The end of the year is the time to look back on all you’ve done over the past 12 months. It’s also time to make a plan for the upcoming year. Did you know that what you’ve already done can inform what you plan to do? There’s no part of your business where this is more true than your marketing strategy.

Here are 5 ways to use what you’ve done to plan your future marketing strategy:

1. Set SMART Goals

Before you do anything else, you should set a goal for your marketing strategy for the next year. These goals should be SMART goals. SMART here stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely.

Say you want to gain 1,000 new followers on social media over the next year. That would be considered a SMART goal. That is because there is a measurable goal with 1,000 followers in a set period of time that equals a year. 

2. Decide What Metrics to Track

Any data-driven marketer knows that there are a lot of different metrics that can be tracked. It can be challenging to know where to begin. For most marketing-related goals, organic metrics are the most relevant to track as they show how well your content performs on various platforms. 

The metrics you choose to track depend on your goals. If your goal is related to your website or blog content, web page traffic metrics show how well your content performs. They also tell you how website visitors respond to your content, including how many people viewed your website, to begin with. 

Key web page traffic metrics to track include:

• Page Views 
• Traffic Sources
• Bounce Rate 
• Referrals
• Keyword Ranking

It may seem like a lot of data to track, but most of these metrics can be found in reports from Google Analytics and other similar programs. 

3. Look at Historical Data

Once you’ve set a goal, use historical data to determine the likelihood of your reaching that goal. For example, look at how many new followers you gain per month on social media. Then, consider the types of content that attract these new followers to your profiles.  

If you don’t have historical data as you’re a new business owner, no worries. Instead of your own data, look at what others in your industry have done through industry benchmark data. Although your own data may differ, this information can give you an idea of what to expect.

4. Know Your Visitors

Those who visit your website or social media profiles should be at the center of everything you do regarding your marketing strategy. You need to know who your visitors are and where they’re coming from. With this information, you can better tailor your content to their needs. 

The best way to get to know your website or social media profile visitors is to create a buyer persona. A buyer persona is a fictional representation of your ideal customer. For example, if you run a daycare center, your ideal customer would be a young parent looking for child care. 

As for knowing where visitors come from, consider looking at traffic sources to your website on programs like Google Analytics. By analyzing this data, you can see how visitors find your content online. There are many places visitors could come from.

Examples of traffic sources include:

• Paid Search Advertisements 
• Organic Search Engine Results
• Email Marketing
• Social Media

Using this information, you can decide where to promote your content. If most people who follow your social media profiles do so after discovering them through your email newsletter, consider improving your email marketing to gain more followers. To do this, create and send more engaging email newsletters to drive more traffic to your social media pages. 

5. Update Your Content

Along with helping you rank in search engines, your content is what brings visitors to your website or social media pages. Consider refreshing your past content by adding new information. 

You can also recreate it in a new format, like creating a vlog, or video blog, instead of writing a blog. This could also potentially extend your reach as the content could be shared in a new format to a new audience. 

Looking Back to Plan Ahead?

With the new year around the corner, you may be starting to think about what you’re going to do next with your marketing. If you’ve looked at your past performance and have no idea how to connect it to your future marketing efforts, we can help. Contact Links Web Design for a free consultation to get started today!

Links Web Design is a Marketing Agency in Bangor, ME, and Fruitland Park, FL.