3 Tasks to Top Your 2019 Marketing To-Do List

Business owners in 2019 have much more on their plate for marketing than those even just five years ago. Not only are you responsible for growing and nurturing email lists, supporting lead generation and providing relevant content for buyers at any point in their buyer journey, but you now also have to be an expert in SEO, digital and social media ads, social media management, digital crisis management and so much more.

While it’s exciting to have so many ways to connect with customers online, it can also be overwhelming to manage them all and stay focused on what really moves the needle.

As an owner, you are spread especially thin as you’re not only responsible for elevating the brand name as whole, but also being sure that franchisees in your system are taking advantage of digital opportunities to help them rise above local competitors.

A new year brings a clean slate to our to-do lists, so before you start jumping in and getting back into the same digital routine 2018 brought, consider prioritizing these 3 tasks to the top of your 2019 to-do list.

1. Let Influencers be your Content Creators

Content creation is critical to a successful digital marketing campaign and no one does it better than influencers! With so much to do as a business owner, utilizing influencers as engaging third party validators to create content while increasing awareness and digital traffic is a win-win situation.

A staggering 94 percent of brands who have used influencer marketing have found it to be effective, so effective that it has shown to deliver a 11x higher ROI than other traditional forms of digital marketing.

Today’s social media consumers digest 300 feet of content each day. That’s higher than the Statue of Liberty! It’s imperative that the content we present is delivering value and is compelling enough to stop a thumb from scrolling.

2. Diversify your Social Media Presence and Strategy

The basics to being successful on social media aren’t changing for 2019. You still need to engage with followers and offer exciting content, but this year is the time to push the boundaries on norms. It’s time to try new strategies and maybe venture to new platforms to really stand out to customers.

Lisa Fong, a marketing lead for Pinterest, recently shared during a speech that 50 percent of all web traffic comes from Pinterest. That’s a pretty staggering number considering lots of brands don’t have a presence, organic or paid, on the platform. The beginning of the year is a great time to review what platforms you are and aren’t on and fill in the missing pieces.

A great way to see what platforms are worth while is to take a deep dive into the in-app analytics that social platforms offer. Looking at your engagement numbers and follower data and comparing it to what your competitors are generating is a great way to prioritize your social efforts.

Additionally, be sure your franchise network is taking advantage of free tools like bitly to monitor traffic and use this data to determine the kind of content your followers are interested in.

3. Invest in SEO

I know you’re thinking SEO is digital 101, so why should it top your 2019 list? But, is investing your time in SEO a regular task on your digital marketing to-do list? When was the last time you made any updates?

With all the continual changes introduced by Google, SEO can’t be something you invest in once a year. It has to be a continual effort to be sure you are ranking. If not, your brand isn’t maximizing the very foundation of your digital efforts. After all, if your pages aren’t being found than all the awesome content creation isn’t really worth much, right?

A key foundation for your SEO strategy is to always keep in mind that Google’s priority is to answer queries. Over the years they have done a good job of selecting the most valuable information to searchers and are constantly weeding out those trying to beat the system. Be sure the content you as a franchisor, and your franchisees, are creating is answering real questions from the customers that are searching for you.

Obviously this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to digital marketing, but these three steps can help you begin moving the needle forward and put you a couple steps ahead of competitors to start the year.