Without a well-planned digital marketing strategy, you can invest a significant amount of money and resources and end up with little or no return on your investment.
The problem is not with the marketing solutions themselves, as there are wide varieties available to help you build your brand, connect with customers and market at scale. A study conducted by Smart Insights shows that 47 percent of businesses are engaged in digital marketing but have no clearly defined strategic plan.
This makes it difficult, if not impossible, to find your way through the maze of interconnected, real-time data powered Internet environment. A closer look at what it takes to see the necessity for the creation and investment of a digital marketing strategy is needed.
Making sure your marketing strategy and overall business goals are moving in the same direction is essential. Define your business goals, then create a construct that will help you reach them through digital marketing.
If your focus is on acquiring new customers, draw up a digital roadmap that will help you achieve the goal. This same thinking applies to every other part of your business plan: opening channels for new products or services and building brand awareness for specific market channels. Setting specific goals will flesh out your overall marketing strategy and work to determine your tactics, channels, messages, and who you should partner with to realize tangible, bottom line results.
Prioritize investment in technology
An outstanding customer experience is a key factor in determining the success of a digital marketing strategy. To accomplish this you need to prioritize your investment in technology, everything from marketing platforms to analytics tools. The best returns will be found when a marketing strategy is clear and dollars spent on technology translate into a positive ROI.
Determine your KPIs and data collection methods to achieve your business goal
Key performance indicators (KPIs) are critical to accurately deciphering customer data. It is easy with modern technology to amass volumes of data on customers. But of all the data, which is the most valuable? Working within the boundaries of a strategic digital marketing plan helps to determine the most important KPIs and the best data collection methods to achieve that goal.
Digital marketing quickly becomes complex, and often the result is increasing amounts of waste and duplication of effort. It is content to create, social media accounts to manage, and customer data collection to implement, all which add to the difficulty of an already difficult job. Knowing what your specific tasks and responsibilities are can be found in the digital marketing plan, so you have a point of reference that will enable you to avoid wasted effort and duplication.
Establish benchmarks and set goals to work on
Establish benchmarks and set goals to work on continually improving your performance. ROI is a key metric in determining when or if you should modify marketing strategies, and where to invest resources. A digital marketing strategy will be your guide in assessing which KPIs are the most important. According to Convince and Convert, some of the key KPIs are traffic, conversions, channel-specific traffic, and search trends. The more you know about what matters most, the more you can put the right analytics tools in the right place and create optimum data feedback loops.
Marketing technology and tools are evolving
Because data marketing tools are constantly evolving, it is important to be prepared to experiment with new approaches. Wearable technology and expanding social media platforms open the door for new technologies and approaches to be developed. Brands that are innovative stay current with new technologies and are proactive with their approach to testing out new formats and channels to see the responses from their target audience.
Digital marketing is at its best when it realizes its interdependence with the rest of the company and seeks to integrate and optimize its services. Multichannel campaigns can have their message amplified and integrate their efforts with traditional forms of advertising, achieving the results in collaboration with digital marketing.
Having a digital marketing strategy, like digital marketing itself is no longer an option for a successful company. Everything from looking for basic information about a company or product to looking for support and interacting with a business, customers are increasingly turning to a digital marketing presence.
Creating a focused campaign through the use of digital marketing tools is essential for defining your goals and avoid being pulled in too many directions. The result will be achieving your most important business objectives and a bottom line ROI that will reflect the wisdom of your digital marketing strategy.