Category: Marketing

Are you torn between using long-form or short-form videos for your small business marketing campaign? Well, you are not alone. Despite 89% of consumers wanting to see more brand videos, there is no one-size-fits-all answer about the ideal video length.

However, this should not deter you from creating an effective video strategy. In 2023, people watched an average of 17 videos per day, highlighting the influence of video content in today’s digital landscape.

Both short-form and long-form videos offer unique advantages and come with their set of challenges. Join me as I uncover the benefits and limitations of each video format to help you make informed marketing decisions.

What are Short-Form Videos?

Short videos typically range from 30 seconds to less than 10 minutes long. They are popular on social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube.

Short-form videos deliver brief yet engaging messages that quickly capture the viewer’s attention. Here are some popular types of short-form video content.

• TikTok Challenges
• Instagram Reels
• Snapchat Stories
• YouTube Shorts
• Twitter Video Ads

Benefits of Short-Form Videos

A previously cited report shows that 39% of marketers find short-form videos, ranging from 30-60 seconds long, more successful. The same study reports that 44% of customers prefer watching a short video to learn about a brand’s offerings.

So, it is evident that short-form videos have their benefits. Let’s take a closer look at some of them.

Attention-Grabbing 

Short-form videos capture attention quickly, making them ideal for the fast-scrolling nature of social media platforms. Your audience is more likely to watch them in their entirety compared to longer content.

Cost-Effective Production 

Creating short-form videos requires less time and resources compared to longer videos. As a small business owner with a limited budget, using short-form videos can be cost-effective. 

Increased Engagement

Short-form videos engage viewers due to their crisp and concise nature. This results in more likes, comments, and shares that boost your content’s visibility and increase brand awareness. 

Integrating short-form videos into your influencer marketing campaigns can further amplify your reach to new and diverse audiences. 

Highly Shareable

Short videos are highly shareable. This makes it more likely for your viewers to share them, increasing their virality. 

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There are multiple benefits of adding video to your website including increased engagement, improved SEO, and enhanced user experience.

Limitations of Short-Form Videos

While short-form videos offer many advantages in content marketing, they…

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You ask the head of marketing how the team is doing and get a giant thumbs up.

“Our MQLs are up!”

“Website conversion rates are at an all-time high!”

“Email click rates have never been this good!”

But when you ask the head of sales the same question, you get the response that echoes across sales desks worldwide — the leads from marketing suck. 

If you’re in this boat, you’re not alone. The issue of “leads from marketing suck” is a common situation in most organizations. In a HubSpot survey, only 9.1% of salespeople said leads they received from marketing were of very high quality.

Why do sales teams hate marketing-generated leads? And how can marketers help their sales peers fall in love with their leads? 

Let’s dive into the answers to these questions. Then, I’ll give you my secret lead gen kung-fu to ensure your sales team loves their marketing leads. 

Marketers Must Take Ownership

“I’ve hit the lead goal. If sales can’t close them, it’s their problem.”

How many times have you heard one of your marketers say something like this? When your teams are heavily siloed, it’s not hard to see how they get to this mindset — after all, if your marketing metrics look strong, they’ve done their part, right?

Not necessarily. 

The job of a marketer is not to drive traffic or even leads. The job of the marketer is to create messaging and offers that lead to revenue. Marketing is not a 100-meter sprint — it’s a relay race. The marketing team runs the first leg and hands the baton to sales to sprint to the finish.

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To make leads valuable beyond the vanity metric of watching your MQLs tick up, you need to segment and nurture them. Screen the leads to see if they meet the parameters of your ideal customer profile. If yes, nurture them to find out how close their intent is to a sale. Only then should you pass the leads to sales. 

Lead Quality Control is a Bitter Pill that Works

Tighter quality control might reduce your overall MQLs. Still,it will ensure only the relevant leads go to sales, which is a win for your team and your organization.

This shift will require a mindset shift for your marketing team: instead of living and dying by the sheer number of MQLs, you need to create a collaborative culture between sales and marketing. Reinforce that “strong” marketing metrics that result in poor leads going to sales aren’t really strong at all.  

When you foster this culture of collaboration and accountability, it will be easier for the marketing team to receive feedback from sales about lead quality without getting defensive. 

Remember, the sales team is only holding marketing accountable so the entire organization can achieve the right results. It’s not sales vs marketing — it’s sales and marketing working…

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As we march closer to the 2024 U.S. presidential election, CMOs and marketing leaders need to prepare for a significant shift in the digital advertising landscape. Election years have always posed unique challenges for advertisers, but the growing dominance of digital media has made the impact more profound than ever before.

In this article, we’ll explore the key factors that will shape the advertising environment in the coming months and provide actionable insights to help you navigate these turbulent waters.

The Digital Battleground

The rise of cord-cutting and the shift towards digital media consumption have fundamentally altered the advertising landscape in recent years. As traditional TV viewership declines, political campaigns have had to adapt their strategies to reach voters where they are spending their time: on digital platforms.

According to a recent report by eMarketer, the number of cord-cutters in the U.S. is expected to reach 65.1 million by the end of 2023, representing a 6.9% increase from 2022. This trend is projected to continue, with the number of cord-cutters reaching 72.2 million by 2025.

Moreover, a survey conducted by Pew Research Center in 2023 found that 62% of U.S. adults do not have a cable or satellite TV subscription, up from 61% in 2022 and 50% in 2019. This data further underscores the accelerating shift away from traditional TV and towards streaming and digital media platforms.

As these trends continue, political advertisers will have no choice but to follow their audiences to digital channels. In the 2022 midterm elections, digital ad spending by political campaigns reached $1.2 billion, a 50% increase from the 2018 midterms. With the 2024 presidential election on the horizon, this figure is expected to grow exponentially, as campaigns compete for the attention of an increasingly digital-first electorate.

For brands and advertisers, this means that the competition for digital ad space will be fiercer than ever before. As political ad spending continues to migrate to platforms like Meta, YouTube, and connected TV, the cost of advertising will likely surge, making it more challenging for non-political advertisers to reach their target audiences.

To navigate this complex and constantly evolving landscape, CMOs and their teams will need to be proactive, data-driven, and willing to experiment with new strategies and channels. By staying ahead of the curve and adapting to the changing media consumption habits of their audiences, brands can position themselves for success in the face of the electoral advertising onslaught.

Rising Costs and Limited Inventory

As political advertisers flood the digital market, the cost of advertising is expected to skyrocket. CPMs (cost per thousand impressions) will likely experience a steady climb throughout the year, with significant spikes anticipated in May, as college students come home from school and become more engaged in political conversations, and around major campaign events like presidential debates.

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Let’s face it—it does no good to build a funnel and spend zero time optimizing for conversion. That’s a no-brainer, right?

But, how many of you are working closely with your head of sales to ensure that the opportunities you help generate actually convert into paying clients? Ultimately, if you want to be seen as a successful marketer, you’re going to have to show that marketing is driving sales.

Now, the challenge is that in today’s commoditized world, sales teams often struggle to stand out from the crowd. As a result, closed won rates plummet, and organizations find it challenging to demonstrate to prospects how their total value proposition is the clear winner against all of the other competitors.

To make matters worse, many organizations rely on “super hero” sales people or even the founder to close deals. This approach is not sustainable or scalable. You can’t build a successful sales team if you’re constantly relying on a select few individuals to bring in all of the business.

The solution to this problem is a sales process that follows a standardized approach while also creating clear differentiation with prospects at the same time. By implementing a systematic sales process, you can scale your sales efforts beyond just the founders and “super heroes.” This will lead to higher closed won rates and higher gross profit margins, as you’ll be able to win at premium prices.

The benefits of a systematic sales process are clear. You’ll be able to scale the process beyond founders and “super heroes,” achieve higher closed won rates, and enjoy higher gross profit margins as you’re now able to win at premium prices.

When I implemented a systematic sales process in my former agency, I was able to consistently have 60-70% closed won rates, even when I had zero involvement in deals. This is the power of a well-designed sales process. In fact, I standardized this process and called it the Systematic Sales Process™.

So, what does a Systematic Sales Process™ look like? Here are the five stages:

Stage 1: Evaluation

In this stage, you’ll have a 30-45 minute call with your prospect. The goal of this call is to point your prospect in the right direction—it’s not to “make a sale.” The reason we want to take this approach is that many prospects are likely not a good fit for your firm, so let’s not assume that every first call is an “opportunity.” That’s why we call this call the “Evaluation”—you want to evaluate whether or not you can help your prospect, whether or not they align with your requirements, and whether or not they are ready to move forward. We call this “two-way qualification.”

It’s not uncommon to reach the middle-to-end of the call and determine that your prospect, in fact, needs someone or something else other than you!

IMPORTANT: You should…

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Before we dive into the second way to assume power in your business, let’s revisit Part 1. 

Who informs your marketing strategy? 

YOU, with your carefully curated strategy informed by data and deep knowledge of your brand and audience? Or any of the 3 Cs below? 

• Competitors: Their advertising and digital presence and seemingly never-ending budgets consume the landscape.
• Colleagues: Their tried-and-true proven tactics or lessons learned.
• Customers: Their calls, requests, and ideas. 

Considering any of the above is not bad, in fact, it can be very wise! However, listening quickly becomes devastating if it lends to their running our business or marketing department. 

It’s time we move from defense to offense, sitting in the driver’s seat rather than allowing any of the 3 Cs to control. 

It is one thing to learn from and entirely another to be controlled by. 

In Part 1, we explored how knowing what we want is critical to regaining power.

1) Knowing what you want protects the bottom line.

2) Knowing what you want protects you from the 3 Cs. 

3) Knowing what you want protects you from running on auto-pilot.

You can read Part 1 here; in the meantime, let’s dive in! 

How to Regain Control of Your Business: Knowing Who You Are

Vertical alignment is a favorite concept of mine, coined over the last two years throughout my personal journey of knowing self. 

Consider the diagram below.

Vertical alignment is the state of internal being centered with who you are at your core. 

Horizontal alignment is the state of external doing engaged with the world around you.

In a state of vertical alignment, your business operates from its core center, predicated on its mission, values, and brand. It is authentic and confident and cuts through the noise because it is entirely unique from every competitor in the market. 

From this vertical alignment, your business is positioned for horizontal alignment to fulfill the integrity of its intended services, instituted processes, and promised results. 

A strong brand is not only differentiated in the market by its vertical alignment but delivers consistently and reliably in terms of its products, offerings, and services and also in terms of the customer experience by its horizontal alignment. 

Let’s examine what knowing who you are looks like in application, as well as some habits to implement with your team to strengthen vertical alignment. 

1) Knowing who You are Protects You from Horizontal Voices. 

The strength of “Who We Are” predicates the ability to maintain vertical alignment when something threatens your stability. When a colleague proposes a tactic that is not aligned with your values. When the customer comes calling with ideas that will knock you off course as bandwidth is limited or the budget is tight. 

I was on a call with a gal from my Mastermind when I mentioned a…

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Did you know there are about 200 Facebook Ad metrics? That’s way too much to keep your eyes on. A smarter approach is to focus on a few metrics and ignore the rest until you need them. But how do you know which ones are really worth your constant attention? Let’s find out…

Every Facebook Advertiser Struggles with Metrics

You are not the only one who is lost in the maze of Facebook ad metrics. Every day, my team at MeasurementMarketing.io answers dozens of questions from business owners and agencies about this topic.

• I read somewhere that metric X is important but is that true?
• Why would I even track metric Y?
• Can I really ignore metric Z? 

These kinds of questions are important, but they are often asked at the wrong moment. 

The key to understanding which Facebook Ad metrics matter the most to you, is to see them as possible answers to questions you have about Facebook campaigns.

Let’s dive in…

Are my Facebook Campaigns Profitable?

Paid ads are like an investment. You pour money into ads and hope that you will get more money back. 

But like any other investment, there is a difference between hope and reality. 

One metric in Facebook Ads Manager will partially answer whether your ads are performing as you had hoped.

Return On Ad Spend (ROAS)

This metric tells you how much money you get back from every dollar you spent on Facebook ads. 

It is calculated with the following formula:

Revenue / Ad spend

For example: (your revenue) $1,000 / $500 (spent on ads) = ROAS 2

That means that for every dollar you spent on Facebook ads, the platform  generated $2 revenue. 

All that sounds great, but keep the following in mind:

• Revenue and profit are different things. So, you will have to do your own calculations to find out if your Facebook ads are actually making profit for you.
• To calculate the real Return On Investment (ROI) of Facebook paid campaigns, you need to include costs for setting up and managing your ads. 
• This metric is especially useful to ecommerce stores because they sell directly and know for which price. For service providers, ROAS is harder to calculate because it is hard to assign a price for someone who, for example, signs up to a newsletter. 
• Facebook knows a lot about you, but you need to assign values to conversions. I cover that a bit further below. 

How Much do My Facebook Ads Cost?

Running ads costs money. To keep track of how much, you can use over 60 Facebook Ad metrics. Here are some interesting ones that can give you valuable insights.

Amount Spent

This metric tells you how much money you have already spent on a Facebook ad or campaign. 

Although you can set daily budgets to…

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