A marketing strategy should unite and align efforts toward clear goals and how they’ll be achieved.
There’s so much going on in a growing manufacturing business. You're working on streamlining production, delivery logistics, back-office details, etc.
We often see companies with the best intentions of keeping up with everything overlook the importance of creating a digital marketing strategy.
You may wonder why a marketing strategy is important when what you're doing seems to be working well enough. After all, something's better than nothing. Right?
In most cases, I would say that that's probably true, but operating that way long term is inefficient and often mistargeted. When marketing your manufacturing business without a strategy, you're not going to get the best return or know how your efforts are performing or if they're meeting expectations.
Set Goals to Establish a Clear Direction
Without direction, you’re left to wander around in circles, getting nowhere. This is what happens when you use digital marketing without a strategy. The marketing effort, be it email, social media, online ads, etc., won't connect back to a goal or metric.
Take a few minutes to go through this growth goals exercise. It provides a goal-setting starting point and will act as your compass when working through your digital marketing.
Assess Your Market
With digital marketing, it's important to know what's out there. What other manufacturers are doing, what you're doing, and how others position themselves in the market? You may have some idea of your competitors' efforts, but when was the last time you took a few minutes to look at their website objectively? Or read over their latest catalog or online ads?
Take time to look at your competition. Doing this gives perspective and provides the "lay of the land," enabling you to hone your messaging and establish your differentiators. If this seems like a daunting task, schedule a time to meet with our team, and we'll help you create a competitive audit.
Identify Problems & Personas
As a growing manufacturing business, your product should solve a specific problem for a particular group of people. It's essential to make sure you have this group identified. If you don't, you'll be speaking to everyone, and your message will get lost in the sea of noise online.
Take a second to think about the group of people that would use your product. What problems do they have? How do they identify those problems? Go through each type of person who buys your product and determine how your product solves their problem. Don't be afraid to be specific. Doing this helps narrow down your target audience (also known as personas) and focus your messaging to resonate with them.
If you could use a little help, we have a persona worksheet that will help you define each one, their needs, and how your products can help them.
Un-silo Your Efforts
Marketing done in a silo apart from the rest of the business will be ineffective. It's like the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. With a strategy, you're planning what needs to happen, determining the tools you will need to complete the strategy effectively, and making sure you have the right people in the right seats to do the job. Efforts won’t be duplicated, and time won't be needlessly wasted, resulting in better results and improved efficiency. All of this together gives your team and the company a better direction — they'll know what they're striving for and how to get there.
When it's time to outline your execution plan, here’s a digital marketing template you can use to build your strategy.
Next Steps
As your business grows, it's easy to get overwhelmed by all of the things going on. But it's important to slow down long enough to create the strategies that provide direction, clarity, and efficiencies for your manufacturing business, including a digital marketing strategy. Instead of wandering around in circles, create a map that your team can follow together toward the same goals and next-level results.
Need an example? We’re with you. Before you start brainstorming goals and the strategies required to get you there, read Marketing Strategy Example For Manufacturing Companies. It will give you a clear and simple example of a marketing strategy and how to execute it.
If you need help creating a digital strategy for your manufacturing business, set up a free consultation with one of our experts. We’re happy to help you start your digital marketing journey.
More reading
- Successful Manufacturing Websites Start With Growth Goals
- 3 Steps to Creating A HubSpot Digital Marketing Strategy
- Choosing A Digital Marketing Agency For Your Manufacturing Business
- The Manufacturer’s Guide to Inbound Marketing
- Digital Marketing For Growth-minded Manufacturers
- More articles for manufacturers