7 Strategies for More Creative Marketing

Marketing campaigns are all about getting your audience's attention and keeping it for as long as possible. Creative campaigns — ones that engage your audience on an emotional level, connect with a shared value, or make people LOL — tend to have better results.

Sure, you want to get noticed, but you also want to help customers get to know you better, gain trust in your company, and ultimately buy from you or sign up for a service. Do this by demonstrating that you and your business are different and you’re providing a solution they didn't know they needed.

But you need to go beyond the basics. You've got to be willing to take risks, put yourself out there and be a little "un"-ordinary. If you're looking for strategies for more creative marketing, you're in the right place.

We're here to help you with these seven strategies for more creative marketing:

1. Create a marketing persona for your product or service.

Before you start on any type of marketing campaign, create a persona for your product or service. This is an imaginary person who represents the types of customers you want to reach with your campaign. A persona is usually built around demographics and interests, but it also incorporates their pain points and goals.

2. Know the end goal of your campaign.

It seems pretty obvious, but it can be easy to lose sight of your campaign goal as you get caught up in making great content. If you want people to become customers, make sure everything in your campaign leads them there. If they’re already customers, then maybe you want them to share your message with their friends. Whatever it is, stay focused on it.

Every good marketing campaign has an objective in mind. It could be increasing sales, attracting new leads or building brand awareness. If you're not sure what your goal is, how will you ever know if the campaign was successful?

3. Have clear direction before you start.

This one is key. You’ll never get anywhere without knowing from the very beginning what you need. As content creators, we often run into clients who have a vague idea of what they want to accomplish but haven’t thought it all the way through or considered all the steps that would be involved.

We always start with helping them identify and article the desire or need that drove them to the idea of the campaign in the first place. What issue or problem are you trying to solve? This involves having clear goals and guidelines so you know where your campaigns are going, how they should look when they get there, and how you’re going to evaluate them.

Once you know what you want to achieve with your campaign and what need or goal you are addressing, write out a clear plan for how you're going to execute it and measure its success. By establishing direction when you start, it'll be easier for you to stick to an idea and see it through from start to finish.

4. Remember: Less is more.

Sometimes, fewer words are better.

This also applies to marketing tactics, platforms, graphics and ad frequency. Start small and keep it creatively achievable so you don’t break the budget.

5. Think visually.

It doesn’t matter whether you're writing an email or crafting an Instagram post — it’s all about visuals nowadays!

We process images 60,000 times faster than text, so it’s no wonder visuals play such an important role in social media feeds these days. You can use this to your advantage by incorporating quality, engaging visuals into your content marketing strategy.

Make sure your graphics are true to your product, your company and your brand. Don’t misrepresent your products or use too many stock images. Invest in quality product photos and use them to create an engaging window for your customers to shop through.

6. Create an irresistible offer.

A good offer doesn't necessarily mean it's cheap — it could be a bundle of products or services or a unique experience that's worth paying more for.

What is going to make your customers want to keep coming back for more? What will make them want to buy from you again and again, even if they could get it cheaper somewhere else?

Your customers should feel like they're getting something worthwhile. If your product or service is very specialized, make sure you're clear about what makes it valuable and why customers should care about it instead of choosing something else.

7. Take risks!

A lot of businesses are afraid to be different or get caught falling flat on their face. But when you step outside the box and get creative, great things can happen for your business.

The creative process requires risk-taking, spontaneity and having the confidence to try that new thing. But you don’t have to do it all at once. You can apply it in baby steps across multiple areas of your marketing plan:

• Invest in a website redesign to optimize your SEO and drive organic search traffic.

• Start creating video content for your Instagram Reels, SnapChat Stories or TikTok.

• Go Live on your Facebook feed during inventory restock day.

• Split your ad buy budget up and test two or three versions of a post to see what sticks.

• Opt for 3-colour printing instead of two on your print ads.

You can use data to back up your creative decisions. If your tracking metrics reward you with an increase in engagement or sales, then it was worth the risk! If not, then you know for next time where to (or not) spend your resources.

Think about some of the most creative campaigns you’ve seen — campaigns that made you laugh, cry, or stop in your tracks. Sometimes, just appreciating the entertainment value of an ad can be enough of an incentive to drive a sale.

Old Spice’s “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like” campaign, California Milk Processors' '90s campaign “Got Milk? Mustache” and Metro Trains' “Dumb Ways to Die” all spoke to me. And, although I'll likely never ride the train in Melbourne or buy milk from California, my husband smells like Old Spice and I see a milk mustache on Wolverine every time I watch X-Men.

Enough said.