Category Archives: B2B

Art and marketing are made for each other, and this week’s master proves that.

He’s done collabs with brands like Nike, Heineken, Crocs, and the NBA … But it’s not all about advertising.

He‘s also a serious artist in his own right, a luminary at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and his work’s been spotlighted everywhere from NBC to The Washington Post to Hypebeast.

In the venn diagram of art, pop culture, and marketing, Matt Zaremba lives smack in the bullseye.

And it makes me think I should really get a hobby.

1. Want to sell your product? Personify it.

You get the sense that Matt Zaremba’s mind is always in story mode.

Take a recent collab with ASICS on an older, previously archived running shoe: When asked how his team came up with the “Small Wins Add Up” campaign to show off the shoe, Zaremba doesn’t even blink.

“First off, we know you can run in this thing, but 98% of people buying the shoe are not running. They’re just trying to look cool, probably in a city somewhere… They want to be on-trend,” he tells me, effortlessly spinning a story of who this desired consumer would be. (He’s not wrong — I just bought $160 Cloudnova shoes to look cooler while I run … errands.)

“So then I ask myself, ‘What’s the sentiment? This product walks into a room… What does it look like and sound like? Does it have an accent? How can we personify it?'”

From there, his team starts riffing — talking about the state of the world today, and how everyone is a little burnt out, and how sometimes just getting up in the morning is a major accomplishment — and voila. A campaign is born.

“Right off the bat, we came up with this idea that small wins add up. So then we go back to the drawing board… How do we visually represent small wins? How do we give a little wink to running, but keep the human element that people have all sorts of little wins they should celebrate?”

Zaremba does this for all his marketing campaigns, and it’s sound advice: Get to know the ins and outs of your product, and what story people will tell themselves when they buy it.

And think outside the norms when it comes to that story: Are you sure you’re selling a running shoe, or are you actually selling the message that little wins matter?

Because at the end of the day, a Stanley is just a water bottle with a really cool story.

2. Don’t use the first idea that comes to you – find the fresher angle.

One of Zaremba‘s proudest campaigns is one he did with Nike a few years back. It was a big moment for him — at the time, Nike was one of the biggest brands he’d ever worked with.

Zaremba knew it would be easy to make a splash with a big-name celebrity. He could stick the shoes on LeBron and call it a day. (Relatable, I know).

But he didn’t want to do that.

“The shoe reminded my team of our childhood — it kind of tapped into the Sandlot (the movie). So we decided to take a moment to reflect our own team. We did a yearbook shoot of all our actual employees wearing a special jacket we made, along with the sneakers. And we had the school-picture cloud background.”

“We presented the campaign as ‘This is who we are, and who we are is the same as you.’”

I‘ll admit most marketers aren’t regularly working with Lebron-sized budgets, but the takeaway still matters: Your first idea is probably the too-obvious one, and you should keep thinking. Unexpected angles will surprise your audience and make them feel like they’re seeing something new.

And ideally, they’ll see pieces of themselves in your marketing then, too.

3. Marketing should make your buyer feel confident — not insecure.

Fashion is a notoriously confidence-crushing industry. Plenty of major fashion and beauty brands thrive off making their consumers feel less-than. They want you to know you’re not cool yet, but you will be when you wear those jeans or that jacket.

But Zaremba calls that kind of marketing “empty calories and empty suits.”

“Sure, you’ll find a cohort of people who you’ll grow with because you’re showing them what they’re not. But eventually they’ll find a brand that makes them feel like they are enough, and they’ll switch to that brand,” he says.

His MO? Being as humble and relatable as possible: “Fashion brands should offer tweaks to your journey of style and culture. I don‘t want to talk down to people and say, ’Oh, you don‘t know this musician?’ I‘d rather be like, ’You gotta check this out.’ There should be no ego in it.”

Whether you’re a B2C or B2B marketer, the sentiment stands — personifying your brand as the “cool kid” works for some brands, but what works better for most is simply being helpful, curious, and encouraging.

The holidays are pretty much here, and my head is still spinning from how fast 2024 went by. And if you‘re a marketer, your head may also be spinning trying to figure out this year’s holiday shopping trends.

You needn‘t worry; I’ve got you covered with insights from our most recent consumer trends report. Let‘s explore consumers’ minds and determine what marketing and shopping trends you’ll need to leverage this season.

Table of Contents

• Holiday Shopping Trends
• Holiday Marketing Trends
• What’s Next?

Holiday Shopping Trends

Last Christmas, I was scrolling through Instagram on my sister‘s couch (as I’m prone to do) when I saw a photo of two velvet blouses by a shop I love called Midnight Hour.

My sister had just given me money as a gift (best sister ever), so I used some of the money to buy both tops directly through the business’ Instagram.

Our 2024 Consumer Trend Tracking Report shows that my shopping experience aligns with most consumers.

More consumers will take to social media for their shopping.

Social media is the #1 channel for product discovery for Gen Z, my fellow Millennials, and Gen X. While it‘s not the top channel for Boomers, our findings indicate they’re rapidly warming up to social media shopping, too.

In fact, a third of our survey respondents say they have discovered a product on social media within the last few months.

Furthermore, our report shows that 1 in 4 social media users have bought a product directly via a social media app, a 39% increase from last year. So, this holiday season, brands and businesses should expect more consumers to discover and purchase products via social media.

So, lean into tools like Instagram Shopping, TikTok Live Shopping, or TikTok Shop so you can meet consumers where they are at (social media) and have them buy directly from your platform.

Remember when I said I was scrolling through Instagram on my sister‘s couch? I wasn’t scrolling via my laptop; I was on my phone when I discovered and purchased the blouses, which brings me to another consumer shopping trend.

Mobile Shopping and purchasing will be on the rise this season.

Regarding online shopping, mobile phones are used more than any other device, especially among Gen Z. Our report shows that 71% of Gen Z use mobile phones most often when shopping online.

Moreover, 63% of consumers in our survey, across generations, use mobile when looking up a question in a search engine. This plays into how consumers shop because most will use their mobile phones when searching for questions about products.

For example, I Googled durable winter tights on my smartphone a few days ago and was shown a few brands to check out. After enough research, I bought a pair via my smartphone.

This holiday shopping season, ensure your website is optimized for mobile shopping and browsing since most consumers will do their online shopping and product research from their mobile devices.

Consumers will seek their favorite influencer’s stamp of approval.

I don‘t follow many influencers, and I can’t recall the last time an influencer convinced me to buy something, but that marks me as an outlier as more consumers look to influencers to help make buying decisions.

Our report shows influencers impact purchasing decisions more, with over a fifth of social media users (21%) buying a product based on an influencer recommendation in the past three months.

And if you‘re trying to attract Gen Z, it’s crucial to know that Zoomers hold influencer recommendations in higher regard than recommendations from friends and family (9% vs 7%, respectively).

More consumers are also following virtual influencers. In 2024, 28% of social media users follow virtual influencers, up from 25% in 2022.

Consider finding influencers who align with your brand and vision and sparking collaboration with them so you can better connect with your audience.

Holiday Marketing Trends

So, we know what shoppers are doing this year. Let’s see what brands are doing.

Brands will provide relatable, authentic holiday content.

So, what do consumers want brands to put in their metaphorical stockings this year? Relatability!

According to our report, consumers crave relatable content, but only 63% say that the content brands post on social media seems authentic or relatable.

Of the types of content brands post on social media, 90% of consumers say funny and relatable content is the most memorable (or 52% and 38%, respectively). 63% say it’s more important for a marketing video to be authentic and relatable than polished and high-quality.

I predict that brands will address this gap this year by creating funny, relatable content that caters to consumers’ interests.

Businesses will promote corporate responsibility.

I also see more brands releasing marketing content that takes a stance on important issues or demonstrates corporate responsibility.

50% of U.S. adults say brands should do more regarding social advocacy, and I have already seen some brands answering that call.

As part of its holiday marketing, True Religion collaborated with Grammy Award-winning rapper Megan Thee Stallion for the denim company‘s holiday collection.

The company hosted an event with the rapper’s Pete & Thomas Foundation, a foundation that supports underserved communities.

The “Where Wishes Come True” event focused on providing holiday gifts to those in need, including LGBT and at-risk youth.

True Religion‘s marketing video from the event hit all the points I mentioned above. It’s authentic and relatable, featuring candid footage of Megan Thee Stallion shopping and having fun with fans and gift recipients.

Participants also shared their genuine excitement about spending time with the star and what she and True Religion mean to them. Megan Thee Stallion’s sense of humor and charisma also shine, contributing to some funny moments in the video.

And, of course, by centering the event on helping LGBT and at-risk youth, True Religion is taking a stand for the LGBT community.

Some brands may leverage AI-generated content, but be careful!

We may also see brands dabble in AI content this holiday season, but I must warn against hopping on this trend too quickly. As I said before, relatability and authenticity are vital in reaching consumers this holiday season.

An overreliance on AI can prevent authentic branding from shining through, alienating your audience. For example, Coca-Cola released its annual holiday ad, which was generated using AI. The ad received heavy backlash from viewers who found it “creepy” and impersonal.

Prepare to see more influencer and content creator collaborations.

Instead of relying heavily on AI in your ads, I suggest leveraging influencers and content creators to build authentic connections with your audience. This is another trend I expect to gain prominence this season.

For example, Fenty Beauty is leveraging influencers like Stephanie Valentine to promote products that create holiday looks.

Image Source

What’s Next?

Now that you‘ve learned about these key holiday trends start getting ahead of the Black Friday buzz by preparing and finalizing your holiday campaigns if you haven’t already done so.

In the meantime, I‘ll likely be back on my sister’s comfy couch this year to do more online shopping. Happy holidays!

To effectively lead a marketing team, you have to know what you’re working towards. Whether your focus is to increase revenue or improve your customers’ understanding of your products, starting with a clear priority helps guide all your efforts in 2025 and beyond.

But sometimes, you may struggle to identify your organization’s most important goals. For this reason, we surveyed 700+ marketing executives to help you make the right decisions.

Let’s examine the top goals of marketing management for the upcoming year and share some advice from leaders at ClickUp, RocketReach, Uber, and more on how to achieve them.

Top Marketing Manager Goals in 2025

1. Increase revenue and sales.

According to our survey, “increasing revenue and sales” is the top priority for most marketing leaders going into 2025, with just over 20% reporting it.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise. Our core job as marketers is to impact a business’ bottom line by attracting the right audiences and driving leads down the pipeline for sales.

Gaurav Agarwal, ClickUp’s chief operating officer, once echoed this sentiment to me: “As a fast-growing company with industry-leading NDR, adding new revenue sustainably is always a top priority. We have to be hyper-focused on building out different growth and sales capabilities to achieve that goal.”

Tips to achieve this marketing manager goal:

To increase revenue, marketing leaders must identify areas of their customer journey that can be further optimized. Additionally, marketing leaders will want to focus on lead generation.

There is no one-size-fits-all approach to effective lead generation. To improve your lead generation strategy, you might test out new landing pages or calls to action. Try creating stronger offers or re-focus your efforts on more powerful lead nurturing campaigns.

It’s also important to continually test new platforms — like TikTok or podcasting — to reach new audiences.

Reflecting on revenue as a goal, Michelle Keene, Vice President of Product Marketing at Rocket Lawyer, told me when years are “expected to be dominated by economic uncertainty, the shift to profitable growth [rather than growth at all costs] will only be accelerated — moving from a nice idea to a requirement.”

To combat this challenge, Keene offers five key principles for marketing leaders to follow:

1. Move from a revenue-only goal to a revenue and cost-of-acquisition goal.
2. Find technology solutions that enable CAC measurement at the program level.
3. Evolve your marketing attribution models.
4. Deeply understand your target audiences and their needs to deliver the right messages at the right time.
5. Encourage ongoing deployment of hypothesis-driven experiments and optimizations.

She added, “As a marketing leader, I embrace this challenge, prioritizing efficient growth. While any mindset shift is challenging, the benefits far outweigh the change management costs.”

“It can transform the way senior executives view marketing — not as an expense, but as an investment — which is really empowering and energizing for me.”

2. Get a better understanding of customers and their needs.

Next, marketers leaders ranked “getting a better understanding of customers and their needs” as their second biggest priority in 2025.

This makes sense, considering they also said the industry’s biggest change in the past 12 months has been an increased focus on the customer and their experience with brands.

Your happiest customers can be not only your most lucrative but also your strongest advocates for your brand out in the wild. Customers stay loyal to brands they love and want to recommend them on social media and to friends and family. But how do you build this kind of commitment?

Tips to achieve this marketing manager goal:

Jennifer Chou, Senior VP of Marketing at RocketReach, believes having a strong understanding of your customers is a vital first step in building brand loyalty.

She told me, “Marketing is about storytelling and helping people envision how your solutions can help them achieve their goals. Having a better understanding of your customers and their needs is critical to creating that intangible connection that builds affinity, consideration, and, ultimately, loyalty.”

She continues, “Customers want to relate to companies in new ways. They want to feel that ‘the company understands what I’m dealing with and is building products for me’…This means we need to know their challenges and goals as well or even better than they do.”

To cultivate a strong relationship between your brand and its community, also ensure your marketing materials convey your brand’s values.

People will feel more connected to your business if they believe your company cares about issues that matter most to them.

As Daniel Godoy, Microsoft’s Global Head of Programmatic Evangelist, says, “The best way to win trust is by upfront stating the values your brand cares about and having transparent communication that highlights your purpose commitments.”

Create better customer experiences with personalization.

As more and more marketers are realizing, loyalty also really comes back to creating a great customer experience. In fact, according to Adobe, 86% of consumers will pay more for a superior customer experience.

We marketers need to dig deeper into what our buyers are looking for from our offering and their interactions with us. What would make being your customer easier or more enjoyable?

Personalization can be key to this.

Zendesk found that 70% of customers expect anyone they interact with at a business to have the full context of their previous engagement and actions.

And, in our survey, 86% of marketers admitted a personalized experience increases sales moderately or significantly.

What are some ways you can personalize your marketing?

• Address your buyer by name in all interactions, including email, website, phone calls, and in-person meetings.
• Make recommendations based on their specific needs, concerns, demographics, or past behavior.
• Have team members respond personally to all social media engagements. While AI can be very helpful with personalization, this is one use case where it can come off as robotic.

But these are just a few ideas. Don’t be afraid to ask your customers what they want and need. Ask for feedback after interactions or purchases. Good or bad, the insights can only help you improve.

Additionally, create opportunities for your customers to interact with each other.

You might create a Facebook or Slack group so your customers can engage with each other, share industry best practices, and get ideas or suggestions to help them work through their business challenges.

Back in 2019, HubSpot’s Social team created a Facebook group and has since leveraged it to foster a stronger sense of community among its members.

3. Increase brand awareness/reach new audiences.

This arguably goes along with our first two points, but according to our research, the third priority of marketers in 2025 is increasing brand awareness and reaching new audiences.

I mean, think about it. Of course, this is to help increase revenue and sales, but its success depends on understanding your audience.

If your business is entering new markets, you must take the time to understand your new customers so you can effectively show how your product helps them.

Tips to achieve this marketing manager goal:

According to our survey, marketers think the most important information to know about their customers is:

• How they consume content (33.43%)
• Their demographics (31.77%)
• Products they’re interested in buying (27.9%)

Based on this information, you can better understand the value your marketing must deliver and what new audiences would be attracted to.

Every audience is different, of course, but in general, there are some trends you can use to start testing. For instance, more than half of consumers prefer to learn about products by searching the Internet or social media.

That means a strong SEO or social media strategy is a great place to start when trying to build brand awareness and increase reach.

Creating product-led content on your website and social media can help show prospects what your product is all about and how it works long before they make a purchase.

Let’s say you work for a video editing company, for example.

By writing content like “Why Video Marketing Matters” and “5 Ways to Create Higher-Quality Videos,” people interested in video will be introduced to your brand as a player in the space.

But you don’t want to stop here. Go further by creating comparison articles that target high-intent X vs. Y keywords. Even if your software isn’t well known in buyer cycles, you can compare yourself to popular competitors and, once again, help explain your role in the industry.

Once readers learn that you are an option for them and find value in your content, they’ll be more likely to explore your site further. It’s content marketing 101.

If you’re marketing to Gen Z or millennials, it’s also imperative you use social media for product education. It’s Gen Z’s favorite channel for learning about new products and millennials’ second favorite (right behind search engines).

More on that in: Social Media Marketing: The Ultimate Guide

Top Marketing Manager Objectives Based on Trends

Our survey also revealed several emerging trends that marketing leaders are intrigued by and planning their strategies around. Here are the top three.

4. Invest in personality-led content and creator partnerships.

Where there’s social media, content creators can’t be far behind. Thus, it should come as no surprise that marketing manager objectives also include investing in influencer and creator partnerships in 2025.

Influencer marketing has been proven to foster engagement, drive traffic and clicks, and generate conversions and sales. Modern consumers tend to trust influencers more than brands, finding them authentic and relatable.

That’s likely why Sprout Social has found that 49% of all consumers make daily, weekly, or monthly purchases because of influencer posts. Knowing this, it’s wise not to sleep on the marketing power of influencers and creators.

But how do you get started?

Tips to achieve this marketing manager goal:

Influencer marketing campaigns can take place on a variety of platforms (Instagram, YouTube, etc.) and come in all different shapes and sizes, including:

• Affiliate or Discount Codes
• Contests and Giveaways
• Sponsored Posts
• Gifting
• Takeovers
• Collaboration

Start by identifying the platforms your audience is most active on and who they are engaged with on them. From there, fellow HubSpotter Ramona Sukhraj breaks down the different possibilities and how to develop your influencer marketing strategy in this article.

5. Diversify paid media across direct, indirect, and brand models.

With more competition on search engines and social and increasingly elusive algorithms across them all, the importance of paid media can’t be ignored.

In 2023, advertising their products and services effectively was one of the top goals of marketers, and now that focus has turned to diversification.

Advertising isn’t what it used to be. This isn’t the days of Mad Men’s Don Draper and creating quippy billboard slogans — at least, not entirely. Beyond the more classic channels like print, TV, radio, and direct mail, many brands now advertise almost exclusively on digital platforms.

Many digital advertising platforms offer helpful tools for nice targeting, creating engaging ads, and iterating quickly if something isn’t working.

Google’s responsive ads feature, for instance, tests various headlines and descriptions and ultimately displays the combination that performs best with an intended audience.

Meanwhile, Facebook allows A/B testing and is known for having one of the most robust audience-targeting tools available for social media.

Tips to achieve this marketing manager goal:

Overall, marketers today have a wealth of paid advertising options, and it’s smart to experiment with them. Like influencer marketing, start by identifying where your audience consumes content and looks for answers.

Next, see what advertising options it has that are relevant to your goals.

For instance, if you’re trying to boost downloads on a particular offer, perhaps you want to run a Facebook Lead Ad. Mix and match your options while being mindful of your budget and see what delivers the best results.

Learn more about your paid advertising options in: The Ultimate Guide to PPC Marketing

6. Update SEO strategies for AI-driven search.

You didn’t think we’d talk about 2025 and not mention artificial intelligence (AI), did you?

Rounding out the top goals for marketing leaders, according to our survey, is updating SEO strategies for AI-driven search.

AI search isn’t limited to assistants like Alexa, ChatGPT, and Claude anymore. It’s also being adopted by leaders in the space, such as Google, with AI overviews.

Source

HubSpot’s Kieran Flanagan expects AI to shift SEO in three main ways. It will:

1. Decrease click-through rates on search engines.
2. Force search engine experts to be more holistic digital marketers.
3. Make customer-centric strategies more important than keyword-focused ones.

So, what can we do?

Tips to achieve this marketing manager goal:

Here’s what Flanagan advised in a recent article:

• Create high-quality, expert content: Your content can’t just answer common questions with relevant information anymore. Everyone can do that. Now, it needs to provide credible perspectives, authoritative tips most readers won‘t find elsewhere, and other elements that comply with Google’s EEAT philosophy.
• Optimize for featured snippets: Structure your content so it’s easily scannable and provides direct answers to common queries. As AI overviews are slowly replacing featured snippets, we believe the criteria for appearing here may be similar.
• Focus on user intent: Tailor your content to address specific user needs, which can improve your chances of being recommended as an answer in LLM-generated search results.
• Build authority and backlinks: Like search rank in general, high-quality backlinks and mentions can signal to LLMs that you’re a trusted source. Keep making this a priority.

You can also check out these resources from HubSpot:

• How to Write Content that Generative AI Search Engines Will Cite, According to Experts
• 6 Steps Bloggers are Taking to Prepare for AI in Search [New Data]

Setting (And Achieving) Goals Like a Marketing Leader

Determining your top goal depends on your company’s needs.

If your company seeks visibility, an increase in traffic may show you are moving in the right direction. If your company is struggling to meet its financial goals, revenue from your marketing initiatives may be your core goal.

Your goals and KPIs should incorporate many thoughts, but some priorities and focuses also remain universal in today‘s market. So, use the trends and advice in this article to explore your business’s possibilities and the best opportunities to achieve its goals.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in October 2022 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

I’m not sure which social platform is winning the algorithmic gymnastics competition this year. Is it Instagram? Maybe TikTok?

Either way, it seems like all of our favorite channels are actively competing for gold, which presents quite the range of social media marketing challenges for us.

From algo updates to unpredictable trends, we’re always left wondering: Which platforms will provide the highest return? Where’s our audience hanging out now? And how can we create content they’re actually interested in?

These are all fair questions. In fact, our latest social trends report shows that they’ve manifested into the biggest challenges social media marketers are facing this year.

Here’s what the data says.

Top 6 Social Media Marketing Challenges in 2024

1. Creating engaging content.

As someone who creates content, I can tell you firsthand that creating good content is hard. And the standard for good content is always changing.

It looks like I’m not alone in this thinking because our survey shows that 17% of marketers said creating engaging content would be their biggest challenge this year.

The key to high-quality content creation is meeting your audience at the intersection of what they care about most and what’s trending on their favorite platforms.

Sprinkle in a few fickle social algorithms, and you’ve created one of the most complicated recipes of all time.

That’s why it’s no surprise to me that this feels like a pressure point for marketers.

How to Overcome This Challenge

Rachael Samuels, director of social media at Sprout Social, believes dedicating time, resources, and headcount towards social media is vital for long-term success.

As she puts it, “The social landscape is becoming increasingly saturated with new networks and seemingly endless potential audiences to engage. Social teams of one are no longer enough to keep up with the demand.”

Samuels adds, “As consumer preferences and expectations continue to grow, social marketers require greater investment in their teams and resources to be successful.

Brands must ensure social is prioritized as a critical communication tool and provide their teams with the resources needed to produce creative, relevant, and authentic content.”

As a former social media team of one, I wholeheartedly agree that lack of time and resources are blockers for content creation.

However, if you’re not in a position to increase your social media headcount, here are a few more ways you can beat the engaging content challenge:

• Repurpose content across channels to get the most bang for your buck. For example, take one of your 1,800-word blog posts and rework it into punchy short-form content for channels like Instagram or TikTok. HubSpot’s free AI paragraph rewriter is great for this.
• Use social media AI tools to streamline content planning, creation, and posting across your social channels — and to open up time for more creativity.
• Pull tips from the video below on how to create an effective social media content calendar:

2. Keeping up with features and algorithm updates.

I already mentioned the fickle social algorithm, and here it is again, rearing its not-so-pleasant head in challenge number two.

Our data shows that 16% of marketers are having trouble keeping up with new social media features and algorithm updates.

After looking at just one example of Facebook’s algorithm from Meta, I get it. (Not the algorithm, but why this is giving social media marketers a headache.)

Source

And coming from a blogger who has been quietly beefing with Google over their all-too-regular algorithm changes, you can trust and believe that I understand the struggle.

How to Overcome This Challenge

As marketers, we can’t stop the algorithms from changing. But we can take steps to be proactive, stay informed, and adjust our content to meet new demands. Here’s how:

• Get to know the algorithms on your most frequently used channels. It’ll be easier to navigate the changes if you already know the basics about how things operate.
• Stay up to date on the latest algorithm changes. Sources like HubSpot (cough, cough), Sprout Social, and Hootsuite are great resources here.
• Create content your audience wants to engage with. Content relevance is a big ranking factor for most algorithms, regardless of platform.
• Post on social media at the right time. The more engagement, the better your chances of showing up in-feed — so catch your audience online early and often.

3. Finding ideas for new content.

Based on our survey, 16% of marketers also reported that finding ideas for new content is a big challenge this year.

Why? It can be exhausting (and tricky) to consistently pitch new ideas for social platforms, especially when they already feel overcrowded with content.

Luckily, we’re at a point now where we can tap AI to help generate new content ideas if we’re feeling stuck. In fact, the below ChatGPT prompt is one of my favorites as a writer:

“Give me [number] of [content type] ideas about [topic] that would appeal to [target audience].”

Here it is with the blanks filled in: “Give me five blog post ideas about social media that would appeal to marketers in 2024.”

And here’s the response I got:

I also talked to an expert about this challenge — let’s see what she recommends.

How to Overcome This Challenge

Christina Garnett, former principal marketing manager at HubSpot, suggests researching what already exists when looking for new ideas.

“When trying to find the new you must consume and see what kind of content is already available and then look for gap opportunities.

Are there questions not being answered? Different perspectives not being shared? Maybe the content exists but not in a format that is tailored for a specific learner or audience,” says Garnett.

She adds, “Once you determine what you can create, you need to determine who needs it, and how it can best be packaged to improve their experience. Content has the same need to find product-market fit as products and solutions do.”

4. Reaching their target audience.

Up next, 15% of marketers also identified reaching their target audience as one of their top social media challenges.

Creating engaging content and finding new ideas is great, but what’s the point if your audience never sees it? (Like if a tree falls in the forest, and no one is around to hear it … )

The good news is we already have a great piece on the blog that explains how to find your social media target audience. I’ll summarize a few of the action items below.

How to Overcome This Challenge

• Identify or create buyer personas. Think about who your current customers are. What are their jobs? Age? Income?
• Find out where your audience is most active. This will help you prioritize which social media platforms to focus on.
• Look at your competitors. Who are they appealing to? Who’s responding to their posts and engaging with them?
• Survey your customers. Ask what type of content they consume, what social media sites they like, or who they follow.

Then, use all of this info to meet them where they are on social.

5. Creating content that generates leads.

Lead generation is also proving to be a hurdle in 2024. 14% of those surveyed report creating content that generates leads as a top social media challenge this year.

Lead generation is a job all on its own. Group that with content creation, trend monitoring, and community management, and you’ve just described the duties of the quintessential social media marketer.

To take some of the pressure off, here’s how you can build a strong social media lead gen strategy.

How to Overcome This Challenge

To start, consider driving your audience from certain social platforms back to dedicated landing pages, or track clicks on specific CTAs for each of your social media campaigns.

Let’s say you’re running a campaign aimed at driving revenue towards a new product offering, create a product landing page and link to it on each of your social profiles. That way, you can track how many clicks come from each page, and alter your strategy accordingly.

For example, if you’re seeing most clicks coming from Facebook, that may indicate that it’s a good idea to put paid advertising behind your Facebook strategy.

Speaking of paid advertising, social media ads and influencer marketing are also powerful ways to generate leads through social media.

Talkwalker’s former CMO Elena Melnikova emphasizes the importance of reading the room when creating ads for social media:

“Too commercial, and this young audience will scroll past your brand, looking for the next dance routine. Read the room. Follow the trends. Be spontaneous,” notes Melnikova.

And when it comes to influencer marketing, Melnikova says:

“Savvy brands will work with influencers to create content. And with the majority of TikTok influencers being Gen Z, they‘ll understand how to ensure their content stands out, and increase a brand’s engagement figures.”

6. Keeping up with new trends.

Last but certainly not least, our data shows that 14% of marketers cited keeping up with new trends as one of their top challenges for this year.

At this point, almost everything materializes as a trend — whether it’s a new platform, an old meme, or even just a sound (I’m looking at you, TikTok).

But the reality is this: Every trend isn’t a good fit for every brand.

Sometimes the most popular social platform isn’t the right place to find your audience. Or maybe your customers aren’t familiar with, and therefore wouldn’t appreciate, that trending phrase that everyone is using in their videos this week.

(For example, I said “sometimes, you need to eat an entire cucumber” to my mom yesterday, and she had no idea what I was talking about. Shoutout to @logagm on TikTok.)

The constant struggle between what’s current and what resonates with your audience makes it difficult to determine which trends to tap into.

How to Overcome This Challenge

I have two nuggets of advice for this one.

First, find a way to keep a pulse of the latest social media trends.

Follow industry leaders like Sprout Social, sign up for expert newsletters like The Marketing Millennials, or see what your audience is currently talking about on forum sites like Reddit.

Also, track the latest news and releases from your favorite social media channels (or curate a network of insiders like Annie-Mai Hodge on LinkedIn) to be the first to know about new features and algorithm updates.

The second is to choose the methods with the highest ROI. And if you don’t know how, take a look at HubSpot’s free lesson on How to Measure Social Media ROI to learn more.

Like I said earlier, it’s not worth it for every brand to hop on every trend. If it can tie back to your audience’s interests and your biggest business outcomes, you’re in the right place.

Challenge(s) Accepted

There you have it! The six biggest challenges that social media teams are facing in 2024.

Now that you know which challenges you’re up against, take the time to brainstorm solutions that will help you level up your social media strategy — for next year and beyond.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in November 2021 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

There’s a shift occurring; in our businesses, homes, and media. 

You all see the signs. Things are changing all around us. 

The Holiday season is upon us!

I love this time of year, personally. It means time with family and some high-quality excuses for whipped cream consumption. 

For B2B marketers, however, we mistakenly believe content engagement slows to a halt. 

Let’s talk turkey.

B2B Professionals Still Consume Content in Q4

We may feel like the final days of the calendar year mean business activity dies, but recent data from NetLine reveals a different story.

While October is historically the month where consumption rates peak, November and December remain prime months for strategic content marketing and sales engagement.

Thus, contrary to popular belief, B2B professionals remain highly active in the year’s final weeks. 

NetLine’s data shows remarkable consistency:

Here’s how November and December registration averages stack up against January through October registration averages.

• 2020: 4.3% lower
• 2021: 10% higher
• 2022: 4.5% lower
• 2023: 11.1% higher

(It’s also worth noting that November 2024 is pacing at a similar rate to 2021 and 2023.)

The data suggests that many B2B professionals are using this time to reflect, plan, and prepare for the upcoming year. 

It’s not a major surprise in this case, but it is certainly worth further exploration.

Industry-Specific Engagement Trends

Some industries demonstrate particularly strong end-of-year content engagement.

• Technology: +15% content requests from November to December
• Finance and Healthcare: Significant spikes as budgets finalize
• Transportation and Logistics: Doubled engagement since 2020

Each sector shows unique patterns, but the overarching trend remains consistent: professionals are actively seeking insights and strategic information.

How Much Does Content Consumption Shift from November to December? Content Format Comparison (2020-2023)

Not all content formats maintain equal appeal. 

Below is a comprehensive table that includes total registrations, Month-Over-Month (MoM) differences, and percentage deltas for each content format since 2020.

Content Format	November Total Registrations	December Total Registrations	MOM Delta (%)
eBook	1.5M	1.4M	–4.71%
Guide (Merged)	454k	437k	–3.87%
Cheat Sheet	231k	228k	–1.52%
White Paper	190k	177k	–7.03%
Article	148k	149k	+0.96%
Webinar	65k	79k	+20.68%
Playbook	42k	48k	+13.74%
Report	38k	36k	–6.94%
Tips and Tricks Guide	30k	28k	–4.75%
Research Report	25k	24k	–4.50%

The four formats I want to focus on are smack dab in the middle of this table: White Papers, Articles, Webinars, and Playbooks. 

Of this group, Articles are the format least associated with a purchase decision.

For our purposes, we’ll dive further into the three formats with greater intent signals: White Papers, Webinars, and Playbooks. 

I highlight these formats due to their high association with purchase intent according to NetLine’s 2024 State of B2B Content Consumption and Demand Report.

The significance here is that B2B professionals registering for these formats are likely preparing for investment in 2025.

Of the three, White Papers are the only format with a significant drop-off. 2021 saw a massive, probably COVID-driven spike, but the format has declined 29.4% since.

Considering that B2B marketers upload more White Papers to NetLine’s platform compared to any other format, this is something marketers must be aware of.

Meanwhile, Webinars and Playbooks have experienced steady, year-over-year growth, with Webinars up 20.6% and Playbooks up 13.7%, respectively.

They hit on some of the key factors marketers and sellers would want to know:

• High Popularity of Format
• High Association of Purchase Intent
• Increased Consumption of Format in December Compared to November

What’s the Point?

If you observe prospects engaging with Webinars and/or Playbooks in the month of December, get in touch with them.

The likelihood of this user making an investment in the near future is higher and therefore should be prioritized.

These figures highlight the most significant growth and declines among content formats.

Understanding Who is Consuming During the Holidays

We’ve demonstrated that B2B professionals remain highly active in content consumption during November and December.

Industries like Technology, Finance, Healthcare, and Transportation show notable engagement spikes with high-intent formats like Webinars and Playbooks seeing increased interest in December

All in all, these signals indicate it’s prime time for marketers to prioritize outreach.

But to whom should you be reaching out to?

Individual Contributors will always be the most prolific content consumers. They could be involved in the buying committee, but chances are they’re just using your content today to level up.

Throughout the year, the C-Level consumes more content than many expect, especially in the months of November and December.

Here are a few nuggets worthy of being called out:

• C-Level and Director content consumption has grown 28% from November 2021 to November 2023
• November typically sees individual contributors leading engagement
• December becomes dominated by decision-makers finalizing strategies

That last bullet is proven by the progression of consumption across the C-Level.

Notice that in years unaffected by a pandemic (2020) or the onset of inflation and recession (2022), C-Level professionals consistently show higher content engagement in December than in November.

We’re still collecting November 2024 data but I’m eager to see what December’s trends look like in the first week of January.

The bottom line here: the C-Suite is looking ahead to the new year. December is a perfect moment to capture their attention. 

Which Words Drive Engagement?

Regardless of Job Level, seizing the opportunity can come down to using the right word or two to strike at the right moment.

NetLine’s analysis revealed that most registration at this time of year revolves around “Reflective/Forward-Looking Content Titles”.

Reflective/Forward-Looking Content Titles are defined as titles containing keywords that indicate content focused on retrospection, trends, forecasts, or planning for the future.

These titles front assets featuring topics likely to resonate with B2B professionals preparing for the next year or reflecting on past performance.

Here’s an idea of which terms drove the most registrations in November and December.

Strategic keywords can significantly boost content registration. 

Push your content to be both forward-thinking and actionable in the moment. It’s a tricky balance, but absolutely worthwhile.

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Q4…

While competitors might be slowing down, you shouldn’t be.

Smart marketers are capitalizing on these final weeks as B2B professionals actively consume and prepare for 2025, and seeking strategic insights.

To take advantage of these insights, focus on these actionable recommendations:

1. Double Down on Engagement: Don’t wind down—gear up for Q4 opportunities
2. Prioritize Interactive Formats: Focus on webinars and playbooks
3. Create Targeted Content: Develop ROI-driven, future-focused assets
4. Leverage Seasonal Keywords: Use reflective and forward-looking language

Five weeks remain in 2024—make them count.

In 2023, my team and I began working on perhaps one of the most ambitious content audits ever conducted on the HubSpot Blog. We’ve run content audits in the past — but not like this.

We ran the audit in three phases:

• Phase 1 addressed our oldest content.
• Phase 2 evaluated our lowest-performing content.
• Phase 3 assessed the value of our topic clusters.

When it was all said and done, we audited over 10,000 blog post URLs and over 450 topic clusters.

In this post, I’m going to focus on phase one of our audit. I’ll walk you through how we audited our oldest content and how we took action. Plus, I’ll share the results we found.

But first, let me give you some background on why we decided to run an audit of this magnitude.

Why We Audited

It all started in early 2023. At the time, my team was called the Historical Optimization team and we sat at the intersection of HubSpot’s SEO and Blog teams.

We were responsible for updating and optimizing our existing blog posts and finding growth opportunities within our library. (We’ve since evolved into what is now the EN Blog Strategy team.)

In case you’re new here, the HubSpot Blog is HUGE.

For context, the blog was home to 13,822 pages in February of 2023, the month we began our audit. Ahrefs’ Mateusz Makosiewicz even declared it as the “biggest corporate blog … ever” in an SEO case study earlier this year.

Image Source

While we are fortunate to have a high domain authority and drive millions of visits per month, having a blog of this size does not come without challenges.

As our library ages, the amount of opportunity for new content across our blog properties and clusters shrinks.

So, we decided to audit our library to find opportunities for optimization.

We hypothesized that we could uncover “greenspace” and “quasi-greenspace” — topics that we have covered but haven’t capitalized on that well — by auditing the oldest 4,000 URLs in our library.

Although this was only about a third of our content library, we believed we’d be able to unearth some traffic opportunities and give our blog a boost.

Around the same time, we started to feel the effects of Google’s March 2023 Core Update that emphasized experience, which our Technical SEO team immediately started addressing.

However, another part of that algorithm update emphasized content freshness and helpfulness. In other words, how cutting-edge and useful our content is to our readers.

This is where we really felt a sense of urgency.

Because we had 4,000 URLs with published dates ranging from 2006 to 2015, we already knew that this chunk of content was not fresh or helpful.

So, we got to work and audited those blog posts over the course of ten weeks.

Eventually, we added phases two and three to our plan so we could further address unhelpful content and clusters.

How We Audited Our Oldest Content

1. Define our goals.

Before we started auditing the content, it was important for us to determine the objectives.

For some publishers, the goal of a content audit may include improving on-page SEO, enhancing user engagement, aligning content with marketing goals, or identifying content gaps.

For this particular audit, it meant uncovering “greenspace” and “quasi-greenspace” in our blog library, and improving our overall content freshness.

We also had to determine the scope of our audit.

There’s no right or wrong way to approach this. Depending on your goals and the size of your website, you could audit the whole thing in one go.

You could also start with a small portion of your site (such as product pages or specific topic clusters) and build out from there.

Since HubSpot has such a large content library, we opted to limit this audit to our oldest 4,000 URLs. Not only was this more manageable than reviewing all of our content in one audit, but this also targeted URLs that were more likely to benefit from an update or prune.

We also did this knowing that we would later address the rest of our library during phases two and three.

2. Gather our content inventory.

Once we established our goals and scope, we had to gather the oldest 4,000 blog posts and put them into a spreadsheet.

This process can vary depending on the tools and CMS you use. Here’s how we did it using Content Hub:

1. Log into HubSpot and navigate to the Blog page in Content Hub.

2. Navigate to the Actions drop-down and click Export blog posts.

3. Select File format and click Export. This will send all of your blog post information to your email. You will also get a notification in HubSpot once your export is ready.

4. Download your export and open it in your preferred spreadsheet software (I’m usually a Google Sheets girlie, but I had to use Microsoft Excel since the file was so large).

5. Review each column in the spreadsheet and delete the ones that are not relevant to your audit. We immediately deleted the following:

• Post SEO title
• Meta description
• Last modified date
• Post body
• Featured image URL
• Head HTML
• Archived

6. Once the irrelevant columns were removed, the following remained:

• Blog name
• Post title
• Tags
• Post language
• Post URL
• Author
• Publish date
• Status

7. Filter the Post language column for EN posts only. Delete the column once the sheet is filtered.

8. Filter the Status column for PUBLISHED only. Delete the column once the sheet is filtered.

9. Filter the sheet by Publish date from oldest to newest.

10. Highlight and copy the first 4,000 rows and paste them into a separate spreadsheet.

11. Name the new spreadsheet
Content Audit Master.

If you’re feeling fancy, you can also create a custom report in Content Hub and select only the fields you want included in the audit so you don’t have to filter as much when setting up your spreadsheet.

3. Retrieve the data.

After compiling all of the content needed for our audit, we had to collect relevant data for each blog post.

For this audit, we kept it pretty simple, only analyzing total organic traffic from the previous calendar year, total backlinks, and total keywords.

We did this because our recommended actions for each URL were determined during post-evaluation. (We’ll cover this in the next step.)

We obtained organic traffic data from Google Search Console and used a VLOOKUP to match each URL with its corresponding number of Clicks.

Then, we got backlink and keyword data by copying and pasting our audit URLs into Ahrefs’ Batch Analysis tool and exporting the data into our spreadsheet.

At the time of our audit, the Batch Analysis tool could only analyze up to 200 URLs at once, so we had to repeat this step 20 times until we had data for each URL.

Luckily, Ahrefs has rolled out a Batch Analysis 2.0 tool since then, which can analyze up to 1,000 URLs at once. So, if we were to do a similar audit in the future, it would take much less time to retrieve this data.

4. Evaluate the content.

Next, we assessed each piece of content by using the collected data. Then, we evaluated the post itself to determine the following:

• Type of Content
• Freshness Level
• Organic Potential

Type of Content

The HubSpot Blog is home to many different types of blog posts, each serving a unique purpose. Labeling each post helped us determine its relevance and became a key factor in our decision to update or prune.

While this isn’t an exhaustive list of all the content types you could find on the HubSpot Blog, we narrowed it down to the following for the purposes of this audit:

• Educational: A topic that can educate the user on a pain point or problem they know they have.
• Thought Leadership: A topic that can educate the user on a pain point or problem they didn’t know they had until an expert drew it to their attention.
• Business Update: A HubSpot-related piece of news or a press release that is likely not evergreen.
• Newsjacking: An industry-related piece of news or a press release that is likely not evergreen.
• Research: A collection of data or the results of an experiment that is used to educate the reader. This topic may or may not be evergreen, but the content is not and needs updates to stay fresh.

Freshness Level

Because the posts in this audit hadn’t been updated in a long time, none of them could be considered 100% “fresh.” However, we took different types of freshness into account when determining what action needed to be taken on the URLs.

For example, some topics, such as Google+, are so outdated that an update would be silly. However, plenty of topics were still evergreen, even though our content was not.

The following scale helped us make decisions on whether the URL had value with regard to freshness:

• Outdated: The topic is outdated, and an update may not be possible.
• Stale: The topic is evergreen, but it would need an extensive update to make the content more competitive.
• Relatively Fresh: The topic is evergreen, and it would only need a moderate update to make the content competitive.

Organic Potential

To determine the organic potential of each URL, we had to ask ourselves the following question: Will anyone search for the content on Google?

• Yes: Someone would definitely search for this, so we’ll need to optimize/recycle the content.
• No: Someone would not search for this. There’s no point in optimizing/recycling the content since there’s no possible focus keyword.

For all of the posts marked “Yes” for organic potential, we recommended a focus keyword for the re-optimized content to compete for. We did this by evaluating the existing title, slug, and content. Then, we did some keyword research on Ahrefs and reviewed the Google SERP for that query.

We also included the focus keyword’s monthly search volume (MSV) to help prioritize which updates to perform first. We did this by plugging the recommended keyword into Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer and adding the MSV to our master sheet.

For an extra layer of caution, we also checked for cannibalization on all posts marked “Yes” for organic potential. There are a few ways to do this:

• Do a site search and see if any URLs come up for the focus keyword.
• Plug the focus keyword into Google Search Console to see if any URLs come up.
• Plug the focus keyword into Ahrefs’ Keyword Explorer, scroll down to Position History, search your domain name, and filter for Top 20 and your desired time frame (I usually check the last six months). If multiple URLs are found, that may indicate cannibalization.

If the focus keyword was flagged for cannibalization, we either found a different focus keyword or noted that the URL should be redirected to the fresher post.

If no cannibalization was found, then we had the green light to move forward with updating the post.

5. Recommend an action.

Once a post was completely evaluated, we turned the insights into action items.

Each URL was placed into one of the following categories:

• Keep: No action is needed because both the content and the URL are good.
• Optimize: The content is good but outdated in terms of freshness or SEO practices. Keep the spirit of the article, but refresh and re-optimize to improve performance.
• Recycle: The content is not salvageable, but the URL still has value (in terms of backlinks or keyword opportunity). Create new content from scratch, but retain the URL.
• Prune: Neither the content nor the URL has value from an organic standpoint.

Audit Insights

Out of the 4,000 URLs we audited, 951 (23.78%) were categorized as posts with organic potential and recommended for optimization or recycling. Additionally, 2,888 URLs were recommended to be pruned. That’s about 72.2% of the audit.

These posts either did not have organic potential, posed a cannibalization risk, or were so outdated that there was no point in updating them.

The remaining 161 URLs either did not require any action or had already been redirected.

How We Took Action

The action taken for a URL was determined by its potential for organic traffic.

The URLs with organic potential were delivered to our Blog team and recommended to be optimized or recycled.

Meanwhile, the URLs with no organic potential were delivered to our SEO team and recommended to be archived or redirected.

First, let’s walk through how we took action on the posts recommended to be optimized or recycled.

Taking Action on Content with Organic Potential

Before addressing any of the 951 posts with organic potential, we needed to figure out the following:

• Our capacity for strategic analysis and brief writing
• The capacity of our in-house writing staff and available freelancers
• Our capacity to edit the updates

We coordinated with stakeholders and determined we only had the bandwidth to update 240 posts in 2024 (in addition to the dozens of blog posts we update each month). This initiative was internally known as the “De-Age the Blog Project” and was led by my EN Blog Strategy teammate Kimberly Turner.

Once we knew how many posts we could take on, we had to narrow down which ones to prioritize. We did this by evaluating the complexity of the lift required for each post update:

• Simple Update: The content updates needed are relatively light, making them suitable for freelancers.
• Complex Update: The content updates needed are heavy, making them better suited for in-house writers.
• Recycle: Content is not salvageable, but the URL is. Rewrite the post from scratch, but retain the URL.
• No Opportunity: Pass on updating.

We originally prioritized updating the simplest URLs first, but later pivoted our strategy to tackle the URLs with the highest MSV potential, regardless of update complexity.

We did this because we wanted to get the most we could out of our updates.

De-Age the Blog Results

Initially, we projected that these updates would be complete by the end of H1 2024, but we had to shift our strategy … again.

Like many other publishers, we felt the effects of Google’s March 2024 Core Update as well as the introduction of AI Overviews.

After having placed the De-Age the Blog Project on hold while we addressed the issues, we deprioritized the project entirely in favor of higher-impact workstreams.

SEO, am I right? It always keeps you on your toes.

Despite sunsetting the project before it was complete, we were still able to perform 76 post updates. Six months after the updates were implemented, the cumulative monthly traffic for these posts had increased by 458%.

This goes to show that even updating a small portion of URLs can make a big difference.

Taking Action on Content with No Organic Potential

While the De-Age the Blog Project was taking place, we also took action on the 2,888 URLs that were recommended to be pruned.

Since the initial audit didn’t include recommendations on how to prune, we had to go back and re-review each URL to determine how we would prune.

Here’s how we evaluated the posts:

• Archive (404): The URL has less than 10 backlinks and the backlink profile does not have value.
• Redirect (301): The URL has more than 10 backlinks and/or the backlink profile has value.

How exactly did we determine the backlink profile value? Rory Hope, HubSpot’s head of SEO, recommended we follow these steps:

1. Login into Ahrefs and submit the URL into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer search bar.

2. Select Overview from the left-hand sidebar.

3. Scroll down and click Backlink Profile.

4. Scroll down further and select By DR under Referring Domains.

5. Analyze and investigate any referring domains that are > 50.

6. Navigate to the Referring Domain you’re investigating > 50 by clicking the number.

7. Analyze the Referring page.

Select Redirect (301) if:

• The Referring page link is from a domain that still receives Domain traffic.

Select Archive (404) if:

• The Referring page link appears to be “spammy.” You can determine this by asking the following questions:

• Does this website only publish low quality guest post (SEO-led) content from lots of different topics?
• Does this website still publish content? If not, ignore it.

• The Referring page is from a website that you see linking to a lot of EN Blog posts, through a RSS style automated linking system.

Additionally, all URLs labeled “Redirect (301)” required a new URL to be redirected to.

When choosing a new URL, we did our best to pick the most relevant and similar page. If we couldn’t find one, we redirected to the pillar page of the cluster that the post belonged to.

If for some reason, the URL didn’t belong to a cluster or there wasn’t a pillar page, we redirected it to the HubSpot Blog homepage.

Decision-making for some content types was easier than others. For example, we were able to automatically assign 301 redirects to URLs that were flagged for cannibalization during the initial audit. We also automatically assigned 404s to URLs with less than 10 backlinks labeled as Newsjacking and Business Updates.

Everything else was manually reviewed to ensure accuracy. To make the evaluation process easier, we followed this decision tree:

It took my team about two and a half weeks to ensure that every URL had the correct label. In the end, we had 1,675 URLs assigned to be redirected and 1,210 URLs assigned to be unpublished and archived.

Once each URL was evaluated, we were finally ready to take action.

After coordinating with Rory and Principle Technical SEO Strategist, Sylvain Charbit, we decided to prune the URLs in batches instead of all at once. That way, we could better monitor the impact of redirecting and archiving a large quantity of content.

Originally, we planned to implement our prune in five batches over five weeks, allowing us time to monitor performance during the weeks in between.

Batches one and two contained URLs meant to be archived and unpublished, and batches three through five contained URLs designated for 301 redirects.

Because there were so many URLs to unpublish and archive, we worked with developers on HubSpot’s Digital Experience team to create a script that would automatically unpublish and archive URLs and redirect them to our 404 page.

Then, we were able to implement the 301 redirects with the Bulk URL Redirect tool in Content Hub.

Note: Although we were able to work through this process internally and finish before our deadline, I want to acknowledge that manually evaluating over 2,000 URLs can be tedious and time-consuming.

Depending on your resources and the scope of your audit, you may want to consider hiring a freelancer to help your team work through a task this large.

Content Pruning Results

While we successfully implemented each batch, this process didn’t come without a few road bumps.

Midway through our pruning schedule, Google rolled out the March 2024 Core Algorithm Update. We ended up placing our pruning schedule on hold so we could better monitor performance during the update.

Once the update was complete, we resumed the rest of our prune until it was complete.

Because of the volatile search landscape in 2024, we didn’t see the traffic gains we’d hoped to see once the prune was complete. However, we did celebrate a massive win for overall content freshness on the blog.

At the start of our audit in 2023, we calculated the freshness of our content library by looking at each URL’s publish date and quantifying the number of days since they were updated.

For example, say the current date is November 12, 2024, and you have a post that was last updated on February 19, 2008. Based on the 2024 date, the post from 2008 is 16.7 years old or 6,110 days.

Once we had all of the ages for every post on the HubSpot Blog, we averaged those numbers to determine the average age of our content library, which was 2,088 days (5.7 years).

Since pruning 2,888 URLs (and updating hundreds of URLs from the audit and beyond), the HubSpot Blog’s average age has dropped to 1,747 days — that’s 341 days younger than when we started.

As content freshness and helpfulness play an even greater role in search algorithms, being nearly a year younger can make a big difference.

What’s Next?

Earlier in this post, I mentioned that this audit is only one of three that my team has worked on in 2024.

Our phase two audit focuses on the lowest-performing posts that were not included in phase one, totaling over 6000 URLs. Then, phase three assesses the value of our Blog’s topic clusters.

We’re still taking action on the results from these audits, but I’m so excited to share the process and insights when they’re complete.

Ultimately, content auditing is a job that is never truly done — especially when working with large libraries. You finish one audit, then it’s on to the next.

Although the work can be tedious, the rewards of improving content quality, user experience, and performance make it worth the effort.

If you’re like me, you only open a small fraction of the (dozens? hundreds?) email newsletters you’ve subscribed to. So I set out to find what those really good newsletters, the ones you open on the regular, have in common.

Email newsletters have been floating around in the zeitgeist for some time now, especially as more writers have left online publishers to make it on their own.

I talked to a half dozen experts in the field, including both technical and content specialists, to tease out the difference between B2B newsletter marketing and other types of emails, guide you through best practices, and uncover some takeaways from indie newsletters that you can apply to your own brand.

Table of Contents

• What is B2B Newsletter Marketing
• Why Start a B2B Newsletter
• How to Create a B2B Newsletter People Want to Read
• B2B Newsletter Marketing Best Practices
• B2B Newsletter Statistics
• B2B Newsletter Trends

What is B2B Newsletter Marketing

B2B newsletters can be broadly defined.

One business might send bi-weekly how-to guides and best practices in its industry; another might send weekly interviews with master marketers (that was a shameless plug for a newsletter I sometimes write for).

What’s most important to understand is how B2B newsletters differ from traditional email marketing. If your inbox is even half as full as mine is, you’ve got a steady stream of emails about sales, new product alerts, and reminders to purchase that new gadget you put in an online shopping cart and promptly abandoned.

Those traditional marketing emails are important to your overall marketing strategy, but today we’re talking about an entirely different beast.

I spoke to Lia Haberman, who founded and writes the successful ICYMI newsletter and teaches social media marketing and influencer marketing at UCLA. She says that “the difference between email marketing and [B2B] newsletters is really a difference between performance marketing and content marketing.”

She explains that the primary goal of performance marketing, like email marketing, is to drive conversions. “You’re trying to generate leads, to increase sales. There’s a point to the email that extends beyond the email itself.” These emails might be tied to a particular campaign or initiative.

Newsletters, like content marketing, “focus on providing value within the email itself. The subscriber doesn’t need to click out to get the value of whatever the newsletter is promising.”

This may sound counterintuitive, but a regular newsletter cadence establishes your brand as an authority in its field.

And if you’re giving your potential customers real value that serves their purposes instead of yours, congrats, you’re well on your way to building trust.

Why Start a B2B Newsletter

The real question, as I learned researching this article, is perhaps, “Why shouldn’t you start a B2B newsletter?”

Starting a newsletter can deliver a great return on investment and build and nurture your target audience — but not if you go into it with unrealistic expectations or limited resources.

Newsletters require consistency and dedication — not just to create regular content, but to ensure deliverability, something that may require advanced technical knowledge.

Newsletters are a long game, so if you need immediate marketing results, look elsewhere. And if you can’t or don’t want to commit to a long-term relationship (we’ve all been there) with your audience, newsletters aren’t going to be a great fit.

Enough of the negativity. Here’s six benefits to starting a newsletter:

1. Build trust with your audience.

A regular drumbeat of newsletters builds long-term relationships and creates an opted-in audience — the people who are enthusiastic to hear from you.

2. Establish thought leadership.

Take HubSpot’s Masters in Marketing newsletter as an example. Every week, we interview a marketer who is breaking new ground and innovating in the field.

It reinforces HubSpot as a source for thought leadership and high-quality marketing expertise that you can’t get anywhere else.

3. Take advantage of the monetization potential.

Contrary to popular belief, making money from your newsletter doesn’t necessarily require tens of thousands of subscribers.

Ferrari — admittedly a brand whose fans have a little more money to burn than the average bear — has just 5k subscribers to its Ferrari Market Newsletter.

The paid subscription options range from $10/month to $90/year (presumably this is chump change if you drive a Ferrari). The yearly revenue attributed to just the newsletter is reportedly between $2 and $4 million.

4. Leverage high-impact sponsorship opportunities.

If you have a dedicated niche audience that has value to other brands, you can sell space in your newsletter.

Evaluate your brand and your audience to make sure that the sponsorships reinforce the trust you’re building — if you run a cat-sitting company, sell sponsorship space to the maker of your cats’ favorite treats, not to a meal delivery service.

5. Use audience segmentation to give readers what’s most valuable to them.

Audience segmentation is arguably more valuable than adding new subscribers, Alexis Grant tells me — though she cautions that segmentation and adding subscribers aren’t mutually exclusive, and that “it’s easy for a list to get stale if you don’t add new people.”

Grant runs the newsletter They Got Acquired, and she uses audience segmentation tools like RightMessage to “serve people exactly what they want.” When you sign up for They Got Acquired’s newsletter, there’s an optional survey to identify niche demographics like founders looking to sell within the year.

One of Grant’s goals is to get more users on her platform, called They Got Acquired Data, which provides data and insights that can be used to identify comps, grow buyer lists, and strengthen your negotiations.

That platform will likely be more valuable to a founder looking to sell within the year than somebody looking to sell within five years, and Grant can tailor her content accordingly.

6. Establish a direct line to decision-makers.

A niche audience can be targeted-networking gold.

Take Al Iverson’s Spam Resource newsletter, which focuses on email marketing and deliverability. Iverson told me that he only has around 1,300 subscribers — but they were the perfect 1,300 people to reach out to during a recent job search.

“My newsletter gave me a direct line to over a thousand connections in my industry,” he says. “It was instrumental in finding my next career opportunity.”

How to Create a B2B Newsletter People Want to Read

Content Strategy

I spoke with several experts and heard the same thing over and over again: Write good newsletters that serve your audience — not your brand. (If you want more examples, I compiled a list of 23 of my fav marketing newsletters.)

Haberman suggests hiring writers with a journalistic or creative background in order to write the kind of personable newsletter that people will be excited to open.

“Marketers can be great writers,” she says, “but the mindset of a marketer and the mindset of a writer are two different things.”

Marketers will naturally come from the “perspective of advocating for the best interests of the company.” Writers will ask themselves, “What does the audience want to hear from me?” versus “What is the message that I have to deliver?”

Former HubSpotter and founder of Newsletter Examples Brad Wolverton echoes Haberman’s recommendations. “Think like a journalist,” he suggests. “Your job is to share the most useful information.”

The information in your newsletter should be curated, of high value to your audience, and should strike a balance between branded and external content.

Lessons for Brands

• Invest in creativity. That requires more than just hiring creative people to write content — it requires giving them trust and freedom, too. That can be a hard pill for brands to swallow, but consumers don’t want an email from a well-oiled marketing department. They want voice, creativity, and a sense of the face(s) behind the newsletter.
• Resist the urge to be self-serving. It’s tempting to use newsletters to drive website engagement and nothing more. Think about what your audience wants, and find the right balance of branded and external content. It will build your credibility, trustworthiness, and authenticity.

Technical Strategies

Most email marketing platforms include some level of technical support, but I wanted to know what you should keep in mind as you’re shopping around for the right platform and getting started with a newsletter.

So I talked to Kaylee Jenzen, a technical marketing manager here at HubSpot who has worked on The Hustle and other HubSpot newsletters.

Jenzen suggests that you consider:

• Deliverability optimization. This includes making sure that your emails aren’t so long that they get clipped by certain email providers, managing DNS records and unsubscribes, and inbox placement strategies (i.e., how to make sure you don’t land in the promotions tab of subscribers’ Gmail inboxes.
• Shared or dedicated IP addresses. Jenzen says that this comes down to a strategy decision. If you’re running a small newsletter or don’t send regular emails, you’ll benefit from a shared IP address and “the additional outflow of emails from other senders.” But “it’s a double-edged sword,” she says. “If you have a bad sender who’s sending out spammy or even malicious emails, it can affect your ability to place within an inbox.”
• Image and formatting best practices. It’s a common misconception, Jenzen says, that a large file size for an image will necessarily hamper your deliverability. But there are things to be aware of; for instance, sometimes the alt-text for an image can find its way into the plain-text version of an email.

Independent newsletter operators have a wealth of AI personalization tools available to them. (All the major email platforms I’ve used, including HubSpot’s, include AI personalization tools.)

Lessons for Brands

• Don’t cut corners on technology. As Jenzen told me, “You get what you pay for.” Not every newsletter needs the Cadillac of email marketing platforms, but if you try to save some money by using a platform that doesn’t serve your technical needs, you can risk seriously damaging your brand.

• Use AI. Personalization is a great way to lean into AI. Let artificial intelligence use data to provide a personalized experience — your readers aren’t a monolith, and AI lets you treat them like the individual people they are. Use real people to give the personality and contextual information that AI can’t.

B2B Newsletter Marketing Best Practices

B2B newsletters, like anything else in marketing, is a growing and evolving field. Use this three-pronged list of best practices as a guide, whether you’re starting a newsletter from scratch or revamping an existing one.

I’ve also included a few examples of newsletters I think do a particularly good job with content strategy and audience engagement. (Technical optimization is a bit harder to judge, since it all takes place under the hood.)

Content Strategy

The content strategy for newsletter marketing should fit comfortably within your overall marketing strategy, but to recap a few guidelines from the experts I spoke with, prioritize:

• A values-first approach that serves your readers
• Balanced promotional content
• Consistent voice and format
• Provide creator-driven content

In original HubSpot research from September 2024, we asked 500+ newsletter operators about their most commonly used content strategies:

• Your personal opinions, tips, or hot takes on your industry or topic of interest (28%)
• Expert advice or tips (quoting someone you didn’t interview other than yourself) (16%)
• News or trends (14%)
• Expert advice or tips (quoting someone you did interview other than yourself) (12%)
• Data, research, experiments, or studies that you’ve gathered or run (11%)
• Data, research, experiments, or studies cited from third-party or outside brands (11%)
• User-generated content with quotes, tips, comments, text, or other elements sourced from your subscribers or audiences (8%)

We also asked what type of content drives the most engagement.

Our findings are consistent with the expert advice in this article: Readers want emails from real people with real opinions.

By every metric, content based on your personal opinions and perspectives and original data and research drive the highest engagement.

Get inspired: Check out The Publish Press, a thrice-weekly send with the latest news for creators, and WTF is SEO?, which shares advice and interviews on SEO for news and publishers.

How to: We’ve got a detailed step-by-step guide on how to create an email newsletter and tips for creating great content.

Audience Engagement

Audience engagement might be measured in different ways depending on your priorities (for instance, one of my colleagues wrote about how The Hustle prioritizes click-through rate over open rates).

• Trust-building tactics, like centering the readers’ wants and needs
• Personalization techniques
• Segmentation strategies
• Response management

Get inspired: Check out FINGERS, a newsletter about drinking in America, which is highly lauded for its engagement; and of course The Hustle, which I would read every day even if I didn’t work here.

How to: We’ve compiled 22 of the best newsletter tools for engaging subscribers.

Technical Optimization

Technical optimization often requires deeper technical know-how.

Since it’s likely that your email marketing platform of choice will provide some technical support, I haven’t gone into detail here — but here are a few things to keep in mind and ask questions about as you get your newsletter off the ground:

• CRM integration and automation setup
• Deliverability optimization and monitoring
• IP management (shared vs. dedicated)

How to: We’ve got a free downloadable guide with email marketing best practices and a planning template.

B2B Newsletter Statistics

In HubSpot’s recent survey of 500+ newsletter operators, we gathered some statistics that can inform your B2B newsletter decisions.

Keep in mind that these are independent newsletter operators and content creators, not brands, so your mileage may vary.

Key B2B Newsletter Findings

Most newsletter operators aren’t making a living out of it.

Just 5.45% of respondents earn more than $3k a month from their newsletter, and 38.4% make between $0 and $100 each month.

Running a newsletter is a lot of work.

Like, a lot of work: An incredible 73.46% respondents said that running a profitable newsletter can easily become a full-time job.

Be sure you do the calculus in your marketing strategy so you don’t put more resources into a newsletter than you can reasonably get out of it.

Paid subscriptions are the top source of newsletter revenue.

We asked respondents to identify the top three money-making tactics, and 26% said paid subscribers, 20% said freemium, and 13% said that ads and sponsorships were their top revenue source.

Stay on top of current trends.

Nearly 62% of respondents said that newsletters that don’t integrate video, audio, or interactive elements will fall behind in less than three years.

Readers want to hear from people — not brands. If you’re writing on behalf of a brand, keep Haberman’s advice in mind about hiring creative writers or getting into a reader-focused mindset.

Narrow your target audience.

Your newsletter can’t be all things to all people, and you’ll be better positioned if you embrace that.

Over 51% of respondents said that the broader your target audience, the lower your ROI. Look for a niche that only you can fill, and you’ll be able to get more value out of fewer subscribers.

B2B Newsletter Trends

Here’s what experts see as growing trends in B2B newsletters:

• Creator-led content. Lia Haberman says she understands that businesses might be hesitant to hand over the reins to a brand newsletter to a single content creator. She quotes Washington Post TikTok guy Dave Jorgenson, who has spoken about creating a WaPo Cinematic Universe in which he introduces new “characters” — i.e., other content creators — so that the creative burden doesn’t rest solely on him. Apply that principle to newsletters by introducing readers to multiple writers.
• Focus on personalization. Personalization doesn’t just mean adding first names to the subject line (although that is a valid tactic!). As Grant demonstrates, AI segmentation tools can bring real, measurable value to your brand by giving readers content tailored to them.
• Emphasis on trust-building. This is admittedly a tough one, because marketers’ natural inclination is to promote the brand. But writing for your readers, rather than your brand, sets you up for long-term marketing wins.
• Value-driven monetization. There’s plenty of opportunities to monetize your newsletter, but proceed with caution. Is it providing real value to your readers? If the answer is “no,” you risk alienating them.

I also asked experts what emerging practices they’re seeing in the field. Keep an eye on:

• Integrating newsletters with other marketing channels.
• Using advanced segmentation techniques, especially as AI is becoming better at this.
• Incorporating multimedia content.

B2B Newsletter Marketing for Brands

Independent newsletter operators and writers currently have an edge in the B2B newsletter marketing game, as readers are clearly prioritizing personality- and creator-driven content.

That doesn’t mean that there’s not room for your brand to jump on the B2B newsletter marketing bandwagon, though — it just means that there’s lots of opportunity to pave your own way and adapting these lessons to your own creative marketing strategies. 

You know how I know I’m in the right field? While most people are excited about holiday decorations, foods, music, parties, and deals this time of year, I’m excited about — holiday marketing.

 

Holiday campaigns are arguably your brand’s biggest chance of the year to get creative and connect with your audience on a heartfelt, human level.

Plus, it’s your chance to get your share of the roughly $902 the National Retail Federation predicts the average consumer to spend this year and hit your revenue goals.

Haven‘t started planning your holiday marketing campaign yet? Don’t panic.

I’ve mapped out a comprehensive guide of everything you need to launch a holiday marketing campaign this season, including surefire holiday marketing ideas and brilliant examples from this and recent years.

Table of Contents

• How to Create a Holiday Marketing Campaign
• Holiday Marketing Tips
• Holiday Marketing Campaign Examples

Note: In this article, I’ll focus on fall and winter holidays like Thanksgiving, Diwali, Hannukah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and New Year’s Eve, as well as retail holidays (Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday, Giving Tuesday, Green Monday). 

But you can really use these steps for your holiday marketing year-round.

1. Define your campaign goals.

Before you start creating a holiday marketing campaign, determine what you’re looking to achieve. Do you want to boost sales before the end of the year or maybe grow your Instagram following for the next year?

Take what you want to do and flesh it out to be SMART – specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound. This framework leaves less room for ambiguity in whether you accomplished what you were supposed to or not.

Depending on what you want to get out of your campaign, your holiday marketing goals might look something like this:

• Generate 1,000 new email subscribers by December 30, 2024.
• Generate 5,000 sign-ups for our app by November 30, 2025.
• Collect $50,000 in donations for charity XYZ by December 25, 2024.
• Increase sales by $100,000 by December 30, 2024.

Here’s a simple formula to help you get started:

Generate [number] leads focused on [topic/product] by [date]

You can also use this free goal-setting template to summarize your holiday marketing goals, calculate your greatest marketing need, and set deadlines.

2. Define your target audience.

Along with your goals, your target audience plays a massive part in where and what you do with your holiday marketing.

The more information you can gather about the people you’re trying to reach, the better. Where are they hanging out on social media? Do they prefer to consume information on their desktop or mobile? What do they care about this time of year?

This will help you make smarter marketing decisions when it comes time to create content and plan promotions.

If you already have a few buyer personas in place for your marketing efforts, you‘ll want to start by narrowing your focus. Do your goals pertain to all segments of your audience? If not, weed out the folks you don’t need to include.

If you don’t already have buyer personas or want to create campaign-specific personas, check out our free buyer persona templates.

3. Identify your offer.

Your offer is the center point for all of your holiday marketing. It could be a specific product or service, a sale, or something digital like an ebook, report, template, online course, video, tool, etc.

Whatever it is, ensure it’s of true value to your audience and aligned with your goal.

Vidyard is no stranger to great holiday marketing, but this campaign was particularly clever if you ask me.

A few years ago, the video software company ran a holiday campaign where it offered users “holiday video templates” in its free Google Chrome extension.

Image Source

The extension included templates for three videos sales reps could send to videos before and during their holiday time off, as well as seasonal effects like snow and festive hats you could apply to make the videos more fun.

Looking at this, I think it’s safe to say the goal of the campaign was to boost extension installations, and holiday templates were a unique way to get them.

Using our goals from earlier, here are some other examples to consider:

• If you’re trying to generate subscribers, the offer would be a subscription to your sales emails (and perhaps a discount or promotion as an incentive).
• If you’re trying to increase app downloads, perhaps it’s a free gift or special holiday feature (like Vidyard).
• If you’re trying to collect $50,000 in donations, the offer may be a thank-you gift or a donation match.
• If you’re trying to increase sales, the offer would be a sale, discount, or promotion.

4. Define your timeline.

The holidays are hectic times for both marketers and consumers. People are working longer hours, trying to plan time off, searching for the perfect gifts, and spending more time with family and friends.

Considering this, it’s best to give your business an extended runway to develop your holiday marketing campaign and actually run it once it’s live.

In my experience, this means giving yourself at least one month before the holiday or launch of your campaign to plan and build. However, if it’s large-scale or high-profile, like a major product launch, this timeline should ideally extend to at least three months.

“At least” are the keywords here. The last thing you want to do is rush execution and put out a mediocre campaign or get a great one ignored before people simply don’t see it in time.

From here, start outlining your promotion plan (we’ll get into that in the next step) and when you’ll release what.

A consistent, well-thought-out promotion timeline will help pique and maintain your audience’s curiosity, ultimately nurturing them toward taking advantage of your offer.

5. Design a promotion plan.

“If you build it, they will come,” — said no marketer ever. Now that your offer has been finalized, it’s time to get the word out.

Here are some of the promotional tactics to consider for your holiday marketing campaign:

Social Media

According to Sprout Social’s Q4 2024 Sprout Social Pulse Survey, 89% of shoppers say a brand’s social media content directly influences their holiday purchasing.

On top of that, 42% of consumers say they plan to use social media more than they did last year to find gifts this year.

So, if you’re not using social media for your holiday marketing, you are sorely mistaken.

Wherever you‘re sharing your content, you’ll need a place to organize and plan your distribution strategy. For that, check out this free social media content calendar.

Pro tip: Team up with influencers.

69% of consumers trust recommendations from influencers and their family and friends over brands themselves. And social media is their bread and butter.

Teaming up with trusted influencers or creators in your space to publish original content, launch an exclusive collaboration, or even run a contest can arguably do more for your holiday marketing than other mediums.

Beauty influencer Aditya Madiraju, for example, recently teamed up with cosmetic brand Anatasia Beverly Hills to develop and launch a limited edition lip combo for the Hindu festival of lights, Diwali.

It sold out in 14 hours.

Learn more about your options in Influencer Marketing Strategy: How to Build a Plan Creators & Customers Will Love [+ Templates].

Pay Per Click (PPC)

Whether on social media, search engines, or otherwise, PPC ads help brands bypass algorithms and get in front of their target audiences.

With so much competition during the holiday seasons, this kind of exposure could mean the difference between hitting or missing your goals.

If your budget allows, use search to target the product names you’re trying to sell or social media to get your promotional content in front of your target audience.

The best part about social ads is there are formats that allow people to fill out a lead form or even buy directly from it.

Email Marketing

Contrary to what many say, email marketing is not dead. In fact, according to the 2024 HubSpot State of Marketing, it’s still the second-highest ROI-driving channel.

Email is unique among digital mediums as it’s a direct, personal line to your audience. It’s a gated, exclusive space with less noise and more opportunity to connect with your audience personally.

This is especially valuable during the holidays when so many brands are vying for the same attention.

If you already have a list of people you know will be interested in your offer, that’s great. If not, you can slice and dice your database to go after a more specific group.

For HubSpot users, segmenting your database is easy with active lists and our AI list assistant. You can use the tool to define criteria based on contact records, company information, or previous behavior or tell the assistant what you’re looking for to see what filters it suggests.

Once you’ve squared away your recipients, you can start the email creation process. Here are some noteworthy best practices to keep in mind:

• Subject line. Your subject line is your one chance to get someone to open your email. If there’s something of extreme value in your message, like a discount or a time-sensitive deal, put that front and center. Or keep it short and snappy to pique curiosity. Use emojis to draw the eye. Get more subject line tips and examples here.
• Body copy. The body of your email should be compelling but concise, much like the copy on your landing page. You want to give the reader enough information to make them want to take the next step. So, summarize the value and also incorporate personalization whenever possible. (HubSpot personalization tokens can help with this.) Here are some great examples of email personalization in action.
• Call-to-action. What do you want your customers to do after reading your email? Keep your message focused on that one goal.

Also, it’s the holidays! I know I’m a marketing nerd, but a good seasonal email design or festive visual always gets my attention and interest, like this Thanksgiving campaign from Nothing Bundt Cakes.

Need some help crafting yours? Tools like Canva can help you create holiday graphics for your emails, while our free Holiday email templates can be used right in HubSpot.

Content Marketing/Blogging

Blogs are one of the oldest forms of content marketing, and while it can be harder to get noticed in the space with so much competition, it still has a unique value to offer marketers.

Depending on the nature of your holiday offering, blogging can educate people about it in detail, create a new page for you to link to on social media, and get indexed in search engines.

6. Create your follow-up plan (if relevant).

What will happen to your leads once you‘ve generated them? Or, after someone makes a purchase, how will you keep the relationship alive?

Before you launch your campaign, it’s best to design a plan for qualifying and nurturing your leads to purchases or return business.

Consider looking into retargeting ads or email sequences (which can be automated with HubSpot Workflows) and how they’ll fit into your greater marketing goals.

7. Create your holiday marketing assets.

Depending on what you’ve outlined for your campaign, you may need to create graphics, videos, and blog articles, among other things. Now’s the time to get those rolling.

Regardless of the finer details, a landing page is a smart asset to prioritize. This gives your offer somewhere to “live” – a page for people to go for more information, take action, or for you to send traffic from your promotions.

Every landing page will look different depending on your brand, but here are a few essential best practices to keep in mind as you create yours:

• Have a compelling headline. This is how you’re going to capture the attention of potential visitors.
• Include interesting visuals. Your landing page shouldn’t just be a jumble of text. Think about how you can provide visual context for your offer.
• Highlight the benefits of your offer. This could be in the form of a video or a bulleted list. Whatever the form, the goal is to drive home what the visitor can expect to get from this offer and why it matters.
• Include steps for taking action. This is how people actually get the offer. Depending on what it is, it could be clicking “shop now” to go to your product catalog, filling out a form, or even instructions to visit you in stores with an address or a call-to-action to your “store locator.”

If you need more guidance on what goes into a great landing page, check out this roundup of 41 brilliant landing page designs.

8. Take the campaign live.

You’ve got all the pieces; now it’s time to send them out into the world.

Pro tip: We recommend building a “soft launch” into your timeline. This gives you time before you initiate any promotion to truly QA test all of your assets and ensure that everything functions as it should.

9. Measure and report.

Remember those goals we set in step one? Now is the time to review your metrics and determine whether you achieved them.

If you didn’t, don’t beat yourself up; it happens to all of us. Take a deep breath and start diving into what might not have worked.

Analyze where people dropped off in your email sequences or after seeing your social media ads. Determine how many of your blog articles they read or if people even viewed the landing page. Take note of these details and use them to inform your next holiday marketing campaign.

Now that you know how to plan your holiday marketing campaign, what should it look like?

Holiday Marketing Tips for 2024

Here are seven versatile holiday marketing tips to incorporate into your campaign.

1. Lean into relatable experiences.

The holiday season is steeped in traditions that many hold near and dear to their hearts. Incorporating these into your holiday marketing can help pique interest and get your message to resonate on a deeper level.

Holiday traditions and imagery to consider:

• Snowmen, snowflakes
• Meals with family and friends
• Shopping and gift-giving
• Light displays and candles
• Santa Claus and elves
• Turkeys, Candy Canes

The idea is to strike an emotional chord. After all, humans tend to buy more with their hearts than their heads.

Etsy is a master of this, as seen in their commercials from 2020 and this year.

2020: “Gift Like You Mean It”

2024: “Gifts That Say ‘I Get You’”

2. Support a cause.

The holidays are a season of giving. In addition to looking for gifts for their loved ones, many people want to donate to causes and charities they care about.

Building a campaign around a cause you and your audience are passionate about taps into this urge and provides a welcome outlet to fulfill it.

This cheeky holiday campaign from The Body Shop does a lot right, including giving back.

The commercial ends by saying that for every gift set sold, The Body Shop would provide one day of safe water for a family in Ethiopia in partnership with WaterAid.

3. Create a sense of urgency.

At the end of the year, time is of the essence. Capturing this sense of urgency is a great way to build hype and elicit action from your audience.

For example, you could run a 12-day campaign (of sales, giveaways, announcements, etc.), playing off of the beloved carol, “12 Days of Christmas.”

Or you could count down to the holiday you’re focusing on with different daily surprises.

You could also sell a seasonal or limited-edition product (like Dunkin) that can only be purchased during a specific time period. When your holiday marketing is time-bound, people are more prone to FOMO.

4. Emphasize social media — but still think multi-channel.

As discussed earlier, social media has huge pull during the holiday season. But while it should be a major part of your campaign, it shouldn’t be the only part.

Conventional wisdom tells us that people rarely purchase after just one interaction with a brand. While the exact number varies depending on your audience, it usually takes multiple touchpoints to make a sale, so you can’t rest on just one medium or asset.

Tap into email marketing, PPC, influencer marketing, and even traditional advertising if your budget allows. Identify the platforms where your audience consumes content and get your message there.

5. Offer a deal, incentive, or premium.

According to Capital One, price is the biggest factor in purchase decisions for 89% of Americans. In fact, the same report found discounts are a major factor for 74% of U.S. online shoppers. Don’t sleep on this insight.

During the holidays, people expect deals, discounts, and specials. Not offering one as part of your holiday marketing is a quick way to get ignored.

6. Make gift-giving easier.

Few things are more stressful this time of year than trying to find the right gift for the people in your life.

Whether it is a partner, friend, child, or even coworker, making gift-giving easier with your holiday marketing is a surefire way to grab attention and build trust with your audience.

What might this look like?

• Publish gift guides on your blog or social media.
• Group products into gift bundles.
• Offer gift cards, certificates, or subscriptions.

Macy’s did a great job here, teaming up with an influencer to publish a gift guide to Instagram:

7. Incorporate humor.

As fun as it is, the holiday season can also be stressful. Any levity you can add to your holiday marketing is appreciated. Plus, it’s the most popular type of content on Instagram and several other platforms.

Amazon is no stranger to cracking a joke in its holiday marketing:

Holiday Marketing Campaign Examples

Tips and processes are cool and all, but some actual holiday marketing ideas would be great, right? Let’s look at some of the most memorable campaigns from various industries in recent years and why they work.

1. Coca Cola: Holiday Caravan

Despite facing backlash for its AI-generated holiday commercial, Coca-Cola still hopes to deliver holiday cheer to cities across the United States with its Holiday Caravan.

The bright red, holiday-themed truck is making stops across in 14 states and inviting fans of all ages to “stop by for a chance to snap a photo with Santa, enjoy an ice-cold Coca‑Cola, and get your very own personalized Coca‑Cola Zero Sugar can!”

The brand ran commercials and social media ads promoting the campaign, like this one I caught in my Instagram Stories.

Why it works:

• Capitalizes on beloved holiday traditions (i.e. taking a photo with Santa)
• Creates an in-person experience
• Incorporates personalization
• Wraps all the warm holiday fun in Coke branding and lets them enjoy their products simultaneously.

2. American Express: “Small Business Saturday”

Image Source

“Small Business Saturday” is a retail holiday on which Americans are encouraged to buy from small businesses rather than the big brands typically highlighted on Black Friday, Cyber Monday, etc.

What many don’t know is that the day actually started in 2010 as a holiday marketing campaign by American Express (AMEX).

Now in its 15th year, the campaign urges buyers to “shop small” and, in turn, support the dreams and growth of millions of small businesses nationwide.

On top of that, for every purchase made using an American Express card, the company donates $1 to charity — this year, it’s the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation to support recovery efforts for small businesses impacted by Hurricanes Helene and Milton.

AMEX runs commercials and magazine ads (yes, those still exist!) for the campaign, promotes it on social media, and encourages entrepreneurs and consumers alike to spread the word with hashtags like #smallbusinesssaturday, #shopsmall, and #smallbizsaturday.

Overall, the idea struck such a chord it became more of a movement than a marketing campaign and has been embraced by many without any connection to AMEX.

Why it works:

• Fits in perfectly with the average consumer’s natural holiday buying habits
• Aligns with AMEX’s culture of supporting small businesses
• Gives back to a relevant charity
• Unites people around a cause regardless of whether they are an AMEX cardholder
• Thinks multi-channel
• Taps into social media and user-generated content (UGC) using hashtags

3. Chewy: “Chewy Claus”

Image Source

Pet supplies retailer Chewy’s Chewy Claus holiday marketing campaign has been a popular one for many years. In it, pet owners are asked to share their pet’s holiday wish list for the chance to have it granted by Chewy Claus.

Then, for every letter/wish list the company receives, it will also donate one pound of pet food and supplies to Greater Good Charities to help pets in need (up to 600,000 pounds). This year, Chewy is also sponsoring adoptions with the campaign.

The company promoted Chewy Claus with a landing page on their website, social media posts, and a related holiday commercial.

Why it works:

• Capitalizes on beloved holiday traditions (i.e., Writing a letter to Santa)
• Offers the chance of possibly getting everything your pet (or fur baby) wants for the holidays
• Aligns perfectly with the Chewy brand
• Gives back to a relevant charity their customers would care about

4. TJX: “Bring Back the Holidays”

Back in 2017, TJX (the parent company behind retailers Marshalls, TJ Maxx, HomeGoods, and others) took what may seem like a counterintuitive approach to its holiday marketing.

Rather than encouraging people to come out and shop like many competitors, the company told its shoppers (and employees) to stay home and spend time with their loved ones by closing its doors on Thanksgiving.

This followed the trend of many big businesses opening their doors on Thanksgiving itself to get a head start on the holiday rush — but this consumerist push didn’t sit well with many, including TJX.

So, rather than promoting a product, the brand promoted values. Even in 2024, seven years later, the group’s stores remain closed on Thanksgiving and Christmas Day.

Why it works:

• Leans into family values shared by its audience
• It’s counter-intuitive, so it stands out

5. Starbucks: “Red Cup Day”

Starbucks has been losing money for multiple years this year, but it hopes its annual Red Cup campaign will help.

Seasonable holiday cup designs have been a staple of the brand since 1999, but starting in 2022, it began hosting “Red Cup Day” — a day when customers who order a handcrafted holiday beverage at a participating U.S. Starbucks store receive a free limited-edition reusable red cup, made with 95% recycled material.

After that, anyone who returns to the store with their cup (or any reusable cup) will receive a $0.10 discount on their beverage, plus 25 bonus Stars in the Starbucks Rewards app.

Why it works:

• Fit in perfectly with the average Starbucks customer’s buying behavior
• Creates an in-person, group experience
• Comes with a free, limited edition freebie
• Promotes loyalty and encourages return business by offering a discount with the cup
• Promotes sustainability and aligns with Starbucks’ promise to reduce waste by 50% by 2030.

6. Office Max: “Elf Yourself”

I still remember seeing Office Max’s first “Elf Yourself” holiday marketing campaign in 2006 — and, honestly, it cracks me up to this day.

For the campaign, the office supplies retailer set up a website where audiences could upload pictures of themselves and their friends to create a hilarious personalized video of them dancing as holiday elves. The video could then be shared as an eCard (remember those?) and on social media.

This level of personalization was the first of its kind, and the campaign has lasted the test of time. Today, the website has evolved into a mobile app and includes VR capabilities that can bring your elves to life in any room using your phone camera.

Why it works:

• Capitalizes on beloved holiday imagery (a.k.a. Santa’s elves)
• Creates personalized content
• Universal appeal — you don’t have to be an Office Max shopper to appreciate it — which makes it a great awareness play.
• Extremely shareable and memorable

7. Fairlife: “Holiday Hot Chocolate Kit Giveaway”

In its holiday marketing campaign, milk brand Fairlife shows audiences how its products not only fit into family traditions but also make them better.

Making hot chocolate on a cold winter night? Baking holiday cookies or leaving some out for Santa? Fairlife’s milk makes those moments even more “magical” by offering more protein and less sugar than regular milk alternatives.

On its landing page, the company shares hot chocolate recipes using its products, shares UGC from #fairlifeholidaymoments, and runs a contest to win a “holiday hot chocolate kit.”

Fairlife promoted the giveaway across social media.

Why it works:

• Capitalizes on beloved holiday/winter traditions (i.e. Enjoying hot cocoa, baking holiday cookies)
• Offers unique value in the form of recipes
• Encourages UGC
• Runs a giveaway to generate leads and offer a fun treat to audience members

8. Macy’s: ”Believe”

Between the Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City and its popular Christmas displays, Macy’s is a staple of the holiday season in the United States. Its “Believe” campaign only added to that reputation.

“Believe” started in 2008 and ran consecutively for over a decade.

Image Source

In it, “believers” of all ages were invited to visit a Macy’s store to write and drop letters to Santa into bright red, Macy’s branded letterboxes or submit them online.

For every letter collected from early November through Christmas Eve, Macy’s would then donate $1 to the Make-A-Wish foundation to help grant the wishes of children with critical illnesses.

Personally, I loved this campaign, even as a young adult. I’ve written letters with my mother, late cousin, and other loved ones over the years, and it’s always been a sweet moment of reflection that takes me back to my childhood. I’m sure many could say the same.

Why it works:

• Capitalizes on beloved holiday/winter traditions (i.e., writing a letter to Santa)
• Supports a charity their customers and most of the general public would care about
• There’s no purchase necessary, but it does get people into stores or onto the Macy’s website with the potential to shop.
• Offers a fun, seasonal, in-person experience.

10. Google: “Santa Tracker”

Now, this one’s simple and sweet.

In 2004, Google launched “Santa Tracker,” a website that simulates and “tracks” Santa Claus’ location as he travels the world on Christmas Eve. 

Image Source

The tracker is usually animated and colorful, catering to children, and it also allows them to play, watch, and learn through a variety of Christmas-themed activities.

Why it works:

• Incorporates well-known holiday lore (a.k.a. Santa traveling around the world on Christmas Eve)
• Low maintenance for Google. (Like Santa himself, the website only needs to work one night a year.)
• Interactive and free
• Boosts Google traffic

11. IKEA Canada: “Assemble Together”

In this commercial from IKEA Canada, audiences are brought into a familiar experience for most.

It’s the holiday season, and the room is filled with family. Some are cooking, some chatting, some setting the table, and some playing games, but all of them are enjoying each other’s company as music and IKEA products fill the space.

What makes this ad different (at least in North America) is that the family is South Asian, and the decor appears to mix Christmas and Diwali elements.

This campaign is simple, but it sends two powerful messages. One, IKEA offers many different things to facilitate your holiday gatherings, and two, no matter what your background, many of our celebrations look the same.

“Assemble Together” ran for six weeks in 2021 via traditional television, digital channels, and social media.

Why it works:

• Capitalizes on beloved holiday traditions (i.e., gathering with your family for dinner)
• Highlights IKEA products in a subtle way
• Showcases the diversity of IKEA’s audience and the common ground they all share

(Also, this is more just a Ramona thing, but it uses an absolutely iconic Bollywood song that instantly resonates with anyone from a South Asian background.)

12. McDonald’s: “Reindeer Ready”

“Reindeer Ready” is a multichannel, UK-based holiday campaign by McDonald’s that started in 2018. In this campaign, McDonald’s locations in the UK and Ireland play off a regional tradition of leaving carrots by offering Reindeer Treats (a.k.a. a bag of carrots) for free on Christmas Eve.

The fast food giant has run several commercials around the campaign over the years and also recently introduced Reindeer Ready Live — an augmented reality (AR) app that lets users take a picture or video of their living room and then insert an augmented reality reindeer.

The result is a personalized “caught on camera” clip of the reindeer snacking on its McDonald’s treats, which can then be saved or shared on social media.

Why it works:

• Incorporates a local holiday tradition
• Incorporates personalization
• Creates a memorable real-life experience
• Encourages user-generated content

‘Tis the Season to Get Creative

Holiday marketing isn’t just about driving sales — it’s an opportunity to connect with your audience on a deeper, more emotional level.

By leaning into the festive spirit, tapping into relatable traditions, and offering genuine value, you can make your brand stand out (and be remembered) during the busiest time of the year.

Despite the rise in popularity of short-form video, I was surprised to discover that YouTube sees the highest usage among social media platforms by video marketers, surpassing TikTok and Instagram.

According to HubSpot Blog research, YouTube was the most successful social media platform in 2023, growing by 79% year-over-year.

Of the marketers surveyed, 95% said YouTube has an average or high ROI and the majority will invest more in this social channel.

With so much emphasis placed on the platform, I thought it was important to find out what times and days video publishers saw the best results so you can optimize the best time to upload YouTube videos.

Keep reading to learn what I discovered.

Table of Contents

• When is the best time to post on YouTube?
• When is the worst time to post on YouTube?
• Does it matter what time you post on YouTube?
• How to Find Your Channel’s Best Time to Post

I know creating a video for YouTube isn’t an easy task. First comes ideation, then scripting, followed by filming, and finally editing — and that’s just at a high level. Imagine doing all that work just to upload a video that doesn’t get much traction.

When you’re first starting out, you’re bound to struggle. However, if you’ve been at it for a while and are still not getting any traction from your videos, your upload time could be the culprit.

Use HubSpot’s AI Clip Creator to improve your YouTube video production.

We surveyed 1,500+ marketers for our Social Media Trends Report and asked them, “What’s the best time to post on YouTube?”

Here’s the breakdown:

• 24% of respondents said 6 PM to 9 PM.
• 22% of respondents said 12 PM to 3 PM.
• 20% of respondents said 3 PM to 6 PM.

Note: Respondents were instructed to answer in their current time zone.

As for the best days, data shows that Saturday is the most popular day for marketers, followed by Friday and Sunday.

I think one way to explain this is that on the weekends, consumers are burnt out from the week and looking for entertainment. The weekend also gives consumers more time to explore the platform and discover their favorite content.

Other video platforms like TikTok and Instagram focus on short-form content, making it easy for consumers to get what they need during breaks throughout the day. YouTube, however, requires a bigger time commitment if you’re making longer-form videos.

Bear in mind, though, that YouTube is prioritizing YouTube Shorts and its short-form videos are gaining popularity.

When is the worst time to post on YouTube?

Wondering when you shouldn’t post on the platform? According to our research, Mondays and Tuesdays aren’t so popular among marketers.

Only 9% of marketers surveyed said Mondays were the best time to post on the video platform and another 9% chose Tuesdays, making these two days tie for last place.

As for the worst times, here’s the breakdown:

• 6 AM to 9 AM.
• 9 PM to 12 AM (midnight).
• 9 AM to 12 PM.

Only 22% of respondents said an early morning posting (between 6 AM and noon) offered the best results.

Does it matter what time you post on YouTube?

I think the answer to this is both yes and no. Yes, it does matter what time you post on YouTube in the short term because it will impact how many views your video gets within the first few hours.

Optimizing your views during this time period can help you generate more traffic to your content and help the growth of your channel.

However, it doesn’t play a huge role in the long term. Say your video was posted at 3 AM, that has little impact on how many views it can garner over the next couple of months or years.

Unlike a platform like Instagram where fresh content is key to success, novelty is not the biggest ranking factor on YouTube — relevance is.

This means that even if your video may not perform well initially, if it’s the most relevant video to a user’s query, it can quickly gain traction. So I recommend your first priority be to make videos that are relevant and of good quality.

I think another trend to consider is AI. In 2023, 71% of marketers said they used generative AI for content creation and that it performed better than content made without it.

A whopping 87% planned on using AI tools for content creation in 2024 and the majority (26%) said they think YouTube will have the most promising generative AI features.

If you’d like to leverage AI for your videos, check out HubSpot’s AI Clip Creator to enhance and accelerate your video production.

How to Find Your Channel’s Best Time to Post

Your Analytics dashboard is the best place to find the most accurate and reliable data on your channel — including the best time to post.

If your channel generates enough traffic, you’ll gain access to an advanced report which shows you when your viewers are most active on the platform.

I think this will be especially insightful so that you can post videos when your audience is online, which may not coincide with the trends I cited earlier.

To access this page, follow these steps:

1. Open YouTube Studio.
2. Click on Analytics.
3. Open the Audience tab and view your report.

With this personalized information, you’ll be able to find the best time to upload YouTube videos.

Posting Videos on YouTube

Digging into the data showed me that knowing the best times and days to post on YouTube isn’t meant to be a strict rule on when you should post.

Instead, I recommend you use this data as a guide to optimize your channel for short- and long-term success.

I’ve learned that the most important part of leveraging YouTube for your brand is making content that is high quality and relevant to your audience.

And with YouTube soaring in popularity and potential revenue, it’s worth the investment to do it right.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in May 2022 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Growing up, I was only exposed to one type of management style. My baseball coaches were some of the most ruthless and demanding people I’ve ever met, pushing our team to our physical and emotional limits.

When I started doing internships in college, I expected my managers to be like my coaches. Since the stakes are higher in a business, I was scared to mess up.

But to my surprise, my managers in the working world were the complete opposite of my coaches. For the first time, I experienced different management styles.

Your management style impacts the team you oversee and sets the tone for your workplace environment.

Check out this overview of the top management styles to learn the pros and cons of each and how each style impacts your team’s performance.

1. Visionary Management Style

A visionary manager casts a vision for a purpose and direction their employees can believe in. They inspire their team to work hard to execute that vision.

I think a visionary management style works best when the leader has excellent communication and charisma to communicate their long-term vision.

When they succeed, they’ll gain buy-in and intrinsic motivation from employees.

When they don’t, they risk disengagement and underperformance.

Visionary leadership works best when managers give their employees autonomy and freedom in executing the vision.

If you want to employ this style, I recommend you empower your team to take risks and make decisions to work toward your shared goal.

2. Autocratic Management Style

Autocratic management is the most top-down approach to management — employees at the top of the hierarchy hold the power to make decisions.

Once a decision is made, autocratic leaders expect acceptance and execution from their team.

I think the benefits of an autocratic management style are fast decision-making and clear direction, both useful during a crisis or when training an inexperienced team. With clear directives and close supervision, an autocratic style can raise productivity quickly.

The risk of an autocratic management style is that employees may experience low morale if they don’t understand or have a chance to contribute to the vision.

Turnover is likely if employees don’t feel engaged and empowered. When implemented poorly, autocratic management can limit innovation and creativity.

Example of the Autocratic Management Style in Action: Satya Nadella, Microsoft

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is known as a clear and decisive leader who guided Microsoft from a struggling tech company to a market leader.

Nadella explains the benefit of clear, direct management this way:

“The most important attribute that any leader needs to have — and it is often underestimated — is the need to create clarity when none exists. You don’t need a leader when everything is well-defined, and it’s easy.”

Being an autocratic leader doesn’t mean that Nadella doesn’t consider employees’ points of view. He is also known for his empathy and embracing a growth mindset at Microsoft. But, when it comes to hard decisions, I respect that he takes full responsibility and leads with transparency.

3. Democratic Management Style

In democratic management, the majority rules. Managers let their employees participate in the decision-making process because they value their team’s diversity of ideas and understand that people are the key to a team’s success.

Democratic managers ultimately approve decisions but allow employees to shape and influence their decision-making.

I’ve found many employees prefer a democratic management style because they have a larger stake in and influence on the work they are doing.

But, when executed poorly, a democratic management style can be inefficient.

Consulting an entire team about a decision can slow down progress. Favoritism of choosing one employee’s ideas over another can also cause factions and frustrations.

If you want your employees to feel like they’re all leaders of your team, I suggest you make sure you are genuinely incorporating feedback and justifying your decisions.

Example of the Democratic Management Style in Action: Reed Hastings, Netflix

Image Source

One example of a democratic management style is Reed Hastings, executive chairman and co-founder of Netflix.

During his 25 years as CEO, Hastings empowered Netflix employees to share innovative ideas from any department or level, even encouraging employees to go above their boss’s head when necessary.

In his book No Rules Rules, he shares how he built a culture of freedom and responsibility using continuous improvement and transparent communications.

Hastings also incorporates some elements of a visionary management style.

Before streaming existed, he needed to convince employees and investors that streaming would replace DVD rentals and led the company through that transformation.

4. Transformational Management Style

Transformational management is one of the most popular leadership styles, embraced by business leaders from Alphabet’s Sundar Pichai to Proctor & Gamble’s Jon Moeller.

Transformational managers believe that change and growth are the only way to stay ahead of the curve, so they constantly challenge their employees to perform better. They motivate employees to keep raising the bar, leading to improved team performance.

The best transformational leaders continue to push employees while equipping them with the support and resources they need.

These teams are innovative, so they can adapt to drastic industry changes. But they can also risk moving too fast and spreading themselves too thin.

As a people manager, I believe it’s important to understand the limits of how far you can push your employees before they start to burn out.

Example of the Transformational Management Style in Action: Pam Bump, HubSpot

Pam Bump is the head of content innovation, research, and growth at HubSpot. She oversees HubSpot Media’s Content Innovation and Research team and identifies as a transformational manager.

“Before I was a manager, I always jumped at major problem-solving opportunities, ambiguous requests from leadership, and identifying big bets for my companies. Now, as a manager, I encourage my team to do the same,” Bump explains.

Bump’s approach follows a long tradition of transformational management at HubSpot from founding leaders like Dharmesh Shah.

One challenge of transformational management is balancing individual and team goals, but a successful manager can accomplish both.

“To balance ambitious overall, transformative team-wide goals, and individual teammate needs, I check in with my direct reports about their growth, what they’re working on, and work that can help them grow their skills or visibility while also supporting team goals,” shares Bump.

Beyond weekly 1:1s, Bump also holds semi-regular career chats to discuss their personal long-term goals and the tactics they can use to get there.

5. Transactional Management Style

Transactional managers use incentives and rewards — like bonuses, stock options, or promotions — to motivate their employees to perform well. Their motto is “If you do this for me, I’ll do this for you.”

A transactional management style relies on extrinsic motivation, where employees are motivated to reach a goal by the promise of an external reward.

Research shows that extrinsic motivation can boost productivity and help employees reach goals in the short term. However, studies show that a balance of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation works best to motivate employees.

Potential pitfalls of transactional management include lower creativity and employees becoming over-reliant on extrinsic rewards. I think it can also lead to a focus on short-term results over long-term success and loyalty.

6. Coaching Management Style

Just like a sports coach, a coaching manager strives to improve their employees’ long-term professional development. I love how they have a passion for teaching and watching their employees grow.

They remain positive and patient through short-term failure, as long as the team is learning and improving. The best coaching managers may adapt their approach according to an employee’s communication style and needs.

Leaders with a coaching style have two main focuses: overseeing employees’ individual development and bringing a team together as a collaborative force.

The best teams are the most united, and an employee experiences the most professional growth when both their coach and teammates invest in their development.

Example of the Coaching Management Style in Action: Jamie Juviler, HubSpot

Jamie Juviler is a marketing manager for HubSpot’s Website Blog team and strives to help his team produce their best work while also pursuing their personal goals.

“I spend a lot of my time thinking about how to help my reports develop in their areas of interest and align their strengths with the needs of the team,” says Juviler.

“I want to manage individuals who are happy with their career growth, since they’ll be more invested in their work and willing to make a bigger impact than those who feel limited by their day-to-day tasks.”

You can learn more about Juviler’s management journey and approach here.

7. Servant Management Style

Servant managers put people first and performance second. They prioritize their customers’ and employees’ well-being over team results.

One key element of servant management is leading by example: Servant leaders demonstrate humility and aren’t afraid to roll up their sleeves and work alongside their teams.

I think the benefits of a servant management style are high trust in and respect for the leader. Teams with a servant leadership style often win over customers with a people-over-profits mentality.

One potential pitfall of servant leadership is that a focus on service may undermine results. This could make employees complacent, leading to average or even sub-par work.

Example of the Servant Management Style in Action: Joaquín Duato, Johnson & Johnson

Do Better Talks | Servant leadership and the builder mindset | A conversation with Joaquín Duato

Joaquín Duato, chairman and CEO of Johnson & Johnson, identifies as a servant leader.

“It’s very important to realize that you are leading on behalf of others. Servant leadership is not about you; it’s about others,” he shares. “That’s a principle that we try to instill in every single leader at Johnson & Johnson.”

To successfully adopt a servant management style, Duato advises that all managers must listen well and make an effort to connect with employees.

8. Brave Management Style

A brave management style, defined by author Brené Brown, is characterized by empathy, vulnerability, and trust.

The idea is that brave managers can build trust and lead with courage by vulnerably sharing their own struggles and failures amidst uncertainty.

“The number one consequence of a lack of brave leadership and courageous culture is we tap out of the hard conversations that we need,” says Brown.

“When people are afraid of being put down or ridiculed for trying something and failing, or even putting forward a radical new idea, the best you can hope for is a kind of status quo.”

In her book Dare to Lead, Brown describes brave management with this acronym:

• Boundaries. Do I respect my own boundaries and others?
• Reliability. Do I follow through on what I said I was going to do?
• Accountability. Do I hold myself accountable?
• Vault. Do I share information that isn’t mine to share, or do I keep it in a vault?
• Integrity. Do I act from a personal code of integrity?
• Nonjudgment. Am I nonjudgmental when someone asks for help?
• Generosity. Am I generous toward myself and others?

By following these principles, I’m confident brave managers can build trust within their team and work toward shared goals, based on shared values.

9. Laissez-Faire Management Style

Laissez-faire is French for “leave alone.” Laissez-faire managers monitor their team’s activities, but they remain hands-off. They expect their team to do their jobs with broad autonomy and only seek guidance when they need help.

Laissez-faire management is the opposite of micromanagement. Some employees thrive with autonomy and are happier and more motivated.

But, the flip side of laissez-faire management is that employees can suffer from a lack of guidance and vision. In turn, their work performance suffers, and underperforming employees could get away with doing the bare minimum work.

On the plus side, with autonomy some employees are happier and more motivated to succeed. It’s a double-edged sword, in my opinion, and has to be implemented in the right environment with the right team to be successful.

Example of the Laissez-Faire Management Style in Action: Warren Buffet, Berkshire Hathaway

Legendary executive and investor Warren Buffet is one of the best examples of laissez-faire management in recent history.

In his 2022 letter to shareholders, he wrote, “Our goal in ownership is to make meaningful investments in businesses with both long-lasting favorable economic characteristics and trustworthy managers. When large enterprises are being managed, both trust and rules are essential. Berkshire emphasizes the former to an unusual — some would say extreme — degree.”

10. Situational Management Style

Finally, I learned that many managers find that they don’t fit exactly in one management style. They may blend several styles together and adapt their approach for each employee and what that employee needs in the moment.

Since every team member has different communication styles and needs, an individualized situational approach can be incredibly effective in giving each person exactly what they need.

Example of the Situational Management Style in Action: Kaitlin Milliken, HubSpot

Kaitlin Milliken, senior program manager at HubSpot, found that situational management works best to lead her team.

“Throughout my career, I’ve found myself changing how I lead based on who I’m working with. Some folks want hands-on management. Others operate best with lots of autonomy,” she explains.

Milliken says she likes situational leadership because she can work with people who have varying experience levels.

“Someone new to the field may need more mentorship. An expert may just want to know about our organizational quirks. Since I naturally adapt to what other people need, this type of leadership fits my style,” she says.

Effective Management Styles for a Thriving Team

Management is one of the hardest jobs in the working world.

But I think my takeaway from writing this article can offer some comfort:

Management style is not one-size-fits-all. Different people will manage their teams differently, and different teams want different leadership styles.

The point is to find the style that feels authentic to you and helps your team succeed. The examples above show how various types of management styles can lead to thriving teams.

After sharing the most popular leadership styles and the pros and cons of each, I hope you feel better equipped to lead your team through both the challenging and successful times.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in July 2018 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.