Digital marketing strategy is a plan that outlines how a business will achieve its marketing goals via online channels like search engines, email, websites, and social media. Digital marketing strategy sets the goals and execution tactics for digital experiences, channels, campaigns and media. It also defines the target audience, the value proposition, the competitive advantage, and the key performance indicators of the business.
Digital marketing strategy is important for businesses because it can help them reach a large and diverse audience, increase brand awareness and loyalty, generate leads and sales, and measure and optimize their performance. Digital marketing strategy can also help businesses adapt to the changing customer preferences and expectations, as well as the evolving technologies and trends in the digital landscape.
However, creating a digital marketing strategy is not a simple or straightforward task. It requires a clear understanding of the business objectives, the customer needs, the market situation, and the available resources. It also requires a systematic and data-driven approach to plan, implement, monitor, and improve the digital marketing activities.
To create a digital marketing strategy, businesses can follow these six steps:
1.Identify your audience personas:
Audience personas are fictional representations of your ideal customers based on their demographics, psychographics, behaviors, needs, and pain points. They help you understand who your customers are, what they want, how they think, and how they behave online. You can create audience personas by conducting market research, analyzing customer data, interviewing existing customers, or using online tools.
2.Identify your goals and objectives:
Goals and objectives are the desired outcomes that you want to achieve with your digital marketing strategy. They should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART). For example, you may want to increase your website traffic by 20% in six months or generate 100 new leads per month. You should also align your goals and objectives with your overall business strategy and vision.
3. Conduct competitive research:
Competitive research is the process of analyzing your competitors’ strengths and weaknesses in terms of their digital marketing strategies. It helps you identify the opportunities and threats in the market, as well as the best practices and benchmarks that you can learn from or emulate. You can conduct competitive research by using online tools such as Google Trends,
SEMrush, or SimilarWeb, or by visiting your competitors’ websites, social media accounts, and online reviews.
4. Define your digital marketing channels:
Digital marketing channels are the online platforms or mediums that you will use to reach and engage with your target audience. They include search engines,
email, websites, social media, video, podcasts, webinars, blogs, e-books, infographics, and more. You should choose the digital marketing channels that match your goals and objectives,
your audience personas, your budget, and your resources.
5. Define your content strategy:
Content strategy is the plan for creating,
distributing, and managing the content that you will use to communicate your value proposition and competitive advantage to your target audience. Content strategy includes the types and formats
of content that you will create (e.g., blog posts, videos, e-books), the topics and keywords that you will cover
(e.g., how-to guides, case studies, industry trends), the tone and style that you will use (e.g., formal, informal,
humorous), the channels and platforms that you will distribute your content on(e.g., website, email, social media), the frequency and schedule that you will follow (e.g., daily, weekly, monthly), and the metrics and tools that you will use to measure and optimize your content performance (e.g., traffic,conversions,engagement).
6. Find ways to amplify your content:
Amplification is the process of increasing the reach and impact of your content by using various techniques and tactics to promote it to a wider and relevant audience. Amplification can help you boost your brand awareness, generate more leads and sales, and improve your SEO ranking. Some of the ways to amplify your content include:
• Using paid advertising on specific platforms (e.g., Google Ads, Facebook Ads, or Instagram Ads) to target your ideal customers based on their location, device, interests, etc.
• Offering free educational or entertaining resources (e.g., webinars, e-books, podcasts) to attract more visitors to your website or landing page and capture their contact information.
