Developing your digital marketing strategy is vital to ensure all the activities you undertake are targeted, on brand, driving engagement and contributing to an overall message and plan.

 

By understanding what you’re doing, why you’re doing it and how you plan to do it, your digital marketing strategy will give you clear focus, better return on your investment and improve measurement of the activities.

 

Read our 7 top tips to develop a winning digital marketing strategy now:

 

Assess where you currently stand

 

As with most things, it’s important to evaluate the current performance of your business and its digital marketing activities so you can begin shaping a plan to move the business forward.

 

Consider factors such as:

 

  • What are your short term and long term goals?

  • How are you currently performing against business goals?

  • What tools are you already using? What tools would you like to use?

  • How is the audience engaging with your business?

  • What capacity do you have to take on new activities internally or new staff?

  • What is the current perception of your brand?

How do you want the business to grow

 

Consider your growth goals over the next 6 to 12 months. What exactly do you want to achieve? Would you like to sell more, promote new messages, save money, change to new technologies, take advantage of new online platforms or extend brand awareness? Whatever your goals are, make sure they’re realistic and measurable as this will inform the core of your digital marketing strategy.

 

Plan the activities you will undertake

 

Thinking about the capacity you have, the platforms you’d like to use and the messages or motives that you have, address how and where you will start sharing your digital marketing activity. Plan the ways you will target and position your brand, the platforms you will use, the messaging you will share, how the different elements will feed into each other and the type of content you will need to create. Remember that all your activity should focus on the customers you are trying to engage.

 

Consider a breadth of digital elements

 

Although it’s great to stick with what’s working, there is a wealth of opportunity out there for businesses of any size so don’t get stuck with the same old platforms if they’re not proving beneficial. Do some research to review the different tools or channels that could help to drive more engagement with your brand. Core digital marketing activities you might like to consider are: social media, video marketing, email marketing, search engine optimisation, content marketing and advertising. This list is not exhaustive but gives you a good basis to get started with. Remember that every channel you use will play a role individually but also collectively so be sure to address how all activities play into a wider strategy.

 

Create a schedule for launching and managing your strategy

 

Once you have developed a strategy with the channels you’re going to use, the messages you’re going to share and the overall objectives to achieve, you should address who will be accountable for managing the different elements to ensure you keep on top of your strategy.

 

Plan how you will create, launch and manage the different elements of your strategy. You should have overarching messages or goals, broken down by key channels and activities. Make sure each element complements each other and feeds into your wider strategy. Consider the best time to launch and implement elements of your strategy in a systematic manner. 

 

Measure the success of your activities

 

Think about what you can assess and how you will evaluate it to understand whether it’s been successful, the type of engagement it has driven and how you can make improvements in the future. How will you respond to any data or analytics you gather? Develop an evaluation and review process within your strategy to ensure the work you’re undertaking is really benefitting the business.  

 

Adapt as you learn

 

Your digital marketing strategy isn’t a static document. Although it provides you with clear ideas, messages and guidelines, it’s important to respond to the results of the data and analytics you collect. Remain flexible and open to new opportunities and making necessary adaptations.

 

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