Don’t we just LOVE a good trend when it comes to marketing…probably not, it’s probably making you feel overwhelmed by the thought of it right! In this episode of The Hayley Osborne Show, I’m pumped to talk about the number one strategy I know that will help you to be always in the know without chasing shiny objects in the form of trends, or wasting your valuable time. Time is money now and time will still be money in 2025, so let’s use it wisely.
I recorded this episode to empower you with actionable steps helping your future-proof your marketing efforts and grow your business with confidence. I want your business and you, to shine bright with confidence the whole year round! When you shine, we all shine and a rising tide lifts all boats.
Tune in to discover how to stay relevant, save time, and focus on what truly matters in your marketing strategy.
While you’re here, I have a new key marketing tool for you over on my website which you can access here: www.hayleyosborne.com titled: 3 essential posts your biz needs to get more people through the door – with templates & swipe copy!
This is a must for you to implement into your business to optimise your social media and make the most of the platforms.
SUMMARY
0:00:01 Introduction and welcome to The Hayley Osborne Show
0:02:03 The rise of AI in marketing
0:06:13 The importance of a smart, streamlined marketing approach
0:08:13 Gathering audience feedback and insights
0:10:13 Balancing trends with your business strategy
0:12:13 The role of data and insights
0:15:13 Staying informed and engaged
0:18:13 Building a sustainable marketing strategy
0:20:13 The role of education and community
0:22:13 Final thoughts and encouragement
Hayley Osborne
Hi there, and welcome to another episode of The Hayley Osborne show. I’m so glad that you are joining me today, and I wanted to talk about, as we’re leading into a new year, I think that a lot of business owners definitely struggle with staying ahead of the latest marketing trends. And so I thought it would be really timely to come into your ears and talk about, you know, the number one way that you can stay ahead of the latest marketing trends, especially leading into a new year. You know, I think 2024 has seen a massive rise in AI and using AI to help to optimize marketing and AI, although it isn’t a trend, I think it’s here to stay.
I think it’s important that you understand how to stay ahead in your business and to leverage all of the things that you can to keep moving. Because I think knowledge is definitely power, and when you can step into that consistently learning mode as you run your business, that is the number one thing to like, train yourself to be like, adaptable and responsive and reactive and really nimble, to be able to capitalize or not on the world of marketing.
And you know, you don’t want to be left behind. And we all know that if we take a holiday, or if we take, you know, four to five weeks out of our business, you come back in and things change. Okay, tech changes as new ways to do things. Instagram might change its interface, and same as Facebook. So I know that when I had my baby earlier in the year, I did take some time off of the social media platforms, and I came back in and Instagram had a bit of a makeover, and I was like, Cool. Everything’s in a different place now.
I have to learn where they are, and this could be really frustrating if I let it be. But I’m quite a positive, happy kind of person by nature. And I think that, you know, having babies has helped me to be a better business owner. And being a better business owner to me means being reactive, being nimble, you know, not sweating the small stuff. So that was the small stuff for me. So I have gone through it a few times now, and yeah, so thank you for joining me today.
If you don’t know who I am, if you’re listening for the first time, I am Hayley, and I’m really glad that you’re here with me, with me in your ears, whatever that you are doing, but I know that it can be really overwhelming, trying to keep up with the latest marketing trends. So I wanted to give you a bit of a heads up and a bit of a head start into 2025 so I want to talk about the most effective ways to stay ahead of marketing without spending all your time chasing the next big thing, and, you know, leaving you time to focus on your zone of genius.
So I think there are massive problems too, with trying to chase every new trend, and they come and go. So like, strategies shift and change, and it can lead to a lot of wasted time and resources. So trying to stay ahead of everything can help you burn out and also dilute your focus, which we don’t want, right? Because you want to bring your A game all year round, not like diluting your focus, which leads to really inconsistent results.
And you know, I think that because every business is different, you know, product based, service based, all services are different. I think that not everything that is available to you in terms of marketing your business should be used by you for marketing your business, depending on what business that you have. And so I think about working out what’s best for me. You, as opposed to what everybody else is doing, will take a lot of the frustration out of how quickly things move with marketing.
So I think that I will emphasize to you and your business, you need a smart, streamline approach, and your foundation set up first to be able to then adapt new trends if they fit or if they don’t like to pass them by. Okay? You don’t need to jump on every single new trend. And I think that when you understand what your audience wants, that’s far more important than following every trend.
Okay, so I think by you know, serving your audience and focusing on your business goals and not getting distracted by them from shiny object syndrome. And let’s be honest, we all do. I think that is definitely the purpose of the objective of this episode is more about your audience. Okay, so understanding your audience is more important than following every trend, according to me.
Okay, so marketing trends should only serve your audience and your business goals if they align with your business goals, your mission, your vision and why you started your business, and if you’re not sure who your audience is, or if you have a smart and streamlined approach or not, that’s where I come in. So it might be time for you to jump in, to have a marketing strategy for the year built for you, or a social media strategy for the year built for you.
So I usually tend to say they’d last for about six months, okay? And then you should have achieved all of your goals within those six months. And then they get revisited, okay, and redone. And so I think that what that will do for you is to help you stay really deeply connected to your audience’s needs, behaviors and preferences and trends tend to matter less when you know your audience well and you can tailor how you approach marketing yourself to be able to serve your audience more effectively regardless of what is trending.
Okay, so your audience is the most important thing, regardless of what is trending, all right? Don’t ever forget that, because they’re your number one fans, right? So the more that you can build that know, like and trust, know who you’re serving, know what works well, so go back and have a look at your analytics. What’s worked and what hasn’t worked. Do more of what’s worked. Test in-betweens, but do more of what’s worked, because your audience loves that, and that’s proof in the insights. Okay, so have a look at that. So I would like to stay ahead. I would regularly engage with my audience.
Okay, so how do you do that? You know through what you’re looking at, what your interactions look like over a week, over a month, you can survey them, okay, and have direct conversations. So in your DMS, what do they look like? What’s happening? There is nothing happening there. If nothing, if nobody, is jumping into your DMS, then you have some work to do in and around. How you approach your social media, because that, to me, tells me that you’re completely wasting your time.
Whatever you’re doing is not working, and so listen to what’s happening in your conversations and tailor every outward piece of marketing to more of that. Okay, so it’s important to gather the feedback that you get from your audience through these avenues and then adjust what you are doing to their evolving needs, their pain points, their desires, what they want, what they’re struggling with, and that kind of thing.
And looking at the data and the insights will definitely help you to be able to do that, because that’s how you show up better the next time, right? So if you’re launching something, or you want to launch a new product or a service, or you’re changing your business around, I think that, why would you keep doing what you’ve always done if it’s not working? All right? So it’s time to change the game for yourself, and then you can look at what resonates most, and that’s really important, because, like, we don’t have a bucket ton of time, okay?
Our time is finite, no matter if you, no matter what you’re doing, everyone has a certain amount of time, and I don’t believe it is equal, because, you know, my time is the way that I used to structure my day. I used to pack it in before I had kids, and so now I’ve got small humans, and they need me so much. So my time looks differently, so I’ve had to up the ante on friggin everything and really hone in on my systems and processes.
And so I know that what I’m doing works, and it can also work for you too. So I’m happy for any of you to like to send me an email. Like, jump in my DMs on Instagram, and we can have a chat about how you can also kind of streamline everything for you, and have a look at if you don’t know how to monitor your customers behavior or data, I would love to help you with that. It’s kind of like my love language. I love, I love, love, love the data. I’ve recently been focusing my time and effort, not all of my time and effort, but on a Pinterest strategy.
So Pinterest is something that I’ve really learned in the second part of this year, and I want to start sharing more of that with you, but I’m still in the testing monitoring phase. So 2025 is going to be really cool. So watch out for things that are going to happen in the Pinterest world for me and for you, because it’s definitely still a bit of an unsung hero and when used right.
So I’ve been getting some great results through Pinterest, and I want you too as well. I also think that you should in terms of monitoring your customer behavior and looking at data and insights and things, I know it can be really overwhelming, but if you know what you’re actually looking for, you know things like Google Analytics and all your social media insights, your email insights, are important to so you can understand a lot about what your audience opens and what they Don’t and do more of what they do. Okay? Because open rates are important.
So if you have around a I think now it’s around 30 to 38% open rate of your emails, you’re in the shit hot zone, all right, so that’s a good, good percentage of open rate. If you’re anything above that, then that’s really, really great, but that’s sitting at a really awesome open rate. And then I think that rather than jumping on every trend, so you know, adapting to trends to your audience, rather than jumping on every trend, pick ones that more align with your business goals and your interests and your audience interests.
Okay, so the thing is, I think that if there is a new social media platform that comes up in 2025 assess if your target market is likely to be on there, before you pour time into it. So I think that was a couple of years ago, there was a clubhouse like, where is that now? I don’t even know, and so I didn’t really pour a lot of time into it. And thank God that I didn’t, because I’m pretty certain that I haven’t heard anything in the clubhouse for such a long time.
And there’s other things too. So if something new emerges, I think that you should assess if your audience is actually playing in that space, and if they are, then that’s where you should be. And if they’re not, don’t waste your time. And then I think in terms of getting insights on what is trending in marketing, listening to this podcast is such an awesome place to start, because I will tell you everything that is what I am here for. And then I think, you know, places like HubSpot, they’re a really great source of marketing trends.
They give a lot of great information. And then, you know, regular like, marketing, marketing reports. So things like, I know, HubSpot do a report, or, what else is there? There’s like, things like, like big influences, like online groups, and there’s another one like Statista, so that’s like a statistics platform. But I think that by listening to your industry specific influences, I wouldn’t say I’m an influencer per se, but I do feel like I am within this industry.
So listening to industry specific heads and people are going to give you great insights on marketing trends. And so that’s where I come in. So I think as well, you know, if you can attend as many networking events as possible, that will also give you a really good heads up on what people are doing, talk to people.
Get out there, be amongst it. There’s nothing that I love more than walking into a room of people that I don’t know that just lights me up, because I’m just like, yes, this is such a great opportunity to meet new people. And I never have business or sales in mind. I just want to chat. I just want to talk to new people.
I just want to find out who they are, what they do, and why they’re there. And, you know, I think that if you can learn something from somebody that’s awesome, and I’m a big, big believer in and I do this a lot, I like to sit back and let people talk. I’m just such an observer, and I love it. Love to watch people, and I love to hear what people have to say. And I think that’s my way of, you know, gathering evidence and consumer behavior.
And I just, I love all of that stuff, and I think that really is deep down the marketer inside of me. And then, you know, I think that when it comes to trends and listening in on what people are doing. So in and around you, I think you need to balance that with your business strategy. And so if you don’t have a business and marketing strategy, I think it’s time to get one. If you’re looking to scale and grow your business in 2025, I think that we should sit down and have a good look at what you’re doing with your marketing, where you want to go with your business, and do the two align, okay?
And so looking at all of that, if you do have these things in place, does it align with your audience? So this podcast episode is all about your audience, and coming back to your audience and what they want. And does it support your long-term goals? Okay, so if the answer is NO, NO, NO and NO, you know that you’ve got work to do, but if it’s yes, then awesome.
Like bring it to the table. But with trends, they do come and go. And I know, as business owners, you know, a lot of us have shiny object syndrome, but if you stay focused on your core strategies and only experiment with trends if they fit your audience’s needs. I think that’s the best strategic advice that I can give you. But think long term. Okay? And what are those one percent that you can do now that will get you to that 365% further at the end of next year.
It’s chipping away, right? So, you know, just as an example, if you say, oh, I want to be featured in six media articles. I want to be interviewed by 24 different podcast hosts. Like, what are you going to do now to chip away at that 1% and inside of my membership, superhero marketing, we have, I have templates and tools and like pitch scripts and everything like that for you to be ready to reach out, because I find that getting started is actually the hardest part, so I’ve taken a lot of that legwork out of it for you.
So all you have to do is copy and paste and do the work, okay, without putting the thinking into it. So, yeah, everything is available on Google if you want it, but it’s going to take you triple the time. And that’s what I found, is like, what’s going to give me the quickest trajectory that I need inside of my business? And it is by leaning into things like education. So you can join my group, superhero marketing.
You can join the waitlist. Doors will open early 2025 which I am so pumped for. I haven’t actually opened the doors right before I had my baby. So that was just before the middle of the year, and they haven’t been open since. And so it’s going to go off with a bang, which I’m pretty excited about. I did launch a short course, which you would have heard if you are a regular listener of the podcast, the magnetic marketing formula, but that’s an eight-week course.
So that is not a membership model. So the membership is just next level to you. There’s lots of business owners in there that are like minded and uplifting and awesome, and that is definitely your way of staying ahead of all of the latest trends and things and understanding and learning right knowledge is power, I think, for the short term, focus on your audience. Okay, as I wrap this up, your audience will be able to help you to build a sustainable marketing strategy that grows with you, rather than short term trend chasing, because I don’t want you to do that.
I want you to have a sustainable business. If you are in for quick wins, then this podcast isn’t for you. I want you to be here for the long run. I don’t want you to be one of those statistics that you know, a lot of businesses start and fail in the first year because they don’t understand the strategy of their business. They don’t have missions and visions, and they don’t have goals, and they don’t have a plan on how to get there.
Okay? And so I think rather than short trend chasing, let’s be in it for sustainable growth. Focus on your audience, so stay close with them. Monitor them. Monitor what is working, what is not working. Look at the data, look at your insights, look at what, what, what marketing has performed the best, and lean into more of that.
Okay, so I really encourage you to join the wait list of superhero marketing to get you off to a really good start in 2025 and I am here to support you. I hope that you’ve had the absolute best day today so far, and I can’t wait to see you. Next week for another episode of The Hayley Osborne show. I hope you’ve enjoyed listening to this episode. If you have hit subscribe so you don’t miss any new episodes released every Tuesday, and while you’re there, leave me a review.
I would absolutely love to read it. Also, don’t forget to tag me @hayleykosborne over on Instagram and share this post with your audience so they can get learning too. Sharing is caring. If you want more, head over to https://hayleyosborne.com/category/podcast/ for today’s show notes and links, catch you next week for another episode of The Hayley Osborne Show.
