Is Online Marketing Your Leading Role or Supporting Actor?

Is your online activity the lead actor in your marketing, or does it play a supporting role? 

The answer will depend on a few factors.

Sometimes professionals make the assumption that they need to do ALL their marketing online.  Hours and hours are spent spinning their tires, writing content, posting stuff, writing more content, posting more stuff, and they wonder why nothing is “working”.

Online marketing shouldn’t play the leading role in everyone’s movie. For some professionals and businesses, building your in-person relationships, network, and champions will be much more important.

Don’t try to make online marketing the leading role if it doesn’t fit.  I’ve noticed that more often than not, the following is true:

• Bigger Investment + Longer Buying Cycle = More Direct Relationship Building 

For example, if you are a financial advisor it makes sense to meet prospects one on one. More intimacy is required and each meeting has a higher potential payoff. If a prospect will be spending a lot of money with you, they need to know, like, and trust you - This is easier to accomplish offline.  

It’s hard to replace human interaction and intimacy with online engagement.

• Lower Investment + Higher Purchase Frequency = Need to Reach Lots of People Online

If you sell shoes, it would be ridiculous to tell you to have a sit down meeting with everyone who might consider purchasing a pair from you.  It’s a lower investment, we buy shoes more often, and you need a much higher volume of customers than the financial advisor. Clothing, shoes, restaurants rely more on media advertising & social media marketing because they need to reach the masses, the purchase decision is generally easier to come to and doesn’t require that same level of intimacy.

Many businesses fall somewhere between these two, and of course there are always exceptions to every rule. You CAN gain big ticket clients online, but it’s usually more work, and I like to make things easy!

You have to decide for yourself where you should be focusing most of your attention.

If it’s in person - building relationships, champions, and connections - that doesn’t mean an online presence isn’t important. It just means that it serves to REINFORCE the work you’re doing in your network. Once someone meets you or hears about you, they will likely check you out online, and whatever they find should reinforce the brand you’re building in your market. They can connect with you, learn more about you, and then you can stay top of mind for them there until they are ready to engage.

So decide for yourself if your online marketing deserves the leading role in your business, or if “best supporting actor” is the role it is meant to play.