As Christmas and the new year approaches, business activity tends to slow down and it’s easy to feel like there is nothing left to do. But actually, it’s the perfect time to do a marketing audit to refresh your business and get prepared for the year ahead.

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Here’s a growth marketer’s guide to Christmas planning and how you can best support your marketing strategy as we enter 2022.

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Day 1: Checking in on your customers.

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A great way to end the year is by getting feedback from your customers & clients on how you’ve done. Not only is customer listening important to build relationships, but their feedback will also help you optimise your business and marketing strategy for the New Year. When checking in on your clients and customers, consider asking them the following to see how close you are to product-market fit:

• “How disappointed would you be if X brand was not around anymore?”
  • very disappointed
  • somewhat disappointed
  • not disappointed

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• If you score 40% or more on very disappointed then you can be confident that you’re hitting your market with the right product and messaging.

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• Once you’ve collected your data, you can use these customer insights going into 2022 to enhance your brand strategy. For example, using your research to support product feature development or to build use cases.

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Day 2: Audit and review activity for the year.

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As the New Year approaches, it’s best to gather some key stats for your business. Reviewing your activity for the year can give you a clear idea and understanding of what well and what didn’t.

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• Check your website analytics. Tools like Google Analytics can help give you a better picture of how well you are meeting your business goals; which content is performing best and what channels are driving the majority of your traffic.

• As well as your website, it’s important to audit the social channels that you use frequently to see what posts and topics were most engaged with.

• Transform your stats into marketing content: website copy, social posts or even case studies for sales pitches.

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Day 3: Setting your marketing goals for Q1.

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You may already have an idea of your 2022 marketing goals but it’s important to get really granular and break down the targets you need to meet.

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• Establish your monthly marketing goals to easily check whether you are on track to hit your quarterly targets.

• Match your targets against specific seasonal, commercial and festive holidays to better understand upcoming challenges and opportunities. Will people be looking for solutions such as yours during certain holidays in Q1?

• Check your roles and responsibilities, do you have everything covered or need to consider training or freelance support for the upcoming quarter?

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Day 4: Refreshing your SEO.

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There’s never been a better time to optimise your content for SEO. Try out the following steps to ensure your content stays relevant.

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• Refresh your SEO strategy and build a bank of keywords to optimise your content. Use tools such as Ahrefs, Google Keywords Planner or Keyword Surfer.

• Review your top social posts, articles or blog posts of the year to see what topics your audience enjoyed the most to inform your future content.

• Check your links. Optimise your URL to improve website navigation and SEO. Review your in-content links and add in a CTA to check out new relevant content pieces.

Day 5: Plan your New Year’s campaigns.

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In the lead up to 2022, use this moment as a time to create a buzz for your New Year business plans.  The week after Christmas many people are likely to be getting organised and setting intentions

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• Utilise social media. Create New Year themed social posts, share tips and tricks, new business news or do a Q&A to boost your brand awareness.

• For those that are focused on b2b sales, consider using long-form copy in your content strategy as read times often increase during the holiday period.

• Launch a New Year’s special offer. The start of a New Year is all about trying some different, so now is a good chance to promote a new special offer, whether that be a referral scheme, a promotion or a sale.

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Day 6: Review the problems you solve for your customers.

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Your business is always evolving, so spend this time re-evaluating your brand positioning and purpose.

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• Complete an updated Jobs To Be Done framework to re-align yourself with the needs of your customers and the value they gain from your product or service.

• Review your brand positioning by re-evaluating what makes your product or service distinctive in the minds of your target audience. Use the data and learnings from this year to help better inform this process.
• Use this time to do competitor research and see how they position themselves in the market also.

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Day 7: Refresh your knowledge of best practices for social posting.

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Whether your main channels are Linkedin, Instagram or Twitter, you want to make sure that your page is up to date and that you’re using best practices to create content that serves the channel’s algorithms.  

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• Keep an eye on social channel updates. Social channel algorithms and policies are constantly changing so it’s important that you get familiar with new updates to ensure you get maximum reach on your content. Check out this 2021 Linkedin algorithm report.

• Refresh your feed. Are your pinned posts outdated? Do your links still work? Does your description reflect your business at this present time?

• Update your imagery and graphics. Use this time to recharge your previous content with fresh branding and imagery to keep your page looking coherent and professional.

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Day 8: Review your Linkedin connections.

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Linkedin connections are so important when growing your business and your network, as a Linkedin study found that 80% of professionals consider networking important to career success. Over time it’s easy for your connections to become filled with irrelevant profiles or even bots. So start your New Year by refreshing your connections to optimise your network.

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• Reconsider Linkedin connections. When reviewing your connections be sure to ask yourself whether you are connected to the right people to grow your business or whether the connection is relevant to your industry.

• Make use of your connections as a way to build future partnerships and client relations. If you already have your eye on certain individuals you’d like to partner up with in the new year, connect with them now and develop engagement with them over time.

• Linkedin connections are all about quality and quantity so it’s important to have both as this can boost your credibility and make your page more attractive to other profiles, especially if you share quality mutual connections.

Day 9: Identify 5 key trends for the future and spend a day researching these.

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As the year comes to a close, you want to make sure you’re looking ahead and going one step further than just researching current trends. Here are some resourceful ways to search for future trends.

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• Keep up with publications. Find publications that are most relevant to you and keep an eye out for their predictions on future trends. For example, every year the Economist publishes a list of trends to watch out for the upcoming year. Identify the most relevant and build content around them.

• Ask your community, get some insight from your audience by asking them or conducting a survey about their thoughts and hopes for future trends.

• Monitor your competition. Perhaps you have market leaders in your industry who are exploring new technologies or communication channels that will create a trend in the future.

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‍Day 10: Seek out potential partnership opportunities.

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Let’s dance on each other’s dancefloors. As a marketer, it’s important to always be seeking out new opportunities for growth. Use this time as a moment to build a bank of potential collaboration opportunities in the new year.

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• Linkedin. As we discussed previously, Linkedin is great for networking and pursuing potential collaborations with others in your field. Find someone that is non-competitive, that has a similar audience and can bring value to your existing audience. Need some help figuring out if a partnership is the right move for you - check out our partnership scoring sheet.

• Explore new content opportunities with previous collaborations. If there was a partnership that worked well for your business this year then don’t discard it. Previous collaborations are often the most reliable and it’s a great way to build relationships in your industry

• Consider influencer partnerships, there are many different influencers in many different industries - but you already know this. However, it must be done right. Use this opportunity to search for potential influencer collaboration and vet the influencers you would like to build a future partnership with.

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Day 11: Identify customers to ask for a testimonial or case study

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With all the projects and achievements that you’ve made this year. It’s important to document your wins and incorporate your success stories into your marketing.

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• Get in contact with your customers. If there is a specific client that you know loves your product or service, or someone who’s extended their gratitude as a customer - reach out to them. This can make for a great testimonial that can be used on your website or as a social media post.

• Use video testimonials. Once you’ve identified your customer, try using video testimonial software like loom to help you create eye-catching and personal testimonial video content for your marketing channels.

• Ask your audience. It’s best to get as much feedback as you can from customers so try reaching out and ask them to give their testimonials.

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Day 12: Check-in on your pricing and packaging

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During this period, it’s a great time to reflect on the progress of your business, the experience that you’ve gained and the values and skills you now offer. Perhaps think about checking in on your pricing and packaging and seeing if that is still reflective of the product or service that your business offers.

• Review your pricing. It should reflect the value of your business. If you have scaled in the past year and have upgraded your product or service, consider updating your pricing also.

• Check your packages. Your business may be offering a lot more than initially described in your package information so make sure that it’s updated - update potential customers as they may not know your full offerings.

• Pitch new ideas. Now that you’ve updated your pricing and packaging, it’s a good idea to think about potential future offerings and services your business could provide in the future.

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Want to learn more about expert growth marketing strategies? Check out our recent post on how to maximise press opportunities and boost brand awareness.

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