Beyond Awareness: Marketing Your Digital Product With Measurable Results

Think “sell” — what comes to mind? Shipping, warehousing and a number of other cost-related matters that bring you a major headache. But wait, the heading of this article says “digital” which means that I’ll tell you how to market a product that could be sold multiple times. Don’t worry, the journey will not be too long, so fasten your seatbelt and trust me. Here we go!

Once you have created a product, you want to sell — and to do so you need to think of the marketing material. Ripping predictable results from your marketing investment is a challenge though, especially if you have an innovative or niche offer. Opportunities will vary depending on the kind of product, the vertical (meaning in what “industry” it’s comprehended), the target user and more, and it will all demand a good amount of effort and creativity before you get something to compare your potential results to. That’s why not rarely your money and time investments on impression or click-based campaigns simply go down the drain.

But that’s no reason not to promote your product (in fact, you can’t afford not to). Be it an app, a training course, a subscription service or an e-commerce, it’s possible to pay for actionable results in your campaign if you choose to work with specialized performance marketing partners. Sit back, grab a pen and prepare the notebook…

Here’s what you should cover to effectively market your next digital masterpiece:

1. Define your campaign goals. This means what you want to achieve with your marketing efforts and will directly depend on what type of digital product you have. It may be newsletter opt-ins, subscriptions, installs, credit card purchases. It is completely up to you what you want your goals to be wrapped around but make sure they are measurable.
2. Establish your price point. How much are you willing to pay for each desired action? Oh, don’t go overboard! Be reasonable. Keep that in mind: you don’t need to bid high for clicks or impressions that may or may not deliver the expected user activity. Being able to base your spending on the end-activity makes it easier to plan your financials in a more predictable manner.
3. Layout the specifics. This is the time to translate your target user approach into campaign guidelines — it’s the “how” to your already defined “what” and “how much”. Take time to decide on countries to target, creatives to be used and produced, types of online media where you want to see your ad placements. Of course it’s a lot to care about but don’t worry, you don’t have to think it all through on your own! Do rely on your performance agency to help building the campaign details and make sure to have a read about how to prepare for your performance campaign.
4. Launch and monitor. So, finally, be ready to go live and evaluate. Make sure your requirements are being met and constantly measure the quality of leads being delivered. Your quality feedback will be crucial for your performance agency to ensure only top-notch traffic is flowing to your campaign. Work side by side with them to meet the goals established and adjust everything accordingly.

This is the whole philosophy behind outstanding performance results. Building up a brand is not an absolute must before you start making money — you can get your product out there with a predictable financial return from day 1. Of course, don’t hesitate to test, try and optimize on a constant basis; the digital world is a fast-developing environment and thus changes are expected at all times. But that’s OK! There is no need to unlock your superpower, just a combination of strategic and technical thinking applied to well-defined business targets.

Aim high and give it a go!