If when reading the title your first thought is "I don't have one?" or "Why would I need one?" then you are ripe for an improvement. A digital marketing strategy today is more critical than ever. Between your website and the social media outlets that you have decided to go with (and most of us should not go with every social media channel). The first thing that many people do is create their website, create their social media page(s) and then do an ad hoc method of updating them. Going this route will not only hurt your business in the long run but make you look unprofessional to potential clients. If you already have started don't fear this can be improved upon as you do need this step but need a strategy to achieve success.
We believe in an initial four-step process when it comes to digital marketing and your business. These being to decide what your business objectives are, research your competition and implement a strategy to achieve your objectives.
Your objectives should include your website which you have complete control over the look-and-feel, content and how you communicate with your customers. This should be the heart to your entire strategy as you have control over it. The next part is deciding which social media outlets work best for your organization. With dozens of potential outlets to communicate with deciding on the right platform is crucial. The final part of your objectives is deciding what you want to post on your social media pages. Are you going to post specials, events, list of services, how often are you going to post, who will be doing the posting of information, how you plan to qualify the results of your digital marketing strategy, etc. As you work on your strategy and decide what you are going to be doing make certain to remember how you are different than your competitors, how you will be differentiating yourself from your competitors (local as well as nationally/globally) and put yourself in the shoes of your target audience.
Your competition may be new or long standing. They may have a large budget or no budget at all. Take a look at what they are doing. See what they are doing and what works with you. If your competitor around the corner is doing a promotion and it rings with you there is a chance it could ring well with your customers as well. Do they have posts with lots of engagements on their site? If they do, what is it about the engagement do you think is making that strategy work? The opposite also holds true. If you see some engagements they post with a lot of engagements and others with little to no engagement take note of those as well. Those can be as important as the ones with a lot of customer engagement.
Now that you have created your objectives and researched your competition now is a time to refine and see what you need to change, if anything. Many times you've nailed it and this step can be done in a relatively quick manner. Write down and document everything that you want to do, need to do, and how you plan on quantifying the result
With your strategy now in-place you need to implement it. This can be yourself, an outside company specializing in the Internet or a combination of both. We always try to encourage both as you gain the expertise of those that do this daily while learning and making certain your business objectives are being met. This not only gives you ownership but will make the implementation a better success.
JM2 Webdesigners is here to help you if you need it. You can contact us online here, through email at @BUSINESSEMAILADDRESS@ or by calling @BUSINESSPHONETOLLFREE@.