago — it matters today. Keeping your content updated will demonstrate that your business is open, active, and ready to serve your customers.

6. Posting to Social Media with No Strategy

Have you ever posted to Facebook or Instagram, but wondered why you weren’t getting any traction or engagement? Social media is a powerful tool, but a lack of strategy can lead to ineffective efforts. Here are a few strategic steps you can take to boost engagement on your social channels:

  • Research days and times when people are most active. This will help you grab people’s attention when they’re most likely to be online.
  • Post content that is going to help solve a problem. The more value people can find in your content, the more likely you are to get their attention — and keep it.
  • Incorporate video and images into your posts. People are far more likely to engage with an interesting video or inviting photo than just straight text.
  • Include a CTA (call to action) in every post copy. Whether you’re encouraging people to laugh, inviting them to think, asking for their opinion, polling them, or directing them to click a link, it’s important to have a clear and direct message in every post.
  • Be patient. This one is the hardest because we often associate social media as something that can give immediate, instant results. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth.
  • Consult the experts. If you’re a business owner, odds are you aren’t an expert in every aspect of business, and that’s okay. Outsource the social media to a marketing agency, like Paragon Marketing Group.

Takeaway: Like in all aspects of marketing, you need to apply strategy to your social media posts to get results.

7. Failing to Adapt to an Ever-Changing Marketing Landscape

Perhaps one of the most exciting and frustrating aspects of marketing is that the landscape is dynamic. What worked yesterday might not work tomorrow. Now this isn’t a call to fix marketing methods that aren’t broken. If what you’re doing is currently working, you might not want to change everything about it.

But more than likely, there’s probably something about your business that needs to be updated, from outdated processes to poorly-functioning equipment to possibly even your marketing strategies. If there’s one thing we can leave with you, it’s that we encourage you to not let fear of something new, something different, or something unknown, keep you from moving your business forward and into the future. At Paragon Marketing Group, we work to stay ahead of industry trends, ensuring your marketing strategy remains agile and adaptive to changing market dynamics.

Your job is to run your business. And if you hire us, our job is to run your marketing.

Takeaway: Don’t let the fear of the unknown or different keep you from moving your business forward.

Here’s a Quick Recap:
  1. When you know exactly who your target audience is, you can more effectively market to them.
  2. Brand consistency needs to carry through every aspect of your business.
  3. A complete marketing strategy will include both traditional and digital marketing channels.
  4. Tracking and analyzing your data will provide invaluable insights into your business.
  5. Keeping your content updated will demonstrate that your business is open, active, and ready to serve your customers.
  6. You need to apply strategy to your social media posts to get results.
  7. Don’t let the fear of the unknown or different keep you from moving your business forward.

If you resonate with any of these challenges, it might be time to reevaluate your marketing strategy. Paragon Marketing Group is your partner in overcoming these hurdles and helping your marketing work.

If you’re trying to find out why your marketing isn’t working, please contact us. Visit our website at paragonmarketinggroup.com or call us at 262-443-9092. We’d love to hear from you.

10 Small Business Marketing Resolutions for 2024

setting small business marketing resolutions for 2024

As the new year approaches, the opportune moment has arrived for small businesses to chart a course for success with actionable marketing resolutions.

In this blog post, we’ll unveil key strategies that can make a substantial impact on your brand’s visibility and success in 2024. Brace yourself for an exciting exploration of innovative approaches, ensuring your business not only keeps pace but triumphs in the ever-evolving marketing landscape.

Marketing Resolutions for the New Year

Here are ten small business marketing resolutions you can employ in 2024:

1. Establish an SEO-Friendly Website

In the vast landscape of digital marketing, your website is your digital storefront. But what good is a store if no one knows where it’s located? That’s where search engine optimization (SEO) comes into play.

Ensuring your website is optimized for search engines is the key to getting visitors. And more visitors equates to increased leads, expanded customer reach, and ultimately, a surge in purchases. To get more visitors, your website needs to be optimized for relevant keywords, improved page load speed, and a design for mobile users.

Takeaway: When executed effectively, SEO acts as a strategic ally, channeling a steady stream of visitors to your site through search engines.

2. Embrace the Power of Blogging

Beyond writing a few paragraphs on occasion, regularly publishing informative and engaging blog posts can become a cornerstone of your digital strategy. It’s a dynamic process that will establish your expertise and act as a catalyst for enhancing your website’s SEO.

When you deliver valuable content that resonates with your readers, you position yourself as an industry authority and create a virtual space that encourages visitors to return for more.

Takeaway: Consistent blogging can capture the attention and loyalty of your audience.

3. Leverage the Influence of Social Media

Leveraging the influence of social media is a resolution with immense potential. Brand awareness, a key ingredient in your marketing plan, can be achieved using platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. The interactive and personalized feel of social media not only informs your customers, but also transforms your business into a source of regular news and relevant updates.

In addition to sharing information, social media forges a direct line of communication with your customers (and potential customers), fostering a loyal online community. Through positive interactions, this digital camaraderie conveys a business deeply invested in its customers. Moreover, social media acts as a gateway, channeling prospective customers to your website and generating new leads through carefully crafted ads.

Takeaway: Whether through engaging posts or targeted paid ads, social media can be the catalyst for steering your business towards growth and success.

4. Introduce a Referral Program

Word-of-mouth remains a formidable force in the realm of small business marketing. One great way to implement word-of-mouth is by creating a referral program to tap into the influence of your satisfied customer base. By encouraging existing customers to refer others, you’re not just fostering brand advocacy but transforming your clientele into enthusiastic promoters.

To make this strategy even more compelling, offer enticing incentives in your referral program. Rewards will encourage your customers to become active participants in expanding your brand reach.

Takeaway: Allowing your customers to be vocal champions of your business can propel your brand into new realms of recognition.

5. Invest in Analytic Tools

Understanding your audience and their behavior is essential, and by investing in analytic tools (such as Google Analytics), you can gain insight and make informed decisions that go beyond guesswork.

The ever-shifting landscape of small business marketing demands a keen eye on analytics, ensuring your business decisions are strategically aligned with your audience’s preferences. By embracing analytics as a core element of your marketing arsenal, you’re not just deciphering numbers; you’re deciphering invaluable insights into your customer base.

As we venture into the new year, we encourage you to make a strategic resolution to invest in cutting-edge analytics tools.

Takeaway: Analytic tools will help you better understand website traffic, user interactions, and the overall performance of your marketing campaigns.

6. Garner Customer Reviews

Trust is the currency of commerce, and positive reviews are your most valuable assets. By proactively seeking reviews, you’ll amplify your brand’s online presence and build trust and credibility among potential customers. Every positive review becomes a testament to the quality of your products or services, acting as a persuasive force that influences purchasing decisions.

Equally important is your responsiveness to reviews, regardless of their sentiment. Engage with your audience by promptly responding to both positive and negative feedback. Demonstrating your commitment to customer satisfaction showcases your brand’s integrity and provides an opportunity to address concerns openly.

So, in 2024, let your customers be the voice of your success. Encourage them to share their stories on platforms like Google, Facebook, or industry-specific websites.

Takeaway: Cumulating customer reviews can build trust with potential clients and set your business apart in the competitive digital landscape.

7. Utilize Video Marketing

Video marketing isn’t just a trend; it’s a transformative tool that can propel your business to new heights.

Whether you’re looking to livestream an event, create engaging website videos, record compelling podcast content, launch video ad campaigns on your social channels, conduct insightful interviews, develop training materials, or simply enhance brand awareness, harnessing the power of video isn’t just an option anymore — it’s a strategic imperative.

Embrace the video revolution, and consider partnering with Paragon Marketing Group to create engaging videos that tell your brand story, showcase products or services, and connect with your audience on a more personal level.

Takeaway: Video marketing can tell your brand’s story, help sell your products or services, and elevate your business visibility.

8. Employ Professional Graphic Design

Visuals play a crucial role in brand perception, which is why your graphic design should be a cohesive, professional representation aligned with your brand identity. So while anyone can attempt graphic design, not everyone possesses the time, knowledge, or skill to craft effective, eye-catching materials.

From making that critical first impression with prospective clients to establishing a consistent brand identity and outshining competitors in effective communication, professional graphic design services are your pathway to visual excellence.

Whether you require brochures, a website facelift, attention-grabbing online ads, a new logo, or any graphic design expertise, your brand’s narrative matters.

Takeaway: With professional graphic design, your designs can resonate and leave a lasting impact in 2024 and beyond.

9. Revisit Direct Mail Marketing

In the digital age, traditional direct mail marketing remains an effective strategy for businesses to connect with potential customers. To leverage this channel, you need to craft targeted, visually appealing mailers to reach specific demographics or geographical areas.

Direct mail isn’t just about sending something in the mail; it’s about outshining competitors. Benefit from targeted customer lists, first-class postage, and customized pieces that make your brand stand out in the mailbox.

If you want to learn more about accessing customer lists, targeting ads, or customizing mailers, contact Paragon Marketing Group today.

Takeaway: Direct mail marketing can target your desired audience demographics in your desired geographical areas.

10. Incorporate Online Advertising

Online advertising, specifically through pay per click (PPC), can revolutionize your digital marketing approach. With PPC, advertisers pay search engines each time their ad is clicked. This method, including search engine advertising like Google Ads, allows you to secure visits to your site without solely relying on organic traffic.

Developing a targeted advertising strategy within your online ads can give your business a competitive edge by placing your content at the top of search engine results and help you reach potential customers actively searching for products or services like yours.

Takeaway: Incorporating online advertising into your marketing plan can help your business and keywords appear at the top of search engine results.

Here’s a Quick Recap:
  1. Ensure your website is optimized for SEO to attract more website visitors.
  2. Post consistent, engaging content to your blog to position your business as an industry authority.
  3. Share content on your social media platforms regularly to foster your online community and engage directly with your followers.
  4. Introduce a referral program to enable your customers to vocally champion your business.
  5. Invest in analytic tools to gain audience insights and make informed decisions.
  6. Garner customer reviews to build trust and credibility with potential customers.
  7. Utilize video marketing to tell your brand’s story and showcase your products and services.
  8. Employ professional graphic design to establish a cohesive, professional representation aligned with your brand identity.
  9. Consider direct mail marketing to reach specific demographics or geographical areas.
  10. Incorporate online advertising to reach potential customers searching for your business’s products or services.

As we step into 2024, these marketing resolutions can serve as a roadmap for small businesses. By implementing these strategies, your brand can build a strong online presence, connect with your audience, and achieve sustainable growth.

Whichever resolutions you strive to achieve in 2024, Paragon Marketing Group wishes you a successful and prosperous year ahead!

If you need help incorporating these marketing resolutions in 2024, feel free to contact us. Visit our website at paragonmarketinggroup.com or call us at 262-443-9092. We’d love to hear from you.

Marketing Strategies for Start-Ups

marketing strategies for startups

If you just started your business, congratulations! That’s a huge accomplishment. As you probably know, there are many strategies that business owners can use for running, managing, and marketing their start-ups. But we have to warn you: the road ahead isn’t an easy one. And unfortunately, the odds are not in your favor:

Almost 25% of all business start-ups fail within the first year.

That percentage doubles to 50% within the first five years of business.

So how can your start-up be part of the other half of businesses, the ones who succeed, who persevere, and who stay in business?

The good news? You’re at the beginning. You have the luxury of time on your side. Right now, you can choose to avoid the mistakes many small business owners make when they’re first starting out.

At Paragon Marketing Group, we want to equip you with some helpful marketing strategies designed for start-ups.

3 Marketing Strategies for Start-Ups

Here are three marketing strategies to employ for your start-up:

A happy business owner using marketing strategies for startups
Are you using any of these marketing strategies for start-ups?

Start-up Marketing Strategy #1: Don’t Try to Do It All Yourself

The entire purpose of marketing is to get people interested in your products or services. And while the idea of doing marketing on your own seems simple in theory, it’s often not.

There are two big reasons we advise small business owners – especially start-up owners – to not try to go it alone:

1. You Need Expansive Marketing Knowledge

Marketing is no longer something that requires a few print advertisements. Digital marketing has unlocked massive opportunities, and all of those opportunities come with a set of rules. Consider the following questions:

  1. Are you certified in Google Ads?
  2. Do you understand all the nuances of every social media platform?
  3. Can you apply an effective SEO strategy to your website content?
  4. Are you a content writer?
  5. Do you know how to professionally design graphics and logos for your business?

Even at Paragon Marketing Group, not one of us is an expert at every aspect of marketing. We all have our different levels of expertise that we bring to the table to best help our clients.

2. You Need Adequate Time to Dedicate to Marketing

A successful business needs a marketing plan, but that’s usually something business owners don’t have time to do:

Especially when you’re first starting out, your focus is everywhere. And no matter how many hours you’re clocking per week, time moves on. Basically, every moment you spend on sales, finance, or technology is a moment lost on marketing.

Takeaway: You’re only one person. Today, life moves so quickly that business owners try to do everything faster, more efficiently, and more productively, and it’s taking a toll. Don’t let your health, family, or life pass you by while you’re trying to do the work of many people.

Start-up Marketing Strategy #2: Don’t Shortcut Your Marketing

If you’re not trying to do all your marketing yourself, we often see small business owners trying to shortcut their marketing.

Common Examples of Marketing Shortcuts
  • Not proofreading content – customers are far less likely to trust a business that has a website or social posts riddled with spelling and grammatical errors,
  • Linking a website or blog post to an untrustworthy site – if you’re linking to outdated information, a broken website, or a site with a negative association, you’ll lose trust with potential customers who click on it.
  • Keyword stuffing ads or website – everyone wants their website and ads to be easily found online, but search engines have gotten smarter. Did you use your focus keyword 30 times on a 300-word webpage? Google and other search engines will not only take notice, but they’ll penalize your site for keyword stuffing.
  • Sending emails to people who didn’t give you permission to email them – no one likes to be bombarded with sales emails from a business where they didn’t even subscribe to emails. This is a quickfire way to encourage potential clients to unsubscribe, turning them off to future sales.
  • Expecting to see instant results when effective digital marketing takes time – just like with all good things in life, marketing takes time. And expecting instant results won’t get you any closer to your marketing goals than eating healthily for one day will help you reach your target weight.
  • Not applying any kind of SEO strategy to advertisements or websites – clients are far less likely to find your business online if you don’t use SEO (search engine optimization). Today, your website will be lost in the millions of sites online unless you employ SEO.
  • Not having consistent listings across the internet – whether your business goes by multiple names or has changed locations, it’s essential that your listings are consistent if you don’t want to confuse clients with faulty information.
  • Relying solely on AI/volunteers/technology to do things that require more attention – while improvements in AI and technology are fantastic tools to utilize in your marketing, they shouldn’t fully replace your marketing. There’s no replacement for attention to detail. Plus, an over-reliance on technology is more likely to hurt than help your marketing.

Takeaway: While taking shortcuts can often benefit your business in the short-term, the overall, long-term effects can be detrimental to your business. Therefore, we recommend doing things the right way the first time.

Start-up Marketing Strategy #3: Don’t Overspend on Marketing

At Paragon Marketing Group, we can’t stress enough how important it is to not overspend on marketing.

Here are a few ways you might be overspending on your marketing:

1. You don’t have a marketing budget/aren’t tracking your marketing spend.

Something we see with many clients is that either they don’t have any business funds dedicated to marketing, or they aren’t tracking their marketing dollars.

When you’re spending $50/month per Meta ad, it doesn’t seem all that bad. But when you don’t take into account your website costs, digital ad costs, all of the annual or monthly marketing programs and software costs, the price can start to add up . . . and you may not even realize it. 

This information is crucial to keep track of. When you aren’t defining your costs and keeping them organized, you’re not going to struggle just at tax season . . . you’re also probably spending way more money than you’re aware of.

2. You got caught in a marketing scam.

This one hurts the most, because frankly, it’s happened to all of us at some point. 

You don’t know all the ins and outs of marketing, so you bought a software program that you haven’t taken the time to learn, or you enlist the help of someone who claims to be an expert, but they’re really just taking advantage of the fact that you aren’t an SEO or social media marketing expert.

You need someone who’s going to have your back, and who is going to advise you when you aren’t sure whether or not you should take your marketing in a certain direction or use a certain marketing tactic.

3. You’re paying a salary to one person in-house to do the job of many people.

Once you realize how much work goes into marketing, you understand how crucial it is to make every dollar count.

And while one in-house marketer can be effective, no one person can be an expert in every aspect of marketing. Plus, the dollars you’re spending to pay that one person could be used to pay several people.

Imagine the value you could gain from taking that one salary and using it to outsource to an agency with a team of experts, like Paragon Marketing Group.

Takeaway: Marketing expenses can add up quickly. Make sure you have a dedicated marketing budget, keep track of your marketing dollars, and don’t overpay an individual to do the job of many.

Here’s a Quick Recap:
  1. You don’t have to do your marketing alone.
  2. You don’t have to take marketing shortcuts to be successful.
  3. You don’t have to overspend on your marketing to get great results.

When you’ve just started your business, your head is spinning. You’re just trying to make it to the next day. And as a small business, we understand how challenging it can be.

At Paragon Marketing Group, our desire is to equip you with information to help your business succeed.

If you need help employing these marketing strategies for start-ups, feel free to contact us. Visit our website at paragonmarketinggroup.com or call us at 262-443-9092. We’d love to hear from you.

Want to learn more about this topic? Check out our podcast, the Main Street Marketing Podcast, on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or your audio platform of choice.

Why Marketing Consistency Matters

Discussing marketing consistency and strategy

In business, there isn’t any advice we could offer that would discourage being consistent. But what about marketing consistency?

See, when most people hear the word “consistency,” they think of repeating the same things over and over again. And while repetition plays a role, there’s a whole lot more to it.

How to Build Marketing Consistency into Your Business

You’ve probably read a lot about the importance of brand consistency, and why it’s so important for your business to maintain it. And that’s true — brand consistency is important! But how do you build marketing consistency into your business?

Building consistency into your business marketing is key to your marketing success.
Building consistency into your business marketing is key to your marketing success.

1. Implement General Consistency in Your Business First

Before you can bring marketing consistency into your business, it’s important to understand how being consistent in general business tasks will set you up for success in your marketing.

There are several definitions for the word “consistency,” but our favorite is probably an “agreement or harmony of parts or features to one another or a whole.”

Consistency brings harmony of parts. Ultimately, consistency brings a wholeness to whatever you’re doing.

Think of consistency in the same way you’d maintain your vehicle. When you buy a car, it’s an investment. You don’t just buy it but never take care of it. You get oil changes, you wash your car, you change its tires. And these aren’t just one-time tasks. You do it multiple times throughout the year on a consistent basis, once every 2,000 miles, or quarterly.

The same goes for your business. You don’t just start a business and perform each task one time. Employees will receive regular paychecks. You’ll ensure your business information is secure every day. You’ll even lock your door every time you leave — not just the first time.

So if you’ve established general consistency practices in your business, you understand how important those processes are. Because without them, your employees won’t get paid, your confidential information won’t be secure, and your office will be open for anyone to stop in and take whatever they want.

It stands to reason that your marketing should also be consistent.

2. Understand How Consistency Will Benefit Your Marketing

You know it’s important to be consistent in a general sense. But how can consistency specifically benefit your marketing?

  • Consistency builds predictable results (You know what’s coming when you’re consistent.)
  • Consistency leads to greater financial returns (The easier you make it for clients, the more likely they’ll spend money.)
  • Consistency helps in the long-term (Better to focus on the big picture by staying consistent rather than just put out short-term fires.)
  • Consistency clears up confusion (Your message will be clear to your customers when you’re consistent with how you put it out there.)
  • Consistency builds trust with your customers (Your business information and your message should be the same across platforms.)

And those benefits just scratch the surface. The power of consistency in your marketing can enable you to accomplish far more with it than without it. But understanding that consistency is beneficial isn’t enough. You also have to put in the work.

3. Build Consistency into Your Marketing

Consistency is all about developing processes and following through with them. You can’t just hope that you’ll always be consistent.

Consider including these ideas when incorporating consistency into your marketing:

Make a long-term plan.

Planning for the next hour or day isn’t enough. If you want to repeat the benefits of long-term success, then you need to figure out how consistency will play a long-term role in your marketing. Ask yourself:

  • In what ways have I already built consistency into my business? Can I apply those methods to other aspects of my marketing/business?
  • What areas can I start adding consistency with little effort, and which areas are going to require a longer planning period to build consistency into them?
  • How can I keep myself (and coworkers/employees) accountable in staying consistent with new procedures?

Cross-post consistently.

Keep your calls-to-action (CTAs) clear across all marketing channels. Don’t give 8 or 10 CTAs on your website or your direct mailer. Your customers won’t know what to do, and they’ll probably end up doing nothing.

When it comes to your digital channels, such as your website or social media sites, or even your Google profile, keep your information consistent. For example, don’t have one phone number on your Google profile, another one on your website, and a third one on your Facebook page.

Incorporate consistency behind the scenes.

The work you put in behind the scenes may take a lot of effort, but the important thing is that it be simple for the customer on the front end.

For example, let’s say you want to run a social media marketing campaign that starts with a giveaway and ends with five people winning prizes. How can you build consistency into this social media marketing campaign?

  • Creating a social media schedule and posting consistently will help your followers know when your posts will go live.
  • Curating a list of highly-followed and relevant hashtags and incorporating them into every social post on appropriate platforms consistently will reach more people
  • Developing a process to consistently test all tagged accounts, links that will be clicked, and words to be spell-checked before publishing posts will provide a much better user experience and provide professional credibility for your business.

Notice the common theme? Consistency.

Ultimately, building consistency into your marketing is no easy task. It takes a lot of work. But understanding why it’s so important for not just your marketing, but also your business as a whole can really help you become more consistent in your marketing.

At Paragon Marketing Group, we understand that many small businesses don’t have the time or the resources to apply a large-scale strategy, which is why we love sharing that marketing load, or even taking it completely off your plate. If you’re looking for advice or help regarding your marketing strategy, we’d love to help you.

You can contact us by visiting our website at paragonmarketinggroup.com or call us at 262-443-9092.

Want to learn more about this topic? Check out our podcast, the Main Street Marketing Podcast, on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or your audio platform of choice.

Luck Is Not A Marketing Strategy

Don't rely on marketing luck to help your business.

Luck is a big theme for the month of March. Most of us think of four-leaf clovers, leprechauns, pots of gold, rainbows, and of course, St. Patrick’s Day. But what about luck in the context of marketing? How does luck play a role in your marketing, and why is it not enough to help you be successful . . . ?

How to Not Rely on Marketing Luck

Let’s face it, all of us know someone who is super lucky. And when it comes to marketing, sometimes it’s easy to hope luck will be enough of a marketing strategy to get your brand out there.

But if you’re reading this, then you probably already know what we’re going to say: luck isn’t a marketing strategy. So as a business owner, what can you do with your marketing that doesn’t rely on just dumb luck?

Here are three things you can start doing right now:

Don't rely on marketing luck to help your business.
Don’t rely on marketing luck to help your business.

1. Accept that Luck Will Play Only a Small Role in Your Marketing

Now while luck isn’t a marketing strategy, it can and will impact your business.

Everyone has a story about a social media post that went viral, or how your dream client walked through your doors, or how an unlikely partnership turned out to be the best thing for your business.

Luck will always play a role in your business, albeit an inconsistent one. The important thing to remember here is that luck is out of your control. You can hope and want it all day, but that doesn’t mean your marketing will always work because you hope it will.

2. Develop the Marketing Strategies You Can Control

Now that we’ve established that luck plays a small role in your marketing, it’s important to understand that luck is out of your control. And if you can’t control luck, then you have to figure out what marketing strategies you can control:

Marketing Channels

In other words, where do you want to market your products or services? You can’t get lucky with an Instagram marketing campaign if you aren’t posting to Instagram. You can’t find new clients through direct mail if you aren’t mailing pieces out to your desired area. Your website won’t keep visitors on the page if it isn’t responsive or optimized for mobile users.

Marketing Dollars

How much of your budget are you willing to dedicate just to marketing? This is a question we find many business owners not wanting to think about. As a small business owner, you might have 132 different things vying for your attention at all times. Marketing is an easy thing to fall to the bottom of the to-do list. And when this happens, relying on luck for your marketing to be successful while not budgeting any dollars towards it won’t cut it.

Marketing Experts

Do you outsource to a marketing agency, or do you try to do it all yourself? This can get really overwhelming for any business owner with his or her hands full. But perhaps there are certain “blind spots” you have when it comes to marketing. Maybe the idea of social media marketing really overwhelms you. Maybe shooting your own marketing videos is something you just don’t have the experience in.

3. Prepare for New Marketing Opportunities

All of us have probably heard a variation of the famous quote by the Roman philosopher, Seneca:

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.”

No matter what your take on that quote is, the underlying message is that in order to actively and purposefully get “lucky,” you have to prepare.

So rather than resort to hoping for lucky circumstances or wishful thinking, here are a few ways you can prepare for new opportunities:

Determine Your Marketing Channels

You know you can’t be successful with marketing channels if you’re not actively using them. So you have to decide which marketing channels you want to use, and then the hard part: you have to start executing.

A good way to determine which channels to start with is to ask yourself which channels are going to best serve your business, attract your desired clients, or engage your customers.

Not sure how to figure this out? Consult with a marketing agency like Paragon Marketing Group. Our staff specializes in understanding nearly any type of business. You name it, we’ve probably seen it, heard of it, or worked with a company in that industry.

Determine Your Marketing Budget

Relying on luck isn’t an option for your marketing budget.

But if you’re leery of budgeting a portion of your funds to marketing, don’t let that stop you from marketing altogether. Even if it’s small, determine the amount you’re willing to spend on marketing ahead of time, and stick to that amount, even if you don’t see immediate results.

We recommend choosing an amount you can confidently put towards marketing each month. Remember: if you never spend a dollar marketing your business, you’re losing out on several dollars you could be making.

Determine Your Marketing Plan of Execution

For some business owners, this might be as simple as setting aside an hour each day to dedicate to marketing. For others, one hour a day might be impossible.

Or even if you have the time, you might not know where to start. This is really common! This is the point at which you decide whether you want to do your marketing in-house, by yourself, or outsource to an agency of experts.

Whether you’re looking to completely hand over your marketing to an agency, or you feel comfortable managing certain aspects of it, you can decide how you’re going to market your business.

It’s important to see luck for what it is: an inconsistent, unreliable tool that, without thoughtful and careful preparation, is just that: luck, and nothing else.

Think of luck as that friend who will show up at random times and be the life of the party for one night. But then when you’re at a point in your life where you need someone to lean on, that friend is nowhere to be found.

If you want your marketing to be effective, get prepared. Make a plan. Talk to experts in the field. Because at the end of the day, a marketing plan is only worthwhile if you’re going to put it in action.

Want to learn more about this topic? Check out our podcast, the Main Street Marketing Podcast, on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or your audio platform of choice.

If you have questions about which marketing channels you should use, or how to develop a marketing plan for your business, we’d love to help you.