While digital marketing might have once been a new idea, it’s not commonplace in most businesses.
With so much more competition in the digital world, it can be hard to come up with some of the strategies you need for success.
Thinking creatively is one of the best ways to come up with new ideas that will delight your audiences.
Creative marketing ideas can help raise awareness in your brand, build interest among your customers, and promote new ideas, products, and promotions.
They also attract the attention of the general public, which is great for small businesses or businesses that are just starting out.
This article will give you 20 creative marketing ideas that can help you reach even better results.
1. Try a Gamification Strategy
Gamification is one of the most popular trends in creative marketing ideas.
Gamification means adding gaming elements to other areas of your business to attract audiences and give them opportunities for engagement.
Most commonly, gamification involves giving rewards to audiences after they complete checkpoints or targets with your brand.
Gamification strategies give customers instant gratification. They can also bring your customers back because they enjoy the experience that your brand has provided.
Gamification is often used in customer loyalty programs and allows you to earn and redeem points for products or services.
2. Create Interactive Content
Interactive content is content that encourages participation by the reader. That could include things like interactive:
When a piece of content is interactive, it rewards active engagement rather than just letting someone passively read an article or watch a video.
It also gives some level of control back to the consumer and empowers them during their interaction. This can build customer loyalty and positive associations with your brand.
In addition to that, interactive content tends to provide more value to an audience member than a static piece of content will.
That further encourages engagement and participation with your brand.
3. Make Appearances in Expert Roundups
If you have specialized knowledge in your industry based on your experience or your brand’s unique take on products and services, sharing that knowledge can help support your marketing efforts.
An expert roundup is a blog post or video that features the contributions of many different experts in a particular area.
An interviewer will ask you and others in your field to give your opinion or advice on a particular topic.
This gives you an opportunity to share your knowledge and help guide others who might be looking to you for advice or guidance.
When you appear on multiple expert roundups, it helps to enhance your reputation and promote your business, brand, and products.
4. Host Competitions on Social Media
Hosting a competition is another great creative marketing idea that can help get the word out about your brand, your products, and your services.
You can hold your competition on social media to help further boost your brand and gather more followers, which can be added to other marketing initiatives.
You can provide your followers with a prompt and have them enter their own content like photos or videos before picking a winner.
Make sure that the people who enter the competition are following your accounts, and promote the user after picking them as a winner.
The prize can be any number of things, from free products to service discounts to cash or gift-card rewards.
5. Use Creative Lead Magnets to Grow Email Lists
Email marketing is still one of the most reliable forms of digital marketing. Emails allow you to directly address your individual customers and deliver clear messages.
However, sometimes our open rates grow stagnant and it becomes more difficult to get engagement in an email campaign.
Using lead magnets can help to grow your emailing list and encourage more opens and clicks. Lead magnets are things like discounts, coupons, product samples, and free shipping offers.
These provide concrete value to audiences and encourage them to engage with an email to get the reward.
6. Plan Seasonal Marketing Strategies
Seasonal marketing is marketing that coincides with annual events. This includes things like back-to-school sales, summer savings, and holidays.
While you might offer some discounts year-round, having a special sales event for different seasonal marketing events can garner more interest in your brand.
Planning seasonal marketing strategies takes some time, so make sure to start spreading the word about what you can do well before the actual event time comes.
That way, your customers know exactly what you are offering and when the window to receive that offer is.
7. Post Guest Content
Guest content is content that you create but is hosted on a website or platform other than your own.
This is great for a few different reasons. First, it allows you to tap into the audience of a different business and spread the word about your own business and brand.
It also gives you an opportunity to build backlinks to your own website.
Backlinks are important for creating strong SEO for your brand. When a legitimate source links to your website, it builds authority in your own business.
Guest posting allows you to link to your pages and create more opportunities for higher SEO rankings.
8. Commission Some Art
Creative marketing ideas can go beyond the digital world and improve your community.
Commissioning art like a local mural can not only help you spread the word about your business but help to beautify your community as well.
It also supports local artists and can attract passersby.
You can also commission digital art that can be displayed on your website or on your products.
Having design competitions can help bring in more interest in your brand and encourage participation from loyal customers who want to be a bigger part of the brand.
9. Add Emojis and Memes to Your Content
Far too often, marketing is formalized and not fun.
While this works for certain audiences, if your target markets include younger buyers or if your products themselves are more fun than formal, adding emojis, gifts, and memes to your content can help to boost awareness and delight your audiences.
When you incorporate fun elements into your marketing content, it can help you develop a more well-rounded brand voice and a brand personality that stands out.
This type of messaging can be applied to your blogs, emails, social media posts, and other forms of marketing content.
10. Play Around with Short Videos
Social media platforms are becoming more and more focused on videos than written content.
Apps like TikTok and Snapchat only feature video content, and Instagram and Facebook are also focusing their efforts on video over text and images.
While long, produced videos can take a significant amount of time to create and edit, short videos can be created in minutes.
A short video can be about anything, like a product demo, service explanation, behind-the-scenes tour, or just for fun.
Sharing these across your social platforms helps keep you relevant and encourages more engagement with your brand.
11. Develop a Welcoming Workflow for New Customers
Getting a new customer is a big deal. However, there isn’t often much work put into greeting these new customers and welcoming them to your brand beyond a standard email.
Creating a strategy around welcoming new customers can build a sense of enjoyment and excitement about buying from a brand.
Strategize about different ways you can welcome a new customer.
Think about things like graphics on your eCommerce site, limited-time discounts, invites to loyalty programs, or personalized messages.
12. Join in on Trending Topics
It’s always fun to join in on a trending topic on social media.
Throwing out a branded image related to a new trend or a viral sensation can help you join in on a trending conversation.
This allows you to get your content in front of new audiences who are tuning in to the trend.
However, you never want to join in a trend too late. Keeping an eye on what’s trending and having your team ready to quickly create content can help you avoid coming in too late to enjoy the trending topic.
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13. Out-of-the-Box Marketing Ideas
The days when clever, creative marketing ideas weren’t necessarily something everyone was embracing are over. Competition is fierce these days, so your marketing strategies need to be, as well. Here are a few out-of-the-box marketing ideas to help you stand out from the rest of the crowd in a way that gets your brand noticed.
14. Leverage a TikTok trend
With over 1 billion active users to its credit, it’s safe to say that TikTok is officially a social media force to be reckoned with. It’s also the type of platform where viral trends are par for the course.
Stay in the know as to the latest TikTok trends, and look for ways to get your brand involved. Tailor your efforts to match your unique brand voice, as well.
15. Create irresistible playlists
Smart brands are masters at finding out where their target audiences spend the most time and actively meeting them where they live. Yes, this means establishing a presence on key social media marketing platforms, but it’s easy to take things a few steps further.
One option is to create custom playlists on streaming platforms like Spotify or Apple Music to help raise brand awareness while becoming a larger part of your customers’ everyday lives. Match the music you choose to your brand values, update it regularly, and watch your reputation grow.
16. Join the conversation on Quora or Reddit
At this point, nearly every brand marketer uses major social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to connect with potential audiences. But far too many forget all about message board-like platforms like Quora or Reddit.
Sites like these are terrific for building authority by answering industry-specific questions your audience may have. You can also jump into relevant conversations on timely topics, as well as incorporate links from your website into your efforts.
17. Creative Marketing Ideas for Small Businesses
Competition is fierce any way you look at it when it comes to marketing these days, but it can be especially difficult for small businesses to stand out and build a clientele. That’s because they’re not just competing with other small businesses. They also have to go toe to toe with huge corporate names. Creative marketing ideas like the following can help.
18. Launch a contest on social media
One of the biggest advantages a small business might have over a bigger company is the type of personal touch modern consumers really respond to. Social media is the perfect tool for leveraging that, as it can really help humanize businesses, facilitate meaningful connections with customers, and encourage brand loyalty.
Consider launching a social media contest, competition, or another special event to get people involved. Set rules that encourage sharing, tagging, following, or sharing to help your campaign spread.
19. Participate in local events
If you’re the owner of a traditional brick-and-mortar business in search of great urban marketing ideas, then embracing ways to connect with your local community is a must. Local events offer incredible opportunities to do this while also encouraging more people to check out your online campaigns.
Check with your local city council for a list of options in your town and surrounding areas. (You can also host your own event if you like.) Examples like Sunday merchant markets, local networking events, and festivals are all terrific picks.
20. Join forces with other small businesses
Smaller businesses are often stronger together when it comes to leveraging the most creative marketing ideas, so definitely consider partnering with some in your industry (or a related one).
Put your heads together, and co-create campaigns that let you take advantage of each other’s audiences. You can treat each other to social media shout-outs, co-host a webinar together, split fees associated with pop-up shops, and so much more. Be creative!
With so much competition in the digital marketing space, it can be hard to stand out.
Coming up with creative marketing ideas can help to build more awareness in your brand and bring in new audiences.
One of the pillars of digital marketing is content marketing. However, it can be done wrong, with pages full of pop-ups and unreadable text.
Learning how to take a diversified approach to content marketing can help you develop your efforts. To learn more, check out our interactive eBook!
