Best marketing techniques for brands to cut through the clutter this Eid
- THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
- AUTHOR: KENSHŌ
- DATE: 2 MARCH 2022
Feeling the pressure to create a ‘different’ kind of marketing campaign for your brand? Do you need an effective marketing technique to stand out during Eid?
Eid Al Fitr and Eid Al Adha are commercially important holidays that connect the Islamic community. Storytelling during Eid time that revolves around devotion, family traditions, culture and charity must be done in a way that is both respectful to the culture and that it resonates with your brand.
We get it, you want a marketing technique to get you at the center of the conversation, and what better way to engage an audience than to use your emotional triggers calendar to stay current. But if your story (or content) doesn’t come together with your brand naturally, then all you’re doing is alienating your audience.
In our increasingly digital world, audiences in our region, places such as Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, are constantly connected. Getting their attention has become increasingly difficult, and if the marketing messaging doesn’t fit your brand, it can be confusing. Having said that, once you do have their attention, keeping it isn’t so hard. After all, we’re living in a time where people don’t just watch a show, they binge-watch a season. So, getting the storytelling as your marketing technique in your social media marketing campaigns and other advertising materials right can be a boon for your brand during any holiday.
Internet marketing for marketing’s sake
We know that using Internet marketing is super quick, and you’ll see your brand scrambling to come up with brilliant ideas in the shortest time possible. Whereas, in a time before fast-everything, a campaign linked to an emotional trigger, such as Eid, would be in the making months before the actual event. Today, many brands only begin to conceptualize campaigns just weeks before, and often turn to fast solutions to be part of the conversation – which is no conversation at all, just single sided marketing. This is where many brands make their first mistake. Instead of starting a conversation, they’re pushing a one-sided agenda. Essentially, talking at their audiences instead of speaking to them.
We understand that relevance can be elevated by seamlessly integrating your brand message into a seasonal need, but marketing for marketing’s sake, or for SEO, is never a good idea.
The truth of the matter is that people’s buying habits have changed. They crave education and information; they research before making any kind of purchasing decision. And the worst thing that your brand marketing team can be doing is gambling on the fact that just a seasonal reference will get them the result they need.
Here are the facts. 42% of global internet users are using ad blockers, and that is likely because they find ads interruptive instead of disruptive. As a marketer you have to look inside the belly of the beast and speak to their heart through content. There has to be a differentiation between a cold call you might get from a telemarketer during dinner and a brand pushing an ad to you on your Instagram feed. What is thumb stopping, and how can brands truly achieve it with seasonal marketing? Can you ever stand out in a sea of Eid themed campaigns? That’s why you should think of storytelling as an effective marketing technique.
The answer lies in connecting with your audience through a story, and that means knowing your audience.
Connect with Your Audience Through Storytelling
We are living in a time where we have more data than ever before, especially in the Middle East. Our region is amongst the most digitally driven in the world, and amongst the top 10 when it comes to YouTube user statistics, for example. The United Arab Emirates ranks #3 globally, while Saudi Arabia ranks 8th. Storytelling and creativity are more important than ever. Even more pertinent is that your brand is telling the story that audiences want to hear, as opposed to the story that they want to tell.
Let’s change the narrative in 2022. Traditional marketing, for decades, has worked for companies, not consumers. Well-intended as it may be, ‘conversations’ that marketers are attempting to have remain one dimensional, and one directional. But our audiences are much savvier than they ever were before, and you’ll find them asking why and calling your brand out more and more often, especially online if you’re using internet marketing.
The best storytellers read the room. They understand their audiences, what matters to them, and what their preferences are. In fact, with the data that we have available today, this should be easier than ever, because we can target our audiences. Unfortunately, we’re living in fast times, and often the values, ambitions and circumstances of our core audiences are overlooked for pushing a brand message. Where there really should be a marriage between the two, there is often just a single string to link them. This is why brands need a marketing partner that understands audiences and their value, and most importantly how to market to them.
This Eid, and during any other seasonal marketing opportunities use a storytelling style that will match your audience expectation.
Our Kenshō-proofed digital marketing techniques for an attention-worthy campaign
Okay, so we’ve established that the best way to generate attention is to understand what your audience wants to see, and create exceptional content based on that. The next question is how do you win? Here are Kenshō’s marketing techniques for creating attention grabbing and heart-warming advertising campaigns and digital campaigns in Oman and the region.
1. Keep It Short, Simple
Old is gold, and KISS is the unspoken rule. Einstein once said, “Out of complexity, find simplicity.” To engage with your story, be it during Eid or any other brand positioning event, your audience must first understand it.
Here are a few tips:
- Don’t mix messaging.
- Have a simple structure.
- Avoid jargon, use appropriate language.
- Don’t fill silences with unnecessary detail.
- The only challenge your audiences should face is what their next action should be.
Finally, don’t reinvent the wheel. The best stories, no matter their length, have a basic beginning, middle and end. And yours should too.
2. Have a Clear Goal
In this blog post, we’ve really placed impetus on knowing your audiences. What we haven’t delved into is goal setting. What is my brand trying to achieve?
And there are many goals that your brand can aim for:
- Amplifying brand love
- Generating brand awareness
- Lead generation
- Driving purchasing decisions
- Increasing share of voice or market share
Every brand or campaign goal lays the perfect foundation for good storytelling. So before you hit the publish button, think about the purpose of the campaign and its success metrics. Never stop asking if the story that you are telling is aligned with your vision and contributing to achieving that vision.
3. Find a Gap and Fill It
Don’t let your story become another glorified PR exercise. Integrating with a seasonal narrative such as Eid requires your brand to show its customer centricity and how it provides real life solutions to real life challenges. Forget tactics for a minute. What do the audiences you are serving care about at that moment? How can you help them? How can you deliver on a promise to them?
Here’s a simple example. If you’re an IT repair shop, don’t just share an Eid message on your socials or serve up a special offer for two. Make it emotional, show how a broken mobile phone can impact the message of sharing and family bonding over a distance, and how your shop can get it repaired before the big event (with a discount or free gift as part of your CTA) and create a solution for customers who may need your services at that moment.
4. Humanize the communication
Nobody logging onto their Instagram or TikTok wants to engage with a brand. This goes for B2B audiences as well. There is a human at the other end of a device, so we cannot stress enough the importance of humanizing the brand through a narrative. Audiences want relatable content that takes them on a journey. Real people want to connect and engage. They want to be spoken to, not spoken at. Your business will always be known as a business, but it can also have a face, a feel, a voice. Each campaign can have emotional resonance. Your brand should have lightness, especially with seasonal marketing, so tell relatable stories, while pushing relatable products or other brand goals.
5. Rely on Emotion, Use Humor Sparingly
Emotion is the key to engagement; make your audience, your customer, feel something. So many brands get it right by making emotional connections with customers. This is something Ooredoo excelled at with their ‘Make the Internet Better’ campaign last year by tapping into local sensibilities with an internationally relevant message. When your brand grabs your audience’s attention with emotional marketing, and influences them into action, your brand wins in marketing. Every time. It is ironic that emotional engagement is at the very end of our blog, and getting the steps given in this blog before, ensures that you get this last and final step of seasonal marketing right.
While you may be inspired to use humor, remember that ‘trying’ to be funny can be a double-edged sword – who can forget the Tuesday ‘Man Sitting Next to You’ campaign that was pulled for being offensive, when it was making an attempt at being funny. Humor can dis-engage an audience, as quickly as it can engage them. So, if in doubt, leave it out. While using emotion, think of humor as the pepper to the recipe, use sparingly when delivering important points. You do not want to trivialize your message.
Don’t Forget Your Call-to-Action
While you’re marketing to audiences this Eid, don’t forget your call-to-action (CTA). A well-told story will inspire audiences to take the next step, and that next action needs to be obvious. If in doubt, remember the rule – tell them, tell them, and tell them again.
Your CTA is your last chance to motivate your audience to take real steps towards becoming a customer and engaging with your brand. The CTA is not just important as a business tool, customers want and expect them. They want the choice of what to do next, and for the process of decision making to be as simple as a click here or go there. They’ve seen your visuals; read your ad copy and they want to engage – it’s up to you to push them over the line by telling them what to do next.
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