We’re stepping into a new year with a lot of hope and expectations. We take stock of the past, intending to carry forward the learnings out of it. We put up plans and get ourselves geared up to face the new year with high spirits.
When we’re stepping into 2022, the marketing landscape has changed drastically from the conventional setting that we had during the pre-pandemic world. The marketing approach needs to be different in the “new normal”. Marketers need to play the game differently this time.
Here are 5 new year resolutions that marketers need to include in their playbook for 2022.
Focus on the brand promise
Brand positioning can be referred to as the “battle for the customer’s mind”. A brand must have a clear and consistent positioning as well as an authentic set of differentiation to support the positioning strategy to establish a strong “share of mind”.
A brand promise can be defined as a value or experience a brand’s users can expect to receive every single time they interact with that brand. To ensure the brand positioning is successful, brands need to stick to their “Brand Promise” at all times.
In a connected world, customers have the power to evaluate and even scrutinize any company’s brand promise. More and more customers are relying on social media for purchase decisions. They’re influenced by family, friends, fans and followers throughout the customer path. The online conversations about your brand by these influential groups can make or break a brand. We’re in an era where brands can no longer make false promises and getaway. This type of “corporate posturing” is not going to work in a world where opinions are driven by online communities.
If there’s a gap between what you promise to the customer and what you deliver, your brand is heading for disaster. Marketers need to consistently strive towards reducing such gaps from all fronts (may it be a gap in product quality or a gap in customer service). If you observe deviations from the brand promise – fix it!
Be agile
The post-pandemic world comes with a unique set of challenges; lockdowns, social distancing, supply chain strain, extreme shipment delays, etc. The usual way of handling challenges during a tough economy is not going to take us out of the current situation. The pandemic has forced massive, rapid changes in consumer behaviour—away from brick-and-mortar stores and toward digital channels. Marketers need to adapt to an agile marketing strategy to remain relevant and competitive in the current marketplace.
Based on research carried out by Deloitte, “58% of consumers surveyed could name a brand that was able to quickly pivot its offerings to better react to the “new normal” created by the pandemic. Of these consumers, 82% said such new, relevant offerings had increased their desire to do more business with this brand”.
Marketers need to increase the adoption of digital technologies and strengthen the online presence of the brand/s. They also have to accelerate investments that empower them to quickly respond to the customer. Speed becomes a critical factor for agile marketing success. This needs to be embraced across the marketing mix, starting from product development to GTM (Go-To-Market) without limiting it only to outward facing efforts such as responding to customers.
Create authentic content
Content marketing helps to foster a deeper connection between the brand and the consumers. This can be achieved only if the content is authentic. Creating authentic content helps resonate with the customers better. Customers not only want to know what the brand sells; they also want to know what the brand stands for and what values does the brand carry. It is important to provide authentic content for the customers to understand the brand better and establish a lasting impression in their minds.
Consumers are continuously looking for something that will help them to learn something new, improve their lives, forge meaningful communities online, etc. Marketers should focus on creating, curating, distributing, and amplifying authentic content that is interesting, relevant, useful and reflects the brand’s characters and codes to the target audience to create conversations about the brand.
Drive omnichannel marketing
Omnichannel marketing can be defined as the practice of integrating multiple channels to create a seamless and consistent customer experience. It requires companies to break channel and departmental silos and unify their goals and strategies. This will ensure a concerted effort across multiple online and offline channels to drive customers into making the purchase.
Marketers need to view the customer path on a more granular level to develop a good omnichannel marketing strategy. They need to map all possible touchpoints and channels across the customer path (Aware, Appeal, Ask, Act, Advocate). As there are many possible combinations of touchpoints and channels that customers experience, marketers need to identify the most popular ones and focus on the integration of those most popular channels.
For marketers, more touchpoints and channels lead to more market coverage for their brands. However, this will also lead to more complexity in designing a coherent omnichannel marketing strategy. Marketers need to strike the right balance between market coverage and simplicity in planning their omnichannel marketing strategy.
Optimise for voice search
According to Google, over 20% of searches in the Google App are now done by voice. Voice search is the future of online marketing. The trend is going to continue with further developments in this area (Google voice search, Cortana, Siri, Alexa) which enables customers to interact and control devices using voice commands.
Marketers need to think about the words people say, not just what they’re likely to type using a keyboard, if they want their content to appear in future search results. Optimising a business for voice search requires a different “SEO” strategy taking into account the likely keywords that the customer might use during a voice search. Marketers need to start now, as voice search is more popular than ever, and it will continue to grow over the next few years as even deeper investments are made into the field by companies across the world.
In summary, the new year is going to bring new opportunities and challenges at the same time. Marketers need to be “future-ready” by embracing the new trends and willing to adapt to changes fast to ace 2022.