Create Engaging Campaigns
A marketing campaign is a series of promotional content that shares the same theme designed to fulfill a specific business goal or objective. The following steps provide an easy guide on how to create engaging campaigns to grab the attention of your target audience.
Click on the different phases below to create an engaging marketing campaign!
In this stage, you want to take the time to define what it exactly is you are trying to accomplish for this campaign.
Goal/Objective
What are you trying to achieve from this campaign? Some examples could be: Increase Sales, Brand Awareness, Leads, Website Hits, Product Knowledge, PR Control, Engagements, ect. In a given campaign, you may have one goal/objective, or you may have many. You simply want to ensure you have a clear understanding of what you are trying to accomplish.
Target
Describe your target segment in this section. Please note, there may be multiple segments depending on the client. For each segment, create a buyer’s persona that includes:
- Demographics (age, m/f, geography, ect)
- What are they passionate about?
- What do they get excited about?
- What causes are important to them?
- What do they enjoy doing?
- What are their hobbies?
- Who do they follow on Social Media?
- What types of groups/communities do they desire to be a part of?
- What self-image are they trying to portray?
- What are their Goals and Ambitions? What do they want in life?
- What are the biggest problems and challenges they face (Related to your product as well as problems in general)?
- What solutions are they currently using to solve these problems?
- What is preventing them from buying your product?
- What does a typical day look like for them?
Want/Need/Problem
What is the tangible identified want, need, desire or problem this campaign will focus on?
Competitors
How is your Target currently fulfilling this want, need, desire, or problem? Who are your key competitors? What solutions do they provide your target segment?
Solution
What is the solution/product/brand this campaign will focus on? How does this solution solve the target’s problems better than the competition?
Brand
In one sentence, describe the company’s brand. What is their logo, what are their colors, what fonts to they use, what images are brand triggers?
Budget
What is the budget of the campaign?
A campaign theme is a central, recurring idea or message that connects individual ads, which are reinforced in the form of different types of content throughout various platforms. A campaign theme is the vehicle that helps you achieve the campaign objective for the designated target segment(s).
- Select the type of campaign type(s) that will best achieve the objective/goal
Look at the campaign objective as well as your defined target. What type of campaign will help you fulfill that objective for the defined target? In a campaign, you can use one campaign type or multiple types. Use whatever will help you best achieve that objective. Below is a list of some of the most common campaign types
- IMC (Integrated Marketing Communication)
- A creative campaign that uses various platforms to help a target recognize a want, need, or problem exists. This campaign is good for branding and product awareness.
- Perception Campaign
- This campaign helps marketers change the perception a target may have on a brand or product. It is often used in PR, political campaigns, brands that need a perception change.
- Inbound Marketing
- This campaign is for target’s who are actively seeking to solve a problem or achieve a goal, in which you will provide them with expert information to guide them through the lead nurturing process as they become a paying customer. This campaign is ideal to position yourself as an expert in a given area.
- Social Media
- Create engaging content across various social media platforms. This campaign is to create brand engagement and loyalty.
- Web / Mobile Application
- If your client is looking to create a website, landing page, or mobile app.
- One off’s
- This is simply a solo piece of content that stands alone and is not connected to a campaign. This could be a single online video or a one-off blog.
- Live Events
- Live events can create a personal engagement with your brand. They can be extravagant such as concerts, live promos, galas or they can be as simple as an in-store display or point of sale (pos) positioning.
If you find yourself stuck as to what direction you should go, click on the Brainstorming Questions section below for some ideas. Details on how to create each type of campaign can be found in the Content (Tactics) dropdown below.
2. Create your campaign theme
Now create a central message or idea that you want to focus on for this campaign. The theme should be a creative message that resonates with your target segment(s) while helping you achieve your goal/objective. This theme should be creative, and one that will attract and engage your target.
Once again, feel free to refer to the Brainstorming Questions section below for some ideas if you need it.
3. Theme Branding
You want to ensure the visual aesthetics of the campaign are consistent across all content. You also want to ensure your campaign branding is in line with the overall company branding. Define the following to establish your theme branding:
- Theme colors
- Theme font
- Theme tagline (Optional for Inbound Campaigns)
- Hashtag (Optional for Inbound Campaigns)
- Common Images (Optional for Inbound Campaigns)
Now that you have defined your campaign, identified what campaigns types will help you achieve your goals/objectives, and created a campaign theme to engage your target, the next step is to outline the various content you will develop for the campaign. The type of content you will use will vary based on campaign type. Click on the campaign type below for a detailed overview of what type of content is best served in each campaign. Then, for each campaign type you plan on using, create a detailed list of all of the different content you will need to create.
- IMC (Integrated Marketing Communication)
- Perception Campaign (PR, Political, Perception Change)
- Inbound Marketing
- Social Media
- Web / Mobile Application
- One off’s (Solo piece of content not connected to a campaign)
- Live Events (concert, live promo, POS, photoshoot, function dinner)
What KPI’s/Metrics will you use to determine the success of your campaign overall? What platform(s) will you use to measure these KPI’s? This should fit in directly with the goal/objective of the campaign presented in the Define section.
The following questions will help you gain some creative campaign ideas. These questions were created by using the 4 human motivational needs.
Belonging
- How can my brand make people feel they are a part of something bigger than themselves?
- Is there some sort of movement you can associate your brand with (Political, Social, Charitable, ect)?
- What is your target passionate about? Is there a movement your brand can create around this?
- What are your target’s interests? Can you make your target feel they are a part of a special group/clique that connects these interests with your brand?
- What type of content can your brand share that revolves around these movements?
- Is there a particular community your target is longing to be a part of (family, friends, social group, professional group, sports team, ect)?
- How can your brand help them feel as if they are a part of this group?
- Or, how can your brand actually help them be a part of this group?
- What type of content can your share to make them feel as if they are a part of this group?
- How can my brand connect and bring people together?
- Can your brand create a live event?
- What type of experiences can you create as people engage your brand with others?
- How can your brand foster Group Communications?
- How can your brand share content the portrays people coming together?
Individualistic / Unique
- How does your target want others to see them; what image are they seeking to portray? What content can you post to help your target portray this image? (Ex: Lamborghini – Fast, Gucci – Luxury, Apple – Innovation, Disney – Imagination)
- How can your brand enhance the status of your target?
- What recognition or validation is your target seeking? How can you give them this validation?
- What is your target passionate about? How can your brand be a tool of self-expression for what your target is passionate about?
- How can your brand help your target feel accomplished?
- How can you recognize their accomplishments?
- What is your target trying to accomplish in the future? How can your brand actually help your target accomplish something they desire to do?
- What problems are they facing? How can you resonate with these problems? How can you help them overcome these problems?
- Is there any type of content you can co-create with your target? Verhoef, Beckers, and Van Doorn (2013)
- What are the interests and hobbies of your audience? What type of content can you provide that is in line with these preferences? Common Ground / Entertaining (Berger, 2014)
- What does your target have strong opinions on? What type of content can you create that is in line with these opinions?
- How can you help your target relive memorable events?
- How can you help the audience relive nostalgic experiences
Altruistic
- How can your brand help others in need?
- What groups are your target market compassionate about? How can you work with your target so together you can help this group?
- How can your brand assist your target in helping others in need?
Curiosity
- What does your target need to know in order to accomplish their goals, but do not know?
- What is a fascinating fact about something your target is interested in, that they do not know?
- How can you make people know that they do not know something; how can you highlight a gap in someone’s knowledge
- Tease readers to make readers think they do not know what you are about to tell them
- Tests revealed that most people assume they know more than they actually do, so you definitely want to make sure you’re not losing readers who “think” they know what you’re going to tell them.
- How can you challenge common beliefs2 so the audience is intrigued to hear what you have to say?
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