The world of marketing has changed dramatically in the years since the field was first created. Back in the 1950s, marketing involved billboard advertisements and radio broadcasts. Today, it’s all about technology, internet platforms, and the data analytics that can actually, for the first time, demonstrate the effectiveness of certain marketing campaigns. In this article, we’ll look at how you can position yourself on the cutting edge of marketing in 2022, making pro decisions with the help of the latest technology so that you’re always making the most of your marketing budget.
Budgeting
Let’s come straight onto budgeting, seeing as that’s something that all marketing professionals have to contend with each time they accept a new project. The problem with budgeting in the past was that it was difficult to predict the return on the investment that a certain campaign might generate. It was difficult to track the success rate of certain adverts. That’s obviously changed today, and marketing agencies especially have their hands on a huge volume of data that can help them to understand which strategies work best for which clients.
As such, you’ll be able to make a more compelling case for marketing spending when you’ve taken a deep dive into the spend data you have internally. Look at what a Facebook paid advertising campaign cost and returned you in the past few months, and calculate, therefore, the return on investment of every dollar spent on that campaign. By doing this across all of your marketing activities, you’ll be able to understand which campaigns seem to be the most profitable and which you should present to clients as a priority in the weeks to come.
Technological Shortcuts
Just as marketing takes place more and more in the digital world, so too does the number crunching and the research involved in planning a truly great campaign. Experienced digital marketers will already be engaging with dozens of software programs to help track and plan their campaigns, but if you’re new to the game or you’re looking to use the best software, a review of the best marketing software in 2022 is an absolute must-read. Here are some things to focus on:
- Email marketing software that helps you track and understand your open rate and conversion rate, which is essential for fine-tuning your email marketing approach
- Keyword research tools that can show you the easiest keywords to target as well as those that your competitors are currently benefiting from
- Overall SEO analytics websites and software programs, which often give you an insight into how the website you’re promoting could be improved in order to feature higher on Google’s search engine results pages
- Software that tracks social media posts and their popularity, helping you to understand how your posting is working, as well as on-trend topics that you may be able to capitalize on
All of these programs can come as free-to-use packages or for monthly subscription fees. As you’d expect, it’s usually best to pay a little extra for access to the best features and the most cutting-edge software.
Performance Tracking
As a marketer, you’re not only interested in coming up with the best campaigns – you’re also keen to know how they’re performing compare with previous campaigns and which arm of your strategy is working particularly well or poorly. This is achieved through smart performance tracking software, which can tell you how you’re doing on a number of fronts in one easy-to-use dashboard.
By engaging with the latest technology in this field, you’re able to measure performance with ease – finding ways to understand your marketing output so that you’re able to continually improve as a marketer. Meanwhile, if you’re struggling to make a case for an increased budget for your marketing team, performance tracking can help you show to your senior managers exactly what’s happening with your campaigns, thereby helping you justify a little more investment for the returns it’ll generate for your business.
New Trends
Every couple of years, a new trend will emerge in marketing that dominates all the others. We’ve seen this dozens of times before, and we’ve also seen micro-trends within these trends as innovative marketers seek to steal an edge on their competitors by harnessing technology and creative thinking. Keeping on top of all these trends will help you be a better marketer in 2022 because you’ll be able to base your work on what’s most successful at any given moment. Marketers love to keep things fresh, and that’s why following the most advanced marketing strategies can pay off for even the smallest marketing team.
In terms of current trends, then, which should you be following? Well, the rise of TikTok is certainly one of them, with marketers finally waking up to the massive potential that this platform has to offer, especially when it comes to younger consumers and the products that they tend to buy. There’s also considerable movement in the world of SEO, which is constantly changing in response to the fierce competition over keywords that takes place in that field.
Collecting Data
Many marketers use A/B testing to improve their approach. You’ll know that to successfully A/B test, you need to know which strategy, marketing material, or advert is working better: A or B. And that means gathering data relentlessly as you pull off a variety of campaigns. Data gathering is a fundamental tool in the modern marketer’s toolkit, as it helps them to plan more effective campaigns. But collecting that data is only the first step. You also have to process it so that you can present insights to the rest of your team.
Many marketers will end it difficult to work with vast quantities of data, which is why it’s important to find the right data analytics software that’ll crunch all the numbers for you. Make sure you’re gathering as much data as you can, capturing every insight so that your marketing campaigns are as well informed as they possibly can be in 2022 and beyond.
Make a note of all these tips in order to make your future marketing campaigns as successful as possible, working within your budget and returning on the investment you’re making in your campaigns.