The Digital Marketing landscape has and continues to change rapidly so how can you keep up? Being a visual person I thought it would be useful to create a checklist and picture of some key elements to consider for a Digital Marketing Strategy. So here we go…

The Digital Marketing Checklist

You should start with your website. Your website is the heart of all the Digital Marketing activity and where prospects and customers go to find out about your business. Here are some starting questions to ask when evaluating your current site (considering the 12 Digital Marketing elements below)?

• What purpose does the website serve for my business?
• Does it make sense as a visitor navigate through the site?
• What links and features should be included?
• How and what content will you update regularly? And
• Is my current platform what I need?

Once you have thought about your website, then consider these 12 Digital Marketing elements and answer the questions as part of your Digital Marketing strategy development:

1. SEO – Is your site optimised for the right search terms – and what are they?

2. Blog – Do you have a blog that engages your audience and how do you distribute your blog to a wider audience?

3. Video – Are you using video as part of your strategy? More and more readers are skipping written content and watching video content, so make sure you start to create video content.

4. E-News – While many have pronounced the email newsletter as “dead”, significant proportions still read and engage with email newsletters particularly in Business-to-Business (B2B) Marketing. So create an email newsletter.

5. Content – What content will you share with whom and via what channels?

6. Social – How do you engage your customers and prospects and through which channels – LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest or Instagram and how do you get this get traffic back to your Website?

7. Adwords – What are the most effective searches to pay for and where on your website should the ads lead when customers click so you don’t pay for traffic and not get a desired action?

8. Keywords – The heart if your SEO and Adwords strategy. What are the key terms that prospects are actually looking for when they are researching and/or buying?

9. Conversion – What do prospects do when they get to your website, blog, or social pages – how does this traffic convert into prospects, leads or sales?

10. Mobile – How are your prospects finding your information and is your “digital footprint” mobile-friendly? Which new mobile strategies are available that you can use?

11. Directories – What free or paid directories are there that have your prospects searching them and should you be listed with them?

12. Analytics – How often do you look at your Analytics report and what information can be used that can improve your results? And finally, 

This is just a starter list of what to think about for your Digital Marketing Strategy. There are many other options like Banner Advertising, Article Marketing, and Online PR etc. etc. to consider – but the list above is a great starting point. If you have checked out and considered all of the above then take an in-depth look at the other options available!

So what’s the missing piece?

The most important element of any Marketing Strategy (and a Digital Marketing Strategy is not any different) – is the customer. I know it sounds obvious, but you would be surprised at how often we focus on the how we are going to market our products or services without stopping to think about exactly who we are going to market to.

That means you start with defining a target market – who your ideal customer is – then what their problems are and how your product or service solves these problems. Don’t start with the elements of your Digital Marketing strategy. The clearer you are on your Target Market – the more effective your Digital Marketing strategy will be. We have some great free tools to help you define your ideal Target Market if you would like to check them out here.

The second step is research that goes beyond keyword research. Research on what your customer’s problems are.  Ask customers, prospects and friends. Look at social media, websites forums, LinkedIn groups, blogs, industry sites, magazines. Attend networking events and trade shows and speak to exhibitors and attendees. So I guess in summary maybe the website should not be at the centre as I started this post with – the customer should be!

Next steps for a Digital Marketing Strategy

There’s nothing worse than learning about information and not being able to apply it. So depending on where you are at preparing your Digital Marketing Strategy here’s a roadmap to follow:

1. Define your Target Market
2. Research what their problems are (see above)
3. Include Keywords in your research
4. Look at Analytics to improve your website
5. Get your Website up to scratch
6. Prepare a content plan for blog, enews, social
7. Start Blog
8. Start your E-Newsletter
9. Start Social pages
10. Focus on defining and improving conversion
11. Get your SEO plan in place
12. Investigate and test Adwords
13. Add Video content
14. Get a Mobile strategy in place
15. Make sure you are listed in the most relevant Directories.