SMARTER WAYS TO SPEND YOUR 'USE IT OR LOSE IT' BUDGET

End the Year Looking like a Rock Star

Between October and December of each year a phenomenon occurs in marketing departments all over the US. It's the magical end of the year use-it-or-lose-it marketing spend.

---

​UIOLI (acronym) is the money that has been allocated to the departmental budget, but has yet to be committed to a project by Q4. In many cases next year’s marketing budget will be determined by this year’s marketing spend. Many marketing VPs and directors worry that their budget for next year will be reduced if they don’t spend everything they were allotted this year.

Online ad spend alone usually rises by ~25% between October and December.

When UIOLI money is spent hastily it will be ineffective in advancing big departmental goals. Sometimes it can even move the needle the wrong way. However, when this money is spent wisely Q4 can be a great time for getting micro-projects or improvements pushed through.

Here are some smart ways you might spend your un-allocated 2018 marketing budget during Q4. Consider which of these would have the greatest ROI if outsourced, then use that UIOLI money to hire the right resources. ​

• Use content created in 2018 to generate even more traffic in 2019  The words used on your website tell Google which searches are applicable. Google ranks pages in search results based on certain signals it collects, like the number of times a page or blog post is viewed. If you create great website content, then drive lots of traffic to that content using email and social media, your page will be ranked higher in applicable searches. This is the traffic generation trifecta - email, social, search. It results in higher traffic to your site month-over-month and year-over-year.

Well planned & promoted content will drive traffic to your website well into the future. So execute amazing pages and blog posts during Q4, then use that content as fodder for your traffic generation trifecta all year next year.

Another way to maximize traffic from great content - plan spin-off or micro-content to be created from posts that did particularly well this year. Take a look at your first 9 months of analytics, and use your traffic data to inform which posts landed well with your audience. Spin-off content like infographics, interactive tools, and short videos can extend the life of that content and generate even more traffic.

• Sprint projects : Short, powerful, and safe Sometimes we get so caught up in planning the next big website redesign or product launch we don't get started on small tools that could make a big difference.
  
  Here's the great thing about small projects - they are safer because they cost less time and money. A small project planned around something that is already doing well can help increase sales or optimize participation in big ways without incurring the same amount of cost or scrutiny as a new product launch.
  
  Here are some ideas for sprint projects:
  • Optimize key pages for maximum action. Look at the acceptance rate for the offers on your most important pages. Maybe it is time for some A/B testing and/or a page redesign. This is the type of work that can be accomplished quickly, yet produce huge returns.
    
    
  • Create a useful interactive tool. Think about your audience's needs and desires. Creating a tool that is super useful can demonstrate that you understand the people you serve. What a great way to generate traffic and create loyalty.
    
    
  • Build landing pages for specific niches. Niching narrows your audience down in order to increase the likelihood of action. It's the difference between ABC TV and Fox Sports. ABC aims for a general audience. Fox Sports knows only a certain set of sports fans is watching.
    
    Not only is a landing page created for a specific niche more actionable, they enjoy an advantage in search as well. They are more likely to show up in searches containing more description (ex: "How do I pay my South Carolina taxes online?"). I recently created a geographic location specific landing page that showed up third in applicable searches within a week.
    
    
  • Search optimization audit. This is a quick project that ensures your site is registering correctly with Google, and helps it do better in searches going forward. When we do a search engine audit we check about 30 factors on the back end of the site (code errors, etc.) as well as off-site (Google +, Facebook, etc.) 
    
    
• Planning and Strategic insights : Plan you're work  The end of the year could be just the time for creating big plans based on insights. Use this time to look at your numbers month-by-month and week-by-week. Think about the year ahead and create timelines for things like social media, website content, email marketing.
  
  Your agency can help you create reports, timelines, and even wireframe documents to help you really give solid footing to your strategies.
  
  And, you could even take this a step further. Think about:
  • Spying on the Competition with a competitive analysis.
  • Using your insights to boost content from this year.
    
    
• Culture or Team building : Show your gratitude  Studies consistently show that salary is only a small part of what keeps employees happy. Employees stay with a company when they feel respected, and with a boss when they feel appreciated. If it is within your spending guidelines consider using some of your UIOLI budget on appreciation. Some ideas:
  • Plan a team building outing.
  • Purchase education or development for team members in the form of conferences or online courses.
  • Give small tokens of appreciation

As I am writing this one point keeps occurring to me. Agencies like mine tend to see a big uptick in requests during Q4 because departments like yours have money they would like to spend. My suggestion is that you schedule a meeting with your agency of choice now to discuss projects that might be coming. The sooner you get your project on their calendar, the better.

Here is a link to my Project Inquiry Form. I would love to talk to you about your needs and plans. We are especially great at search engine audits, landing pages, trifecta content, and planning documentation.

​Do you have even more ideas for using 2018 use-it-or-lose-it funds wisely? Leave them in the comments. And if you found this post useful please 'like' and share it using the buttons below. Your social nods help others like you find my posts too.

Project Inquiry Form >