Social media is a mess, ad conversions are down and costs are up, and SEO is collapsing under the weight of AI content. The tools that have reliably grown online businesses for the past decades are no longer effective, but we still need to reach new customers and get those sales. Behind the scenes, successful online business owners are scrambling to pivot and figure out what’s next.

So what is the future of online marketing? What is actually working in 2023?

In this episode, I analyze the current state of online marketing, share what’s working now, and examine the impacts of reduced reach on online business models that require scale to succeed. I offer five effective marketing strategies for 2023, share my new favorite lead generation tool, and encourage us to question our ongoing reliance on social media even as, yes, I say we should still use it.

The big takeaway? We have to actually talk to people, leverage real relationships, and look to the pre-data mining way of finding customers: referrals.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sarahmchappell.substack.com