Marketing Strategy

My Digital Strategy Playbook: Proven Ways to Maximize Your Online Presence

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For most of us, digital forms a significant part of our overall marketing strategies. Consumers and businesses alike are almost always online and on the go, so you want to be able to reach them wherever they are. But this ever-changing digital landscape can quickly become overwhelming. I’ve put together this guide — with a free template — to help you efficiently create, fine-tune, and maintain an agile digital marketing strategy and improve your digital presence. Table of Contents Marketing Strategies vs. Marketing Tactics Components of a Digital Strategy What is a digital marketing campaign? Digital Marketing Strategy Template Digital Marketing Campaign Examples Digital Strategy Examples Building My Own Strategy Marketing Strategies vs. Marketing Tactics Are you confused about the difference between a marketing strategy and marketing tactics? You can think about it like this: strategy is planning, and tactic is doing. Having a strategy without ways to act on it (tactics) is daydreaming, and taking actions with no common goal or plan (strategy) wastes your time. Let’s dive a bit deeper into the differences between the two. Characteristics of a Strategy Marketing or not, there are three parts to any strategy: 1. A diagnosis of your challenge. 2. A guiding policy for dealing with the challenge. 3. A set of targeted actions is necessary to accomplish the policy. Depending on the scale of your business, your marketing strategy may include several moving parts, each with different goals. With that said, working on your strategy can become daunting at times. So, if you’re ever feeling overwhelmed about your marketing strategy, refer to these three steps to keep you focused on achieving your objectives. (Psst: Subscribe to Masters in Marketing newsletter for weekly insights from top brands. Plus, for one week only, 100 readers can win our limited Kit!) Characteristics of a Tactic While strategies provide a framework for your overall vision, tactics determine the specific steps taken to execute that vision. A good tactic should: Be specific, actionable, and measurable. Align with the overall strategy. Have a relatively short timeframe. Depending on your marketing strategy, your tactics may include email marketing campaigns, publishing a blog, or organizing an event. Now, let’s look at digital marketing strategy. A strong digital marketing strategy helps your business achieve specific digital goals through carefully selected mediums. Similar to marketing strategies versus marketing tactics, “digital marketing strategy” and “digital marketing campaign” are also often used interchangeably. So, how do they differ? I’ll discuss that in the following sections. Components of a Digital Strategy Goals and Objectives First of all, you’ve got to lay out your main goals and specific objectives to build an effective digital strategy. Goals are big-picture ideas, while objectives are more detailed and easier to measure. They have clear deadlines and show what success looks like. Here is an example of how I like to think about the difference: Goal: To increase brand awareness. Objective: Grow social media following by 20% within the next quarter. See the difference? When it comes to goals, you can define and measure them through SMART goals and criteria. Source Audience Analysis Next step — get to know your audience. Research and identify the specific groups of people you want to reach. Consider their age, where they live, and how much money they make. What are their interests? What issues do they face? Where do they spend their time online? Study their online behavior, preferred websites, and what they like to read or watch, so you can pick the best platforms and make content that grabs their attention. Pro tip: Take it further with Customer Profiling in 10 Easy Steps [+ Templates] Content Plan A content plan is the most interesting and, at the same time, most challenging part of any strategy. Your content must inform, entertain, and engage. Here you need to “spy” on your audience again. What kind of content do they devour? Where do they leave the most comments, likes, and shares? When do they mostly check in (morning, lunch, bedtime)? Here are my top tips for creating a content strategy that works: Content variety. Use blog posts, videos, infographics, and more content formats to keep your audience engaged. Unique research and case studies are also great. Content pillars. Build content around core ideas that resonate with your brand and audience. Content calendar. Use a content calendar to stay consistent and ensure a steady flow of material. SEO. Research keywords and sprinkle them in for better online visibility. Content repurposing. Turn successful content into new formats to maximize its reach. Tracking and adapting. Use Google Analytics data to see what works and adjust your strategy accordingly. Pro tip: Take your content strategy to the next level with this handy guide: How to Develop a Content Strategy in 7 Steps: A Start-to-Finish Guide UX Design Every digital strategy should prioritize a good user experience. Your site or app needs to be functional, enjoyable, and easy to use. It must be clear, intuitive, and frustration-free. Otherwise, you risk losing potential customers. Here are my tips for good UX: Clear navigation. Make the menu simple so customers can find what they need easily. Simple forms. Keep forms short with clear instructions and no annoying error messages. Mobile-friendly design. Your site must look good and work well on any device. Fast loading speed. Speed up your site to keep visitors and improve user experience. Pro tip: Explore more UX design with our article Perfecting Your Digital UX Design — The Tips You Need to Know Data Analytics Data analytics track traffic, analyze which parts of the campaign resonate most, and even pinpoint where users might be dropping off. Data analytics can also track how users behave, understand what they like, and even predict future trends. Managing data analytics can be overwhelming, but HubSpot’s Marketing Analytics & Dashboard Software makes it easy to keep track of all your marketing efforts effortlessly. This lets you identify what‘s working and what’s not. You can then refine your approach, optimize content

Uncategorized

How We’re Building Breeze to Power the Future of GTM

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Two years after Generative AI took off, one thing is clear: AI will transform the way businesses operate. But for most small and medium businesses, the AI landscape feels overwhelming. They don’t need the hype; they need practical help. The reality is that 50% of small businesses fail within five years. Not because starting a business is hard, but because scaling one is brutal. When you’re caught between limited resources and ambitious growth goals, you need tools that deliver actual results, not more complexity. That’s what we’re building with Breeze — AI designed specifically for scaling companies, built directly into HubSpot’s customer platform. In this post, we’ll take you behind the scenes of how we’re building Breeze, the most common use cases, and how it’s already helping real businesses drive results. The Breeze Tech Stack: Building for the AI-First Era Software is evolving. What started as desktop programs in the 1990s and moved to cloud-based SaaS in the 2000s is now entering a new era: software that doesn’t just serve, but works toward outcomes. This is the shift from “software as a service” to “results as a service.” We’re not building AI because it’s the latest tech trend — we’re using AI to deliver what customers are actually after: more leads, faster sales cycles, and better customer satisfaction. With Breeze, scaling companies can quickly and easily get value from AI connected to their customer data. We’re distinguishing Breeze in three ways to enable HubSpot customers to get the most out of AI: Our platform unifies structured data (like CRM records) and unstructured data (such as emails, calls, and transcripts) with external data like buyer intent and company news to give Breeze the full picture. Our “all-on-one” approach provides context across the customer journey, unlike point solution AI agents that fall short without a full understanding of the GTM. Our agent ecosystem connects humans with AI agents to extend their teams — some built by HubSpot, others by partners and citizen developers — all seamlessly connected to customer data to solve any need. The Four Layers of Breeze We’re building Breeze in four layers with data and context as the foundation. It’s something HubSpot is uniquely positioned to provide as the source of truth for nearly 250,000 companies with millions of users. From there, we help customers make sense of that data, customize and extend Breeze, and use it to power their GTM — all without having to become AI experts themselves. 1. Context Layer: Unified Data for Powerful AI AI is only as good as the data that powers it. Imagine asking your AI assistant to help with a customer issue, but it can‘t see their recent emails, doesn’t know about their last support call, and has no idea about the new product update that might solve their problem. That‘s the reality of most AI tools today — they’re smart, but they’re working blindfolded. Providing complete customer context is essential to AI delivering on its full promise, and this is what makes HubSpot stand out from other tools in the market. Only HubSpot has the depth and breadth of data across the customer journey, and can unify it to train our AI systems. That’s what makes Breeze’s Context Layer so unique: Breeze Knowledge Models: Not one, but multiple specialized models that pull all of your data into one clear picture of your customer, their interests, objections, and more. We combine the latest foundation models — from OpenAI, Stability AI, Google, Anthropic, and others — with our own custom models and deep understanding of the GTM for scaling businesses, so you get the best of AI without worrying about which model is best this month. Structured Data: This has always been our strength — customer records, company information, contact data, and all the rich CRM information that HubSpot has organized for over 15 years. Unstructured Data: This represents up to 80% of a business’s data that, until now, has been trapped, unable to be used. Think emails, call transcripts, meeting recordings, conversations. Our acquisition of Frame.ai in 2024 allows us to use this data for the first time, a capability lacking in most solutions on the market today. External Data: Think of this as all the data that exists out in the world, beyond your company. We’re able to perceive this external data across text, audio, and video, including over 200 million buyer and company profiles, information from earnings releases, funding rounds, and other relevant news posted across the internet. When you’re building a business, you don’t have time to hunt through multiple systems or keep up with AI developments. We absorb that complexity and bring together your internal and external data so Breeze has the complete picture. 2. Intelligence Layer: The Brain of Breeze Our Intelligence Layer is the cognitive engine that processes your data into insights — it’s the “brain” of Breeze. While nascent today, we’re thinking about this in three ways to make Breeze even more powerful in the future: Reasoning: Breeze won’t just look up answers — it will think things through, connecting different pieces of information to work out solutions, like your best employees tackling tough problems. Memory: Unlike basic chatbots that forget conversations the moment they’re over, Breeze remembers. This is the next evolution in AI personalization and quality. Breeze will learn from previous conversations and remember key user facts and preferences that can be used across all of their interactions. No more repeating yourself. Prediction: Instead of just reacting to problems, Breeze spots patterns and anticipates what might happen next through predictive analytics. For example, instead of finding out a client may not renew 30 days before expiration, Breeze flags concerning signals (decreasing usage, logins, fewer support tickets) months before the contract ends. You shouldn’t need a massive data science team to turn raw business data into insights you can act on. With Breeze, every business will be able to reason through problems, remember every interaction, and predict what comes next. 3. Integration

B2B marketing

Is B2B Telemarketing Making a Resurgence? Here’s What the Experts Say

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Like many professionals, I face a deluge of sales messages every day. It’s easy to tune out emails, display ads, and LinkedIn messages. But a phone call? Love it or hate it, it captures my attention. I set out to discover if B2B telemarketing is dead in 2025, or if it’s due for a comeback. I talked to sales experts and dug into data to find out whether cold calling still has a place in the modern sales strategy. Follow along as I share what I found and the expert tips I uncovered on how to turn conversations into conversions with a phone call. Table of Contents What is B2B telemarketing? Is telemarketing dead? Benefits of B2B Telemarketing B2B Telemarketing Types Tips for B2B Telemarketing [+ Experts and Data] What is B2B telemarketing? B2B telemarketing is an outbound sales tactic in which one company attempts to build a relationship and sell its products or services over the phone to another. It’s better known as cold calling, “cold” because the seller is initiating contact with the buyer instead of the other way around. Is telemarketing dead? To answer my question, I turned to HubSpot’s State of Sales report to see what sales reps say about telemarketing as a lead gen and sales tactic. First, I saw data that confirmed what I already knew: 71% of consumers want to start with self-service tools to do their own research rather than speak to a human. However, this finding doesn’t mean that a lead won’t start their buying journey with research before talking to the sales team later on. Just 19% of sales pros say that telemarketing is their best source of high-quality leads. That lags behind referrals, social media, and email marketing but shows that phone calls still work well for some companies and industries as a first point of contact. I also found this surprising statistic. When HubSpot asked over 1,400 sales professionals about their most effective sales tactic, they reported 1) in-person meetings and 2) phone calls. This tells me that high-dollar deals aren’t done over email or chat alone. Personal conversations — in-person, phone, or video — are key channels for conversion. Leslie Venetz, founder of the Sales-Led GTM Agency, is bullish on phone-based outreach. “Inbound gets fewer results than it ever has before. The same is true with PLG — it’s a very, very crowded market, and our buyers are frazzled, distracted, and overwhelmed. This is why I think we are seeing a resurgence in cold calling. Because so many folks are overly reliant on email right now, I believe cold calling will be a primary channel for revenue generation in 2025,” Venetz says. Based on everything I’ve learned, I believe B2B telemarketing still deserves a place in most company’s sales strategies. It still needs an effective inbound marketing, social media, and email strategy to be effective, so your prospect has some brand awareness. When you pick up the phone, a well-timed cold call can bridge the gap from awareness to interest. (Psst: Subscribe to Masters in Marketing newsletter for weekly insights from top brands. Plus, for one week only, 100 readers can win our limited Kit!) Benefits of B2B Telemarketing What can this 150-year-old channel, the phone call, give us that email and social can’t? Personalized Channel for High-Value Buyers Buying enterprise software or multi-million dollar equipment isn’t like buying a pair of socks off Amazon. The average B2B software purchase takes three to six months and involves four to six decision-makers. For that reason, 57% of C-level executives and VPs still prefer to speak to a sales rep on the phone to ask questions and fully understand the product or service they would be buying. “While Gen Z does not like the phone, it‘s important for them to remember that most of the decision-makers they’re calling on are still in that older millennial+ age bracket,” says Venetz. “Especially if we look at senior level executives, the data repeatedly shows us that they prefer to be reached with a phone call.” The most important factor B2B buyers look for, more than support and integration potential, is the trustworthiness of the organization and sales team, according to Gartner. To showcase your value and build trust, you need to build rapport and a relationship — you need conversations. High Conversion Rate According to Cognism’s State of Cold Calling, the average cold call connect rate is 16.6%, and the average success rate is 4.82%. Compare that to the average conversion rate of 0.80% for B2B display ads, and that number starts to look pretty good. It’s also more than double the cold calling success rate from 2022 — a good indicator that cold calling is gaining traction again. Let’s say that an outbound lead specialist makes 100 calls a day and actually speaks with 55 of them. That translates to 275 prospect convesations a week, not to mention voicemails to many more and about 13 qualified leads or appointments for your sales team each week. B2B Telemarketing Types The goals of B2B telemarketing can vary depending on your company’s size, industry, and sales organization. A sales rep for a small company might manage telemarketing from first contact through lead nurturing and closing. At a larger company, dedicated sales development representatives often focus exclusively on outbound calls with the goal of handing qualified leads off. 1. Lead Generation A lead generation call is when a sales development representative calls a prospect to qualify them as a lead. In a lead gen call, the caller should gather more information about a prospect, like job title, needs, and budget, and confirm their interest in learning more. 2. Appointment-Setting Call An appointment-setting call has a very specific goal: booking a next step, like a demo, tour, or sales call. 3. Lead Nurturing Call A lead nurturing call, also called a sales call, is when a sales team contacts a lead after they have expressed interest in the company’s offerings. Often, a lead fills out

Social Media Marketing

59 TikTok Stats to Know in 2025

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Despite TikTok’s uncertain future and mysterious algorithm, there’s a lot of data about the platform and its users that marketers can use to refine their strategies. I don’t know about you, but TikTok stats help me identify opportunities, pinpoint audience behaviors, and better understand the overall landscape of the platform as we head into an uncertain season of TikTok. To help you make informed decisions about your strategy, I’ll share key TikTok statistics and facts to help you improve your social strategy in 2025. Already know what stats you’re looking for? Jump there: Table of Contents TikTok Stats for Marketers Userbase, Downloads, and Growth Demographics User Behavior The Impact of TikTok Shopping on TikTok Viral Trends and Influencers on TikTok Business, Revenue, and Competition The Future of TikTok Where to Find More TikTok Stats TikTok Stats to Know in 2025 TikTok Stats for Marketers Before I jump into overall TikTok stats, I want to share some key figures and best practices for marketers to know when using the app. TikTok usage among social media marketers has increased 15% year over year. (HubSpot Blog Research) 27% of marketers are increasing their investment in TikTok in 2025, behind Instagram (28.84%) and YouTube (29.58%). (HubSpot Blog Research) The best times to post on the app are 6-9 p.m., 3-6 p.m., and 12-3 p.m., and the best day is Friday. (HubSpot Blog Research) According to a study, one in ten Gen-Zers is more likely to rely on TikTok than Google. (Adobe) Over 2 in 5 Americans use TikTok as a search engine. (Adobe) TikTok has the third-best engagement rate, according to marketers. Of marketers surveyed, 13% said that TikTok has the highest engagement rate. Ahead of TikTok is Facebook (22%), YouTube (23%), and Instagram (23%). (HubSpot Blog Research) TikTok video downloads reached 186 million in quarter four of 2024. (Statista) TikTok says that a few U.S.-based employees can “heat” videos, which means they can intervene to increase their viewership. (Forbes, eMarketer) TikTok’s CPM is half the cost of Instagram, a third of the cost of Twitter, and 62% less than Snapchat. (eMarketer) TikTok’s ad revenue worldwide is projected to reach $33.1 billion in 2025 and $54 billion by 2027. (Oberlo) Userbase, Downloads, and Growth Next, I want to cover TikTok’s general user data, including downloads and growth over the years. Within TikTok’s first year, it reportedly reached 500 million monthly active users. While once considered a fluke, TikTok’s growth has only skyrocketed since then. In September 2021, TikTok celebrated reaching 1 billion monthly active users. (TikTok) Douyin, TikTok’s original standalone app in China, had 300 million users when Musical.ly merged with TikTok. (The Verge) In 2024, TikTok was the most downloaded app globally (825.5 million downloads), followed by Instagram and Facebook. (Statista) In 2024, TikTok was the most installed iOS app, with 186 million downloads, followed by Temu, with 138 million. (Business of Apps) TikTok generated around 186 million downloads from users worldwide in the fourth quarter of 2024 (Statista) Demographics Next, I want to share a breakdown of TikTok’s major demographics. These demographics are based on TikTok’s user base around the world. Indonesia, the United States, and Brazil have the largest audiences on TikTok as of August 2024. (Statista) TikTok’s largest age group is between the ages of 18 and 24. (Statista) 70% of U.S. TikTok users identify as sports fans. (TikTok) 92% of Gen Z users aged between 16 and 25 years use YouTube. Instagram and TikTok follow, with 85% and 78% of U.S. Gen Z users. (Statista) Among social media marketers who build social media communities, 28% say that TikTok is the most effective platform for building an active community on social media. (HubSpot Blog Research). User Behavior TikTok is a fast-paced app. The second you log in, you see a video at the top of a feed that’s algorithmically curated around your interests. From my own experience, I can easily spend more time than expected watching an endless stream of entertaining videos. Since these videos can be anywhere from 6 seconds to 10 minutes, the app is ideal for bridging the gap between people who seek quick entertainment or those looking to learn from longer-form content. Because of TikTok’s quick pace and highly curated feed, many of the stats below don’t surprise me. Instead, they point to what most marketers already know, which is that TikTok content has major influence over consumers. The average user spends 58.4 minutes per day on the app, according to Oberlo. (Oberlo) 73% of TikTok users watch whatever the algorithm suggests. (TikTok) 72.1% of Gen Z is now on TikTok, and 72.5% use Instagram. (eMarketer) After seeing an ad on TikTok, viewers trust the brand 41% more and are 31% more likely to be loyal to the brand. (TikTok) TikTok users are 1.5x more likely to buy products they discover on the platform. (TikTok) Users are 1.8x more likely to agree that TikTok introduces them to new topics they didn’t even know they liked. (TikTok) TikTok is 20% more likely to be the sole focus of a user’s attention compared to video streaming platforms. (TikTok) Millennial TikTok users are 2.3x more likely than other users to create a post and tag a brand. (TikTok) A quarter of U.S. adults under 30 regularly get news on TikTok. (Pew Research Center) 40% of users say that their For You Page (FYP) is either extremely or very interesting to them. (Pew Research Center) 52% of U.S. adults on TikTok have never posted a video on the platform. (Pew Research Center) The most active 25% of U.S. adults on TikTok produce 98% of public content. (Pew Research Center) New recipes are the topics consumers search for the most on TikTok (36%), followed by new music (35%) and DIY tips (34%). (Adobe) The Impact of TikTok 52% of consumers who make purchases after seeing TikTok ads were only exposed to TikTok. (TikTok) Ads on TikTok viewed for less than six seconds still produce a stronger impact compared to ads

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