Interview With Austin Rotter, a digital branding and media relations expert with over 12 years of experience working with a number of clients ranging from innovative startups to hypergrowth brands and everything in between.
With the first half of 2022 in the books, it’s time to turn your attention to the rest of the year. And when it comes to your digital marketing strategy, there’s no shortage of steps you can take. Even if you’ve met or exceeded all your digital marketing goals for the first half of 2022, there’s no guarantee you’ll experience the same success in the months to come.
According to Austin Rotter, now’s the time to rethink the final six months of the year, and doing so means taking these three steps.
1. Review what’s worked
Make a list of the digital marketing tactics that generated the intended result. This is the first thing you should do as it sets the table for what comes next.
For example, if you’ve successfully used social media to grow your audience and engage with prospects, it’s something you’ll want to stick with over the months to come. Increase the frequency with which you publish new updates.
Or perhaps your corporate blog has generated more traffic and leads than ever before. In this case, it’s a good time to create even more content.
If you don’t know what’s worked to date, you could mistakenly eliminate it from your strategy when what you should be doing is doubling down.
2. Review what hasn’t worked
Just as you need to know what’s worked, you should also make note of what hasn’t. This doesn’t necessarily mean you should eliminate the tactic from your strategy. However, it should lead you to review your approach and make changes with better results in mind.
Let’s look at video marketing as an example. You’ve devoted all the necessary resources to create high-quality video content, but you’re not getting what you want in terms of views, engagement, and conversions.
You have two options at this point:
- Continue to create the same type of videos and hope for different results.
- Dig deeper to determine the “why” behind the poor performance.
The first option is the easiest, but it’s also a money pit. Continuing down the same path will get you the same results.
The second option makes more sense. Once you know why your videos aren’t performing — perhaps because you’re sharing the wrong type of content — you can adjust your approach accordingly.
It’s not fun to pinpoint what hasn’t worked. That’s especially true when you realize how much money you’ve spent. But if you don’t do this, you’ll continue to make the same mistakes in the future.
3. Take notes from your competitors
Don’t get caught up in the trap of paying more attention to your competitors’ strategy than your own. At the same rate, don’t ignore this altogether. You can learn a lot about where to allocate resources by spying on your competitors. Do this to answer questions such as:
- Where are your competitors focusing the majority of their time and budget?
- What digital marketing tactics are they avoiding altogether?
- How does their approach to digital marketing differ from yours?
Rethinking your strategy doesn’t mean copying your competitors. What it means is taking cues and repurposing them to suit your specific situation and goals.
Final thoughts
Some of the digital marketing trends that were hot at the start of 2022 are beginning to lose steam. On the opposite side of the spectrum, there are tactics you can employ over the next six months to achieve better results.
Take as much time as necessary to review, rethink, and adjust your digital marketing strategy. Doing so will position you for greater success as the year comes to an end and the calendar turns to 2023.
