Marketing, whether it's a digital product, professional services, or a non-profit movement, is necessary and it requires attention. A marketing strategy, much like a new digital product, requires ongoing maintenance, planning, and adjustments. Here are a few ways to keep your marketing on track.
It takes people an average of seven times hearing a message before it really sinks in. While I'm not advocating you repeat your message seven times in every email blast, you do want to repeatedly circle back and look at adjustments that need to be made, evaluate consistency (whether consistency of message or consistency between marketing and your actual product or service), and plan for upcoming scenarios. I prefer evaluating each quarter, but a 30-day or even a bi-weekly evaluation may be a requirement, depending on your situation.
Repeatedly going back over the effectiveness of your marketing strategy doesn't do you any good without data to back it up. Use Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, Mailchimp's campaign reporting dashboard and statistics to get a realistic picture of how your customers and potential customers are reacting to your marketing message.
When you first create your marketing plan, you have to make certain assumptions. It may have been about the type of person that needs your product or it may have been about the location of your customer. It could be any one of a thousand variables, so it's important to measure those assumptions and make sure you were correct. If you weren't, you might need to re-think a few of them.
Entrepreneur Magazine had a great article outlining the reasons your marketing strategy might not be working. Give it a read and see how you can go back and repeatedly evaluate your data and validate the assumptions you made.