3 Most Common Causes of Demand Gen Campaign Fails ... and how to fix them without starting from scratch

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The countdown is on. You're trying to hit your year-end KPIs. Your demand gen campaigns are in place, but they're not performing as expected. Now what?
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If you're like most overstretched marketers, you're already being tasked with doing more with less. The macroeconomic climate is resulting in precautionary budget cuts and ongoing layoff threats. And you have neither the bandwidth nor the budget to redo the marketing campaigns and content already in place. 


What if you could add one component to your existing marketing efforts that resuscitated the entire campaign?

And what if that one component didn't overburden your team by adding unnecessary complexity?

What if that one component was also competitor-proof?


It sounds too good to be true; the truth is that this proven strategy has been used by the world's biggest and best brands for decades.


CTAs can't be an afterthought

People need a reason to take action. Yet, a typical CTA is an afterthought in the marketing campaign development process. The truth is, without a compelling reason to act, your prospect won't respond. And when that happens, your buyer's journey stalls. Your media spend won't deliver, which means your CAC will increase, and ultimately your campaign won't perform as expected, meaning you miss your target metrics. Then what?


Enter the Signature Offer

Your brand needs a Signature Offer. In fact, it's the key to the success of your entire marketing campaign. No matter how great your content is or how clever your ads are, your prospect won't move on to the next step of the customer journey if you don't get the offer right. You can build a whole new campaign. Or you can bolt on a Signature Offer—one that appeals to YOUR specific audience and connects to YOUR brand essence, all while aligning to the correct step in the customer journey.


HubSpot, for example, places a heavy emphasis on creating high-quality, valuable content to attract prospects. But they don't stop there. They offer free versions of their tools to get users into the ecosystem. They use their helpful free tools like CRM or Website Grader to generate leads, which helped them grow to over 100,000 users in 2021.


Avoiding piling on to your team

It's possible to add a cost-efficient, appealing Signature Offer to a marketing campaign without overburdening your team or adding unnecessary complexity. How? It comes down to the choices you make. With the right resources, you can get the campaign assets you need delivered to you and your team the way you need them. You can avoid the branding police, limit the marketing operations asks, and even scale cost-efficiently based on how you structure your offer.


Making it competitor-proof

How do you create a Signature Offer that your competitor can't swipe? You connect your brand's USP to your target audience so tightly that the same offer wouldn't work for the competition. In fact, a great test of an existing offer is to ask yourself, "Could I replace our brand with a competitor, and would it still work?" If the answer is yes, you've got work to do. But when you understand your ICP and can seamlessly connect your USP through your offer, you're on your way to creating a Signature Offer.

Apple has delivered a masterclass on delivering a unique brand experience that a competitor can't easily clone. From the white earbuds to the exclusive deals with the launch of the iTunes Music store, Apple is an expert at freezing out competitors. Similarly, we developed a simple UGC contest with Slinky that competitive brands couldn't touch; it tapped into the brand's iconic jingle. This anniversary campaign resulted in the brand enjoying its best sales year in history.


Fix your Demand Gen campaign now

You've still got time to hit your target metrics.

Build and bolt on a Signature Offer to your existing campaign today.

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About The Author

XPROMOS is an independent marketing agency with a 33+ year history of delighting B2B and B2C clients of iconic brands from Barbie to Sage. Exceeds expectations by creatively combining proven strategies with evolving tactics throughout the customer journey, while delivering on time and within budget.

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