2023 is almost over. It’s time to start thinking about your 2024 marketing and PR strategies.
The current economic climate is still in flux and the possibility of a recession remains a possibility. Now is not the time to pull back on PR and marketing efforts. Now is the time for intelligent promotion. Get smart and strategic, so you still meet your goals.
The more you know about your customers, clients, employees, and competitors, the better your planning will be. You need to understand your potential clients’ mindset and craft a business strategy that provides what they need and want. Find gaps and threats you would otherwise not have known about. In-depth insights can uncover opportunities that allow you to thrive in a tough economy.
These PR and marketing trends can help you thrive in 2024.
Embrace AI
A lot has changed in this arena this year – not the least of it the introduction of AI.
Generative AI services like ChatGPT can be incredibly helpful for research and drafting content. The trick to getting good content from an AI service is to learn how to write excellent prompts.
Always edit and put your own voice on a piece that’s created by AI. Never use it straight from AI. Optimized AI content wins every time.
TIP: Talk to ChatGPT as though it were a real person or co-worker. Give it an identity to write from, a tone of voice to use, and enough context about the topic so that you get a great response back.
Example: As a nutrition expert, write an informational 600-word article about why women over 35 need to eat a healthy diet that will help improve their health. Use subheads and bullet points. Use a friendly, informal tone of voice.
Brand Visibility in 2024
“The only thing I’d really be thinking about is, can I get my brand name next to more mentions of the words and phrases I want to be associated with all around the web.” Rand Fishkin.
For example, if you are the CRM software space, is your brand mentioned in articles about new CRM features or comparisons of CRM systems? What are people saying about your brand when discussing CRM systems on social media?
Do you show up in Wikipedia, Reddit, X, LinkedIn, ChatGPT, relevant blogs and podcasts when people are looking for words and phrases related to your product or service?
Discover your current Brand Visibility Score.
Audience Analysis
Knowing as much as you can about your audience has always been the key to success. In the past it has taken hours of grinding hard work, combing through surveys, interviews, research, and news material to come up with a guesstimate of what this audience cares about.
With audience tracking and analysis you can gather all kinds of data and discover the true sources of influence for an audience.
- Who is in your audience?
- Where are they on social?
- Who are they connected to?
- Who do they follow?
- What hashtags are popular right now?
- What podcasts are they listening to?
- What YouTube channels do they subscribe to?
When you have this data at your fingertips, and you have current information as it changes, you can use this to drive strategy: what stories to tell, what images to create, where to pitch those stories, and where to post your content.
The Need for a Content Audit
A recent update from Google stated that any unhelpful content reduces your chances of being seen in the searches for relevant words and phrases related to your brand. They specifically highlighted that this is not just for new content. Any content on a site that is seen to be low quality or unhelpful can damage your chances of visibility.
The most important factor is, does this content help your audience in some way? Does it answer a question, give them directions, or make their lives easier? It might be as simple finding the news they need to read each week and saving them the time of searching for those gems of knowledge.
Do an audit of all your content online and see if there are items that should be updated or edited, or even removed.
TIP: When witting content that will be indexed online, refer to the Google Quality Guidelines
Value with Analytics
In this digital age it is possible to track everything. And in the current climate, it’s vital to keep your finger on the pulse of your digital PR and marketing campaigns. Don’t wait till the end to discover that it didn’t work. Set measurable goals and start tracking right away. Course-correct if you are not making headway and reaching your milestones. Performance tracking will show which campaigns work and which ones need to be changed. In a recent Meritus Media survey, learning analytics and how to track results was the number two skill PR people wanted to learn. Now would be a perfect time to do that.
If you need assistance incorporating these trends into your 2024 planning, give us a call. 888 243 3470
