If your small business needs a little traction to start a growth path, a co-marketing campaign could be in your future. Co-marketing is also a wise choice when cash is short if you’ve come close to maxing out your marketing budget.
A co-marketing campaign requires that you know how to play nice with another business (or multiple businesses), preferably one that doesn’t directly compete with yours. Essentially, you’ll be piggybacking off of what they do and vice-versa.
Related: Drive More Profits With These Marketing Strategies
Table of Contents
What Is Co-Marketing?
Co-marketing involves a partnership where the two companies take a product or piece of content and freely share what they’ve developed to market that item. With this approach, you are essentially getting two minds for the price of one. In addition, when one company runs through its promotion efforts, you get a result of those efforts, which means two teams working together should double those results: you are reaching a new audience that your team alone has not been able to attract.
While this might be your first exposure to co-marketing, it’s nothing new. Companies in the same industries have collaborated for years to serve the same audience, but better than they can alone. For instance, if your company is involved in publishing and focuses on fishing magazines, you could co-market with a publishing company specializing in boats, hunting, or another outdoor activity that would likely attract the interest of anglers. But, again, the audiences will be completely similar while the niche differs.
Co-Marketing & Partnerships
The principle is simple enough: working together with another brand is a method for the two parties to introduce themselves to new audiences, increase profits and construct brand awareness. It’s a win-win.
While the concept isn’t revolutionary, co-marketing relationships completely differ from the ordinary partnerships we usually see brands make today.
The key distinction is that the teaming up brand names are treated as equals with co-marketing projects. So you’ll see that distinction when it comes to both promos and putting together the campaign.
Co-Marketing vs. Co-Branding (No, They Aren’t the Same)
Even though those two terms are often used interchangeably, they are two different concepts.
Co-branding generally involves brand names collaborating to release a brand-new product and using their respective name recognition to develop buzz. Co-branding projects are typically booked for brands with bigger audiences and prevail on the planet of eCommerce (think: brand name collabs, limited edition runs of items, etc.).
It’s not truly a matter of either/or when we talk about co-marketing versus co-branding when it comes to effectiveness. They’re two completely different types of campaigns. Co-marketing represents a straightforward promo, while co-branding includes the legwork of developing a brand-new product.
However, both are terrific for developing awareness and attracting customers.
Common Co-Marketing Methods
Email marketing and telemarketing efforts can also be of great value in co-marketing efforts. The email focus isn’t much different than sharing blogs; it is copy-heavy and provides a wealth of information to a targeted group.
Companies that have given co-marketing a shot have significantly benefited from the amount of time they save in their marketing efforts. Instead of branching out on your own and trying cold call prospects, partner with another company and benefit from their qualified leads, while at the same time, you are offering your qualified leads to your partner. It’s a win-win
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Even online merchants can see improved penetration through co-marketing efforts. In some cases, companies like this will come together to offer a package deal with each partner bringing something of equal value to the table. If you can bring more than one partner into the mix, you’ll likely achieve even greater penetration into new demographics.
Trade shows often serve as a platform for organizations to set up a personalized booth to show their wares; however, this is also a chance for organizations to team up on a co-marketing campaign. This not only shows a unique approach to the typical trade show, but it also saves costs for the teaming companies.
Advantages of Co-Marketing
At a glimpse, partnering up with other services may not look like a concern in pursuing a larger audience.
The truth, though? A shocking 77% of brands believe co-marketing and partnerships are crucial to growth.
Below is a quick breakdown of how brand names benefit from co-marketing projects.
Tap into New Audiences
It’s simple: the more people you can get your brand in front of, the better.
Exposure to a partnering brand name’s social following or email list is absolutely nothing to belittle. If you’re an up-and-coming service or you’re making your intro to an audience that has no concept of who you are, this is even more true.
Related: Supporting & Understanding the Customer Experience
Become an Industry Leader
No matter what industry you’re in today, competition is intense, and attention is scarce.
Brand partnerships provide a chance to break through the noise. Doing so likewise signifies you as somebody worth working with for possible name acknowledgment. This can instantly set you apart from competitors in a big way.
Build Better Relationships
Among the underrated advantages of co-marketing is the ability to build relationships with like-minded company owners and market professionals.
You truly can’t afford to be an island in today’s social landscape. Whether short-term or long-lasting, having a network of people to build you up can be a game-changer.
Explore New Markets
Co-marketing likewise allows you to dip your toes into a brand-new market without a full-blown expansion.
If absolutely nothing else, a campaign might serve as a chance to perform some market research study and discover more about audiences parallel to yours.
Produce New Leads
Beyond brand name awareness, this is the huge one.
When done right, co-marketing allows you to grow your list and drive opt-ins and traffic to any promo.
Building Your New Co-Marketing Strategy
Although co-marketing campaigns are perhaps more straightforward than ever to assemble, they still require preparation and attention to a couple of crucial details. Let’s look at some of them below.
Define Your Goals
Like any project, you need to have your goals and desired outcomes defined before going live.
There are no “ideal “answers here, but you should, at the minimum, specify:
- Why you’re running the project (brand awareness, leads, a mix of both).
- What resources will be needed to fulfill your end of the project (creatives, time, and so on)?
- How you will determine success (KPIs and metrics such as sign-ups, traffic, or conversions).
- What will your deliverables be (social posts, emails, webinar slides, and so on)?
- What are the expectations of your partnering brand(s)?
Build Relationships Before Outreach
You need to be thoughtful when it concerns who you partner with.
Preferably, co-marketing chances need to emerge organically with brand names and marketers with whom you trust and have existing relationships. As noted previously, brand name partnerships are ideal for industry-adjacent ones without being direct rivals.
Co-marketing campaigns typically aren’t going to come from cold outreach. That said, it doesn’t hurt to start considering prospective partnership prospects to check out opportunities.
Be open to chances yourself. You can probably notice whether somebody’s done their homework and desires to participate in a significant co-marketing effort.
What matters most is that the relationship provides a benefit for both parties and isn’t one-sided regarding who’s doing the bulk of the work for the promotion.
Measure Campaign Results
Even if your campaigns are focused mostly on awareness, tracking your efforts with KPIs is a must-do.
Reach. Engagement. Conversions.
There are numerous ways to determine success; they must be front-and-center before you begin. For example, you must think about:
- Tracking sign-ups, opt-ins, and other related metrics (and connecting them to your co-marketing project).
- Assessing fans, @mentions, and beliefs through social listening to see if your project’s built favorable buzz).
- Take a look at landing page traffic and lead sources to see how engaged your co-marketing audience was.
Co-Marketing: The Link to Social Media
Social networks are essential to current co-marketing campaigns and maximizing your reach.
How so? Let’s check out social’s function in getting the most out of your brand partnerships.
Promote Campaigns Organically
Not a surprise here! Basic marketing techniques related to co-marketing may include:
- Creating announcement posts and hyping up your brand collaborations.
- Broadening the reach of your efforts through staff member advocacy to reach even more people.
- Funneling social traffic to a specific top-quality landing page (and measuring engagement).
Evaluate Co-Marketing Candidates
Social media is the go-to location to build relationships with brands and company owners.
You can likewise research, study and examine the value of a potential partnership before outreach. Assessing a possible partner’s following material, voice, worth, and engagement rate would be a good starting point.
Also, consider that messaging and DMs via social are fair play for outreach beyond email.
LinkedIn is a massive platform to use for B2B social media outreach.
Co-Marketing for Success
Piggybacking on another company’s success means you are gaining instant approval by association with that company. Co-marketing allows you to build trust with a new audience much faster than you can on your own. With co-marketing efforts, this audience, which is new to you, has been introduced to a new brand. It’s basically been introduced to them without any effort on their part.
Related: Co-Marketing & Call Center Services: Why and How to Outsource
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Last Updated on November 20, 2023 by Ronen Ben-Dror