How to Create a Campaign…It’s Not as Scary as You Think

Yes, I said the word campaign. Please don’t run away.

From talking to nonprofit and small business owners, I’ve learned that many think the word “campaign” is scary. It sounds like something that’s incredibly complicated and time consuming, but I’m here to tell you that it’s not hard to create a campaign.

I, personally, like to define a campaign as a themed promotion created to reach a specific goal with a beginning and an end date. Your campaign can contain as few or as many pieces as you find necessary for your bottom line.

But first things first, let’s start with a few burning questions.

Where do I begin?

The most important part of creating a campaign is defining a clear and concise goal. Your goal can be as simple as increasing your revenue for the month of October, but it must be specific. The more specific you are when setting your goal, the greater chance you’ll have of actually achieving it. The specificity will help focus your tactics and save you time.

What do I need for a campaign?

A clear call-to-action: You want to make sure your campaign has a clear call-to-action. A call-to-action is a phrase intended to encourage your customers to take action. This can be anything from “download this guide now” to “make your reservation today.” No matter what it is, ensure it clearly tells your reader what action you want them to take.

A plan of attack: Creating a calendar is the most efficient way to run a campaign. And considering that campaigns have a start and an end date, it should be relatively simple to put together a calendar with your plan of attack. Example calendar reminders:

• Send email on September 9th with a link to campaign (or asset)


• Post on Facebook about campaign September 5th, 12th, and 26th


• Don’t forget that you can have overlap. Including a Facebook post about a campaign in your September 20th newsletter.

What to offer?

People tend to struggle most when it comes to deciding what to offer in a campaign. Here are a couple examples of what you could offer:

1. Discounts


2. Downloads


3. Event invites and updates


4. B2B (a business working with other businesses) Services


5. Hints and tips


6. Support a cause

Not only do you want your goals and objectives to be specific, but you want your offer to be specific too. Telling people you have a sale going on is too vague. Telling people about a specific discount for a specific amount and product will peak their interest.

How do I know if my campaign worked?

ROI (return on investment) is very important when it comes to almost anything you do for your business. If you are unsure about the success of your campaign, you won’t know if it was worth your time and effort.

The way you measure your success will vary from offer to offer, but you always want to measure your end goal. If your goal was to build your network, you would want to take a look at how many email addresses you received from your campaign.

Note: There are many programs out there that let you ask for an email address before your recipient receives your offer.

If your goal was to drive attendance to your event, you should measure the amount of attendees you received due to your campaign.

Using your social networks and email lists to boost your campaign is a must. This is a key reason why including a social campaign in your overall campaign strategy is helpful. You can create a campaign in 10 minutes or less with the new Constant Contact Social Campaigns flow. This will allow you to get your campaign up-and-running on your Facebook Page and begin promoting your most recent offer in just minutes.

Social Campaigns allow you to create a “gate page” too. A “gate page” prompts people to “like” your Facebook Page in order to receive your offer. The person who is viewing this page cannot receive your offer until they have liked your page.

Once they have liked your Facebook Page, or if they had already liked your page on a previous date, they will be sent to your “reveal page,” which will display the offer you were promoting.

Example of Social Campaigns in action:

Lisa Kember, Regional Development Director in Eastern Canada for Constant Contact, was presenting at an event in Toronto. Lisa decided she wanted to give away 20 free tickets to this event and wanted to utilize her social media channels to do so.

Lisa created a campaign in 8 minutes, promoted it in an email newsletter and on social media, and reached 20 entries in less than an hour! The campaign looked like this:

What does campaign success look like?

Your success will vary based on your goals, but know that your campaign will grow your email list, Facebook list, and even your event. It will also allow you to get in front of your customers to help them remember who you are and why they should be using your product or service.

Lisa Kember was happy with her success:

Lisa was able to show how socially savvy she was by using Social Campaigns. She also allowed 20 people into her event for free and gained 23 new email address and 69 new Facebook fans!

Campaigns aren’t so scary…are they?

I know, it’s a lot of information, but creating a campaign does not need to be complicated. A campaign can be as simple as a sweepstakes that gives away a free product of yours to a random winner. Your customers will have to input their email address to be entered to win, so it’s a win-win situation.

No matter what offer you decide on, always remember that promoting your campaign everywhere your customers may see it is super important when it comes to your campaign success.

For information about how you can find success on other social media sites like Pinterest, reserve your spot for our free webinar, “How to Drive Social Visibility and New Business with Pinterest.”

Let me know how the campaigning goes. I’d love to hear about all your successes!

via Business 2 Community http://www.business2community.com/online-marketing/create-campaignits-scary-think-0595443?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=create-campaignits-scary-think