Have you ever experienced this: you misplace something, for example a sweatshirt, and then you spend hours looking for it? In the end, you give up and a few days later, you find it at the exact spot you checked while looking for it. Well, searching for the right idea is exactly like that. Sometimes, the best ideas are the ones we get randomly. I believe that everybody has the potential to find the right idea, so I compiled a list of a few key steps in brainstorming and tips on how to overcome a creative block. Good ideas are an important part of everyday life, as well as business, especially in marketing, as it’s constantly evolving, demands more and more novelty and is incredibly competitive. An important element in brainstorming is creativity. Not only in an artistic sense, but in every way – innovativeness and craftiness. If you’re motivated and curious, your creative energy will be limitless.

Where do we start brainstorming? In the beginning. I’m afraid there is no one right answer. But you can ask yourself 4 questions that will help you get your creative juices flowing. The answers will help you stay on track and define clear goals.

The goal of brainstorming is always to get some lightbulbs to go off – those invisible lightbulbs over our heads. But it often happens that our lightbulbs simply go out. This is called creative block, and unfortunately, no one can escape it. Because modern society demands we stay quick, inventive, productive, and efficient at all times, we have to find ways to overcome out creative blocks.

How to change the lightbulb (or how to overcome creative block)?

The purpose of the strategies below is to relax and forget about everything for a moment, as we often think of the best ideas, when our brain looks for it without our conscious participation.

Music can help us relax, fall asleep, wake up and liven up. Play your favourite music genre and take a few minutes to yourself. Music brings out feelings, which guide our thoughts. If you get a random idea or inspiration, write it down, take a picture or a video. Even the smallest idea can lead to something bigger. Many of us have spent hours surfing Pinterest, which isn’t bad at all! Just make sure not to copy the entire idea, but use it in your own unique way and develop it further. If your routine is morning brainstorming and you often face creative block, it might be time to change it up a bit. How about afternoon brainstorming?

Every idea has potential, some only need a bit more work.

I believe the secret to a good idea is in details. Start small and work your way towards something outstanding – in other words, make it snowball. At the end of the day, practice makes perfect, which means your brainstorming sessions will get easier the more you do it. As I’m sure you know, there is no such thing as a stupid question. The same applies to brainstorming – there is no such thing as a bad idea. Every idea has potential, some only need a bit more work.

Looking for inspiration can be relaxing, sometimes exhausting, but fun either way. Those tips are not only useful for dealing with creative block, but we can use them in everyday stressful situations. At Beglobal, we know that every individual plays an important part of successful and creative ideas. We believe that finding the right idea is a lot more than just reaching another goal. It’s about challenging yourself, become more independent and grow as a creator. And now, grab your earphones and pens and let your creative adventure begin!

Every unexpected situation or a turbulent time leads us to wonder, what we could be doing differently, what we could improve and how to get ahead of our competitors.

Nowadays, when the digital comes first and most companies spontaneously or deliberately focus on digital strategies, it is difficult to make your offer and activities stand out.

Many companies keep blogs, use hidden content that may get a few likes, send weekly or monthly emails, and the truly competent ones offer free content in exchange for contact information.

Is that really all you can do online to grow your business? At Beglobal, we dedicated the past year to improve our performance and offer our clients more than just another basic service.

Of course, traditional marketing techniques are crucial in designing a long-term strategy, but they are not enough to beat the competition. If you want to raise your brand awareness, you must diversify your marketing platforms and go further than basic digital strategies.

The following article introduces some underrated marketing techniques that we often use for the benefit of our clients.

4 marketing techniques your competitors haven’t mastered

1. Native advertising

Native advertising is gaining in popularity and is becoming the primary form of display advertising in many countries. But according to latest research carried out by CMI and Outbrain, only 26% of companies use it to reach their target audiences. This means that the remaining 74% are still missing out on an opportunity to improve their content appearance.

Native advertising is a payed marketing and advertising service, using ads that flawlessly fit the platform on which they are displayed. As opposed to the commonly used banners, native ads are not intrusive and do not harm the user experience.

Native ads can be seen on social media platforms (yes, all those Booking.com ads that you see whenever you return from a holiday, are native ads), under articles (Can you think of something that you may like to see?) or in between items in online stores.

Native advertising requires a lot of time, knowledge of buyer psychology and ad placing skills. But results suggest that it pays off to invest in this type of marketing.

• Native ads are 18% more likely to increase sales than ordinary banners
• Consumers view native ads at a 53% higher rate than display ads (GDN)
• 70% of users say that they would prefer to discover products through content than through traditional forms of advertising

2. Surveys

Anyone with enough website traffic can conduct research. Your own research will elicit unlimited traffic on your website and give you an amazing opportunity to establish connections and build credibility fast.

What goes into research?

• An idea
• Research questions
• An audience
• A questionnaire

The other important advantage of doing research is that you can shape it in many ways. While you may want to publish your survey as an e-book to capture email from the target audience, you can also present your results in a blogpost, include them in your newsletter, and so on.

3. Quora

Marketing on the Q&A platform Quora bears a lot of potential for many companies.

There are 300 million monthly users on Quora and this can help you significantly raise your brand awareness.

What is Quora marketing like?

Quora started out as a platform where you can find answers to your questions and became the worldwide base of knowledge. Today, you can see people asking for product reviews, solutions, advice for their companies etc. Quora is now also a platform for companies to market their services to a wider audience.

Experience shows that Quora is a good choice for advertising products of a medium price range entering the American market.

If this is the case for your company, you should definitely try using Quora to market your products.

If this is the case for your company, you should definitely try using Quora to market your products.

• Create a reliable profile. Show that there is a real person behind your answers. Provide as much information as you can. Add a bio, describe your field of expertise, add pictures and details of your educational background, and link your social media accounts.
• Monitor other users and topics. This will allow you to see new relevant answers and build connections
• Answer new questions. Look for related keywords and find ongoing discussions.
• Answer questions that show up on the first page of Google search results. These answers will invite a lot more engagement. To do this, you will need a keyword research tool.
• Make sure your answers are truly valuable. Quora has a strict no-spam policy. Moreover, your audience is smart and knows when it is being cheated.

4. Gamification

This is an excellent way to gain more engagement from customers.

Competitions, tournaments, rankings, and encouragement help create loyalty to a brand, bring about more opportunities and prompt conversion.

(Maybe you never thought of buying this product, but now you can get it half the price if you set a new best time at this game.)

If you choose this form of advertising and marketing, you need to have a strategy and define its key elements.

• Your goal
• Mechanics: in what way and under what circumstances you want to achieve your goal
• Control: How to put all of this into practice, what are the consequences and how to evaluate the goals

It is important not to make it too complicated. I often see large campaigns which I would like to participate in, if it didn’t set so many rules and conditions.

“Fanta created a fun fruity game to promote its new flavour to its target audience – generation Z.”

How to promote and market your company on social media in times of COVID-19?

It’s a tough question, to which we propose a few great solutions that really work!

People all over the world are trying to adapt to the new social distancing rules, while small companies and their social media managers are looking for innovative ways to communicate with their followers and costumers. It is not more important than ever to stay connected, as people and companies use social media to keep in touch with friends, read news and have fun. Facebook and Instagram observed a 40-perent higher engagement rates due to Covid-19.

But just because people are spending more time on social media, it doesn’t mean that the content a company posts should be the same.

The type of content that you post now is directly connected with the state of your company and with how COVID-19 affects your field. You have probably set one of the following goals:

• Sales
• Keeping your costumers
• Brand awareness

When it comes to the current state of business, one of the following three things may happen:

• Companies that remain open for business and are looking for opportunities
• Companies that are closed for business
• Open companies in privileged positions

Scenario 1: Hustling

If your company is open for business, but you are currently struggling to keep it afloat (e.g. restaurants with delivery or different stores), you want to share content that will increase sales through social media. This is a very hard and stressful period and you are probably focusing on free organic platforms such as Instagram more than ever. Here are some ideas:

• Post an Instagram story every day. It doesn’t have to be perfect; it is more important to remain relevant for your followers.
• Connect your online store to Instagram Shopping by including products in your posts and stories.
• Encourage loyal followers and costumers to share your content. Share their content in your stories and other platforms. It is also important to thank your customers for buying or ordering from you in this time.
• Sell your services, but share your content in a spirit of education, appreciation and mutual support

Scenario 2: Companies currently closed for business

If your company cannot do business right now (e.g. wedding photographers, hairdressers, florists etc.), you will want to share content that will help you keep your existing customers.

Keep in touch with your loyal followers to always be on their mind. Don’t forget that they will want to return to the service and experience you offer again, as soon as they can.

For example, 4P FITNES is collaborating with their employees, to give their followers tips for home workouts and motivate them with various challenges.

Share educational videos as a story, Instagram Live or IGTV. If you don’t usually make videos, now is the good time to start.

• Update your Instagram and highlight your content (tip: create highlights ‘in times of corona’ and add all the content that you are now sharing in your stories.
• Update your Instagram bio and archive all the posts that don’t fit your new aesthetics.
• Create a TikTok profile! You will soon get a hang of the app and figure out how to make your first video. So, if you have extra time, this is an excellent way to spend it, as you can attract an incredible number of viewers. You can also use the video on other social media platforms (like Facebook or Instagram).
• Develop new habits. Now’s an excellent time to try out new things that you can keep doing throughout the year. Plan your content a month in advance or dedicate 30 minutes of your day to connect with new followers.

Scenario 3: Business as usual

If your business is unaffected and you’re not worried about the financial situation, your goal is raising awareness.

The world has slowed down, and you can use this to your advantage. You could start new social media accounts, platforms for communication or start a campaign with influencers.

If you’re not using YouTube or IGTV, now is the time to consider starting it. The production value may not be perfect, but keep in mind that people are spending way more time on social media and the number of views on all social platforms is rising. We recommend starting to make videos.

Another way of raising brand awareness and investing in marketing is collaborating with influencers.

You could turn to influencer you have collaborated with before and ask them to share older but transformed content from your past campaigns.

This way, influencers will get some income in these difficult times, and the brand acquires content and recognizability in a less expensive way.

Many US influencers saw better engagement on sponsored posts and all they have to do is tweak the content and captions to make it fit the new stay-at-home lifestyle.

A Slovenian influencer Lepa Afna collaborated with Twix and launched a competition and used an enjoyable challenge to adapt her content.

These are only a few guidelines you can follow on your social media, depending on your company’s situation. There are no experts on how to do market your products during a pandemic and nobody really knows how to react, so don’t be too self-critical. We see changes every day (even every hour) and you can expect a lot of concern and uncertainty, as well as lower productivity of your team.

Stay healthy!

Beglobal

Are your ads and posts not giving you the desired results? We give you 6 tricks that will help you connect with your audience and build a community of loyal followers.

My colleagues keep complaining about useless and even bothersome ads on social media. They are not what they want to see or are interested in and they greatly impede their use of Facebook or Instagram.

When I listen to these stories, I find myself surprised by how some companies still manage to completely miss their target population. We all know that technology has much improved in terms of target marketing, but these companies are wondering in the dark. There must be a better way for brands reach the customers through social media.

62% of social media users

follow at least one brand!

Allow me to touch on some statistics. Almost 2/3 of social media users are annoyed by marketing content on social media and 26% are actively ignoring them. But the good news is that as many as 62% follow at least one brand on social media.

According to GlobalWebIndex, 42% social media users use social media to keep in touch with friends, and more than a third are also interested in seeking events and entertainment. Even though 27% of users look for or explore products on social media, most of them are focused on building relationships. So it is understandable that many users are annoyed by advertisements they find intrusive, irrelevant or boring.

This might be the case for the general social media community, but it gives us some insight into users’ attitudes and their contact with brands. The Slovenian public still doesn’t seem to understand brands holistically and their long-term value, rather, it recklessly favours fast and impulse purchases.

The hyper competitive spirit of today is not limited to brands and ads. Consumers want to know about the latest trends in fashion and technology, they want to be the best at everything. That’s why they swear by the best brands and through contact with those brands, they express their feelings.

This allows consumers to connect with brands more directly and express their dissatisfaction when something goes wrong. As many as 46% of users messaged a brand on social media and 4 out of 5 believe that this had a positive effect on the brand’s sense of responsibility. The good news is that 45% of users will share a good response from the brand online and over a third will share it with their friends.

Too many Slovenian companies underestimates the power of social media, but the reality is that all of that creates a certain image of a brand, increases sales or lays off employees. Here are some tips on how to use social media to your advantage and how to benefit from this revolutionary modern era:

Your brand should reflect your personality, your company and its values. Consumers relate to a brand that stands for values and goals they strive for. Make the content on social media interesting, encouraging and useful to their lifestyle.

The content should be useful for them, not you!

Statistics shows that social media users are most interested in connections and entertainment. Brands that share news about the new trends or offer content they create themselves, are an added value to a user and it reflects on the number and the engagement of followers.

Context is key. Interactions on social media are not the same. Users may view some of your posts for fun or for news, and others for knowledge and inspiration. To meet all these needs, you need a careful plan of what to post. But with merely 2 hours a day, you will not be able to carry it out well enough for your followers or for yourself.

Your starting point should be your own values. Before creating content, ask yourself why you’re doing this and not only what purpose it serves. Avoid posting bare marketing content and don’t advertise discounts or last days of sale. Build on your brands specific value and its importance for an aspect of your follower’s life.

You need to build an audience of loyal and active followers, who will help spread your values and message. In addition to posting content that aligns with their interests and beliefs, brands can also achieve this by being more accessible for communication.

Responding immediately can be a powerful tool for answering queries, responding to complaints and building more intimate bonds with followers. With an immediate and personal response, brands can encourage users to initiate the bonding process.

ersistency is the most important factor of a brands success on social media. This means responding to feedback from costumers and actively working on improving their social media experience. As many as 60% of users require an active introduction of a brand, 2-4 times, before forming an authentic bond and trusting its added value, which results in purchase or conversion. This can be achieved by good content and consistent posting, as this is the only way to keep in touch with the user and encourage communication.

Brands are often bad at testing and evaluating their own marketing and content. We see excuses like ‘there’s no time’ or ‘we don’t have to do this, we understand our customers’.

This is a mistake. You can never be sure of your success if you don’t independently confirm that your ads are achieving your goals (behaviour).

Based on the above, as well as research, we can be certain that managing social media is very different from conventional marketing. The power lies more and more in the hands of users themselves. Interacting and adding value to users’ lives are the most important aspects of your brand, which can only be realised through persistent and relevant content and advertising.

Brands that are interested in what users have to say and respond with honesty to their needs and interests, will be able to benefit from new business opportunities. Sprout research found that more than 75% of users made a purchase after interacting with marketing content.