& How to Avoid Them
Are you making these marketing mistakes? 🤔
In the world of marketing, there are a number of fads, empty promises, and the feeling that you’re always behind because, “HOW do they have so many followers?!”
Business owner to business owner, there IS a RIGHT way to do marketing, and it certainly isn’t chasing trends and hoping that something “pops off.”
Today, we’re going to outline FIVE common marketing mistakes we see, and how you can avoid them. Plus, we’ll give you a few marketing tips for small businesses, teaching you how to stop comparing yourself to million dollar marketing budgets.
5 Common Marketing Mistakes
- Banking on Going Viral
- Making “Selling” Your Marketing Goal
- Not Knowing Your Target Audience
- Inconsistent Branding
- Doing Everything Yourself
Marketing Mistake #1: Banking on Going Viral
It can be tempting to want to go viral.
How cool would it be to just capture the attention of hundreds, if not thousands, even millions of people?
If only you could get just ONE post to go viral, your follower count and sales would skyrocket, right?
Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. Putting the pressure on yourself or your team to “make it big” exhausts your time and energy. Instead, a better approach is consistent, strategic marketing that builds brand recognition, trust, and customer loyalty over time. If something happens to go viral naturally, great! But it shouldn’t be the main goal. Plus, in the case that you do go viral, it’s essential that you have your customer’s journey, branding, and other marketing pieces solidified so that the virality converts.
Marketing Mistake #2: Making “Selling” Your Marketing Goal
As a marketing and branding agency, we talk about goal setting quite often with our clients.
It’s necessary to have goals in your business. They guide your financial and marketing strategies!
However, we often see business owners claim “selling more” is their primary goal in their marketing. However, having a goal to “sell more” is undefined. It’s broad and lacks a clear, actionable strategy. It ignores customer relationships and the need to cultivate a committed audience. It’s unsustainable and an ever-moving target.
Instead, it’s important that goals are specific, measurable, and attainable.
For example, strategic marketing goals could include:
- Grow social media engagement by 25% over the next 3 months by posting consistently and engaging with followers.
- Gain 50 new email subscribers per month using a lead generator like a free guide or discount.
- Increase brand awareness by establishing a cohesive brand, from imagery to voice.
Among our top marketing tips for small business owners is to set S.M.A.R.T goals. They give you a clear direction for your marketing (and other aspects of your business)!
Marketing Mistake #3: Not Knowing Your Target Audience
If you’re selling to everyone, you’re selling to no one.
It’s harsh, but true.
Business and marketing best practices say that defining your niche, your target audience, builds you a stronger community and increases the likelihood of conversion. When you speak to the general public, people don’t feel connected to you.
Say you’re an HVAC company, and you want to be top of mind for your community when they’re in need of your services.
If you’re just putting content out there saying, “we’re reliable and do good work,” that’s great! However, it’s non-specific. Any HVAC company could say that. Really, any company in any industry could say that.
What sets you apart is when you do your research on your target audience. Once you’ve done your research, you know that as an HVAC company in Edmond, Oklahoma, your typical customer is a young to middle aged woman with two kids and a job. While the field is male dominated, women (traditionally wives) are often the ones making the purchasing decisions and making the call. And, since you’ve done your research, you can now speak directly to them.
For example:
“A/C on the fritz? The last thing you need is an unreliable air conditioner that struggles to keep up with you and your family’s busy schedule.
Here at HVAC Edmond, we know how important it is to have a cool and comfortable home after a Saturday juggling kids sports.
Give us a call, and allow us to check one thing off your to-do list! ✔️”
Get ahead of your competition and get to know your audience! And remember, speaking to everyone is speaking to no one.
Marketing Mistake #4: Inconsistent Branding
We all start somewhere!
At the beginning, it’s understandable that you’re just trying to get your feet off the ground and may not have a cohesive brand.
However, as you establish your business and put your mind on growth, it’s essential that your brand remains consistent across your marketing, from your website to your social media to your print outs.
Having an established brand helps with brand recognition, building your trust factor, and standing out in your industry.
If it’s been awhile since you created your brand or you’ve never had one, it may be time to revisit it!
Marketing Mistake #5: Doing Everything Yourself
Again, as business owners, we often start out doing everything ourselves!
However, as we grow, our work outgrows us. We feel a responsibility to continue the work ourselves, but it often reaches a point beyond our reasonable ability. When we overwork ourselves, we are overextending our energy, leaving us drained of the passion we had when we first started our business.
So our marketing tip for small business owners is to delegate!
Delegating marketing as a small business owner is essential for long-term growth, allowing you to focus on what you do best without worry.
Marketing best practices evolve constantly, and it can feel overwhelming to try to keep up! By outsourcing or assigning marketing tasks to professionals, you ensure that you are investing in the right marketing tactics rather than relying on guesswork. It saves you time and money, and it helps you connect with your audience.
Marketing Best Practices: Create a Plan
We know you want to do things the right way.
The right way, however, requires hard work, strategy, and, often, a helping hand.
If any of these marketing mistakes are something you’ve struggled with, don’t worry! We ALL have room for growth and could benefit from an outside opinion.
If you’re in need of marketing tips for small business owners, if you’re feeling overwhelmed and like you don’t know where you’re headed next, our team at Oakes Creative House can help!
How? Well for one, we’re entrepreneurs like you!
We know that as a small business owner, you are responsible for a lot. From finances, to networking, to marketing, you have a lot on your plate. Being so busy, it’s easy to get caught up in the chaos, and it’s challenging to know who or what you should trust. We know how it feels! That’s why we’ve simplified our services for you, easing your decision making process.
Your first step? A Marketing Roadmap session.
With a marketing roadmap session we’ll make the tough marketing strategy decisions for you! You’ll get the marketing results you deserve rather than throwing things at the wall hoping they stick. These sessions are a $500, 1-hour call with Crystal, our owner, creative director, and strategist, to dive into your unique marketing needs. This call is more immersive than a discovery call, and allows you to take what you learned with you to DIY or work on with another marketing agency, or stick with us for a top-notch experience!
Even if you aren’t ready for a roadmap session, you can combat your marketing mistakes. We encourage you to explore our resources for more marketing best practices and insights, curated specifically for small businesses.
However you choose to move forward with your marketing, you’ve got this! Delegating and investing in strategic marketing will pay you dividends in the end.
And, if you ever need help, we’re just a click away. Happy marketing!
