Every company needs an effective marketing strategy in its business plan. This increases brand awareness and drives new customers to their products and services. However, creating a clear marketing strategy can be a hassle when you’re just getting started.
The most successful marketing strategies consider every aspect of the marketing process. This includes a thorough understanding of your target audience and marketing methods. It also includes key brand messaging, budget, and more.
This article highlights some of the best marketing strategy examples from other companies. The brands mentioned may not be in the same niche or size as yours. However, you can use inspiration from another brand's marketing strategy to align with your business.
What is a marketing strategy?
A marketing strategy is a marketing tool to promote and sell a company's products or services. It defines how a company grows through reaching, converting, and retaining potential customers.
The best marketing strategies will define:
What business outcomes the company will achieve
What marketing activities the company is going to do, when, and how
Why does the company need to do these marketing activities vs. others
How the company will achieve those results
Who the company is targeting
Who is responsible for performing each activity — internal marketing teams, agencies, freelancers…
How the company will measure its marketing campaign success
Budget
An effective marketing strategy will consider digital marketing trends, including content marketing, social media marketing, search engines, and offline marketing.
It will also include a balance of paid, owned, and earned media. Paid media includes paid search ads like PPC and digital display banner ads. Owned media includes content, social media, email, and other types of online marketing. Earned media includes PR, referral marketing, referral programs, and link building. Read up more in this advertisement for business post.
The beauty about marketing is that many of the principles can be applied across all verticals. That means somethings that are done well for a major consumer brand can be applied to HVAC marketing or lawyer marketing.
9 Successful Marketing Strategy Examples
Bounty: Surprising the target audience
One marketing strategy example that uses guerrilla marketing comes from the paper towel brand Bounty. It involved using unconventional ways of making your brand known. They placed life-sized "spills” throughout downtown New York. These included knocked-over cups of coffee and giant melting ice creams. The “spills” were big enough to capture people’s attention and create buzz about their product.
Bounty then placed a stack of paper towels next to the spills, creating relevance and brand visibility with a lasting impression.
The lesson: Don't be afraid to get your creative juices flowing. Find unconventional ways to connect with your audience. Highlight their problem and the solution your company offers.
Myfix Cycles: Retargeting campaigns
Running retargeting campaigns can convert lost customers and increase sales. They can also activate dormant users, or upsell to existing customers.
Myfix Cycles partnered with WebRunner Media to run a retargeting campaign on Facebook. They installed a tracking code known as Facebook Pixel on their website.
The retargeting campaign reached three different demographics:
Visitors to the site in the past 14 days
People who abandoned their online store carts (added items but didn’t complete the purchase)
Customers who purchased in the past 180 days
Myfix Cycles then displayed ads to their targets, providing users with a discount on the items in their abandoned carts. Myfix Cycles even offered free shipping to ensure they reach their marketing goals.
The lesson: Investing in retargeting campaigns is worth it. They may help to reduce customer acquisition costs.
GoPro: Leveraging user-generated content
GoPro has achieved great success with a user-generated content marketing strategy. This particular brand is popular with adrenaline junkies, and they make it simple for consumers to create and share videos.
GoPro’s video editing program places branding elements on each recording. The brand then shares these on their social accounts. This creates a ripple effect and encourages other users to create and share their videos.
However, GoPro doesn’t stop there. The GoPro Awards program rewards owners of the best content. Prizes include cash prizes, gears, shoutouts, and reshares on their social media platforms.
These effective marketing techniques lead to loyal customers at very little cost.
The lesson: Take advantage of user-generated content. It can help to convert customers into advocates for your brand.
Warby Parker: Monetizing the brand story
Warby Parker is an eyewear company that sells premium-quality glasses at affordable prices. Their approach to attracting customers was to humanize their brand story.
Their brand story talks about the brand's owner, who had less than 20/20 vision yet couldn't afford glasses. The company was created so people can access high-quality glasses at affordable prices. They even donate a pair of glasses to the needy for every pair of glasses they sell.
This brand’s message resonated with many people suffering from the same issue. This marketing tactic increases brand awareness and customer loyalty.
The lesson: Don't be afraid to share your brand's story. People are more likely to engage with a human brand than a faceless one.
Sephora: Loyalty programs
Loyalty programs are a sure-fire way for maximizing customer retention. Sephora has a tiered approach and generous rewards program. The rewards keep customers interested and they buy more products. It also works as a great way to increase word-of-mouth marketing.
Loyalty programs can be combined with a referral program or monthly subscription for other types of engagement.
The lesson: Have a members-only program so your best customers feel valued.
Coca-Cola: Championing a cause
According to Edelman, 56% of consumers feel that many brands use social causes as a marketing ploy. However, Coca-Cola made a breakthrough with their "Happiness Campaign."
The company launched "The Happiness Truck" in Brazil. A red truck roamed the streets, distributing free merchandise to people. They later released a 30-second commercial about the campaign on YouTube. The "sharing is caring" theme increased global sales.
The lesson: Align your brand with a cause that you care about or one that is relevant to your brand. Make a genuine effort to champion that cause and get your customers involved in the journey.
Frito-Lay: Be original and fun
Frito Lay is a subsidiary of the marketing powerhouse, PepsiCo, and includes products like Doritos, Cheetos, and Lays.
You may have noticed Lays features new flavors pretty regularly.
That’s because the company runs contests like "Do Us a Flavor." People submit a list of flavors and ingredients they would like to see Lays produce. Lays chooses three of the best flavors, puts them in stores, and rewards the winning entrants with cash prizes.
The lesson: Include customers in your decision-making process.
Taco Bell: Know your audience
Knowing your audience and their preferences is important.
For Taco Bell, a huge part of its customer base is college students living in dorms without TVs. So, they need alternatives to traditional TV advertising: mobile devices, social media, and more.
Taco Bell decided to intensify its social media marketing campaigns. Their Twitter handle, @tacobell, includes witty and edgy content. They also post hilarious responses to comments on social platforms about them.
This is smart because around 54% of social media users use social media to research brands and products. About 89% of them will make a purchase. Check out the beginners guide to social media for more information.
The lesson: The more you know about your audience, their preferences, and where to reach them, the better for you.
Heineken: Event marketing
Heineken, the popular beer brand, mostly focuses their ad campaigns on millennial males.
To reach this audience, they sponsor sporting events like the UEFA Champions League, as well as the summer festival Coachella. Event marketing is a great way to connect with core customers out in the world.
The lesson: Always look for sponsorship opportunities. Choose the ones that resonate with your audience and strengthen your brand image.
Examples of Marketing Strategies FAQ
What is an example of a marketing strategy?
For a good example of a marketing strategy, look at Twitch: one of the most popular social networks today. Despite its popularity, not many people know about Twitch. That’s because their marketing is highly targeted to a key demographic.
Twitch broadcasts video games live. This specific niche lets them establish a unique relationship with users.
What are the 5 Ps of marketing?
The 5 P’s of marketing are Product, Price, Place, Promotion, and People. They are all key components of quality marketing efforts.
Product - What you're trying to sell.
Price - Marketing budget, profit margins, etc.
Place - Channels and platforms you'll use to reach people
Promotion - What you are trying to achieve: building social media presence, increasing brand perception, etc.
People - Your target audience and what drives them
What are the types of marketing strategies?
There are several different types of marketing strategies. Some of the main ones include:
Social media marketing strategy
Email marketing strategy
Inbound marketing strategy
Content marketing strategy
Editorial strategy
Marketing communication strategy
Digital marketing strategy
Internal marketing strategy
Public relations strategy
Search engine optimization strategy
What is the difference between marketing strategies, marketing plans, and marketing tactics?
A business’s marketing plan involves every aspect of your marketing initiatives. It includes every campaign you plan to run over a set period, the project goals, and market research. A marketing strategy takes a closer look at a few specific parts of the marketing plan. Marketing plans and marketing strategies deal with what you're going to do. Meanwhile, marketing tactics deal with how you're going to do it.
Conclusion
There are as many marketing strategies as there are products and services in the world. How you choose to market yourself should be highly strategic, unique, and targeted to your audience.
Look to your most successful campaigns. What worked well? Where could you improve? Then use that knowledge to build marketing campaigns that are stronger than ever before.
