Image by: Marvin Lee
By: Todd Downey

It can be devastating to invest endless amounts of time, energy and money into structuring a marketing strategy and seeing no increase in attention toward your business model. Perhaps you tried everything–blogging, internet ads and word of mouth, but nothing seems to be garnering your company any recognition.

Well, if this is the case then perhaps either you’re missing one or more crucial methods, or your brand just may not fall into a niche market capable of sparking the interest of the masses–or perhaps you’ve just been having a stroke of bad luck.

Whatever the case, there are ways you can overcome this issue by assessing and fixing any problems you may be having with the campaign–and with the amount of work that goes into marketing there may be a few. Here are a few theories as to why, despite all your grueling efforts, your campaign just isn’t seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

#1) Uninspired Headlines

You may net realize it, but a quick, witty and creative headline can go a long way when determining the amount of traffic you accumulate. Such a concern may seem miniscule, but if you take the extra effort to build creative, informative and capturing headlines, then you may just be in for a pleasant surprise.

It’s no secret that most people have attention spans the lower than a frightened insect, so wouldn’t you want to use this to your advantage and filter out all the boring headlines in favor of your exciting theme? Get people amped up about your product! Use the “call to action” method and encourage your viewers to engage with something other than the miscellaneous nonsense they wade through as they browse the web.

The key is to make sure your lingo is prominent, understandable and maybe even funny, so to shock someone into a cheap click. You never know, that click may just turn into a customer. And if one person was entertained or captivated enough by your title, then what’s stopping millions from investigating your site? Something like this is painfully easy to overlook, but building an inspired headline which attracts attention your way is one of the most important factors to successful advertising.

#2) Bad Content

Perhaps you’re doing everything right–you’ve got the most jovial, informative headlines that can ever be extracted from a human brain, you’ve paid thousands of dollars to flood the internet with advertisements and you’re posting up two or three blog posts a day for the world to see. That’s great! But let me ask you just one question…are those blog posts and or your business model quality posts or offerings?

Yea you may think your brand or content is the best thing on the market, but is it something that the customers can identify with and understand without gouging their eyes out?

The fundamental rule for any marketer or entrepreneur before anything else is ensuring that the product he or she is trying to promote is in fact a quality, worthwhile product. Just what is a quality product anyway? A quality product is something unique and creative that is useful and in demand to its targeted audience.

So how do you know if you are brandishing a product worthy of the masses? Criticism, people. A little constructive criticism goes a long way in the development of any idea, product or content. Perhaps have a friend or family member give you their personal, honest insight about your blog posts--giving you advice about why it is or isn’t compelling enough to hold their attention.

Or if you are in the market of hygienic’s, for instance, perhaps go to a local mall and issue out free samples of your product, while later in turn getting their feedback either through email or face to face conversation. You may be okay with what you have on the market, but are the consumers?

#3 Targeting the Wrong Audience

One of the most common mistakes an inexperienced marketer may make is marketing his product at the wrong select group of people. Considering the audience you’re trying to reel in is essential when structuring your marketing campaign, because if you aim in the wrong direction you will be wasting time and money, while in turn losing confidence about your brand.

Think about it this way: If you owned a Hip Hop themed record shop would you fill the racks with Death Metal CD’s? Of course not!? And why not? It’s because the product you are selling would be in the wrong place, and therefore would either be shown little to know attention or would scare away the customers. This is the exact opposite of what you’re trying to achieve as a promoter.

Although, with access to a myriad of online users, it may initially be difficult to determine who your product should be targeted at. This is why you should test the waters and try several different audiences to see which group responds the best to your techniques. And once you’ve determined where your comfortable at and widely accepted, that’s when you flood the specific  market with all the wonderful content you have to offer, using your newly revamped marketing campaign as your henchmen.

Are you one of the lucky few who has constructed a successful marketing campaign? Yea we all envy you, but before you start to brag, how about you share any theories I may have missed as to why some people just can’t find the light.