What are the best practices and trends for marketing strategy in your industry?

I've found that the most powerful strategic audits start by ensuring you're working and aligned behind the right context. If you don't have clarity that your UVP is up-to-date and still valid and powerful, you don't have context by which to evaluate if any of the actions or activities are driving towards the right alignment. Start with the critical marketing & business basics first i.e. your value proposition, your addressable market segmentation and your targeting. Is your business aligned and able to articulate your 3C's and do you have clear objectives on how you're impacting the marketing funnel? Once you have alignment on these key items, then you have the view by which you can measure and evaluate how well your tactics working.

When we do these audits, one of the first things you have to look at is your public-facing collateral or assets. This is typically your website in 99% of the cases. And there are three main things that we always look at when examining the website, the landing page, and the sales funnel. Here is the first one. 1. Does it look great on mobile and is it fast? According to Google, 85% of all traffic is from mobile devices. And the Mobile version of the site needs to load in less than 3 seconds or (preferably 2 seconds). For every 8/10ths of a second slower, you will lose 8% of your sales. Just by speeding up mobile load speeds, it is possible to increase sales by more than 20% and drop ad costs by more than 50%.

The starting point of every marketing audit should be the status of the relationships that you are building. Everything in business is about relationships. What are your goals with building relationships with your customers, employees, investors, community at large, and how are you doing with achieving those goals? Every living entity (your customers, employees, investors, company etc.) is an adaptive environment and the same rules of science of evolution apply to building and influencing (growing) those relationships. This is based on a triadic structure: (1) shared vision, (2) growth strategy to add value and (3) complementation strategy (shared values, trust, common ground). Evaluating the health of these relationships is step 1.

Here are some B2B ecommerce marketing best practices: Offer bulk ordering: B2B buyers need to buy in bulk to sustain their business operations. Increase brand recognition: This helps ensure that potential customers are aware of a company and its products or services. Optimize your customer catalog: Make the ordering process as intuitive and user-friendly as possible. Target audience: Knowing your ideal audience is crucial when launching an eCommerce business.

Don't forget to look 'inward' as well. Plan ways to assess how the marketing elements that you are auditing are coming to life - from your marketing strategy, to specific tactics. This could unlock opportunities for improvement.

After working with hundreds of clients on strategy reviews over the years, I firmly believe that brand leadership has to roll up their sleeves and do a lot of this work themselves. Too often, the "audit" becomes "interview key stakeholders and let them share their POV." But real evaluation isn't a monologue. Outside facilitation helps, but you can't outsource the real work. It involves collaboration, unpacking the key issues together, debate, and agreeing on the path forward.

Audits, whatever their focus (marketing strategy, digital marketing, MOPs), are only useful if conducted by a credible third-party. The right consulting or agency partner can bring to bear a collective expertise in what's working in the marketplace from dozens of companies similar to yours. Any internal audit, by comparison, is subject to a myriad of biases, politics, and institutional barriers.

Embrace the digital-first approach! In our industry, the trend is clear: online is where the magic happens. From harnessing big data for laser-focused targeting to leveraging social media for engaging storytelling, the digital landscape is fertile ground for innovative marketing. Don't just follow the crowd; use data analytics to understand your unique audience. Tailor your strategy with AI and machine learning for that cutting-edge advantage. Remember, in today's fast-paced market, staying ahead means being adaptive, data-savvy, and digitally fluent!

Trends and best practices should be an initial reference point for your marketing strategy, but not the primary focus. You want to build upon the status quo in your industry and market by finding the sweet spot between your customer's interests and your perspective as a company. Speaking to what your audience cares about is how you ensure your marketing is useful, and your point of view is what makes it memorable. Don't stress about creating "thought leadership", and instead work on one campaign at a time that builds upon the last, improving as you go.

Most smaller businesses don’t have the time or staff to conduct this kind of exercise and they shouldn’t do it without an external set of eyes. An outsider can see the real picture better than you can, so hire someone to conduct this audit with or for you. When I lead my clients through this exercise (I hate saying audit—no one wants to be audited)—the one thing I repeatedly hear is “I didn’t know/see it/consider it that way”.