You’ve spent time crafting your brand. It’s time to get a bigger piece of the audience pie. Here are a few innovative ways to broaden your reach.
It’s a rule of business: The bigger your audience pool, the more chances you get to convert them to customers. Yet widening your brand reach to include new eyes isn’t always easy. Even if you’re engaged in an omnichannel publicity or marketing campaign (which 85 percent of consumers prefer), you have to be strategic.
For instance, do you have a new, barely touched target demographic in mind? Or are you just eager to claim more of your total addressable market (TAM) for your company? Answers to questions like those can help you unlock the “who” so you can move onto the “how.” And the “how” may include some overlooked recommendations and considerations.
Below, we’ll explore some often passed-over ideas that may help you broaden your audience circle.
1. Experiment with untapped ways to boost your social media presence.
Your online corporate presence likely includes being on at least one social media platform. Thinking you have to become active on another one for growth? That’s not necessarily the case. Plenty of organizations only scratch the surface when it comes to maximizing social media.
Take YouTube, for example. It’s the second biggest search engine, and as Aux Mode notes, it hit some serious high notes in 2020. Not only did the platform log 100-plus billion gaming hours, but it paid out $4-plus billion in advertising revenue to global musicians and related companies. Yet few companies are strategically bumping up viewership by concentrating on channel growth.
Channel growth is different from individual video growth, of course. When a video spikes, that’s great. However, you’ll be even more pleased when subscriptions go through the roof. One YouTube gamer grew his subscribers by 616.4 percent in a little more than a year. The growth led to improved content distribution and fresh revenue streams. And it happened without the brand expanding operations to an untested social platform.
TLDR tip: Challenge your team to see opportunities to catch more attention without radically adding to your social media plate.
2. Mix up your content length and see what sings.
Speaking of social, do you feel like engagement has plateaued? If it’s getting harder to lift your number of followers or other stats, your content length could be the issue.
Different audiences prefer different content lengths depending on a variety of factors. These could include the time of day, the channel, and their stage of life. This means that any variable could be the key to getting more buzz from posts, videos, image captures, and even subject lines.
How do you figure out whether a video’s too short or long? Or if your LinkedIn article’s both snackable and compelling? You have to know your audience well and play around. Content Marketing Institute ran a piece about Quartz, a site with incredibly high engagement. Quartz prefers to publish longer pieces based on its deep audience knowledge. This bucks the trend followed by its competitors. It also keeps Quartz growing.
TLDR tip: Sometimes, it’s not what you say but how long you take to say it. When you hit pay dirt, you should see audience engagement and shares.
3. Hook up with a non-competing brand.
Did you know that the Oscar Meyer Weinermobile has joined forces temporarily with Lyft? The mix might seem more stunt than substance. Nevertheless, it’s getting more exposure for both companies.
You don’t have to engage in a partnership that’s quite as flashy or quirky, of course. Still, you may get some interesting traction with audiences you never considered when you think outside your brand. Are there any companies you could work with, even if it’s just for a few campaigns? Maybe even an organization or vendor that’s already a known commodity? Gather your team and brainstorm some novel ideas. Then make a few phone calls.
The only caveat to this suggestion is that your audiences need to have equal appeal. You can’t get an audience boost and leave your partner in the dust. That wouldn’t be fair. Plus, you’ll want to vet the other brand carefully to ensure it’s in alignment with your corporate mission and philosophy.
TLDR tip: Partnering with other brands can help you stretch marketing dollars while still reaching more people. Think outside your branding for unique ways to interconnect with other businesses.
Bigger isn’t always better, but it tends to be in the business world. The more creative you’re willing to be online and offline, the larger your audience is likely to become. And that’s a good start to hitting your most ambitious customer engagement and revenue goals.
