The 6 Marketing Channels You Should Prioritize in 2023
by Joseph Jones • February 11, 2020
*Last updated July, 2023.
Everyone has limited marketing budgets. We get it. That’s why it is crucial to carefully consider which marketing channels to prioritize. As is often the case, quality is better than quantity. Try to avoid the temptation to spread your budget too thin by attempting to utilize every single channel. Instead, choosing the right placement for your marketing efforts is a better use of your time and money!
If you’re wondering “what are channels in marketing?” You have come to the right place! Channels in marketing are just the various platforms online that you can use to build your brand, obtain leads, and sell your products and services.
It’s true, there are a lot of marketing channels to choose from in 2023, it feels like most places you visit can be called a marketing channel. But with a little help, you can figure out which ones will give you the biggest bang for your buck. We’ll tell you which are the top 6 marketing channels we’ve found that you should be prioritizing this year and how you can best leverage them.
Best Marketing Channels
Read about how you can use any or all of these key digital marketing channels to make 2023 your best year yet!
- PPC (or paid ads)
- Paid Social Media Ads
- Email Marketing
- Website & Blog
- SEO (organic search)
- Word-of-Mouth Marketing
*This list of marketing channels is not meant to be comprehensive. These are the types of marketing channels that are most important to utilize in 2023.
Pay-Per-Click Marketing
Running PPC ads is the most cost-effective way to market your product or service to large audiences, especially when compared to traditional media channels like TV, radio, or print advertising. The two largest pay-per-click platforms in the world today are Google Ads and Facebook/Instagram Ads.
nk seriously about which marketing channels to prioritize. As is often the case, quality is better than quantity. Sure, you could try to do “a little everywhere,” but is that the best use of your time and money?
The truth is that there are a lot of advertising channels you can take advantage of in 2021. Some are online marketing channels, while others are a little more organic. Here are six of the most important types of marketing channels to help you begin strategizing.
The best way to know whether your PPC ads are running effectively is for you to have a professional marketing agency run a free diagnostic for you. They will closely examine your return on ad spend (ROAS) to see whether your ads have been profitable and where you can make improvements.
Your PPC Marketing Channel
PPC marketing involves leveraging paid advertising to drive traffic and conversions. It’s a way to bid for top-ranking positions in search results for better visibility.
There are many misconceptions about PPC, so let’s dispel them:
- You don’t need thousands of dollars to start.
- It’s not an immediate strategy.
- There is no such thing as over-optimization.
Google Ads for PPC Marketing
If you sell products or services online, then Google Ads is often your best bet. You can get more customers for less money with just a bit of know-how. In fact, thanks to its built-in learning technology, Google Ads can drive conversions for you with only a little information from you.
Search ads are highly targeted and can help you capture customers who are already actively looking for your product or service. They’re easy to set up: all you have to do is choose your keywords and bid on them. Google does the rest.
Facebook Ads for PPC Marketing
PPC ads on Facebook and Instagram are effective because they target people at their most motivated when it comes to interacting with your brand. Facebook also boasts amazing targeting abilities. By targeting the right audiences, you can get in feeds until you familiarize prospects with your brand.
These users are more likely to purchase because they’re aware of what you have to offer and why it will benefit them. With that said, it’s important to use retargeting tactics to capture people who previously visited your website or store but didn’t make a purchase. Target. Present. Promote. Repeat.
Social Media Marketing for 2023
Social media marketing in 2023 is more important than ever before, as it has become an even bigger source of brand discovery and engagement. Influencers have a strong presence on social platforms, so brand discovery will always find an important foothold in social media.
Why Social Media Marketing Matters
Social media continues to grow as a vital platform for digital marketers. If you aren’t engaging with customers on social media, be assured that your competitors probably are. No worries if you aren’t there yet–you can always work on growing your social presence. Here are some tips to use in social media marketing:
1. Emphasize Relationship Building
More and more consumers are interacting with brands on social media, but that doesn’t mean you need to get pushy. Authentic interactions can build relationships with your customers, giving you access to personal information you can use to cultivate them as a lead.
Social media is an excellent way to answer questions and resolve problems quickly–so you can be there when your customers need you. Get personal with your customers and they will be more likely to patronize your business.
2. Showcase Your Brand
Using social media as a marketing channel lets you broadcast what’s best about your brand. Your goal with any social profile is to establish an identity that resonates with users so they can connect emotionally with what your company offers.
Likes and shares are a way to know that your posts are accomplishing that. When that happens regularly, it will be easier to build relationships with potential customers, who may turn into loyal followers down the road.
Choosing the Right Social Media Platform(s)
While it’s tempting to run your campaigns on every social media platform available, you could be wasting time and money on the wrong ones. Each platform offers unique opportunities for targeting and serving specific audiences. Make sure to consider which platform best aligns with your message, products and/or services.
Your Email Marketing Channel in 2023
The rise of social media once led some to call the effectiveness of email marketing into question, but it’s stronger than ever in 2023. Why? Email marketing offers benefits that few other marketing channels can. Namely, it’s permission-based, so subscribers must have an active interest in your product or service before any messages are sent to them. It also has opportunities for marketing automation which can streamline marketing campaign efforts.
But how can you step up your email marketing game? Here are some tips:
Write Great Email Subject Lines
Bad subject lines are off-putting to potential customers and can get flagged as spam and never reach an inbox. A great subject line should directly relate to your product, sale, or general email topic. It’s also important to include any special offers or deal promotions you’re running so customers know what to expect when they open it.
For example, if you’re promoting an end-of-summer sale on clothing items, use something like “End of Summer Sale: 20% Off Women’s Shoes” instead of just “End of Summer Sale.” Communicate your specific benefit or offer.
Keep Your Emails Simple
The best emails are a succinct message and/or offer, and not too wordy. Make sure all of your content/offers are also on your site so you remain clear and consistent across channels.
When you’re trying to get customers to opt-in to your email list, make sure they know what they’re getting. Be straight about the purpose of your emails: don’t try to hide the fact that you’re selling, but don’t be pushy either.
Use Email Personalization
Segmenting your subscribers into categories is a great way to offer both personalization and automation. For example, create a list of buyers based on their sales history that tells you who typically takes advantage of specific promotions or product releases. For business-to-business (B2B) customers, consider segmenting with an industry-based marketing approach to further personalize those emails.
Pay Attention to Email Data
Watch for metrics like open rates and purchases that result from emails. If some segments open more emails than others, that means they’re probably more engaged with your brand and might be a good group for customer-specific messages.
Website Marketing in 2023
Your website is an integral part of your marketing strategy. It doesn’t just present information about your business and products — it serves as a marketing tool that helps build and maintain relationships with your customers.
One way to use your website as a marketing channel is by setting up social media sharing buttons so users can instantly connect with you via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram or TikTok.
The focus should be on providing a quality customer experience and helping customers to interact with you and your brand. Making sure your site is in tip-top condition is key to making that happen. Start with the following basics.
Conduct an SEO Audit
The first order of business is to make sure that your website shows up on the SERPs (search engine results pages). An SEO audit can help you uncover any issues that might be hurting your chances of showing up in Google or Bing searches.
If you don’t know where to start, services like Semrush can help with a free audit tool that will crawl and analyze your website, pointing out areas for improvement along the way.
The audit will probably point out issues like duplicate content, bad internal linking, or inefficient site structure. You can either take care of these issues yourself or bring in an SEO professional to do it for you.
Test Your Site Performance (Core Web Vitals)
Here’s a full guide to Core Web Vitals to help you learn more.
Bounce rate (BR) is your enemy. When potential customers visit your site and find it unresponsive, they will most likely hit the back button and never return. That’s why you need to test how well your website performs under load before you launch.
It is always better to know how things are functioning and make fixes before you’re counting on steady traffic from Google and paying for it with AdWords campaigns.
Content Marketing in 2023
Content marketing is an increasingly popular way to attract new business and brand awareness. SEO-optimized content can generate traffic to your site, which is an extremely valuable digital marketing tactic. By creating content that informs and solves problems, you can establish yourself as an authority in your field, leading readers down the path to conversion.
Offer Value with Your Content Marketing
Don’t produce content just to produce content! Content marketing should provide value; it should resonate with your audience and promote interaction and sharing. When it does, people are more likely to share it because they genuinely believe in what you have to say.
Here’s an example of good content for a window blinds retailer:
Consider things like search rankings and social sharing metrics when developing a content strategy. If no one finds your information useful, then you won’t see any SEO benefits from your content marketing. You need to think about what topics and problems appeal to your customers and then deliver what they want to see.
Strategic Content Marketing for SEO
The best content marketing targets specific kinds of customers. Once you know your ideal customer, you can write content that will resonate with them and entice them to return to your site again and again.
Your content doesn’t have to be overly promotional. It just needs to provide your readers with value. It needs to clearly communicate what makes you different from all of your competitors so they’ll come back when they’re ready for more information about their problem or solution.
A/B testing on your website can help determine how well each type of content is resonating with visitors by looking at search behavior metrics like bounce rate or conversion rates.
Promote Content Marketing Across Multiple Marketing Channels
Don’t limit your content marketing to one platform. Incorporate your posts into your social media to create a consistent message across all channels. Focus on mobile-first design for everything you publish so you can reach audiences where they are most likely to see it.
Word-of-Mouth Marketing in 2023
Word-of-mouth marketing has always been one of the most effective ways to grow your business. That’s why it’s important to understand word-of-mouth marketing.
What is Word-of-Mouth Marketing?
When a person has a great experience with your company or product, you want them to share it with others, and an endorsement from an acquaintance or friend, rather than an advertisement, often carries more weight. But word-of-mouth marketing is more than just a referral from a friend. It includes online comments and reviews, social shares, and even back-linking.
Run Referral and Affiliate Programs
Referral and affiliate programs are some of the most effective means of boosting your word-of-mouth marketing.
In a referral program, you motivate customers to spread the word about your business by giving them a bonus or benefit if they can refer a new customer to you.
Affiliate programs boost word-of-mouth marketing by rewarding affiliates for each sale they generate. Usually, your affiliate will have their own network through which they’ll market your product or service.
Ask Your Customers to Leave Reviews
When your business gets a few positive reviews on Google or Yelp, you will rank higher in search results.
The more glowing reviews from verified customers you have, the more you grow in credibility online. Ask satisfied customers to leave you a review. It might not feel natural at first, but it’s an essential part of any successful word-of-mouth marketing strategy.
Display Your Great Reviews on Your Website
Have you received a great review from a customer? Get it on your website, pronto! Use social proof on your website by displaying positive reviews, awards, or other forms of recognition to position yourself as an authority in your industry and build trust with your customers.
A great way to do this is by having review software on your website to acquire new reviews. It’s pretty easy to get this kind of software integrated on your website. In fact, most ecommerce CMS’s have this already available. Think Shopify, BigCommerce, and WooCommerce (WordPress).
The Marketing Channel Bottom Line
Each marketing channel has its advantages and disadvantages. The type of marketing you decide to use will depend on the nature of your business and the kinds of customers you’re trying to attract. Trial and error is going to be part of your journey. Remember to utilize a robust analytics tool like Google Analytics to help inform your marketing channel choices.
We’d love to get your insights; which marketing channels have you been prioritizing? Let us know in the comments what has been working best for you and your brand.
