Skip to content
Key Takeaways
- Choose marketing platforms based on where your ideal clients are and how they find businesses like yours.
- Marketing goes beyond social media. Your website, Google, AI search, email marketing, referrals and networking all have a role to play.
- Test one new platform at a time, set measurable goals and give your activities enough time to produce meaningful results.
- Measure the quality of your connections, enquiries and business opportunities, rather than focusing solely on followers and engagement.
- Review your marketing platforms regularly. What didn’t work a few years ago might be worth trying again as your ideal clients’ behaviour changes
If you’re hearing that you must be doing all the socials, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, YouTube and whatever else is being recommended this week, and you’re feeling overwhelmed, give yourself a break.
You really don’t need to be everywhere.
And with so many marketing platforms available, it’s worth spending some time working out which ones are going to help you connect with your ideal clients and achieve your marketing goals.
Why?
Because you really only need to focus on where your ideal clients are.
And your ideal clients probably aren’t using all those platforms to find businesses like yours. They’re more likely to be using a few different places to research, connect with and choose the businesses they want to work with.
For example, someone might spend plenty of time scrolling Instagram, but when they need a bookkeeper, they search Google, check a few websites and ask another business owner for a recommendation.
That’s an important distinction when you’re deciding where to spend your marketing time and money.
It’s also worth remembering that marketing platforms go well beyond social media. Your website, Google Business Profile, email marketing, industry publications, networking groups and even local sponsorships can all play a role in reaching your ideal clients.
And now we’ve got AI search to think about too.
People are using tools such as ChatGPT and Google’s AI search features to research products, services and businesses. They might ask for recommendations, compare service providers or look for answers to questions before they decide who to contact.
So your website content, online business information and the places your business appears online are all worth paying attention to.
The best thing you can do is focus your time and energy on the platforms that make sense for your ideal clients and your business. You’ll get much more value from doing a few things well than spreading yourself across platforms simply because you think you should be there.
If you’re unsure about who your ideal clients are, this article will help.
Testing
How do you know where your ideal clients are?
Start with a little research.
Ask your existing clients how they found you, particularly those you’d love to have more of. Look at where your enquiries are coming from and whether there are any common patterns.
And don’t just ask where someone first heard about your business. Find out what they did before contacting you.
They may have been referred by someone they know, then visited your website, checked your Google reviews and had a look at your LinkedIn profile.
All those platforms contributed to their decision.
Once you’ve got an idea of where your ideal clients might be, you can start testing and measuring.
I recommend focusing on one new platform at a time, particularly if you’re already busy managing other marketing activities. That way, you’ve got a better chance of understanding what’s working.
For example, if you wanted to know whether Instagram was a suitable marketing platform for your business, you could:
- Identify what you want to achieve. This might be increased awareness of your business, more website visits, enquiries, bookings or sales. Be specific about what success would look like.
- Develop an Instagram content plan. Plan content that your ideal clients will find useful, interesting or entertaining. Include a mix of posts, Reels and Stories that suit your business and the people you’re trying to reach.
- Get active. Publish content consistently, find businesses and people who are relevant to your ideal clients, engage with their content and participate in conversations. And when I say engage, I mean genuinely. Nobody appreciates someone turning up in their comments just to sell something.
- Make it easy for people to take the next step. Check that your profile explains what your business does, includes relevant contact information and gives people an easy way to visit your website or make an enquiry.
- Track what happens. Keep a record of your activity and results so you can see whether your efforts are helping you achieve your goals.
It’s also important to remember that when you post, you don’t want to be selling stuff all the time.
The 80/20 rule is still a useful guide. Around 80% of your content can focus on things your ideal clients might value, while 20% can directly promote your products or services.
You don’t have to stick rigidly to those percentages. The point is to give people reasons to engage with your business beyond asking them to buy something.
And depending on your goals, a combination of organic content and paid advertising might be worth testing.
Measuring
After the first month, look at the results.
Are you achieving the goals you set? Is your activity making a difference to your business’s presence? Are you getting more engagement from people who could become ideal clients or recommend your services to others?
If your following is increasing, have a look at who those followers are. Are they people who might genuinely be interested in your business?
Because having 1,000 new followers is lovely, but if none of them are likely to engage your services or recommend you to someone who will, what have you really achieved?
And there’s something else worth remembering.
A month of activity is a good starting point for measuring, but it’s usually too early to decide whether a marketing platform is right for your business.
I’d generally recommend giving a new social media platform a few months of consistent activity before making any major decisions. Some marketing activities, particularly search engine optimisation and building business relationships, can take longer to produce measurable results.
You’ll also need to measure different platforms differently.
If you’re testing Instagram, you might look at profile visits, engagement from relevant people, website clicks and enquiries.
If you’re focusing on Google, you could look at how people are finding your business through search, what they’re doing when they visit your website and how many enquiries you’re receiving.
If you’re using LinkedIn to develop professional relationships, you might measure new connections with relevant people, conversations, introductions and enquiries.
And if you’re using email marketing, you could measure the actions people take after receiving your emails, including website visits, bookings and enquiries.
The important thing is to measure the results against what you wanted that platform to achieve.
You also need to recognise that people don’t necessarily make decisions after seeing one piece of marketing.
Someone might read your blog, follow you on social media, receive your newsletter and then contact you six months later.
That’s why it’s useful to look at the contribution your different marketing activities are making, rather than relying on one number to tell you whether something is working.
And please, keep asking people how they found your business. It’s one of the simplest ways to gather useful marketing information.
Letting go
Here at Starfish Marketing, we trialled Instagram when it was first starting to gain popularity.
And we found that the people who started following us were mostly other marketers from all over the globe.
So, while this was nice for the ego, those people weren’t our ideal clients.
Rather than continuing to spend time on a platform that wasn’t helping us connect with the businesses we wanted to work with, we stopped using Instagram and focused our marketing efforts elsewhere.
But a couple of years later, something interesting started happening.
I noticed that more and more of my ideal clients were following my personal Instagram account. The people I wanted to connect with were now using the platform, which gave me a pretty good reason to reconsider Instagram for Starfish Marketing.
So, I turned the Starfish Instagram account back on.
And this time, we started attracting our ideal clients instead of marketers from the other side of the world. Much more useful for a regional Australian marketing business.
It’s a good example of why your choice of marketing platforms doesn’t have to be permanent.
It’s okay to let a marketing platform go if it’s not working for you. And it’s just as okay to give it another go when things change.
Perhaps you’ve been posting on Facebook for years, but your enquiries are consistently coming through Google and referrals. Or you’ve spent months developing LinkedIn content and discovered that your ideal clients are much more responsive to your email newsletters.
Have a look at what you’re achieving, how much time and money you’re investing and whether that activity is contributing to your business goals.
And remember, just because a platform was useful a few years ago doesn’t automatically mean it’s still the right choice. Equally, a platform that wasn’t suitable when you first tried it might be worth revisiting.
Your business changes, your ideal clients change and the way people use marketing platforms changes too.
And your marketing can change with them.
When it’s right
Once you find a marketing platform where your ideal clients are, really focus on that platform and get it right.
Understand how people use it, develop content that works for them and be consistent with your activity.
Then, when you’ve got that working, consider bringing another marketing platform in and getting that right too.
And think about how your platforms can work together.
For example, you might use LinkedIn to share your expertise and build connections, while your website provides more detailed information about your services. Your email newsletter can then help you stay connected with people who’ve already shown an interest in your business.
Or perhaps you’re a local service business where Google helps people find you, Facebook keeps your business familiar in the community and referrals generate a significant proportion of your enquiries.
There’s no set combination that works for everyone.
What matters is choosing platforms that connect you with your ideal clients, support your business goals and are realistic for you to maintain.
And if you’re already using several platforms, it’s worth reviewing whether you’re getting the most out of them before adding another one.
Because I can assure you, there’ll be another marketing platform making headlines soon enough.
You don’t have to join it.
If you need help finding the right marketing platforms for your business, or making your marketing happen once you’ve chosen them, let’s have a coffee and a chat.
Frequently asked questions about marketing platforms
1. How do I choose the right marketing platforms for my business?
Start by understanding your ideal clients, where they look for information and how they choose businesses like yours. Look at where your existing enquiries come from, then consider which platforms support your business goals. Focus on the platforms that give you opportunities to connect with your ideal clients and that you have the resources to manage consistently.
2. How long should I test a marketing platform before deciding if it’s working?
A month of activity can provide some useful information, but I’d generally recommend testing a new social media platform for a few months before making a decision. Activities such as search engine optimisation and building professional relationships can take longer. Set measurable goals, review your results regularly and consider the quality of enquiries and connections you’re attracting.
3. Do I need to be on every social media platform to market my business?
No, you can achieve your marketing goals by focusing on the platforms your ideal clients use. For some businesses, that might mean Facebook and Instagram. For others, LinkedIn, Google, email marketing or networking could be more effective. It’s worth regularly reviewing your choices, as a platform that wasn’t suitable previously might become more relevant as your ideal clients’ behaviour changes.
