Things you should STOP doing for greater marketing success

• Holding onto the past

Yes, you might not be the biggest fan of the latest marketing strategies, especially if you’re lost when it comes to anything online. But there’s no point in holding onto the things you learnt when you started out in the job, because it’s unlikely to get you anywhere these days. If you’re confused about how to implement the latest marketing techniques, there are plenty of free online courses and tutorials to help you out.

• Being antisocial

Heads up: you can’t work in marketing if you’re antisocial. The best way to appeal to an audience is often to speak to them directly, whether that be an arranged phone call, or even random approaches in the street. The best at their jobs are those that are making and answering phone calls all day, speaking to potential and current clients or customers and bringing a personal touch to the business.

• Acting inhuman

Have you ever read an email or website that lacks personality and seems a bit, well, computerized? If you’re not really sure what I mean by this, you should probably check you’re not doing it yourself. Remember the readers of your website and other online & offline advertising methods are real people, who expect to be spoken to like real people- whether that be in real life or through text- when it comes to business-to-customer communication. Writing in a robotic, computerized style will be noticed by your potential customers, and not for the right reasons.

• Forgetting who your target audience is

One of the most important things about marketing is that you know exactly who you’re appealing to, and your marketing content should clearly reflect this. For example, if your target audience is young people, you should use social media to your advantage, or if your target audience is the elderly, you should consider a more offline approach. If you forget your target audience, your marketing strategies might lead you off in the wrong direction, and your target audience may not even be seeing your business.

• Getting comfortable

Many see feeling comfortable in your business as a good sign. It must mean you’re financially okay, and you’re enjoying work in general, right? This isn’t always the case; being comfortable can mean that you’re not pushing yourself enough or thinking outside the box. You should always feel a little out of your comfort zone in your business, in order to develop and progress forwards.

• Using automation poorly

Automation can be a really useful tool for your business if you use it correctly. Whether you automate emails, text messages or anything else, it enables you to send out messages to your customers at designated times, or politely respond to a customer’s enquiry before anybody from your team replies. That said, automation can be irrelevant, or even annoying, to potential customers it it’s not done properly. Make sure you do your research before you decide to use automation as a marketing strategy.