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How To Create a Digital Marketing Plan That Actually Works

Feature   |   Posted: 11/18/2020
Posted by: Motorhead Digital

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Competition can be worrying, but with a well researched digital marketing plan in place, you’re more likely to succeed in reaching your goals and getting rid of those sleepless nights thinking about your business’ future.

By Barry Alt

Here’s everything you need to know to maximize the return on your marketing investment!

It can be pretty scary to think about your company’s future. The next couple of months, the next year, the next few years, where will you be? What will your profits look like? How can you keep up online? Competition can be worrying, but with a well researched digital marketing plan in place, you’re more likely to succeed in reaching your goals and getting rid of those sleepless nights thinking about your business’ future.

But what exactly is a digital marketing plan?

A digital marketing plan (or digital marketing strategy) is the plan of action that is implemented to help you achieve your company’s goals online. It does this through carefully selecting online marketing channels, including paid adverts, social media exposure and many others. All of these channels are used to help increase your company’s ranking on the search engines, visitor numbers, conversions (how many people book in/buy from you) and ultimately your sales.

So, how do you create the perfect digital marketing plan? One that actually works and provides you with all the assistance you need to meet those conversions?

Analyze Your Current Online Presence

When developing your digital marketing plan, it is important to first carry out both an internal and an external SWOT analysis of your business and it’s online presence. A SWOT analysis looks at the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats for your company, competitors and the industry.

You shouldn’t go rushing into the planning stage completely blind, which is why analyzing your digital presence’s past strengths and weaknesses can help you improve your business going forward.

Some of the questions you should be asking yourself are:

  • Is your website customer-oriented?
  • How is the customer’s browsing experience?
  • Do you update your blog and products/services often?
  • What is your website’s current ranking on the search engines?
  • If you depend on local business what does your local SEO landscape look like
  • What is your social media presence like?
  • If you’ve already done some online advertising, what worked? What didn’t?

Asking yourself these questions will help you realize what your online strengths and weaknesses are.

Pro Tip: Be brutal. Be honest. Don’t look at your current online efforts through rose-tinted glasses. The more honest and critical you are now, the better your online presence will be in the future.

Know What You Want

It’s important to know what you want to achieve for your business. Define what your overall objective is and then match your digital marketing plan to your grand scheme. Think big and work towards what your end goal for your company is.

Setting and measuring your Success Metrics will help with maintaining what you want for your business. Yes we know everyone talks about KPIs (key performance indicators) but aren’t we really looking for success in everything we do? So we’re changing it up and thinking about Success from the start.

  • Be specific with your Success Metrics and identify the figures which you want to be held accountable for. Examples are number of leads generated, X number of calls, etc.
  • Be realistic with your goals by analyzing any previous digital marketing attempts (this will ensure a positive increase on your current results and help you avoid expectations that are too high).
  • Make sure you know what method you’ll be using to measure success metrics (Google Analytics, number of completed online sales for example)

Pro Tip: Keep every element of your digital marketing plan SMART – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-bound.

Choose Your Methods

A few things are important when it comes to identifying the methods most suitable to you, but most importantly you must remember the following four things:

  1. Your Budget
  2. Your Audience
  3. Your Digital Channels
  4. Your Team

Your Budget:

  • Define what type of budget you’ll have for your digital marketing
  • Develop your budget for the long haul, 6-12 months rather than one or two months
  • Look at past data to see what has and hasn’t worked

Your Audience:

  • Where does your audience hang out online?
  • What are they looking for online?
  • What can you give them that they actually value
  • Are you targeting a specific geographical area or niche within the industry?
  • Know your target demographic: where they live, what their income is, what their likes and dislikes are, where they spend their money and where they hang out online…

Please head on over to the Motorhead Digital Blog for the rest of this article.

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Barry is the founder of Motorhead Digital, providing signature Marketing Maximizer™ programs specifically developed for auto restoration, performance and restyling shops. These programs are geared towards customer acquisition and conversion to keep those project bookings coming. With over 23 years of experience in digital marketing and web development, Barry’s goal is to help clients market and grow their shops through strategic marketing practices. You can reach him at (585) 766-9785[email protected] or online at MotorheadDigital.com

 

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