Best Marketing Hack That Works Every Time
When you dive into marketing for your wedding or event business, it can feel like a lot. It can get really overwhelming quickly, especially when marketing isn’t your “thing.” Maybe you’re a wedding photographer, stationery designer, florist, wedding planner, caterer. No matter who you are, when you don’t specialize in marketing, what to do, let alone how to actually do it, can feel scary. Really scary.
I’m sharing my biggest and best marketing hack that works for every business in every niche every single time. If you’re struggling with what to do, when to do it or where to do it, when it comes to promoting your business, start with this one thing: Your marketing “why.” Ask yourself why you’re doing a particular marketing effort. What’s the goal? What’s the point?
Just doing this one simple thing of asking yourself why you’re doing something is single the best marketing hack that will change your life and your business. Let me explain why getting crystal clear on your marketing “why” is so important to success.
What Is Marketing?
When I say marketing, I’m talking about promoting your business so that you can get more customers and clients. Marketing, to me, refers to the actions that we take to let the world know about our business in order to get more business.
Marketing can include everything from posting on social media to attending a conference for referrals from other businesses to redesigning your website so that your contact form is easier to use. All of these actions, or marketing efforts, are done so that you can ultimately sustain and (hopefully!) grow your business.
Why Though?
If you want to avoid the confusion and frustration when it comes to marketing, you simply need to ask yourself why. Before you get on Instagram, for example, ask yourself why. Why am I using this platform? What is the goal of using it? Do I want to appeal to new and different potential customers who might be on Instagram? Do I want a way to quickly and easily show my custom work? Do I want to show the personality behind the brand?
There are so many reasons for why we’re doing a certain marketing thing, maybe it’s to get more traffic to your website or to meet new peers to trade referrals to. Your why will be different than the why of your competitor. And, your why will be different between marketing options. Your why for being on Instagram will be different than your why for being on Pinterest.
And, if you’re using a particular marketing platform already and you don’t know why, I suggest you figure it out soon. Maybe you just hoped on years ago, because everyone else was doing it. That’s OK, but now is as good of a time as any to step back and figure out why you will continue to choose to use this platform or marketing option.
Why Why Matters
Asking yourself why matters for so many reasons when it comes to marketing. But, one of the reasons I love asking why first is because it helps to inform your strategies and your tactics. What do to, how many times to post or what photos to use is the end result of asking yourself why.
When you just start with the tactics, such as posting certain times of take or using certain music or photo types, you’re just posting and praying. You don’t know whether it’s going to work or not, which is not an efficient use of your time or money.
When you start with why, it can help you decide what to do next. If one of your why’s for being on Instagram, for example, is to be able to show the behind the scenes of your business, then you might want to post in your Stories every time you're at an event and then save them in the Highlights. If one of your why’s for being on Pinterest, for example, is to increase your website traffic, then you’re going to want to make sure that you’re pinning high quality content consistently
Every Effort, Every Time
Ask yourself why for every single marketing thing that you do. Why am I doing this? Why am I spending money or time on this marketing effort? Take the time to really understand how a platform works, maybe even use it yourself for a little bit. You don’t have to use it forever, but it might be beneficial for you to experience something as a user before implementing it into your marketing.
In addition to using it yourself, try to think about how your potential customers who interact with a marketing effort. What questions would they ask? Why would they be using it in the first place? When you know how your ideal customers use something, you can target your marketing language and content to attract them as well.
Remember that each platform works differently and has the capability of delivering different results, so it’s important that you have a why for each each platform.
For example, if you’re on Instagram to get more clicks to your website to improve your website conversation rate, you’ll never be succeessul, because Instagram doesn’t work like that. Instagram doesn’t send traffic to your webiste as well as other platforms. So asking yourself why when it comes to Instagram, will reveal that if clicks to your website is your goal, perhaps you should look into another platform like Pinterest or email marketing instead.
Getting crystal clear on your why will help you hone in on what you need to do and it will inform your tactics on a micro level. But, if you don’t starts out at the top with why you’re even doing something in the first place, you’ll never know what success looks like. How do you know if something is working if you don’t know the goal? If you don’t know why, you’ll never know if you’ve achieved your desired result.
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If you’re a creative small business serving the wedding and event industry - such as a wedding planner, photographer, entertainer, DJ, rental company, florist, invitation designer and more - and you need help with your online marketing, content creation, or your Pinterest account, please send me an email at info@juliannesmith.com or check out my done-for-you and training services for wedding pros. I’d love to work with you to maximize your creativity and the overwhelm and work with the clients that you want to work with!
For more tips and advice on the wedding industry, be sure to check out past blog posts and sign up for my weekly emails where I’ll send you all kinds of wedding business education nuggets in 100 words or less!