I've been working in content marketing for 13 years.
I've also been writing about email marketing, SEO, influencer marketing, and social media marketing during those 13 years.
I've interviewed 100s of experts, reviewed data/reports, written case studies, and analyzed top trends.
I've learned a ton by writing about marketing. But, now I'm officially in the marketing hot seat as I grow my own DTC business (www.readingwithrik. com).
I'm implementing what I've learned to grow my own little (for now) business, and it's not easy.
Here are some of my takeaways so far:
1. Product quality is king.
A big marketing budget can't make up for a crappy product. Similarly, if you have an excellent product (we do, BTW), marketing is a lot easier.
2. You need a distribution plan.
You can have the best content in the world, but if you don't have a distribution plan, no one will see it.
For 13 years, my responsibility has been to create high-quality content and then pass it on to another team member for distribution.
Nailing distribution is a current challenge for me, and I'm drinking from the firehose over here.
3. Audience channel before omnichannel.
I will never stop preaching omnichannel marketing. Customers shop across several touchpoints before making a purchasing decision, and it's critical to meet them with cohesive experiences.
That being said, omnichannel marketing is expensive and time-consuming.
If you are a small DTC business, it makes more sense to invest in the platform where your primary audience spends *most* of their time and grow from there.
4. Ask your audience & track your audience.
Your marketing budget is precious when you're a small, family-owned business.
The best way to maximize ad spend is to learn as much about your audience as you can BEFORE you dump money into campaigns.
But also, don't take audience feedback at face value. You'll also want to set up an attribution platform so you can see what your audience actually responds to.
We're still in the audience research process, but we will use Triple Whale 🐳 for attribution.
5. Website copy and platform count.
One of the best things we've done so far is migrating our old site to Shopify, redesigning the site, and rewriting the copy.
Given, we didn't have a budget to hire a huge marketing firm to do the design for us. What we did have on our family team was a rocket scientist (for real), a designer, a writer, and a founder.
Thankfully, Shopify is fairly intuitive. With our combined skills, we've been able to create a website that's pretty dang good.
I'll report back with more findings as I continue to grow. In the meantime, check out Reading With RIK.