If you’ve been in business longer than 5 minutes, you know that there are a lot of things to pay attention to. It’s so easy for many of these things to hit the back burner throughout the year and even cause problems the longer you go without taking care of them.
As this year winds down, this is a great chance to take a few simple steps to prep your marketing for 2024.
Let’s take a look at the 7 steps you should take now to clean up your marketing and get ready for the new year!
(And then maybe collectively decide that we should take better care of them from now on.)
1. Look at Your Numbers
It’s hard to know what you should even be focusing on next year if you don’t know your overall numbers.
I know that “analytics” or “data” can sound like super overwhelming terms, but you can pay attention to only those things that matter to you most.
Are you trying to get more people to buy your services and find you via your website? Then you need to take a look at your overall website traffic. How many people visited on average during a month? How many looked at your services page or is there a blog post you wrote that did well?
If you’re posting on social media with any regularity, then you need to go through your data and see what posts or content got the most engagement. The great thing is that most social platforms will give you easy numbers on your top posts and I love that Instagram will even show you the posts that got the most follows.
Another set of numbers you might not think of – look at your sales. Which month was your highest revenue? Were you doing any special pushes that month that just worked gangbusters? Do you have an offer that’s working well that you can double down on?
The thing with your marketing data is that it’s not just about the numbers on the platform. You need to know what’s leading to sales so that you can continue with what’s working.
Just a quick hint: marketing is about getting more sales and revenue in your business. That’s kind of the whole point.
Knowing what worked (and what didn’t) will help you create a plan for the next year so you know where to focus your time and efforts on what will get you those sales in your business.
2. Update Your Dream Client Information
This is a big one. Are you still talking to the right people?
I see it all the time. You start thinking that you’re going to work with one type of client, but as your business grows and shifts, so does your ideal client. You might not even realize that it’s happened.
Use the data that you just analyzed, look at your followers and client list, and ask yourself if you need to make any adjustments and changes.
Then, sit down and map out a new dream client persona.
When you know who you’re talking to, what problems they’re facing, and what transformation they want when they work with you, your overall marketing strategy will be far more effective.
And before you think – but what if I cut someone out – I’ve got an important reminder for you. When you try to talk to everyone online, you’re often talking to no one.
Just because you create a dream client persona doesn’t mean that you’re going to alienate others who might not quite align. You’ll find that you might just do a better job of capturing the attention of those who are very similar.
3. Review Your Goals
Did you hit the goals you had for 2023? Did you even have set goals for last year?
In my head, I’m extremely organized but in reality, I let things get overwhelming and forget about them.
I’m a weird mix of wanting to be Schmidt but am a lot more like Nick than I’d care to admit.
Even if you’re on the Nick end of the spectrum, you can set goals for yourself and your business.
If you had even a vague notion of where you wanted to end 2023 – like a certain revenue goal – then check in and see if you got there.
Did you hit those goals? Why or why not? And ask yourself – where can you improve next year?
A big question to ask yourself (and this is where that data comes in handy again) – what worked when it came to hitting those goals?
And most important – what didn’t?
You don’t need to be wasting your time on things that just did nothing for you over the last year.
And don’t forget after you check in on your 2023 goals to set new ones for 2024. Now that you have a pretty good idea of who you’re talking to and what worked, it’s going to be easier to set strategic goals for your business and marketing.
4. Clean Up Your Email List
I’m going to tell you to do something a bit counterintuitive if you’re trying to grow your business online, but you might need to delete some people from your email list.
Email marketing is one of the most effective tools in your online marketing, but you have to use it correctly. You also have to be good stewards of the emails on your list, or you could be winding up in Spam folders and never get seen.
How do you stay in the inbox? You clean up your list.
First, when was the last time you emailed your list? If it’s been longer than a couple of months, I want you to commit to sending out a couple of re-engagement emails.
People won’t remember why they ever signed up for your emails if you never actually emailed them, so send out a couple this month. Keep them simple – maybe a short how-to, a wrap-up of things you’ve learned this year, or share your most recent blog post.
You can even take a popular social media post, reformat it, and send it as an email.
If you’ve been emailing your list regularly (think at least once a month), then it might be time to bid adieu to some of those who never open your emails.
Before you do that, most email service providers will allow you to segment your list to those who rarely open and email just them. Simply offer them the chance to confirm that they do indeed want to stay on your list.
If they don’t click the confirmation link or even open the email (and they haven’t opened an email in months), you can archive or delete those contacts.
Don’t forget to delete the ones that bounce and don’t get delivered either.
Of course, you might be wondering why you might delete a large chunk of your list.
Because if they’re not opening your emails, then you don’t need to be spending the money to keep them on your list and market to someone who’s just not the right fit for your business.
Start 2024 with a clean list and work to get more of the right people on it.
5. Run Through Your Website
My own OBM once told me that she never thinks much about her website – she just hopes that it’s up and running.
I have a feeling you’re not unlike Erin.
Have you looked at your website recently?
Here’s what I see happen all too often as businesses grow – their website no longer reflects the business they’re running.
So this month, I want you to run through every page of your website and ask yourself:
- Does your copy match up with what you do now?
- Are all your offers listed?
- Has anything changed in your business?
- When did you blog last?
When I run website audits and start new website projects with clients, often we find a lot of incorrect information that has been living out there on their online hub for months, maybe years.
That means when a referral finds you or that dream client comes from social or your emails, they might be seeing offers for things you don’t even provide anymore.
For this month, just take stock of what’s wrong and then do a quick check through all the links, forms, and any purchasing people can do.
Your website should not only accurately reflect your business, but it should work technically, too.
6. Update Your Social Media Profiles
If you’re like me, you probably worry more about posting new content on social media than you do about what’s on your profile.
That’d be a mistake.
When someone finds your post, especially on a platform like Instagram, they’re often going to click through to your profile and check it out.
How can you ensure those lookers are going to click the follow button?
Make sure your profile picture is recent and looks like you (this is hard for me since I change my hair color way too often) and make sure your bio is accurate for what you do for customers.
Instagram allows you to have more than one link on your profile now, too, so this is a good chance to add some new links or refresh your social links page on your website.
If you have highlights, go through and update those. My lovely social media consultant Ania recommended I have pinned posts instead of highlights, so if you’re like me and find keeping highlights A LOT, that can be a great strategy instead.
7. Plan Your Marketing Strategy for 2024
After you’ve done all the cleanup, it’s time to sit down and plan your marketing strategy for 2024.
How you plan depends a little bit on your business and what kinds of services you sell, but start with your 2024 goals.
What are you trying to accomplish in the next year?
This doesn’t just have to be revenue-related either. One of the goals my business coach and I set for 2024 was for me to take 2 vacations where I’m disconnected.
Then, you just work backward. What needs to happen for you to get there? What’s doable and what might need to be shifted to make that successful?
One of the big things I’m doing this year is sitting down and mapping out everything for the entire year.
When I want to push certain services we offer. Big client projects that take a lot of time. When I want to go on vacation.
Having the big picture helps you break it all down into smaller pieces, social media posts, email campaigns, maybe even setting dates for when you want to have your website updated or try a new marketing strategy altogether.
Another big key to this is to remember that you don’t have to be responsible for everything. When you’re writing out your plan, make sure to note who on your team will be working on what (even if it’s you and a VA right now), so you’re clear on the logistics.
Let’s Grow Your Business in 2024
For your business to grow, your marketing needs to be aligned with your overall objectives.
Marketing is an ongoing process, but by following these seven simple steps, you’ll be prepared to hit the ground running in 2024.
Gain Clarity for Growth
If you want to accelerate your marketing strategy and bring stability to your business in the new year, now is the perfect time to schedule a Leads Growth Strategy workshop with me.
We dive deep into your business, your numbers, and your dream client, and help you set the goals and objectives you need to be successful next year.
Then, we take everything we’ve discussed and put together a marketing plan with the steps you need to take to hit your goals – for the next 12 months.
Gain clarity and get a plan for more leads and growth in your business.
Sign up today at captcoder.com/leads-growth-strategy.
