Say No To FOMO Marketing

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Often, when a new client comes to us for marketing help, they are overwhelmed by the scope of possibilities and in particular, the social media landscape. Of course, we help them to understand that not every idea is applicable to their business. “But what about x social channel? We see everyone doing it now,” they’ll often retort.

The scope of marketing software and social media channels is indeed vast and overwhelming. But in reality, not everything is right for your business needs. Just because you see GoPro doing some very cool thing on a social media channel does not mean it will yield the same results for you or even that the social channel is applicable to your audience… especially if you’re a B2B company. Marketing strategy built from the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is naive at best, and irresponsible at worst.

Instead of looking around at what everyone else is doing and thinking “We need to be there, too,” step back. Ask yourself these four things before you kick off your marketing brainstorm, and ensure that your strategy makes sense for your needs and isn’t born out of FOMO:

  1. Start with your business goals – marketing is not an island unto itself. It’s there to support the business and help roll out the red carpet for sales. What are the overarching business goals that marketing is supporting?
  2. Analyze the competition – ok, so we said don’t fret over what everyone is doing, but definitely check out what your competition is doing and more importantly, if it seems to be working. Learn from their mistakes so you can avoid making your own.
  3. Understand your customers – in fact, ask them where they hang out online. Where do they prefer to consume content? The answers for a B2C company are likely much different than a B2B company. THIS IS ALL THAT MATTERS – that you’re reaching the right audience, not every audience.
  4. Analyze your resources – what is the size of your marketing team? How many minds do you have to brainstorm great ideas with? How many bodies do you have to execute the work? What is your budget? These questions alone should demonstrate how not all marketing is created equal. Ensure that your strategy and social media efforts are of reasonable proportion to your resources. It’s much worse to start a marketing campaign and fail to execute well because you tried to do too much, vs. taking on smaller efforts that are executed flawlessly.

Starting with these four simple questions can help your marketing team to keep the eye on the prize and not get fearful that they aren’t doing the latest cool thing. Marketing trends come and go. Trust your expertise in knowing your customers and prospects and communicating with them where, when and how they want to communicate and consume content. If they start to demonstrate a change in social channels, you can begin to explore.