5 Marketing Questions To Ask Yourself in 2020

A new year is here and with it comes a new decade! The beginning of a new year is a perfect opportunity to establish clear marketing goals for your business. (Of course it’s also a perfect opportunity to make cliche comments about “2020 vision.”) As you sit down to realign your marketing goals and growth plan for your business in 2020, ask yourselves these questions.

What did you learn in 2019?

When done in the right way, looking back can lead to moving forward. Reflect on the last year and notice which marketing efforts were most effective. What marketing strategies yielded the greatest return on investment? What did you learn from any setbacks you experienced?

Answering these questions can help prepare you to maximize results in 2020. Understanding your successes and setbacks last year will provide great clarity going into this new year. 

What are your goals this year?

Another very important question has to do with goals. Without a goal, you’ll be firing aimlessly and success will be very improbable. 

Spend some time thinking about what marketing goals you want to set in 2020. Your marketing goals could be monetary in nature. How much revenue will your business bring in? They could also be engagement goals. How many new followers will your business attract on social media? How many new sales leads will you have by the end of the year?

These goals can help you determine what strategies, platforms and marketing projects you prioritize throughout the year. This brings us to the next question you should ask yourself.

What strategies and tools will you use?

There is an exhaustive number of platforms, tools, and strategies available to marketers today. It can be overwhelming to find a straightforward strategy when you are faced with so many decisions. It’s generally better to be really good at one thing than to be okay at many things. That’s why it’s important to find a simple marketing strategy and toolset that doesn’t overcomplicate your marketing efforts. Will you use a customer relations management software? Decide on one and learn to use it to its full potential rather than using multiple tools to do one job.

Here are some specific elements to determine when developing your marketing toolset for the new year:

• Advertising
• Website
• Customer Relations Manager (CRM)
• Content marketing (blog)

Deciding which tools and strategies you will use to reach your customers will save you a lot of wasted time and resources.

Who will you connect with?

This question has to do with your audience. Who do you want to reach this year? How will you connect with them? Does your business need a bunch of new customers? Do you need to find some business partners to provide your current customers with a better experience? Determining your audience and other connections you need to make will help you direct your marketing efforts to the right people. Knowing your target customer is a fundamental marketing best practice.

How will you build strong habits?

A common theme of “new year’s resolutions” is building strong habits and developing best practices for life. Similarly, you should be entering 2020 with a list of marketing best practices and habits that you intend to stick to. How often will you communicate with your customers through email or social media? What will your web content schedule look like? How will you incorporate great SEO into your marketing efforts on a regular basis?

Finding good rhythms for all these things are important elements in a productive marketing plan. Building habits and establishing standard best practices will help you direct your efforts more effectively and avoid aimlessly wasting your precious time and resources.

Plans are nothing…

…but planning is everything. When Dwight Eisenhower said this during World War II, he was referring to the necessity of flexibility and adaptability when laying out plans. Asking yourself questions like the ones above at the beginning of the year doesn’t mean you should be inflexible or expect that you can properly predict and prepare for all your business adventures in 2020. Marketing isn’t always an exact science and it requires constant innovation and flexibility. However, starting the new year with your eyes wide open will benefit your business greatly as you seek to receive the greatest return on your marketing investments.

If you are ready to grow your business in 2020 but feel confident in your toolset, partner with IX Publishing. Our web design and inbound marketing services may be just what you need to make 2020 an awesome year for your business! Tell us about your project!