Can a company really be “everywhere” at once? Or should they?
Many companies believe that their marketing team should try and be everywhere and do everything. Be on all the social media channels, they say! Do all of the different media types, they say! Let’s do a podcast, a video series, or as Michael Scott once profoundly said, “a thingamajig, or a whose-whatse or a whatchamicalit”. That’s what you’re going to feel like trying to be everywhere at once. What trying to “be everywhere” actually reveals is that they don’t have a clear understanding of their target. The lie that it’s a good idea to “be everywhere” is more pronounced these days due to the current idea that we can “follow the user” across all of their many touchpoints across the web, finding them where they are engaging. This is nice in theory, but in reality, it doesn’t work that way. I mean, you can try, and you might get lucky, but it is addressing the wrong fundamental question.
The right question is, what does the marketer have control over?
The marketer has control over a few things:
- What characteristics of a potential target can you choose to engage with on a given channel for advertising and communication purposes
- How to expand your reach via an existing channel online
- What type of communication is happening on a given channel (and thus, how your message might resonate or fall flat)
- And lastly, and most importantly, they understand the context in which a conversation could happen and when it is most likely to happen (or if they don’t know, they can find out with a simple test)
It is more important to select the right targeting criteria and present the right message consistently over time. As I explain what the marketer DOES have control over, you can know what we actually CAN control. Instead of trying to “be everywhere”, a good marketer should help a business understand clearly what your ideal audience wants and also, where (i.e. one or two places/platforms max) it makes the most sense to share the message with them.
The 5 C’s of Marketing
I teach an adjunct class at the University of Texas at Dallas to eager marketing students, where I talk about the 5 C’s of marketing, which I think is the information age’s formula for a good marketing mix. Reminder that the pre-internet marketing mix was the 4 p’s, product, price, promotion, and place. PS, does anyone actually follow this anymore?! The 5 C’s of marketing are: create content, context, connection, community, and consistency.
The last C in this marketing mix is important. Your potential audience wants to know that they can depend on you to share your message in your defined voice in the right context…CONSISTENTLY. This means, you should be choosing the channel that works for you based on that context, i.e. based on their preferred media consumption habits. And then, be consistent at that.
Learning what your voice is, the tone, the feel, the visual imagery, takes trial and error that turns into clarity and focus. It might take a few iterations before you get it right. But this process will be very clarifying, for those that persist while listening to audience feedback.
Conclusion: Find Your Voice
So, you can’t REALLY follow them around the web. You can’t be everywhere. But you can notate a place (I’m not talking about your website, I’m talking about other places where people congregate on the web) that your audience might be engaging and speak to them with an authentic voice that is true to you. And this is the bigger challenge, to find your voice in a channel where others are talking. The goal then is to be authentic in communicating well what you offer in the audience’s preferred language rather than in internal speak.
When you get the message and voice right, you won’t need to be everywhere. The audience will come and find you. If you set it up correctly, they will take it everywhere else on your behalf AND bring their friends TO YOU. That is the real gem of a good digital marketing program. The good marketer will then know how to help you capitalize on those that have arrived to your website and help you get them into your pipeline.
Contact us to schedule your 15 minute consultation so we can learn more about your business.