By Nick Nelson

We’re more than a year into the pandemic, and things are looking up. Vaccines are rapidly rolling out, states are dialing back restrictions, and a massive government stimulus is about to be distributed across the country. There is a hope, if not an expectation, that the economy will get on a roll this summer.

Nothing can be taken for granted, but the outlook is bright. Numerous industries may experience rises in demand during the months ahead. This is a good time for companies serving those industries to be positioning themselves with smart growth strategies and ambitious marketing plans.

With that in mind, here are some ideas and recommendations to springboard your B2B marketing into the summer months:

Spring Ahead: 4 Tips to Drive Fast Marketing Growth

#1. Let your raving fans guide you forward

During the economic slowdown of the past year, it was common for organizations to look inward, immersing themselves in customer research and refocusing on relationships.

Taking a curious approach to understanding your best customers, and what they value most in your product, can really pay off.

In a recent writeup at The Next Web on surprising growth strategies for 2021, one suggestion from Andrea Hak is to tap into engaged and loyal users. She points to the example of SYLVAIN, a strategy and design consultancy hired by Spotify to help fend off an advance from Apple’s streaming music platform.

Hak shares this insight from SYLVAIN’s Managing Director, Sherry (Sherzad) Rahmatian, who argues that a narrow focus on acquiring new users and expanding to new audience segments is misguided:

“Power users and super fans often hold the secret sauce for a brand’s future growth. What we see is that smaller brands actually have an advantage in that they don’t have to dilute their marketing for the masses.

Instead, they can focus on decoding what exactly makes people obsess over them, and use that to continuously iterate a better and better experience. This will naturally filter out to a wider audience, without losing what made it special.”

Hak later notes that, “By the end of 2020, Spotify increased its number of premium subscribers by 29%, bringing it to a whopping 124 million.”

The size of your company and its customer base will dictate the extent you’re able to lean into this strategy. But most marketing departments today have some method of gauging the loyalty and strength of their customer relationships. Identify and study those most avid fans. Center your marketing on that which drives their affinity.

[bctt tweet=”“Identify and study those most avid fans. Center your marketing on that which drives their affinity.” — Nick Nelson @NickNelsonMN” username=”toprank”]

#2. Strategize around trust, purpose and empathy

It might be time to rethink your marketing messages of the past. More than ever, brands in the new era need to ensure they are aligning and resonating with their most valuable audiences, and developing connections that move beyond the traditional problem-solution framework.

In a recent study from Iterable, …read more

Source:: Top Rank Blog