The best digital marketing strategy is the one that is the most adaptive. Consumer habits change every single day, and so do the marketing strategies necessary to remain a relevant presence online. But companies are having a hard time switching to entirely new strategies and techniques because the technological world of internet marketing changes exceedingly quick. Adapt or be left behind.
If your business does not integrate the latest innovative system that is shaping how we market products and services online, then it will quickly become irrelevant. Digital marketing strategies that were considered effective just a couple of years ago are now obsolete, annoying, or downright unethical and can land your business in no man’s land faster than a failed product.
What are some of these obsolete digital marketing strategies?
5 previously successful digital marketing strategies that are now almost useless and may result in losing your customers.
1. EMAIL MARKETING: At its peak, email marketing was one of the most effective digital marketing strategies a business could deploy. Businesses would actually (and some still do) purchase email lists, which they would then use to advertise to hundreds or thousands of potential customers. This strategy used to worked, and you could find businesses thriving from the leads they generated from email marketing. Fast forward to 2019, and an unsolicited email from a brand is considered spam. It does not matter how well your brand is known, people just do not want to be bombarded with promotional emails about products or services that they did not previously inquire about. In lieu of email marketing, websites are requesting site visitors to subscribe to their email list if they want to receive updates or deals in the future. This is a much more effective way of creating an email list because it only targets those who are interested in what your business has to offer.
2. COOKIE-CUTTER MARKETING CAMPAIGNS: A few years back, it was not uncommon to spot the same marketing campaign being utilized by a brand year in year out. Today, this is one of the worst marketing strategies you can adopt. Behavioral targeting has replaced the old one-size-fits-all mode of marketing, which targeted consumers as a whole as opposed to separate demographics. The consumer population is growing more and more diverse every year, which means basic template strategies are becoming less and less effective. Personalized marketing campaigns are what work, and the more specific you get, the more you reel in a specific demographic which translates directly to your target market.
3. KEYWORD-DEPENDENT SEO: SEO has grown to be a much more intricate marketing strategy over the years, and focusing on keywords alone is no longer considered effective. Businesses that are still leveraging their visibility online solely on SEO are seeing no real return as search algorithms have evolved to rank websites based on more than just keyword accuracy. SEO is still crucial in today’s marketing sphere, but on its own, a toothless dog. To get higher rankings, businesses now have to focus on the quality of their content and the contextual relevance of their keywords, in addition to using other SEO strategies in combination with keyword research.
4. CONTENT WITHOUT OPTIMIZATION: Content is everything these days as the shift towards organic, consumable content becomes more dramatic. You will become stagnant with poor content, but content without optimization is also quite irrelevant. The reason for this is that search engines cannot rank you highly if your content is not optimized. SEO goes hand-in-hand with content, and today you simply cannot have one and not the other.
5. PURCHASING REVIEWS: Do not underestimate a consumer’s ability to detect a fake or bought review. There is nothing that makes them as suspicious as reviews that seem a tad too manufactured, and they tend to give companies with fake reviews a wide berth. Not only are you wasting your money with this “strategy,” but you are also losing credibility in the eyes of your customers. It becomes easy to doubt the quality of your products or services when you lack any genuine, non-coerced reviews to back them up.
If your business is still practicing any one of these marketing strategies, it’s time for a change. These disenfranchised strategies will only do more harm than good to your reputation, so steer clear of them if you want success in the wide world of digital marketing. Ask yourself the following questions. If you need help, reach out to us today!
1. How do I market my business?
2. How can I increase my brand awareness?