Whether you are joining the digital marketing craze, or have cruised here and there, you cannot wish away the need for a sound digital marketing strategy. It could be the only way to make a positive impact on the company’s bottom line, which would range from drawing participants, more sponsors, and exhibitors and improve online visibility while engaging the existing client base. A recent study by smart insight showed that more than 46% of all brands lack a defined, and about 16% have one that is not yet integrated into the marketing plan.
Without a plan, it is almost impossible to grow and innovate, measure significant results and learn from the past misconceptions. You need to stop panicking about the coming month or year and begin making a plan for your brands. While you could leverage on existing plans, it helps to start with an end goal in mind and work towards the achievement. With a sound digital marketing plan, you need to do the following:

Analyze the past performance

If you have done it before, the chances are that you have a bright idea of what digital marketing entails. You need to put your new plan in the dark, as you could have learned great lessons that keep you afloat in the ever-changing marketing arena. Look at what worked in the past and what failed at the implementation stage to avoid predictable failure. It helps to set a timespan for analyzing the performance of your past KPIS perhaps same length as you did the previous period. The analysis entails the following:

  • Setting Google Analytics calendar to suit the timeframe
  • Use Google Benchmarking Reports comparing your firm against competitors
  • Analyze the competitor’s online strategies and the progress realized against your plan
  • Always seek for things that you did not do before, that could give great prospects

Understand the target audience and talk their language

The implementation phase comes after you have identified your target audience and created a marketing strategy that suits their needs. It should not negate the requirements defined by the analysis as you might lose the existing customers. With varying needs across the target market, your execution process ought to factor the audience and communicate in a language they can adjust. The chances are that you have identified methods that were successful for you or your competitors, and if not, try to learn the audience before rolling out the online campaigns. Curve the process to revolve around the audience to satisfy their emotional needs as well as their deposit desires.

Identify the means

It is not enough to make an ambitious strategy and execute it through the conventional means. You need to factor the three top drivers that include the budget, the people and the digital channels used to convey your message. It starts with taking stock of the resources available to identify the gaps and the strengths in place for execution. A comprehensive audit leaves you with ample information needed to decide whether the business will outsource a portion of the online marketing campaigns or hire more staff for the job.

Execute the plan but do not stick to it

While your plan is made with an end goal in mind, it will never be perfect from the start. The large part of the strategy comes from the past occurrences, which seems indicative of the present and the future. A vast majority of the assumptions made in the planning process is likely to go wrong, and while some could be right, the digital marketing platforms keep changing. Your assumptions do not guarantee a static behavior from your customers hence the need to keep it flexible to accommodate the changes. Sticking to your original plan leaves your company vulnerable to losing the market share to the competitors. It calls for periodic evaluation of the strategy to know where you need to change to match the market demands.

Avoid interruption marketing

In a bid to gain better online visibility, most firms subscribe to Facebook paid ads; Google paid ads as a well as sponsored Twitter hashtags. While it might give you some online presence, they are not known to trigger engagements between the visitors and your website. In fact, most users tend to ignore the ads hence not likely to give the results needed for your investment. Nonetheless, you can turn up your fortunes through inbound marketing as it leans towards earning the audience’s interest as opposed to buying it. While it is not easy to appear first on the organic searches, you would rather take time for a worthwhile venture.

Review the strategy

Without discrete measures of success, your online marketing efforts are likely to go to waste. From the onset of the implementation process, you need to keep track of all the elements and highlight those not performing to the intended intensity. They might be suitable for the audience but find changes in the competitor strategies or the State policies. Your next move must be informed by ongoing evaluations on what works, what does not and the key strengths that you need to keep. It helps to deploy Google Analytics to decipher the elements that work and areas that need constant interventions.