Management by Objectives: Everything You Need to Know

A very famous Cheshire cat once said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.”

Alright, maybe Lewis Carroll is actually the one that penned that quote, but it’s true nonetheless, and good advice for life and business.

As a leader, you have expectations for your team. You want to see a specific level of performance and efficiency, but have you ever been clear about exactly what success looks like?

If goals and desired outcomes are not communicated to employees, they can’t possibly meet your expectations. This leads to micromanaging or helicopter-managing and instills the belief in your employees that you do not trust them or their ability to achieve results. Over time, this breeds resentment erodes job satisfaction and increases the rate of turnover as employees go off in search of greener pastures.

If you’ve seen this situation occur multiple times throughout your organization, it’s time to look at your leadership style. Do you provide your employees with the knowledge and the skills they need, and clearly communicate what you want to see?

If not, it’s not too late. Shift your mindset and company culture to management by objectives and watch your employees step up to the challenge.

What is management by objectives?

The term “management by objectives” (MBO) may be new to your vocabulary, but it’s certainly not a new concept. MBO is one approach managers use to get the most out of their employees. It involves creating a series of concrete goals for an employee to accomplish for the betterment of the organization.

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What is the purpose of management by objectives?

MBO ensures that employees receive clear communication regarding their roles and responsibilities, and they understand the role they play in the overall health of the organization. It not only helps them get clear on what’s expected of them but also gives them a sense of purpose as they take ownership of how they impact the rest of the organization and help meet its mission.

Businesses that operate in silos where from one department to another, people don’t know what anyone else is working on, have a lower chance of succeeding. Employees can easily become disheartened when they can’t see the larger picture. Management by objectives aims to break down these walls for great transparency across organizations.

Management by Objectives Advantages and Disadvantages

Just like any management style, there are pros and cons to management by objectives. Let’s take a closer look:

Advantages of Management by Objectives

• Employees can understand and appreciate their individual impact on the company as a whole.
• Expectations are clearly communicated and based on Key Result Areas (KRAs) tailored to each employee.
• Employees understand what success looks like and what they have to accomplish to reach it.
• Teamwork improves and finger-pointing decreases. Employees know their responsibilities and tasks are less likely to fall through the cracks.
• Employees feel essential and indispensable to the organization as they each perform a unique task.

The Disadvantages of Management by Objectives

• It’s possible for managers to rely too much on MBO and a management style. While it can revolutionize your organization, it has its limitations and is not always appropriate.
• With goals and objectives overemphasized, non-measurable aspects of the work environment (like teamwork, positive customer interactions, etc.) may become less practiced and valued.
• With a constant focus on numbers and metrics, employees may feel anxious about their performance which could make things worse.

As you can see, management by objectives can help your organization move in the right direction, however, it is not a cure-all for every challenge your organization may face. Let’s take a closer look at how to utilize this leadership style for optimum effectiveness.

How To Incorporate Management by Objectives Into Your Organization

Like everything in life, it helps to have a plan before you dive in. Let’s review how to implement MBO in your own company.

Management by Objectives Steps

Define Your Goals

What would you like to see the organization as a whole achieve, and during what time period? These goals should be shared with everyone in your organization.

Create and Communicate Employee Goals

How do your employee’s responsibilities play into the goals of the organization? This will allow you to create specific goals and objectives for them to meet.

Monitor Their Performance and Progress

Review your employees’ performance on a regular basis. Are they hitting whatever numbers you’ve assigned them? Are they steadily working towards a larger goal?

Assess Their Performance

It’s good to know where your employees stand, however, it’s even more important to communicate how they’re doing with them. Without regular performance reviews, your employees can’t gauge how they are performing and if changes need to be made.

Provide Feedback

If employees are doing well, let them know. You may wish to do this privately or publicly to congratulate them and inspire others. If they are not meeting your expectations, provide this feedback privately so as not to demean them in front of their colleagues. You will also need to give them steps to take to improve their performance.

If they’re not reaching their goals, this may be because those goals have not been properly communicated, or because they don’t have the right tools to do what’s expected. Have a conversation to assess if either of these factors is at play, and then do whatever is necessary to remedy the situation.

When you follow these steps, you can implement a successful culture of management by objectives and see an improvement in your team’s performance. This works for a sales environment, as well as customer service, or any other department in an organization.

Management by Objectives Examples

If this sounds like something you’d like to try, you may be wondering what are some examples of objectives that you could set. While specific objectives may differ depending on your industry, product, and specific company, there are some blanket objectives that you can begin with. While any department can use MBO, we’ll take a look at 3 specific instances.

Sales MBO examples

• Decrease the sales cycle to 2 months
• Increase the average sales to $10,000
• Bring in 15 new customers

Marketing MBO Examples

• Increase social media likes by 40%
• Increase time spent on the website by 5 minutes
• Generate 500 new leads per month
• Get 5 media placements

Customer Service BMO Examples

• Decrease call time to under 5 minutes
• Increase customer satisfaction by 30%
• Reduce manager call intervention by 10%

Human Resources MBO Examples

• Improve retention rate by 15%
• Implement a leadership training program for remarkable employees
• Increase employee satisfaction by 30%

When it’s time to inspire your team and breathe new life into your organization, consider incorporating management by objectives into your company culture. You may be surprised how well your employees take to this new system and once they understand your expectations they’re in a better position to meet or exceed them.

How to Write A Career Objective That Gets Your Resume Noticed

Career objectives are a topic of hot debate in the resume space. Certain career experts say they’re outdated. Others claim they give hiring managers a quick glance at your top attributes and experiences.

Whether you call it a personal branding statement, experience overview, or resume objective, a career objective statement is still relevant. That’s because a well-crafted objective lets hiring managers learn about your skills, personality, and career highlights from the first look.

That’s if a hiring manager even makes it to your resume, of course. With an increasingly competitive pool of candidates, HR teams often rely on technology to help sort resumes and select candidates for the next hiring stage. Algorithms pick and choose people based on keywords, often prioritizing optimized language over someone who may be the best fit for the job.

But there are ways to ensure your career objective works for you, instead of against you. Let’s look at what a career objective is and how to make yours meet today’s resume standards.

What is a Career Objective?

A career objective is a succinct paragraph that summarizes your professional experiences, skills, and goals. It is usually two to three sentences long and sits at the top of your resume, under your name and contact information.

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Your career objective is one of the first pieces of information hiring managers will see when scanning your resume, so it has to stand out. You can do this in several ways, like tailoring the objective to the role you’re applying for, adding top keywords, and highlighting relevant skills. The result should be a concise summary that’s clear, actionable, and compelling. Bonus if it hints at your personality.

But what does that look like? Here are the steps you can follow to craft a great career objective for any role.

How to Write a Career Objective

1. Understand the job description.

It’s easy to copy and paste information for your career objective from a job description. But to show originality and thought, you have to understand what a hiring manager truly wants.

Do this by looking for the most in-demand skills or characteristics for the role. These are often listed within the job description under a section labeled “Required Skills” or “Core Responsibilities.” You can find the right skills or traits to include by cross-referencing the list to any additional descriptions about the company or position.

If you can tell it’s a fast-paced work environment, for example, the ability to multi-task and develop efficient processes are good skills to highlight within your career objective.

It’s also important to consider the job-specific software you may need for a position. For technical roles like SEO Marketing Managers, tools such as Ahrefs, Google Analytics, or DeepCrawl are needed to perform audits and analysis. Make sure to note the software requirements so you can reference one or two in your objective.

Here’s a sample job description for a Growth Marketing Manager in the foodservice industry that shows both the software requirements and the company personality.

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Once you comb through the job description, create a list of the top 10 traits and skills you want to include in your statement. You may not use all of them, but it’s good to have options as you write.

2. Know your value.

If you’re deep in the job hunt, you can probably recite your strengths in your sleep. Instead, write down the specific ways you add value to your list of skills and traits.

These can include your strengths, degrees, licenses, or certifications. It’s also worth mentioning any strong connections you have, such as working for top-tier clients or experience speaking at industry events. Just make sure the experience is relevant to the company, industry, and role.

Let’s say you’re applying to a Community Marketing Manager position and have a proven track record of running an ambassador program. The company wants candidates with experience leading teams and implementing community programs.

You can highlight your value by including a statement like this in your career objective: “Experience developing an ambassador program that elevated diverse voices and united micro-communities into one passionate group.”

Again, look to the job description to understand how you can most add value to the company.

3. Keep it concise.

A career objective should be no more than three sentences. Your resume still needs to include your work experience, core skills, education, volunteer experience, and certifications.

Write a draft of your career objective using the list you created in steps one and two. Your first few drafts may be more than three sentences. That’s okay. Try to remove any excessive language, like “that,” “a,” “the.” And don’t worry too much about using complete sentences (see more on this in the examples below).

Here’s what a career objective should, and should not, look like for a growth marketer role:

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If you get stuck, have a trusted friend, colleague, or mentor review the statement. They may be able to offer feedback and correct any errors. You want it to be absolutely perfect, so it’s helpful to have one or more pairs of eyes review your work.

How to Write an Objective for a Career Change

You may be comfortable writing a career objective for a field you have experience in. But what if you’re changing careers?

The goal when writing this type of career objective is to tie your previous experience into your desired role as much as possible. This requires you to draw connections between your past work and your new career. Let’s look at an example, where the candidate is aiming to transition from an accounting career to one in marketing.

The candidate uses the career objective to explain their career switch and draw attention to their analytical skills – a must-have in many marketing careers. If you want to make the switch to marketing, check out this list of in-demand technical skills to get ideas for your career objective.

Career Objective Examples

Every role has distinct requirements, and your career objective needs to reflect those differences. Look to the following examples for inspiration when writing your statement. But remember to change up your career objective based on the position and company.

Lifecycle Marketing Manager

Data-savvy lifecycle marketing manager with seven years of experience crafting omnichannel customer journeys. Have successfully built customer programs that increased loyalty by 25% using best practices for lifecycle frameworks and communication strategies. Strong analytical skills and familiarity with various ESP and CRM software.

Communications Specialist

Highly creative communications specialist who excels in collaborative, fast-paced environments. Over the past four years, I’ve coordinated and refined content for marketing industry leaders to ensure company narratives are compelling and accurate. Experience managing content libraries, social media platforms, and internal newsletters.

Senior Brand Strategist

Creative lead with a knack for developing strong client relationships and innovative branding strategies. Over 10 years of experience crafting strategic marketing plans that have led to 45% growth in clients’ brand awareness. Excellent communicator and coordinator with the ability to foster long-term partnerships while ensuring teams stay on track.

Communications Manager

Proactive global communications manager with 11 years of experience developing and executing strategic communications programs for fintech companies. Skilled at media pitching, evolving core narratives, managing external partners, and overseeing complex technology communications. Looking to guide teams on best practices for translating complex narratives into compelling content that attracts audiences.

Director of Content Marketing and Strategy

An empathetic leader with 15+ years of experience managing high-growth content and editorial teams for Fortune 100 clients. Passionate about building data-driven content strategies that simplify complex messaging to engage audiences and meet business goals. Seeking an environment that challenges assumptions to drive customer acquisition through best-in-class editorial strategies.

Now, it’s time to write a career objective that showcases your skills. If you follow the steps above, keep it original, and reference the job description, your objective is likely to wow hiring managers – and hopefully, help you move on to the next stage in the hiring process.

What’s a Competitive Analysis & How Do You Conduct One?

When was the last time you ran a competitive analysis for your brand? And most importantly, do you know how to do one efficiently?

If you’re not sure, or if the last “analysis” you ran was a quick perusal of a competitor’s website and social media presence, you’re likely missing out on important intelligence that could help your brand grow.

In this detailed guide, you’ll learn how to conduct a competitive analysis that will give your business a competitive advantage in the market.

A competitive analysis can help you learn the ins and outs of how your competition works, and identify potential opportunities where you can out-perform them.

It also enables you to stay atop of industry trends and ensure your product is consistently meeting — and exceeding — industry standards.

Let’s dive into a few more benefits of conducting competitive analyses:

• Helps you identify your product’s unique value proposition and what makes your product different from the competitors’, which can inform future marketing efforts.
• Enables you to identify what your competitor is doing right. This information is critical for staying relevant and ensuring both your product and your marketing campaigns are outperforming industry standards.
• Tells you where your competitors are falling short — which helps you identify areas of opportunities in the marketplace, and test out new, unique marketing strategies they haven’t taken advantage of.
• Learn through customer reviews what’s missing in a competitor’s product, and consider how you might add features to your own product to meet those needs.
• Provides you with a benchmark against which you can measure your growth.

What is competitive market research?

Competitive market research focuses on finding and comparing key market metrics that help identify differences between your products and services and those of your competitors. Comprehensive market research helps establish the foundation for an effective sales and marketing strategy that helps your company stand out from the crowd.

Next, let’s dive into how you can conduct a competitive analysis for your own company.

Competitive Analysis in Marketing

Every brand can benefit from regular competitor analysis. By performing a competitor analysis, you’ll be able to:

• Identify gaps in the market
• Develop new products and services
• Uncover market trends
• Market and sell more effectively

As you can see, learning any of these four components will lead your brand down the path of achievement.

Next, let’s dive into some steps you can take to conduct a comprehensive competitive analysis.

To run a complete and effective competitive analysis, use these ten templates, which range in purpose from sales, to marketing, to product strategy.

Featured Resource: 10 Competitive Analysis Templates

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1. Determine who your competitors are.

First, you’ll need to figure out who you’re really competing with so you can compare the data accurately. What works in a business similar to yours may not work for your brand.

So how can you do this?

Divide your “competitors” into two categories: direct and indirect.

Direct competitors are businesses that offer a product or service that could pass as a similar substitute for yours, and that operate in your same geographic area.

On the flip side, an indirect competitor provides products that are not the same but could satisfy the same customer need or solve the same problem.

It seems simple enough on paper, but these two terms are often misused.

When comparing your brand, you should only focus on your direct competitors. This is something many brands get wrong.

Let’s use an example: Stitch Fix and Fabletics are both subscription-based services that sell clothes on a monthly basis and serve a similar target audience.

But as we look deeper, we can see that the actual product (clothes in this case) are not the same; one brand focuses on stylish everyday outfits while the other is workout-centric attire only.

Yes, these brands satisfy the same need for women (having trendy clothes delivered right to their doorstep each month), but they do so with completely different types of clothing, making them indirect competitors.

This means Kate Hudson’s team at Fabletics would not want to spend their time studying Stitch Fix too closely since their audiences probably vary quite a bit. Even if it’s only slightly, this tiny variation is enough to make a big difference.

Now, this doesn’t mean you should toss your indirect competitors out the window completely.

Keep these brands on your radar since they could shift positions at any time and cross over into the direct competitor zone. Using our example, Stitch Fix could start a workout line, which would certainly change things for Fabletics.

This is also one of the reasons why you’ll want to routinely run a competitor analysis. The market can and will shift at any time, and if you’re not constantly scoping it out, you won’t be aware of these changes until it’s too late.

2. Determine what products your competitors offer.

At the heart of any business is its product or service, which is what makes this a good place to start.

You’ll want to analyze your competitor’s complete product line and the quality of the products or services they’re offering.

You should also take note of their pricing and any discounts they’re offering customers.

Some questions to consider include:

• Are they a low-cost or high-cost provider?
• Are they working mainly on volume sales or one-off purchases?
• What is their market share?
• What are the characteristics and needs of their ideal customers?
• Are they using different pricing strategies for online purchases versus brick and mortar?
• How does the company differentiate itself from its competitors?
• How do they distribute their products/services?

3. Research your competitors’ sales tactics and results.

Running a sales analysis of your competitors can be a bit tricky.

You’ll want to track down the answers to questions such as:

• What does the sales process look like?
• What channels are they selling through?
• Do they have multiple locations and how does this give them an advantage?
• Are they expanding? Scaling down?
• Do they have partner reselling programs?
• What are their customers’ reasons for not buying? For ending their relationship with the company?
• What are their revenues each year? What about total sales volume?
• Do they regularly discount their products or services?
• How involved is a salesperson in the process?

These helpful pieces of information will give you an idea of how competitive the sales process is, and what information you need to prepare your sales reps with to compete during the final buy stage.

For publicly held companies, you can find annual reports online, but you’ll have to do some sleuthing to find this info from privately owned businesses.

You could find some of this information by searching through your CRM and reaching out to those customers who mentioned they were considering your competitor. Find out what made them choose your product or service over others out there.

To do this, run a report that shows all prospective deals where there was an identified competitor.

If this data is not something you currently record, talk to marketing and sales to implement a system where prospects are questioned about the other companies they are considering.

Essentially, they’ll need to ask their leads (either through a form field or during a one-on-one sales conversation) to identify who their current service providers are, who they’ve used in the past, and who else they are considering during the buying process.

When a competitor is identified, have your sales team dive deeper by asking why they are considering switching to your product. If you’ve already lost the deal, be sure to follow up with the prospect to determine why you lost to your competitor. What services or features attracted the prospect? Was it about price? What’s the prospect’s impression of your sales process? If they’ve already made the switch, find out why they made this decision.

By asking open-ended questions, you’ll have honest feedback about what customers find appealing about your brand and what might be turning customers away.

Once you’ve answered these questions, you can start scoping out your competitor’s marketing efforts.

4. Take a look at your competitors’ pricing, as well as any perks they offer.

There are a few major factors that go into correctly pricing your product — and one major one is understanding how much your competitors are charging for a similar product or service.

If you feel your product offers superior features compared to those of a competitor, you might consider making your product or service more expensive than industry standards. However, if you do that, you’ll want to ensure your sales reps are ready to explain why your product is worth the additional cost.

Alternatively, perhaps you feel there’s a gap in your industry for affordable products. If that’s the case, you might aim to charge less than competitors and appeal to prospects who aren’t looking to break the bank for a high-quality product.

Of course, other factors go into correctly pricing a product, but it’s critical you stay on top of industry pricing to ensure you’re pricing your product in a way that feels reasonable to prospects.

Additionally, take a look at any perks your competitors’ offer and how you might match those perks to compete. For instance, perhaps your competitors offer a major referral discount or a month-long free trial version. These perks could be the reason you’re losing customers, so if it feels reasonable for your brand, consider where you might match those perks — or provide some unique perks of your own if competitors’ don’t offer any.

5. Ensure you’re meeting competitive shipping costs.

Did you know expensive shipping is the number one reason for cart abandonment?

Nowadays, free shipping is a major perk that can attract consumers to choose one brand over another. If you work in an industry where shipping is a major factor — like ecommerce — you’ll want to take a look at competitors’ shipping costs and ensure you’re meeting (if not exceeding) those prices.

If most of your competitors’ offer free shipping, you’ll want to look into the option for your own company. If free shipping isn’t a practical option for your business, consider how you might differentiate in other ways — including loyalty programs, holiday discounts, or giveaways on social media.

6. Analyze how your competitors market their products.

Analyzing your competitor’s website is the fastest way to gauge their marketing efforts. Take note of any of the following items and copy down the specific URL for future reference:

• Do they have a blog?
• Are they creating whitepapers or ebooks?
• Do they post videos or webinars?
• Do they have a podcast?
• Are they using static visual content such as infographics and cartoons?
• What about slide decks?
• Do they have a FAQs section?
• Are there featured articles?
• Do you see press releases?
• Do they have a media kit?
• What about case studies?
• Do they publish buying guides and data sheets?
• What online and offline advertising campaigns are they running?

7. Take note of your competition’s content strategy.

Then, take a look at the quantity of these items. Do they have several hundred blog posts or a small handful? Are there five white papers and just one ebook?

Next, determine the frequency of these content assets. Are they publishing something new each week or once a month? How often does a new ebook or case study come out?

Chances are if you come across a robust archive of content, your competitor has been publishing regularly. Depending on the topics they’re discussing, this content may help you hone in on their lead-generating strategies.

From there, you should move on to evaluating the quality of their content. After all, if the quality is lacking, it won’t matter how often they post since their target audience won’t find much value in it.

Choose a small handful of samples to review instead of tackling every single piece to make the process more manageable.

Your sampler should include content pieces covering a variety of topics so you’ll have a fairly complete picture of what your competitor shares with their target audience.

When analyzing your competitor’s content, consider the following questions:

• How accurate is their content?
• Are spelling or grammar errors present?
• How in-depth does their content go? (Is it at the introductory level that just scratches the surface or does it include more advanced topics with high-level ideas?)
• What tone do they use?
• Is the content structured for readability? (Are they using bullet points, bold headings, and numbered lists?)
• Is their content free and available to anyone or do their readers need to opt-in?
• Who is writing their content? (In-house team? One person? Multiple contributors?)
• Is there a visible byline or bio attached to their articles?

As you continue to scan the content, pay attention to the photos and imagery your competitors are using.

Do you quickly scroll past generic stock photos or are you impressed by custom illustrations and images? If they’re using stock photos, do they at least have overlays of text quotes or calls-to-action that are specific to their business?

If their photos are custom, are they sourced from outside graphic professionals or do they appear to be done in-house?

When you have a solid understanding of your competitor’s content marketing strategy, it’s time to find out if it’s truly working for them.

8. Learn what technology stack your competitors’ use.

Understanding what types of technology your competitors’ use can be critical for helping your own company reduce friction and increase momentum within your organization.

For instance, perhaps you’ve seen positive reviews about a competitor’s customer service — as you’re conducting research, you learn the customer uses powerful customer service software you haven’t been taking advantage of. This information should arm you with the opportunity to outperform your competitors’ processes.

To figure out which software your competitors’ use, type the company’s URL into Built With, an effective tool for unveiling what technology your competitors’ site runs on, along with third-party plugins ranging from analytics systems to CRMs.

Alternatively, you might consider looking at competitors’ job listings, particularly for engineer or web developer roles. The job listing will likely mention which tools a candidate needs to be familiar with — a creative way to gain intel into the technology your competitors’ use.

9. Analyze the level of engagement on your competitor’s content.

To gauge how engaging your competitor’s content is to their readers, you’ll need to see how their target audience responds to what they’re posting.

Check the average number of comments, shares, and likes on your competitor’s content and find out if:

• Certain topics resonate better than others
• The comments are negative, positive, or a mix
• People are tweeting about specific topics more than others
• Readers respond better to Facebook updates about certain content
• Don’t forget to note if your competitor categorizes their content using tags, and if they have social media follow and share buttons attached to each piece of content.

10. Observe how they promote their marketing content.

From engagement, you’ll move right along to your competitor’s content promotion strategy.

• Keyword density in the copy itself
• Image ALT text tags
• Use of internal linking

The following questions can also help you prioritize and focus on what to pay attention to:

• Which keywords are your competitors focusing on that you still haven’t tapped into?
• What content of theirs is highly shared and linked to? How does your content compare?
• Which social media platforms are your target audience using?
• What other sites are linking back to your competitor’s site, but not yours?
• Who else is sharing what your competitors are publishing?
• Who is referring traffic to your competitor’s site?
• For the keywords you want to focus on, what is the difficulty level? There are several free (and paid) tools that will give you a comprehensive evaluation of your competitor’s search engine optimization.

11. Look at their social media presence, strategies, and go-to platforms

The last area you’ll want to evaluate when it comes to marketing is your competitor’s social media presence and engagement rates.

How does your competition drive engagement with their brand through social media? Do you see social sharing buttons with each article? Does your competitor have links to their social media channels in the header, footer, or somewhere else? Are these clearly visible? Do they use calls-to-action with these buttons?

If your competitors are using a social network that you may not be on, it’s worth learning more about how that platform may be able to help your business, too. To determine if a new social media platform is worth your time, check your competitor’s engagement rates on those sites. First, visit the following sites to see if your competition has an account on these platforms:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram
• Snapchat
• LinkedIn
• YouTube
• Pinterest

Then, take note of the following quantitative items from each platform:

• Number of fans/followers
• Posting frequency and consistency
• Content engagement (Are users leaving comments or sharing their posts?)
• Content virality (How many shares, repins, and retweets do their posts get?)

With the same critical eye you used to gauge your competition’s content marketing strategy, take a fine-toothed comb to analyze their social media strategy.

What kind of content are they posting? Are they more focused on driving people to landing pages, resulting in new leads? Or are they posting visual content to promote engagement and brand awareness?

How much of this content is original? Do they share curated content from other sources? Are these sources regular contributors? What is the overall tone of the content?

How does your competition interact with its followers? How frequently do their followers interact with their content?

After you collect this data, generate an overall grade for the quality of your competitor’s content. This will help you compare the rest of your competitors using a similar grading scale.

12. Perform a SWOT Analysis to learn their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats

As you evaluate each component in your competitor analysis (business, sales, and marketing), get into the habit of performing a simplified SWOT analysis at the same time.

This means you’ll take note of your competitor’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats any time you assess an overall grade.

Some questions to get you started include:

• What is your competitor doing well? (Products, content marketing, social
• Where does your competitor have the advantage over your brand?
• What is the weakest area for your competitor?
• Where does your brand have the advantage over your competitor?
• What could they do better with?
• In what areas would you consider this competitor a threat?
• Are there opportunities in the market that your competitor has identified?

You’ll be able to compare their weaknesses against your strengths and vice versa. By doing this, you can better position your company, and you’ll start to uncover areas for improvement within your own brand.

 

Competitive Product Analysis

Product analysis drills down to discover key differences and similarities in products that share the same general market. This type of analysis if you have a competitor selling products in a similar market niche to your own – you want to make sure that wherever possible, you aren’t losing market share to the competition.

Leveraging the example above, we can drill down and discover some of the key differentiators in product offerings.

Step 1: Assess your current product pricing.

The first step in any product analysis is to assess current pricing.

Nintendo offers three models of its Switch console: The smaller lite version is priced at $199, the standard version is $299, and the new OLED version is $349.

Sony, meanwhile, offers two versions of its Playstation 5 console: The standard edition costs $499 and the digital version, which doesn’t include a disc drive, is $399.

Step 2: Compare key features

Next is a comparison of key features. In the case of our console example, this means comparing features like processing power, memory, and hard drive space.

Feature	PS5 Standard	Nintendo Switch
Hard drive space	825 GB	32 GB
RAM	16 GB	4 GB
USB ports	4 ports	1 USB 3.0, 2 USB 2.0
Ethernet connection	Gigabit	None

Step 3: Pinpoint differentiators

With basic features compared, it’s time to dive deeper with differentiators. While a glance at the chart above seems to indicate that the PS5 is outperforming its competition, this data only tells part of the story.

Here’s why: The big selling point of the standard and OLED Switch models is that they can be played as either handheld consoles or docked with a base station connected to a TV. What’s more, this “switching” happens seamlessly, allowing players to play whenever, wherever.

The Playstation offering, meanwhile, has leaned into market-exclusive games that are only available on its system to help differentiate them from their competitors.

Step 4: Identify market gaps

The last step in a competitive product analysis is looking for gaps in the market that could help your company get ahead. When it comes to the console market, one potential opportunity gaining traction is the delivery of games via cloud-based services rather than physical hardware. Companies like Nvidia and Google have already made inroads in this space and if they can overcome issues with bandwidth and latency, it could change the market at scale.

Competitive Analysis Example

How do you stack up against the competition? Where are you similar, and what sets you apart? This is the goal of competitive analysis. By understanding where your brand and competitors overlap and diverge, you’re better positioned to make strategic decisions that can help grow your brand.

Of course, it’s one thing to understand the benefits of competitive analysis, and it’s another to actually carry out an analysis that yields actionable results. Don’t worry – we’ve got you covered with a quick example.

Sony vs. Nintendo: Not all fun and games

Let’s take a look at popular gaming system companies Sony and Nintendo. Sony’s newest offering – the Playstation 5 – recently hit the market but has been plagued by supply shortages. Nintendo’s Switch console, meanwhile, has been around for several years but remains a consistent seller, especially among teens and children. This scenario is familiar for many companies on both sides of the coin; some have introduced new products designed to compete with established market leaders, while others are looking to ensure that reliable sales don’t fall.

Using some of the steps listed above, here’s a quick competitive analysis example.

1. Determine who your competitors are.

In our example, it’s Sony vs Nintendo, but it’s also worth considering Microsoft’s Xbox, which occupies the same general market vertical. This is critical for effective analysis; even if you’re focused on specific competitors and how they compare, it’s worth considering other similar market offerings.

2. Determine what products your competitors offer.

Playstation offers two PS5 versions, digital and standard, at different price points, while Nintendo offers three versions of its console. Both companies also sell peripherals – for example, Sony sells virtual reality (VR) add-ons while Nintendo sells gaming peripherals such as steering wheels, tennis rackets, and differing controller configurations.

3. Research your competitors’ sales tactics and results.

When it comes to sales tactics and marketing, Sony and Nintendo have very different approaches.

In part thanks to the recent semiconductor shortage, Sony has driven up demand via scarcity – very low volumes of PS5 consoles remain available. Nintendo, meanwhile, has adopted a broader approach by targeting families as their primary customer base. This effort is bolstered by the Switch Lite product line, which is smaller and less expensive, making it a popular choice for children.

The numbers tell the tale: Through September 2021, Nintendo sold 14.3 million consoles, while Sony sold 7.8 million.

4. Take a look at your competitors’ pricing, as well as any perks they offer.

Sony has the higher price point: Their standard PS5 sells for $499, while Nintendo’s most expensive offering comes in at $349. Both offer robust digital marketplaces and the ability to easily download new games or services.

Here, the key differentiators are flexibility and fidelity. The Switch is flexible – users can dock it with their television and play it like a standard console, or pick it up and take it anywhere as a handheld gaming system. The PS5, meanwhile, has superior graphics hardware and processing power for gamers who want the highest-fidelity experience.

5. Analyze how your competitors market their products.

If you compare the marketing efforts of Nintendo and Sony, the difference is immediately apparent: Sony’s ads feature realistic in-game footage and speak to the exclusive nature of their game titles; the company has managed to secure deals with several high-profile game developers for exclusive access to new and existing IPs.

Nintendo, meanwhile, uses brightly-lit ads showing happy families playing together or children using their smaller Switches while traveling.

6. Analyze the level of engagement on your competitor’s content.

Engagement helps drive sales and encourage repeat purchases. While there are several ways to measure engagement, social media is one of the most straightforward: In general, more followers equates to more engagement and greater market impact.

When it comes to our example, Sony enjoys a significant lead over Nintendo: While the official Playstation Facebook page has 38 million followers, Nintendo has just 5 million.

Competitive Analysis Templates

Competitive analysis is complex, especially when you’re assessing multiple companies and products simultaneously. To help streamline the process, we’ve created 10 free templates that make it possible to see how you stack up against the competition – and what you can do to increase market share.

Let’s break down our SWOT analysis template. Here’s what it looks like:

Download Free Templates

Strengths – Identify your strengths. These may include specific pieces of intellectual property, products that are unique to the market, or a workforce that outperforms the competition.

Weaknesses – Here, it’s worth considering potential issues around pricing, leadership, staff turnover, and new competitors in the market.

Opportunities – This part of the SWOT analysis can focus on new market niches, evolving consumer preferences, or new technologies being developed by your company.

Threats – These might include new taxes or regulations on existing products or an increasing number of similar products in the same market space that could negatively affect your overall share.

How Does Your Business Stack Up?

Before you accurately compare your competition, you need to establish a baseline. This also helps when it comes time to perform a SWOT analysis.

Take an objective look at your business, sales, and marketing reports through the same metrics you use to evaluate your competition.

Record this information just like you would with a competitor and use this as your baseline to compare across the board.

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published prior to July 2018 but has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Exit Intent Pop Up Examples and What Makes them Effective

It’s common for people to visit websites without converting — maybe they’re conducting product research, educating themselves on your brand, or weighing out the advantages of your product versus one of a competitor.

All of these actions are normal but they’re not always ideal for your business — you want those visitors to stay on your site and convert (e.g. provide their contact details, sign up for your newsletter, or make a purchase).

One way to help accomplish this — and avoid customers coming and going without converting — is with the help of exit intent pop ups.

In other words, exit intent pop ups know when one of your visitors is about to leave your website — they serve a visitor a valuable offer/ message that’s designed to keep them on the page (and, hopefully, influence them enough to convert). 

How do exit intent pop ups work?

Imagine a visitor is on your ecommerce site — they’re browsing your product line. They then decide they want to exit the web page they’re on and they move their cursor out of the frame/ boundaries of your website. But a pop up appears with an offer (e.g. coupon code, free ebook, free trial, etc.) that they stay on the page to read. They click your CTA and convert in the way you intended them to.

So, exit intent pop ups make it possible to retain visitors on your site for longer periods of time, increase conversions, decrease cart abandonment rates, grow your email subscriber list, and more. 

What about exit intent pop ups on mobile sites?

Your target audience is bound to browse your site via mobile device. But if exit intent pop ups work by tracking cursor movements, then how does this strategy work on mobile devices? 

Exit intent pop ups will often appear on mobile devices after one of two actions are completed by visitors. 

1) A visitor scrolls down your web page at a normal pace, but then rapidly scrolls back up to the page. 

2) A visitor presses the “Back” button on the screen. 

How to Implement Exit Intent Pop Ups

The easiest way to implement exit intent overlays on your web pages is with the help of a tool specifically designed to do just that.

Let’s take a look at the features and benefits you can get out of one of these tools by looking at an example.

Exit Intent Pop Up Software: HubSpot Exit Intent Forms

Price: Free forever, $45/mo (Starter), $800/mo (Professional), $3,200 (Enterprise)

HubSpot’s Exit Intent Forms track visitor mouse movements and clicks on your website and then display your form when visitors appear to be leaving. In addition to showing your customized exit intent form, HubSpot can send automated emails (e.g. cart abandonment) and re-engagement campaigns or content.

Implementing exit intent forms with HubSpot is simple and quick — you simply embed your exit intent messaging on your website. HubSpot also allows you to customize your message, theme, and pop up timing.

With HubSpot, you can also:

• Customize your exit intent form’s location, branding, and messaging.
• Trigger email campaigns once visitors leave your website to reengage them.
• Integrate with your other systems for marketing, forms, and meeting scheduling without the need for additional development (e.g. Zapier, Shopify, WordPress, etc.).

Other tools on the market to help with exit intent pop ups are Optinmonster, Sleeknote, and Informizely.

Why would you use an exit intent pop up?

When they’re used and shared on the right web pages at the right time, exit intent pop ups are an effective strategy for increasing revenue. This is because they help you lower cart abandonment and increase retainment, form submissions, and subscriptions on your website.

To better understand how exit intent pop ups work, put yourself in the shoes of your website visitors for a moment. Imagine you’re browsing a website with a specific product that you like and/or believe can help you resolve a challenge you’re facing.

But you then say to yourself, “Ehh, I’ll think about it and come back to this later.”

You move your cursor to the top of the screen to exit the page. But suddenly, a pop up appears on the screen — it’s a coupon for 20% off your first purchase.

You’re likely going to consider applying that coupon code and purchasing the product now, right?

Exit intent pop ups work by providing customers and website visitors with the value that they wouldn’t otherwise have had on the landing, web, or ecommerce page.

An important piece of information to note is that exit intent pop ups should be used when people haven’t already taken action — this feels redundant and impersonal to your visitors.

For instance, if someone already clicked your CTA to subscribe to your newsletter — which shares discount codes and information about product deals — then you shouldn’t show them an exit intent pop up with that offer.

Exit Intent Popup Examples

In this section, we’ll review some of the best exit intent pop up examples.

Best Exit Intent Pop Up Examples

Here are some of the best exit intent pop up examples for lead generation to inspire and guide your exit intent pop up creation.

1. Cart Abandonment Exit Intent Pop Up Example

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Why it’s effective: This cart abandonment exit intent pop up is effective because it appears on the page the moment someone who has an item in their cart moves their mouse towards the “exit” button on the screen.

Not only does it remind visitors that they are leaving items in their shopping cart, but it also asks for feedback about why the visitor is deciding to move forward without making a purchase.

This is unique and powerful because it shows visitors that the company cares about them on a personal level — they want to know their opinions, challenges, feedback.

These are the types of customer experiences that leave a good impression on visitors and leads even if they don’t complete a purchase. You’re offering them a personal experience that may lead them to come back in the future or promote your business among their networks by word-of-mouth.

2. Email/ Newsletter Subscription Exit Intent Pop Up Example

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Why it’s effective: The moment you scroll back to the top of the page and move your mouse out of Omsom web page’s framework, a bright exit intent pop up appears with a form so visitors can sign up for the Omsom newsletter.

The pop up is well-timed, on-brand and eye-catching (even for someone who has the intention of leaving the page), and clearly states the value a lead will get out of submitting the form (getting the latest brand information, recipes, tips, and “hot takes”).

3. Discount on Purchase Exit Intent Pop Up Example

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Why it’s effective: If you go to leave the Elaluz landing page an offer appears on the screen with a 15% off discount. Whether a visitor was thinking about moving forward with a purchase at that moment in time, the coupon is enticing for anyone on the site.

In addition to influencing purchase behavior with the coupon code, it also requires an email address — meaning those visitors who want the code must convert whether they use the code that day or not.

4. Exclusive Offer Exit Intent Pop Up Example

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Why it’s effective: When you go to leave Curls’ landing page, you’re shown an exit intent pop up that asks you if you’re leaving. It then succinctly tells the visitor what they’ll be getting out of submitting the form.

In addition to this exit intent pop up’s timing being effective, it’s also located in an ideal spot — it’s at the top of the page, where a visitor who’s leaving the page naturally has to move their cursor. Lastly, it’s unique because it makes the offer a surprise — visitors know they’re getting an “exclusive offer” but they don’t know exactly what that offer is which is exciting and enticing.

5. Resource Offer Exit Intent Pop Up Example

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Why it’s effective: When you’re on ActiveCampaign’s blog and you go to leave the page, an exit intent pop up appears with educational resources. It’s a free guide with six emails for your “welcome series”.

Not only is ActiveCampaign positioning itself as valuable because they have helpful information to share with their target audience, but the company is also positioning itself as a thought-leader in the industry.

Additionally, although the offer is free, visitors who want it have to submit their email address ¸— meaning, a new lead and contact for the business.

Other Ideas for Exit Intent Pop Ups

These aren’t the only five types of exit intent pop ups you can create and implement. You can offer your target audience anything you believe they’ll find valuable, whether it drives leads or not — here are some more ideas:

• Free shipping
• Contest entry
• Blog subscription
• Customer experience survey
• Course or lesson
• Customized offer of some kind based on past buying experiences
• Product demo

Increase Conversions With Exit Intent Pop Ups

Exit intent pop ups are a simple yet powerful marketing and lead generation strategy. Once you implement them, you’ll be able to retain more audience members on your website and increase conversions and revenue.

Best Facebook Ad Software For Creating Effective Campaigns

In 2020, the number of monthly active users on Facebook was 2.74 billion.

Based on that statistic alone, it goes without saying that marketers need to be on Facebook.

And they are — in fact, in 2020, there were 10 million active advertisers using Facebook to promote their products and services.

But how can you ensure you’re targeting your unique audience while also breaking through the noise of all of the other ads on Facebook?

With the help of Facebook ad software.

Facebook Ad Software

Facebook ads are an effective way of getting in front of your target audience on the platform.

In this article, we’ll review 1) what Facebook ad software is, 2) why it’s important, and 3) popular ad tools to choose from.

Benefits of Facebook Ad Software

Here are examples of the beneficial features you get from using Facebook ad software.

• Targeting and customer segmentation to help you reach your audience based on their behaviors, characteristics, and traits (e.g. location, demographics, age, past actions or purchases, languages).
• Automation to expedite the processes of creating and sharing ads, data collection, and reporting.
• Reporting to share, visualize, and analyze all of your Facebook ad and contact data.
• Customization to create ads and CTAs that help you achieve your specific goals.
• Ad creation for different points in the buyer’s journey and for new and returning leads/ customers.
• Integrations to connect your Facebook ads and data with other business, marketing, and social media tools.

By incorporating Facebook ad software in your strategy, you’ll have the ability to tap into the benefits listed above and more.

1. HubSpot Ads Software

Best Facebook Ads tool for: Managing and creating personalized Facebook ad campaigns all within your CRM/ HubSpot.

Price: Free, $45/mo Starter, $800/mo Professional, $3,200/mo Enterprise

With HubSpot Ads Software, you can use your CRM data to create and optimize customized and highly personalized ads for your target audience. Report on those ads to determine which are converting audience members into paying customers.

HubSpot offers direct integration with Facebook, LinkedIn, Google, and Instagram so you can easily create, share, manage, and report on your ads all through one tool. Report on the ROI of individual ad campaigns across Facebook and those additional platforms.

HubSpot also has automated lead follow-up — meaning, once your ads do what they’re supposed to (convert leads!), it automatically saves their contact details and routes those leads to the right reps on your team.

Pro Tip: Use HubSpot Ads Software to manage and personalize your Facebook Ads with your CRM data.

2. Facebook Ads

Best Facebook Ads tool for: Creating ads tailored to your target audience within Facebook on a pre-determined budget.

Price: You determine the price of Facebook Ads by deciding 1) how much you want to spend on your ads or 2) the cost of each result of your ads.

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Use Facebook Ads to tailor ads to your target audience by first selecting your business type and goal.

Facebook makes it easy to then create, publish, and edit ads, as well as track and share their performance across any of their platforms (e.g. Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, etc).

Customize ads by selecting one of the six available formats as well as the specific audience you’re going after based on their behaviors, characteristics, demographics, and more on the platform.

Stick to your ad budget on Facebook by setting a daily and/or lifetime budget and determining the amount of time your ads will run. As a result, you’ll only spend the amount you set aside on your ads.

3. Qwaya

Best Facebook Ads tool for: Ensuring your target audience sees fresh ads on Facebook using the tool’s automatic ad rotation feature.

Price: Plans starting at $149/mo

Qwaya is an ads tool for Facebook and Instagram. It allows you to identify the right audience segments for your ads with A/B testing and targeting criteria. The tool makes it easy to test ad types, ad placement, text, images, and more on Facebook.

Qwaya automatically manages your audience segments and ads for those segments¸— ads and audiences are placed in a “campaign and ad set” folder structure to keep all information organized accordingly. You can also automate the process of running your ads when your target audience is most likely to be on the platform (e.g. certain time of the day and/or week).

4. AdEspresso

Best Facebook Ads tool for: Split-testing Facebook ads and saving the most successful ads and creative elements for easy, future access.

Price: Plans starting at $49/mo (billed annually) for a $1,000/mo spend limit.

AdEspresso is an advertising platform by Hootsuite with features for ad creation and management across Facebook, Instagram, and Google Ads.

By making it easy to split test all aspects of your Facebook ads (e.g. creatives, headlines, images), AdEspresso helps ensure they’ll reach and resonate with your target audience so you can increase conversions.

Once you determine which Facebook ads work best through split testing, save ads and creative elements in the tool for easy access across your team.

You can also bring your product catalog into AdEspresso to create dynamic ads for your individual products that are tailored to your audience. These relevant product ads will then be placed in front of your audience when they’re most likely to convert.

5. SocialPilot

Best Facebook Ads tool for: Using a single social media marketing platform for Facebook ads and “boosting” those ads to increase their reach.

Price: Plans starting at $25.50/ mo for 10 social media accounts and one user.

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SocialPilot is a social media engagement platform with a tool meant specifically for Facebook ads. With this tool, you can create, schedule, and manage your Facebook ads.

With audience targeting, customizable CTAs, and dynamic ad content, SocialPilot helps you create Facebook ads that generate high-quality leads.

Use the “Boost Posts” feature (paid ads offered by Facebook) to increase the reach of your ads. Once you create your ad, select your audience, and set a budget, SocialPilot will publish the ad and immediately “boost” it for you to increase reach among your target audience.

Additionally, if the platform believes you’ve scheduled an ad that would do especially well with a “boost”, SocialPilot will give you that suggestion.

6. Revealbot

Best Facebook Ads tool for: Merging multiple actions into individual automations to save you time and increase productivity when it comes to your Facebook ad strategy.

Price: Plans starting at $83/mo for maximum ad spend of $10,000/mo.

Revealbot is a Facebook ad automation and management tool. Use the drag-and-drop automation builder to establish automation for all parts of your Facebook ad strategy — you can set more than 20 actions for single automation to save you time.

Connect your external marketing and ad data to Revealbot to report on and analyze ads while maintaining a holistic view of your data.

Track and analyze ad data you care most about by creating unique and/or customized metrics and timeframes in your conditions. You can also use comparison conditions to compare and visualize metrics to better understand the performance of your ads.

7. Madgicx

Best Facebook Ads tool for: Using artificial intelligence (AI) to optimize and automate your Facebook ads.

Price: Plans starting at $49/mo for up to $1000/ mo ad spend.

Madgicx is an AI-powered, omnichannel advertising platform with a Facebook ad optimization and automation tool. Over 100 audience targeting options exist to help you develop a customized advertising strategy that covers every stage of the funnel.

Input your KPIs targets in Madgicx’s PPC tool so it automatically optimizes your account. Meanwhile, the AI-powered creative intelligence feature analyzes the performance of your ads and creatives based on a variety of data points.

As a result, you’ll have the information you need to target all of your buyer personas both effectively and efficiently.

Improve Upon your Campaign Strategy With Facebook Ad Software

Facebook ad software has the ability to help you create, optimize, and analyze your advertisements and campaigns on the platform. Begin improving upon your Facebook ad strategy by incorporating one of these tools.

How to Conduct an Exit Interview: 7 Top Questions [Form Template]

To determine what causes employees to leave — and to create a better, happier employee experience moving forward — it’s critical you conduct productive exit interviews.

In this post, you’ll learn everything you need to know about exit interviews, plus the best questions you should ask. We’ll also go over an exit interview form template that you can copy and paste into a document and reuse for future interviews.

What is the purpose of an exit interview?

The purpose of exit interviews is to get valuable insight from employees who are leaving your company. When conducted correctly, these interviews tell you what, if anything, could improve about your company culture. You’ll then be able to improve moving forward and drastically reduce employee turnover.

Why are exit interviews important?

According to a study conducted by The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), on average it costs a company between six to nine months of an employee’s salary to locate and train a replacement for them. So if the employee who’s leaving makes 60K, that can work out to anywhere between 30K and 45K in recruiting and training costs.

Undoubtedly, a high turnover rate can hurt your company financially. Additionally, a high turnover rate can lead to less productive teams, and lower employee morale overall.

Luckily, you can reduce turnover rate by using the feedback you get from exit interviews. Many employees who are leaving can help you determine areas for improvement and provide valuable feedback. Additionally, it can be helpful to identify consistent patterns of discontent to figure out larger organizational issues.

For instance, let’s say you hire a new marketing director, and a year later, you see a severe increase in turnover rates. Out of 15 employees, only seven from the prior year remain. Undoubtedly, this change impacts your team’s productivity and morale, and leave you nervous about the future of your department.

So how do you figure out what’s going wrong, or how your marketing director can improve their performance to ensure higher job satisfaction for their team?

The answer is conducting an exit interview for every person who’s leaving. You’ll find out what your marketing director is doing wrong and help them improve in their leadership role.

You’ll also improve morale because you’ll show employees that you care about their experience. You’re not just letting people leave — you want to know why they’re leaving and stop anyone else from doing the same thing.

To ensure you’re asking the right questions during exit interviews, take a look at the questions you should ask below and what to look for in an answer.

1. How long have you been considering leaving our company?

This is a simple question that will tell you whether this was a rash decision or a decision that happened over time. If it seems sudden, then it was likely caused by a certain event, and you’ll be able to better tailor your questions to get to the motive behind the employee’s decision.

What to Look For

Look for a time range. A year versus a month is a big difference. Determine whether any major company changes happened at the time they considered leaving — an acquisition, a change in management, and so forth.

2. How did the job match expectations?

The job may have perfectly met the employee’s expectations, or maybe it wasn’t exactly what they were looking for when they were thinking about the next step in their career. Regardless, this question will help you determine where you could be clearer in your job postings and in your company image.

What to Look For

Listen for “I thought I would be doing more of X” or “I was looking more of an X type of company.” This will help you better refine your job postings and the way you represent your business online. If an employee was looking to work at a startup and you’re an enterprise firm, you’ll want to screen future candidates for these expectations.

3. What reason primarily describes your reason for leaving?

Was it a change in lifestyle, a career change, or a better opportunity elsewhere? While the last option may seem like the most common and useful answer, a change in lifestyle — such as becoming a stay-at-home parent — could tell you where else you could improve.

For instance, you could offer paid parental leave so that your employees no longer have to choose between their jobs and their children. Or if they’re switching careers, you could offer more interdepartmental mobility to current employees, so they don’t feel stuck in one role.

What to Look For

Dig into the specific reason for their leaving without letting the employee dive into anecdotes or frustrations. Focus on what attracted them to the new opportunity, new career, or new lifestyle, and use those answers to figure out what you could offer your current employees.

4. If you have accepted a new position, what is most attractive about your new role?

This is a fantastic follow-up to the last question if the employee has already accepted an offer elsewhere. It also helps you dig further into what convinced them to leave the company and see where, if anywhere, you may fall short.

What to Look For

Listen for standard answers such as “pay,” “benefits,” “industry,” and “location.” Only note those that you can improve. For instance, you can’t really move offices or change your industry.

5. What did you like most about your job?

Give yourself a chance to breathe — and your employee, too — by focusing on the positives. That way, you don’t accidentally overhaul the things that work. If the employee answers that they loved the people they worked with, for instance, continue attracting top talent to your firm.

What to Look For

Listen specifically for the people aspect and the project management aspect of this answer. If the employee loved the projects they were working on or the people in their team, you’re doing the core things well. If they only mention surface-level things, such as the snacks or the free parking, you’ll want to revise your recruiting strategy.

6. What did you dislike about your job? What would you change about your job?

This is your opportunity to truly dig into what prompted the person to leave as it pertains to their role. Employees will likely “skirt around” the true reason here — or they may launch into an anecdote. Either way, listen carefully, and remember that this is only one employee’s experience. Only when you see repeated patterns do you need to take action, which is why it’s important to ask the same questions every time.

What to Look For

Search for answers that allude to the people in the team, because as the old saying goes, people don’t quit companies — they quit managers. If they don’t directly mention a person, listen for emotional words that show how the employee felt working in that team, which would show how the team operates under its manager.

7. How would you describe the culture of our company?

With this question, you can identify the gaps between your employees’ experience and the culture you aim to promote. Hopefully, you’ve already defined an organizational culture that upholds your values. (Pro tip: If you’re in need of inspiration, you can take a look at our Culture Code and steal some ideas from there.)

What to Look For

Don’t look for direct antonyms to what you’ve defined as your culture, because employees won’t be as up-front. They might use seemingly positive terms, such as “fast-paced” or “structured,” but these may hint at a high level of stress and a sensation of immobility. Listen carefully for these seemingly positive adjectives.

Don’t let it stop here. To ensure you’re employing best practices to get optimal feedback from your employees, take a look at our exit interview form template. It includes even more exit interview questions that will help you understand why the employee is leaving.

Exit Interview Form Template

Once an employee has given their resignation letter, you’ll want to send them a form with some (or all) of the following questions. Give them time to submit their answers through the form before meeting with them to discuss their answers, face-to-face.

Below are some of the questions you’ll want your exit interview form to include. Simply copy and paste them into your preferred word processor.

Exit Interview Form

1. How long have you been considering leaving our company?

2. How did the job match expectations?

3. What reason below primarily describes your reason for leaving?

a. New industry (significant career change)

b. Compensation

c. More opportunities for learning and growth

d. Personal Reasons

e. Manager / leadership quality

f. Day-to-day work environment / culture

4. If you have accepted a new position, please select all the items that are more attractive about your new role:

a. Better pay

b. Better culture

c. Better location / commute

d. Different industry

e. Manager

f. Better work-life balance

g. More career advancement opportunities

5. What did you like most about your job?

6. What did you dislike about your job? What would you change about your job?

7. How would you describe the culture of our company?

8. How would you describe the general atmosphere in the office?

9. The quality of supervision is important to most people at work. How was your relationship with your manager?

10. What could your supervisor do to improve their management style and skill?

11. We try to be an employee-oriented company in which employees experience positive morale and motivation. What is your experience of employee morale and motivation in the company?

12. Please provide any context to further describe your reasons for leaving. Was there an event that led to this decision?

13. What were your reasons for joining our company originally? How have your feelings changed?

14. Do you believe your manager supported your professional development?

15. What are 1-2 things our company could do to promote a better workplace?

16. Please provide context and any additional feedback you’d like to provide on your manager.

How to Conduct an Exit Interview

Now that it’s time to conduct the interview, you’ll want to take the following steps to make sure the conversation is productive, amicable, and neutral.

1. Send the exit interview form to the soon-to-be ex-employee.

First, send the person who is leaving a form or document with your standard questions. This would happen the same week that they put in their resignation letter — ideally within one to two days. They should already know a form is coming their way, because you would have expressed that verbally.

2. Choose an interviewer and set up the meeting.

After you’ve given the employee time to thoughtfully respond, it’s time to choose an interviewer and set up an in-person meeting.

The interviewer should be an unbiased third party, such as a staff member from your HR team. Don’t set up the exit interview meeting with their manager or with anyone whom the person has worked with before. This may impair their ability to be honest during the interview.

3. Ask the same questions in every exit interview.

Ensure you ask the same questions in each exit interview so you can gather actionable data and insights.

Prepare a handout for yourself that prompts you to jot down similar notes for every person you or your HR staff member interviews. If all of the notes are highly disparate or seemingly disconnected, it will be difficult to glean insights and improve moving forward.

4. Keep the tone of the conversation neutral.

In person, do not ask targeted questions regarding specific people or departments — keep your questions general and don’t input your own opinion into the conversation. Don’t prompt the employee to over-share about their frustrations with the job.

This is not constructive to you as a company. Rather, you want to find out areas of improvement in more general terms, so that you can create company-wide change.

If the employee only gives personal anecdotes, that would only help you create a better experience for them. The problem is that they’re already leaving. What you want to find out is how you can improve the employee experience for those who are staying.

5. Distill the answers into insights.

Identify patterns you see from different exit interviews, and use that data to draw conclusions on which feedback you should use to improve the employee experience moving forward. As mentioned, take similar notes for each exit interview. To make it easier, you could use a survey software that helps you collect the employee’s written answers.

Exit Interview Best Practices

Ultimately, an exit interview doesn’t just help you understand why your talent is leaving — it also helps you ensure you can implement strategies or cultural changes to improve the satisfaction of employees who stay.

However, it’s not always easy to discern what a highly productive exit interview looks like.

To learn more about exit interview best practices, I spoke with Winston Tuggle, an HR Business Partner at HubSpot. Here are some of the best practices he suggests.

1. Always ask the same questions.

When it comes to exit interview best practices, Tuggle suggests, “For conducting productive exit interviews, I think one key is asking the same questions of all people who leave. This structure allows us to codify the exit responses so we can extract actionable data around why people are leaving, and how we can improve the employee experience.

We do this by having a standard exit interview form that leavers submit, and then have an unbiased third-party follow up in-person to go deeper on the answers the person filled out in the exit interview. Exit interviews aren’t necessary unless you plan on using them to gather as much data as possible that can be coupled with employee survey data to understand the employee experience.”

2. Understand the “why” behind the person’s resignation.

Tuggle also notes, “[It’s critical you understand] the ‘why’ behind someone leaving … to gather trends over time. As an HR team, it helps us to not overreact to one person’s experience and conversely helps us identify trends that we can proactively address before they lead to more unwanted attrition.”

3. Explain the purpose behind the exit interview.

It’s important you explain the purpose behind the exit interview to each employee before you begin. You might say, “We hope to use your feedback to continuously improve our culture and business processes, so we are interested in your honest opinion on how your experience has been.” That way, they don’t feel they’re taking part in a conversation that won’t be used to create change.

4. Ensure interviews stay confidential.

You’ll also want to make sure your exit interviews are confidential between the HR team and employees. While data or general insights can be used to improve employee experience and should be shared with leadership, your employee needs to know their exact complaints won’t reach their old manager or coworkers.

5. Thank the employee for their time.

Finally, be sure to thank your employee for taking the time to provide feedback during an exit interview. While one individual likely can’t pinpoint issues regarding an entire team or department, you’ll likely see commonalities over time that can help you determine how you can improve your workplace for the long-run.

Exit Interviews Will Improve Your Company Culture

Exit interviews are the key for improving your business from the inside out. Knowing what makes some employees leave can help you keep the employees you already have. As a result, you’ll improve your company culture, reduce turnover, and boost productivity — leading to a better and better workplace over time.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in January 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Boosted Posts vs. Paid Ads: Key Differences and When to Use Each

For many businesses, social media is an intimidating landscape. You know that you need to be on several platforms to reach your audience, but you’re not entirely sure if your content is getting enough organic reach to make the time investment worth it.

To add to that, you’ve been collecting followers and page likes for years and your audience is somewhere in the thousands. Why then, do your posts only reach a few hundred people at a time?

Thanks to complex social media algorithms, your posts will only reach a fraction of your actual audience. This means that no matter how good your content is, it will never be seen by everyone who could benefit from it. Sure, every once in a while, a post may be liked, commented on, and shared so many times that Instagram or Facebook deem it worthy to be seen by the masses… but that shouldn’t be your only strategy.

If you need to get it in front of a lot of people to introduce a new product, announce an event, or just spread awareness about who you are and what you do, it’s time to invest in paid advertising.

Facebook Advertising

Within Facebook, you’ll find two types of paid advertising: boosted posts and Facebook ads. Let’s take a look at what each of these is and their pros or cons.

What is a boosted post?

A boosted post is a post that you’ve made on your page’s timeline that you can boost to an audience of your choosing for a fee. It’s a very easy way to get your posts in front of more people who may not know who you are and what you do.

When you boost a post, you’ll be asked a few questions to help optimize the experience. These include:

1. Who do you want to reach? This prompts you to choose a targeted audience who may enjoy your content.
2. What is your budget? Pick a max budget that you’d like to invest over the life of your campaign.
3. How long do you want to run your boost? Facebook will take your max budget and divide it by the number of days, then apply your investment accordingly.

Pros of Boosted Posts

• Boosted posts can be a great way to help your content reach more people.
• They are easy to set up as you work directly from your timeline.
• Compared to other forms of advertising, they can be more affordable

Cons of Boosted Posts

• These still show up as “ads” to your audience so they’ll know that you paid for the reach rather than it happening naturally.
• You have limited customizability when it comes to creating your ideal audience.

What is a Facebook ad?

Unlike boosted posts, Facebook ads are created in the Ads Manager where you’ll have many more customization options to choose from.

Pros of Facebook Ads

• You can choose where your ad is placed. In addition to the Facebook time and Instagram, you can also choose from the Facebook News Feed side ads, Messenger ads, Instagram stories, instant articles, and Audience Network.
• Be goal-oriented by choosing an objective early on in your ad building. This can help you align your marketing strategy with your business goals. You can choose from options like store traffic, conversations, and lead generation.
• Get creative. Facebook ads include carousels, allow for specific descriptions, and provide a call-to-action button to motivate your audience to do something.
• Customer your audience. Facebook ads give you more options to identify and reach your ideal audience. They also have advanced tools that allow you to create “lookalike audiences” and create overlapping audience types.

Cons of Facebook Ads

• Facebook ads can be complicated to create and require more in-depth knowledge of your ideal audience.
• Ads are created from scratch rather than boosting an existing post that’s already doing well.
• Facebook ads can be more expensive than boosted posts.

Boosted Post vs. Paid Ad

Both options can provide additional reach, so how do you know which is best for you? Even with knowing the pros and cons of boosted posts and Facebook ads, the real decision comes down to your goals and what you hope to get for your money.

Before we dive in, it’s important to note that whether you choose a Facebook ad or a boosted post, both will show up on your bill as an ad.

Boosted Posts are good for bringing your business more exposure because it helps your posts reach audiences that may not be familiar with your brand. They are helpful for raising awareness but are not necessarily effective for converting customers or donors.

Consider Boosted Posts If You Want To:

• Grow your following
• Develop brand awareness with a new audience
• Increase audience engagement on your Facebook page
• Improve visibility on your best posts
• Host promotions or giveaways
• Get more website clicks

It’s always best to boost posts that are already doing well with organic reach. This will allow you to maximize your budget while increasing engagement.

For example, let’s say that you’ve got an amazing success story testimonial. A customer used your product and had phenomenal results. You’ve got a relatable character, strong visuals, and a wonderful outcome. You’ve shared this story as a post and notice that it’s getting a lot of engagement from your audience. Hundreds have liked it, commented on it, and several have even shared it.

This presents a wonderful opportunity for you to boost the post and be seen by potential customers who may not know your business existed. You’re not necessarily looking to convert customers right then and there (although you certainly wouldn’t say no!), but rather to introduce your company and what you can do, to a larger audience. In this case, a boosted post may be the perfect way to spend your advertising dollars.

Maybe though, you’re looking to do more with your advertising budget. You want to capture leads, convert customers or donors, and see both a short-term and long-term benefit from your investment. If this sounds more like your advertising goals, you may want to invest in Facebook ads.

Consider Facebook Ads If You Want To:

• Convert website visitors
• Generate leads
• Drive traffic to your store
• Get orders for your store
• Have your videos seen by more individuals

Perhaps you just opened a new brick-and-mortar location or have expanded your business to sell products online. You not only want people to know about your business and what you do, but you want them to take action and shop in your store.

You’ve got a decent social media following, however, you’d like more than just your regular audience to know about your latest expansion. You understand your ideal customer or “avatar” and rather than build an audience from scratch, you’d like to target people who are just like your existing customers and are ready to buy. In this case, a Facebook ad will help you better reach your goals.

Boosted posts and Facebook ads both have their place in robust marketing and advertising plans. The key is to learn when to use each one so you can capitalize on your effort and get the best results for your business.

Data Tracking: What Is It and What Are the Best Tools

When data is surfaced, organized, analyzed, and applied effectively, you have the power to delight more customers and improve your business’s bottom line. But first, you need to obtain all of that valuable information.

A common way to collect data related to the metrics that you care most about — such as churn, conversion rate, engagement rate, user activation rate, and average revenue per customer — is through the process of data tracking.

Data Tracking

To obtain meaningful data about your customers and target audience and their behaviors, you need to track the metrics that matter most to your business both accurately and securely.

In this article, we’ll talk about what data tracking is, why it’s beneficial, how it works, and which tools can help you track and analyze the metrics you care about.

How does data tracking work?

Data tracking and collection are often performed with cookies and/or Javascript libraries. This is how a business can track information about user behaviors on the various pages of your website (e.g. web page, landing page, blog article, product page, checkout page, etc.) as well as user/ customer accounts.

There are several tools available (we’ll look at some examples shortly) that use cookies and Javascript to track data.

For instance, Google uses Javascript to measure how users interact with your website, HubSpot uses cookies to monitor website traffic (on your landing pages, blogs, and web pages) and track visitors, and Segment uses cookies and Javascript to analyze site traffic, deliver personalized ads, and improve browsing experiences.

How to Choose the Metrics You’ll Track

The key to data tracking is selecting the right metrics (a.k.a. what you’re actually going to be measuring).

1. Ask yourself questions about what it is you want to learn. For example, “Which version of my product page converts the most users?”
2. Then, turn your question into a metric. For the example in the above step, your metric could be a product page’s conversion rate based on page views.
3. Hone in on your metric of choice even more by indicating the “events” within that metric. For the above example, events could be: 1) when a visitor lands on a product page, 2) when a visitor clicks the CTA on a product page, 3) when a user completes a form or submits a request to speak with a rep on a product page, 4) when a visitor converts into a paid customer on a product page.
4. Your chosen metrics and events should help you prove a strategy either works or doesn’t among your audience. In other words, you can use your resulting data to prove your strategy’s impact on the business and revenue.

Data Tracking Compliance

Now that you have a basic understanding of what data tracking is, you might be wondering about General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), privacy policies, and the laws that exist to protect visitors, contacts, and customers.

How to Comply with Data Tracking Policies and Laws

Today, businesses should share information with customers and visitors about how they comply with these regulations.

For instance, here’s Segment’s website data collection compliance explanation:

On the web page, Segment clearly lays out how they collect and use data and contact details that are tracked with cookies and Javascript libraries on their website.

If you’re worried about the potential of not covering all of your bases when it comes to compliance, there’s good news — many data tracking tools help you with this process.

Note: There isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution to legal compliance. That’s why — in addition to implementing a data tracking tool — it’s recommended that you consult your legal team on compliance. They will be able to help you apply the relevant features of your data tracking tool and determine what compliance at your company looks like.

For instance, HubSpot has a web page that explains in detail how GDPR works and how every HubSpot customer can feel confident that their website is compliant.

Here are examples of how HubSpot helps you ensure data tracking and application are compliant:

1. Cookies

GDPR requires you to tell your website visitors that you’re using cookies on your website in a language that they understand. They then need to consent to that tracking.

HubSpot allows you to capture all of your visitors’ cookie tracking consent and you can share different versions of your consent banner on your web pages.

2. Lawful Basis

GDPR requires you to have lawful basis to use someone’s data. HubSpot categorizes lawful reason to use someone’s data by your intent to either use it to 1) process or 2) communicate.

HubSpot has a default contact property to store lawful basis to process and there’s an option to track opt-ins and opt-outs to store lawful basis to communicate.

3. Deletion

Under GDRP, your contacts have the ability to ask you to give them a copy of all of the personal data you have about them. They can also ask you to modify that information or delete it completely.

HubSpot makes this easy by offering a “GDPR delete” function which permanently deletes a contact for you.

Data Tracking Software

Did you know that operations teams spend 80% of their time putting out data and process fires and only 20% driving business strategy and improving the customer experience?

With the right tools, things don’t have to be this way — your team can feel confident that your data is being tracked automatically, accurately, efficiently, and securely.

1. HubSpot Operations Hub

Best data tracking tool for combining a complete operations platform with a CRM to integrate all customer data across your business.

Price: $0/month (Free), $45/month (Starter), $720/month (Professional)

According to HubSpot’s Principal Marketing Manager, Ari Plaut, “Operation Hub’s key differentiator is that HubSpot is also a CRM.” Today, many data tracking tools allow you to track and analyze data — however, they don’t let you do anything else with that data.

For example, with pretty much any data tracking tool on the market, you can track your customers to help you understand your activation rate.

However, if you want to then send an email to the customers who haven’t activated to show them how they can get started, you aren’t able to with most data tracking tools. But with Operations Hub you are.

Operations Hub increases HubSpot’s already powerful capabilities by making it easy for users to connect, clean, and automate customer data across the entire business.

Unique features:

• Sync data without code (e.g. bidirectional sync, custom field mappings, filtering, historical syncing).
• Automate data cleaning and run code-based actions with Advanced Workflow Automation.
• Build fully-native custom applications with Custom Objects.
• Install the HubSpot tracking code to monitor website traffic on your landing pages, blogs, and web pages.
• Track and manage your data with local regulations in mind (e.g. GDPR deletion, consent and cookies, and lawful basis processing).
• Keep data secure with SSL, SSO, two-factor authentication, and more.

Pro Tip: Use Operations Hub, powered by HubSpot’s CRM, to sync customer data and automate business processes.

2. Google Analytics

Source

Best data tracking tool for tracking website engagement, audience behaviors, and digital marketing campaigns for free.

Price: Free (for under 10 million or fewer hits per month).

By adding the Google Analytics JavaScript tracking code to your web pages, you’ll have the insights necessary to improve the customer experience and identify the right messaging, channels, and content for your target audience across your website and app.

There are a number of customizable metrics that you can track with Google Analytics such as sessions, engagement, entry and exit pages, events, retention, return, conversions, and more.

As for reporting and tracking specifically, track custom events, attribution, user path, and user activity all in real-time via a single dashboard.

Unique features:

• Collect user session and ad campaign data from page requests by setting and reading first-party cookies on your users’ browsers.
• Read the DoubleClick cookie to collect data on display features.
• Use Google’s Events to collect data (such as downloads, link clicks, form submissions, etc.) about interactions with your content.
• Use Google’s Event Goals to define a certain Event as a conversion.
• Decide how you want to configure your Google Analytics tracking code so it’s tailored to your unique website.
• Build custom reports and dashboards to track your Events.
• Collect user-specific data while they’re on your website such as location, language, and activity.

3. Segment

Source

Best data tracking tool for implementing a CDP that can track, collect, align, and route all of your customer data into any system.

Price: Free, $120+/month (Team), request a custom demo (Business)

Segment is a data collection, management, and analytics platform. It powers and integrates with all of your data tracking tools in and out of Segment to keep your teams aligned.

There are also GDPR, CCPA, and other privacy regulations to help you maintain data compliance.

Segment uses its API to collect data from any part of your product (e.g. mobile, web, server) via open source libraries for all platforms.

Unique features:

• Integrate your data with over 300 available apps in minutes.
• Use the event tracking API to track user events and record the actions those visitors perform on any platform.
• Query data in SQL and easily access your data at any time by using Segment’s APIs.
• Keep all of your analytics data in a data warehouse of your choosing (e.g. Google BigQuery, Snowflake, etc.).
• Automatically back up your data and download your data whenever and wherever you need to.
• Access your user profiles in real-time.
• Use the Segment Profile API to review user- and account-level customer data.

4. Emarsys

Best data tracking tool for collecting product and behavior data and making that information accessible across the Emarsys platform.

Price: Request a demo and/or pricing.

Emarsys’ website data collection tool, Web Extend, establishes one-to-one personalization capabilities across different channels. It uses cookies and JavaScript API commands to keep track of your website visitors and their behaviors.

Emarsys tracks visitor interactions and behaviors across your website — from product catalog to online store — and combines that information with your historical sales data (if you have any) to give you a holistic view of your audience.

Then, the tool adds your data to the various Emarsys systems within the platform such as the Revenue Attribution and Automation Center systems. This way, you can share your data cross-team and -department as well as reference and apply it throughout all business decisions.

Unique features:

• Track the type of customer data you need to create personalized experiences across all of your channels.
• Use cross-device user identification and campaign tracking.
• Track your known-contact interactions on your website and sync that data into the Emarsys contact database (which automatically happens every few hours).
• Access your data via any of the systems within the Emarsys platform, so you never have to integrate it.
• Track revenue from email campaigns with the Revenue Attribution system.
• Build campaigns based on contact behavior with the Automations system.
• Apply your catalog and purchase data to customer and lifecycle segmentation with the Smart Insight system.

Choose Your Metrics and Tool, and Begin Data Tracking

Data tracking is an effective and accurate way to identify and track the most important metrics to your business — you can then apply your results and insights to improve the customer experience and your bottom line.

What Is an Ad Network and How Does It Work? [+9 Networks to Try]

To state the obvious, researching, finding, and buying digital ad space is a time-consuming process. In fact, an article by the Wall Street Journal compares it to “pulling out weeds online.”

But what if there was a middleman who could connect advertisers to websites that are seeking advertisers (and vice-versa)? Enter the ad network.

Let’s learn more about ad networks, how they work, and the best networks for digital marketers.

The chief function of ad networks is to collect unsold ad inventory from online publishers and match them with advertisers looking for ad spots. This makes it seamless for both sides to interact and, ultimately, come to a deal.

The benefit of using an ad network depends on which side you fall. For publishers, it helps to secure buyers for unsold ad space, although the revenue is typically less than what they could earn from direct sales. For advertisers, it helps to find inventory that fits their audience and budget.

It’s important we make a distinction between ad networks and ad servers. While both operate as advertising technology, they serve two distinct purposes.

An ad server is used by both ad networks and advertisers to run, track, and manage advertising campaigns. An ad network is also an advertising technology, but it’s used exclusively to broker buys between publishers and advertisers.

Different Types of Ad Networks

If you need to find an ad network that fits your particular audience or industry, odds are you’ll have no problems finding one. There’s an overwhelming amount of ad networks for different topics, audiences, and formats.

Here are four main types:

• Vertical networks: Ad networks that are topic-specific, such as fashion, automotive, or business.
• Premium networks: Ad networks that offer inventory from popular publishers.
• Inventory-specific networks: Ad networks that provide a specific type of ad inventory, such as video or mobile.
• Targeted networks: Ad networks that offer specific targeting capabilities that are built into the ad server.

So how much does using an ad network cost? Like most online advertising, it depends.

Some ad packages have a fixed rate, while other options may charge you on a cost-per-click (CPC) or cost-per-thousand impression (CPM) basis. Other times, an ad network will bring inventory to auction and use real-time bidding (RTB) technology to match ad impressions with the highest bidder.

How do ad networks work?

Ad networks are a powerful tool for both advertisers and publishers. But exactly how do they work? Here’s a traditional model of an ad network — but keep in mind that because of evolving technology, these steps are ever-changing.

1. To start, ad networks aggregate a large number of publishers with available inventory.
2. Meanwhile, the advertiser creates a campaign using the ad network’s campaign panel. When creating the campaign, the advertiser fills out details about the budget, target audience, and more.
3. On the publisher side, they install the ad network tags on their website.
4. When a match occurs between an advertiser’s campaign and a publisher’s supply, the ad details are sent to the publisher. The ad network earns money by taking a cut of the ad revenue, or by marking up inventory before selling it.
5. Once the ad is live, the advertiser can track and manage its performance in the ad network’s campaign panel.

Ready to give ad networks a try? Here’s a list of the 9 best ad networks for both advertisers and publishers.

Best Ad Networks

1. Google Adsense

When it comes to ad networks, Google Adsense is one of the oldest — and largest — networks. And with its great reputation and sophisticated technology, it’s not going away anytime soon.

Google Adsense can publish ads in various formats and provide super detailed targeting options, like behavioral targeting. But be warned, Google AdSense holds its advertisers to a high standard of quality, so prepare to follow the rules.

2. Media.net

Media.net is one of the most distinguished ad networks on the web, making it a popular alternative to Google Adsense. Some of its most well-known publishers include CNN, Forbes, and Esquire.

Bing and Yahoo power Media.net, exposing publishers to a large pool of both national and local advertisers. On the flip side, advertisers can leverage the ad network to create contextual ads across multiple inventories, including search, native, display, and mobile.

3. PopAds

PopAds is one of the leading ad networks specializing in pop-under ads. As a refresher, pop-under ads appear under an active window for desktop and mobile users.

PopAds offer instant approval and competitive CPM rates. And, unlike other ad networks, there’s no minimum traffic requirement.

4. PropellerAds

Another heavy hitter in the ad network sphere is PropellerAds. PropellerAds offer a variety of ad formats, including display, native, pop-under ads, and push notifications.

PropellerAds unite publishers and advertisers through its Self-Service platform.

With the platform, you can create campaigns and see real-time reporting for your ads, making it easy to track and manage campaigns.

5. BidVertiser

BidVertiser is an attractive option for publishers — just take a look at its monetization model. In addition to earning money each time an ad is clicked, a publisher also earns a little extra when the click leads to a conversion, such as a sale for the advertiser.

BidVertiser also has a bidding system to ensure publishers secure the highest revenue for each ad impression.

6. Adcash

Adcash offers a number of ad formats and tools to help publishers monetize their traffic better. What’s better, their technology can bypass those pesky ad blockers. With a clean interface and straightforward reporting tools, it’s one of the most user-friendly ad networks on the market.

7. AdThrive

AdThrive is an ad network specializing in publishers in the lifestyle industry, including travel, food, and fashion. So, if you fall into one of these niches (or not, you can still join), you may thrive on this platform.

AdThrive follows a “creator-first mindset,” and part of the deal is guaranteeing payouts for publishers — meaning, even if AdThrive doesn’t get paid by an advertiser, they will still pay you.

8. Amazon Affiliates

Amazon Affiliates is one of the leading affiliate ad networks on the web. As an affiliate, you can use link-building tools to direct readers to certain products. Here’s how it works: If a visitor clicks on a native shopping ad and makes a purchase, you earn a commission.

It’s also important to note that Amazon Associates has strict rules and policies, more than other ad networks.

9. Propel Media

Propel Media specializes in display and push ads. It’s also one of the best ad networks for reaching a high-intent audience. Using intent-based technology, it can analyze customer intent and match it with highly relevant content in real time.

The right ad network can help advertisers reach their target audience and increase conversions. And for publishers, it’s an effective way to secure buyers and fill ad inventory. However, there’s an overwhelming amount of ad networks available, so carefully weigh your options.

41 Types of Marketing Your Brand Can Invest In

Like many of the people who currently work in the industry, digital marketing was born in the 1990s. Since then, the industry has evolved at breakneck speed, sprouting many more types of marketing.

From search engine marketing to account-based marketing, every brand can use a combination of these tactics to attract its target audience and bring in more revenue.

Read on to learn about the top types of marketing around today.

Types of Marketing

1. Traditional Marketing

Traditional marketing refers to brand promotion on offline channels that were around before the rise of the internet. Think billboards, flyers, and radio spots.

Because information wasn’t as easily accessible and readily available, the majority of traditional marketing relied on outbound tactics such as print, television ads, and billboards.

2. Outbound Marketing

Outbound marketing refers to intrusive promotion, such as cold calling, email blasts to purchased lists, and print ads.

This marketing method is called “outbound” because it involves pushing a message out to consumers to raise awareness on your products or services — regardless of consumer interest.

3. Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing, on the other hand, is focused on attracting customers rather than interrupting them. The majority of inbound marketing tactics fall under digital marketing, as consumers are empowered to do research online as they progress through their own buyer’s journey.

Inbound is built on three pillars: Attract, engage, and delight. Your initial goal is to create valuable content and experiences that resonate with your audience and attract them to your business.

The next is to engage them through conversational tools like email marketing and chat bots, and of course continued value. Finally, you delight them by continuing to act as an empathetic advisor and expert.

4. Digital Marketing

Digital marketing is the opposite of traditional marketing, leveraging technology that didn’t exist traditionally to reach audiences in new ways. This type of marketing encompasses all marketing efforts that live online.

Businesses leverage digital channels, such as search engines, social media, email, and websites to connect with current and prospective customers.

5. Search Engine Marketing

Search engine marketing, or SEM, includes all strategies used to ensure your business is visible on search engine results pages (SERPs). With SEM, you can get your business in the number one spot when a user searches a particular keyword.

The two types of SEM are search engine optimization (SEO) for organic search results and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising for sponsored search engine results.

To get started with SEO, you must familiarize yourself with search engine ranking factors and produce content for search engines to index.

Pay-per-click SEM involves bidding on keywords to get your ads placed, through platforms like Google Ads. There are also ads management tools to make creating and managing PPC campaigns a breeze.

6. Content Marketing

Content marketing is a key instrument in inbound and digital marketing because it’s one of the best ways to attract your target audiences.

It involves creating, publishing, and distributing content to your target audience through free and gated channels, such as social media platforms, blogs, videos, ebooks, and webinars.

With content marketing, the goal is to help your audience along their buyer’s journey. First, identify common FAQs and concerns your buyers have before they are ready to make a purchase.

Then, create an editorial calendar to help you create and manage your content. It also helps to have a content management system (CMS) to make publishing easy.

7. Social Media Marketing

With platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter, brands can promote their business and engage with audiences on a more personal basis.

However, with social media, two things are key to success: relevant content and consistency.

No one logs on to social media looking for something to purchase, it’s important to balance promotion with entertainment. Compelling images and captions that encourage your audience to like, share and comment will bring your brand that much closer to gaining a customer.

Now onto consistency – it’s what keeps your followers coming back. How can they get invested in your brand if they rarely see it on their timeline? To make publishing content across platforms easy, there are a number of social media tools that automate the process.

8. Video Marketing

According to a 2021 Wyzowl study, 87% of marketers say using video in their marketing strategy has a positive ROI. Whether it’s for your website, YouTube channel, email list, and/or social media following, video can boost brand awareness, generate conversions, and close deals.

Some video marketing apps even allow you to analyze, nurture, and score leads based on their activity.

9. Voice Marketing

Voice marketing is leveraging smart speakers like Amazon Alexa and Google Home to add value to your audience and answer questions about their topics of interest.

Beyond optimizing your website for voice search by incorporating the right keywords, you can also get inventive by developing a Google Home action or Alexa skill.

For instance, Uber created an Alexa skill that allowed users to request a ride with a simple voice request. TED developed a feature that allowed Alexa users to play TED Talk based on topic, tone or speaker.

10. Email Marketing

Email marketing connects brands to leads, prospects and customers via email. Email campaigns can be used to increase brand awareness, generate traffic to other channels, promote products or services, or nurture leads toward a purchase.

Email regulations like the GDPR and the CAN-SPAM Act require brands to comply with responsible commercial email practices, which boil down to three principles:

• Only email people who are expecting to hear from you. I.e. they’ve opted in.
• Make it easy for subscribers to opt out.
• Be transparent about who you are when you do make contact.

With that in mind, the first thing you’ll need to do is strategize how you’ll build your email list — the database of contacts you can send emails to. The most common method is through lead capture forms on your website.

Then, you’ll need email marketing software and a CRM to send, track, and monitor the effectiveness of your emails. To push your email strategy further and maximize productivity, you may also want to look into email automation software that sends emails based on triggering criteria.

To learn the ins and outs of email marketing, take the free email marketing course from HubSpot Academy.

11. Conversational Marketing

Conversational marketing is the ability to have 1:1 conversations with your audience across multiple channels – meeting customers how, when, and where they want. It is more than just live chat, it extends to phone calls, texts, Facebook Messenger, email, Slack, and other channels.

When you’re getting started, you’ll first identify which channels your audience is on. The challenge, though, is being able to manage multiple channels without slow response times, internal miscommunication, or productivity loss. That’s why it’s important to use
conversational marketing tools

, such as a unified inbox, to streamline your efforts.

12. Buzz Marketing

Buzz marketing is a viral marketing strategy that leverages refreshingly creative content, interactive events, and community influencers to generate word-of-mouth marketing and anticipation for the product or service a brand is about to launch.

Buzz marketing works best when you reach out to influencers early and have a plan in place to generate buzz surrounding your brand. To track your efforts, invest in social listening software to keep a pulse on how your audience is responding.

13. Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is designed to tap into an existing community of engaged followers on social media. Influencers are considered experts in their niches and have built loyalty and trust from an audience you might be trying to reach.

To get started with influencer marketing, you must first build your influencer marketing strategy and define what type of influencer you’re targeting. Then, you’ll want to create criteria for your influencer to ensure they align with your strategy and budget. Factors to consider include their niche, the size of their audience, and their current metrics.

From there, you can find influencers and reach out to them by:

• Manually reaching out on social media.
• Using an influencer marketing platform.
• Hiring an agency to do the research and outreach for you.

14. Acquisition Marketing

With any marketing strategy, your goal is to attract and retain customers. However, each type of marketing focuses on a specific stage of the buyer’s journey. Acquisition marketing focuses on the attract and convert phases to turn strangers into sales-qualified leads.

What differentiates it from other marketing types is that it extends beyond the marketing team, often involving collaboration with customer service and success teams. Why? Because satisfied customers are the biggest promoters.

Acquisition marketing can involve a number of tactics to turn a website into a lead generation engine, including offering freemium products, launching education hubs, tightening the copywriting on the site, conversion rate optimization, and lead optimization.

It may even include a lead optimization and nurturing strategy to facilitate the hand-off between marketing and sales.

15. Contextual Marketing

Contextual marketing is targeting online users with different ads on websites and social media networks based on their online browsing behavior. The number one way to make contextual marketing efforts powerful is through personalization.

A CRM combined with powerful marketing tools, such as smart CTAs can make a website seem more like a “choose your own adventure” story, allowing the user to find the right information and take the right actions more effectively.

Contextual marketing takes strategy and planning, so start off on the right foot by accessing HubSpot’s free contextual marketing course.

16. Personalized Marketing

Personalized marketing aims to create a tailored marketing experience for every user who comes across your brand.

This can be as simple as adding a user’s name in the subject line of an email or sending product recommendations based on past purchases. Software products like Versium Reach make it easy for marketers to target their B2B or B2C customers with powerful audience insights.

While it might seem a tad bit creepy, most consumers are OK with it if it makes for a better shopping experience. A 2019 Smarter HQ study reported that 79% of consumers felt brands knew too much about them. Yet, 90% of them were still willing to share information about their behavior and preferences for a cheaper, easier, and more enjoyable purchasing journey.

17. Brand Marketing

Brand marketing is shaping your brand’s public perception and forging an emotional connection with your target audience through storytelling, creativity, humor, and inspiration.

The goal here is to be thought-provoking and generate discussion so that your brand is remembered and associated with positive sentiment.

To begin brand marketing, you need to deeply understand your buyer persona and what resonates with them. You must also consider your position in the market and what makes you unique from your competitors. This can help shape your values and what you stand for, giving you fodder for storytelling campaigns.

18. Stealth Marketing

Stealth marketing occurs when brands promote their products or service to consumers who don’t realize they’re being marketed to. For instance, when you’re watching a television show, and see a branded product integrated into the shot. 

Before influencers were subject to ad disclosure regulations, they often used stealth marketing to advertise sponsored products. 

For this marketing style to work, brands have to find opportunities that align with their brand identity and values.

19. Guerrilla Marketing

Guerrilla marketing is placing bold, clever brand activations in high-traffic physical locations to spread brand awareness.

Examples of guerilla marketing include altering outdoor urban environments, promoting during a live event without permission from sponsors or organizers, public stunts, and treasure hunts.

It can be a cost-effective way to garner widespread attention. However, it also has the potential to go left if its misunderstood by the audience or interrupted by weather conditions, law enforcement or other factors beyond the brand’s control.

20. Native Marketing

Native marketing occurs when brands customize their ads to fit the feel, look, and function of the platform on which they’ll be published.

Often, brands collaborate with publishers to create and distribute sponsored content to their audience. The goal is, by leveraging the brand’s editorial expertise and creating non-disruptive ads, it will increase conversion rates or create some brand awareness.

For instance, a recipe blogger could have a guest post from McBride Sisters Collection titled “The Best Wine-Infused Desserts For the Holiday Season.”

To benefit from native marketing, you’ll need to either reach out to media publications yourself or go through a native advert network that helps find and facilitate ad placement.

21. Affiliate Marketing

When a business rewards another brand – called an affiliate or affiliate partner – with a commission for each purchase made by a customer through the affiliate’s promotion tactics, that’s affiliate marketing.

It’s popular among influencers but can also be used by brands to promote products or services that align with their own.

If you already have marketing assets that are performing well, such as a website that generates leads or an engaged social media network, affiliate marketing is a great way to further leverage those assets. Choose a product or brand that closely aligns with what you sell – but does not compete with you – and promote it to your audience.

On the flip side, it’s a cost-effective method of spreading brand awareness and a good alternative to influencer marketing. You can leverage affiliate marketing to generate more revenue. And the best part is that every business can design its own rules when launching an affiliate program.

22. Partner Marketing

Partner marketing, also known as co-marketing, is a marketing collaboration between brands where they partner up on a marketing campaign and share the results. It’s a great lead generation tool that allows brands to tap into an audience they may not have reached yet.

For it to work, brands must align on their goals, have products or services that complementary and have similar user personas.

23. Product Marketing

Product marketing is much more than what it sounds like. It’s not just taking product pictures and launching campaigns. It’s driving demand for a product and its adoption through positioning, messaging, and market research.

Product marketers sit at the intersection between product, sales, marketing, and customer success teams. They work with all teams for sales enablement and aligned marketing strategies.

24. Account-based Marketing

Account-based marketing (ABM) is a hyper-focused marketing strategy where teams treat an individual prospect or customer like their very own market. Marketing teams create content, host events, and launch entire campaigns dedicated to the people associated with that account, rather than the industry as a whole.

This strategy allows brands to design personalized campaigns for their ideal clients and dedicate their time and resources to prospects exhibiting high-intent behaviors.

Here’s how you can start:

1. Identify key accounts.
2. Create messaging based on issues that matter to them most
3. Learn how to put that messaging in action with HubSpot’s introductory ABM lesson.

Find ABM software that can enable your efforts.

25. Customer Marketing

In contrast to acquisition marketing where the focus is on acquiring new customers, customer marketing is focusing on retaining your existing customers. The end goal is to delight your customers with your product or service as well as excellent customer service to turn them into brand advocates.

The cost of acquisition is much higher than the cost to retain or upsell existing customers, so brands can benefit from investing in this type of marketing.

However, it does rely on constant improvement of the customer experience, i.e. the impression you leave with a customer after you’ve provided service.

Simple ways to do this include eliminating friction in the customer service process, providing self-service resources, like online knowledge bases, and using customer service software to manage and automate interactions.

26. Word-of-Mouth Marketing

Whose opinion do you trust more: Your friend’s or a brand’s? The answer is obvious.

That’s why word-of-mouth marketing is so powerful. While you can’t force it to happen, you can position your brand in a way that makes it easier to do so, like:

• Creating shareable, viral-worthy content.
• Offering referral and loyalty programs.
• Requesting reviews after providing a product or service.

27. Relationship Marketing

Relationship marketing is a type of customer marketing that focuses on cultivating deeper, more meaningful relationships with customers to ensure long-term brand loyalty.

It’s not focused on short-term wins or sales transactions but rather on creating brand evangelists who will promote the brand.

The key to doing this is by focusing on delighting your customers who are already satisfied with your brand. Start by using customer feedback software to run a Net Promoter Score (NPS) campaign to help you find out who those customers are.

Then, come up with ways to turn those happy customers into raving fans. From there, you can request that they leave a testimonial, participate in a case study, or help you achieve your goals another way.

28. User-generated Marketing

User-generated marketing is when businesses leverage their audience to participate in creating marketing material.

It can be anything from a social media hashtag challenge that asks users to come up with a jingle, or asking users to share their pictures or videos using your product or service.

Why do brands use it? It’s cost-effective, builds connection with your audience, and increases brand awareness.

29. Campus Marketing

Some brands target college students, and who better to market to them than their peers?

Campus marketing is the process of promoting products or services to students on campus. It often involves brand ambassadors who bring awareness to the business.

You’ll often see campus marketers promoting products at event booths, hosting their own events, and handing out giveaways.

30. Proximity Marketing

Proximity marketing is a local and highly targeted marketing strategy that uses users’ location to show them relevant product or service promotions.

For instance, if you’re walking by an ice cream shop, you may receive a notification of a special discount for a flavor at that shop. There are a few ways to use proximity marketing:

• Bluetooth beacons
• Wi-Fi
• QR codes
• NFC
• Geofencing

Brands can also use it to organize treasure hunts, retarget users who don’t make a purchase, or simply learn more about user behavior.

31. Event Marketing

You’ve got an event coming up to launch a new product. Now, how do you get your target audience to show up? That’s event marketing.

It requires brands to plan a promotion strategy, develop creative assets to create anticipation, and determine the right channels to spread awareness.

An event – whether it’s a workshop, seminar, trade show, conference, or pop-up shop – helps brands connect directly with their target audience and build lasting relationships.

32. Experiential Marketing

Experiential marketing encompasses in-person and virtual events, experiences, and interactions that forge lasting emotional connections between a brand and its target audience.

It takes event marketing just one step further with the goal of making the experience magical for attendees and providing something they can take with them after the event is over — other than just information, of course. According to independent HubSpot research, 61% of marketers surveyed said experiential marketing is one of the most effective strategies for their company.

At HubSpot, we do our best to make our INBOUND conference an immersive experience that extends beyond breakout sessions by including networking opportunities, parties and happy hours, food truck lunches, and other immersive experiences. Instead of a conference, INBOUND becomes a celebration.

33. Interactive Marketing

Interactive marketing is a trigger-based marketing strategy that creates a dialogue between a brand and its audience. The brand adapts its approach based on the user’s behavior.

For instance, let’s say you’re on a bookstore website and searching for a memoir. The next time you log on, you may see recommendations for more memoirs from other authors. This strategy meets consumers where they’re at and adjusts to meet their needs.

34. Global Marketing

Global marketing is the process of scaling your marketing efforts to appeal to global audiences. However, it does require lots of market research to determine where a product or service may best resonate and how to market it to reach business goals.

Take, for instance, a food company based in Germany. If the team decides to expand to the United States, there may be changes in menu items, packaging, pricing and advertising to better reflect the audience.

35. Multicultural Marketing

Multicultural marketing is devising and executing a marketing campaign that targets people of different ethnicities and cultures within a brand’s overarching audience.

It involves in-depth research to understand those communities needs and values, and figuring out the right messaging to resonate with that group.

36. Informative Marketing

Informative marketing refers to the type of message that focuses more on the facts and less on emotions.

This marketing tactic highlights how your product’s features and benefits solve your customers’ problems and compares to your competitors.

37. Neuromarketing

Neuromarketing leverages neuroscience to gain insights into consumer decisions and predict behaviors.

Neuromarketing studies can involve tracking eye movements, analyzing brain scans, and tracking physiological functions in response to marketing stimuli.

38. Persuasive Marketing

Unlike informative marketing, persuasive marketing taps into users’ emotions. It aims to make an audience feel something, associate those emotions with a brand, and trigger desired actions.

There are many techniques, including the scarcity principle or adding .99 to a price, that can aid in persuading consumers to purchase a product or service.

However, it only works if you understand your buyer persona and know what will resonate with your target audience.

39. Cause Marketing

With cause marketing, brands tie themselves to social issues while promoting their goods. For instance, your favorite brand may advertise that a purchase from their brand will result in a donation to a certain charity.

It can also go beyond a campaign. Some brands’ entire identity aligns with a particular issue. For instance, luxury jewelry brand Civil donates 20% of its profits to underrepresented founders and entrepreneurs.

Whether it’s temporary or long term, you must answer three questions before starting with cause marketing:

1. What causes does my brand care most about?
2. How can we leverage our position to support those causes?
3. How can we tell my prospects and customers about our efforts and encourage them to get involved?

40. Controversial Marketing

Controversial marketing uses controversial topics to drive attention to marketing campaigns. It doesn’t aim to polarize audiences, but rather grab their attention and spark discussions.

There are pros and cons to this approach. On one hand, it has the potential to go viral and generate some buzz around your brand. However, there’s a risk that you turn off potential customers and negatively impact your brand’s image.

41. Field Marketing

Field marketing, a.k.a field selling, is a traditional form of marketing that involves going out to promote your products or services directly to your target audience. You can do this by distributing product samples, offering product demos, or leafleting in a community.

Best Type of Marketing

There’s no right or wrong way to do marketing — as long as it connects with your desired audience and provides a return on investment. Most companies use a combination of these strategies to generate leads and acquire customers.

Ultimately, you’ll want to choose what makes the most sense for your business based on your product, audience, and resources. 

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