By JULIE WARNECKE
Guest Columnist
In today’s digital landscape, all businesses seek to stand out and resonate with their target audience.
One of the most effective ways to increase exposure with a specific market is through strategic digital marketing efforts. Even if a business only has a limited budget to work with, digital marketing may be the best use of a company’s time and dollars, especially if they’re looking to quickly generate revenue, customers, and awareness.
Digital marketing can effectively and efficiently meet an organization’s marketing goals, when executed correctly. With strategic selection of channels, platforms and tactics, digital marketing can accomplish almost any marketing objective throughout the funnel. There is no one-size-fits-all approach, but the four tips below will help you achieve the best return on investment (ROI) on your next digital marketing campaign.
- At the start of the campaign, identify and understand your goals, target audience and messaging.
To be successful, it’s necessary for local businesses to first determine their goals. Sometimes, reaching a specific audience is a primary objective. If so, identifying and researching where you can reach your audience is the first step. Your entire digital strategy will stem from your goals.
It’s also important to ensure your message is customized for your target audience. Determine what you want your audience to learn about your product or service or identify what action you want them to take. Every organization is unique, and highlighting what sets your organization apart from the competition will assist with messaging and goal setting.
- Keep messaging and content consistent, clear and strong.
Keeping user experience consistent with messaging is key throughout a digital marketing campaign. Even if it’s a small piece of creative content associated with a digital ad, it needs to look and feel like your brand, so customers associate the messaging, color, and creative design with your company. This helps to establish trust and recognition for your business.
Building concise and clear content to engage your audience is also important, since jargon won’t engage your audience and can fizzle a campaign quickly.
Put in the effort before launching a digital campaign to ensure your brand and user experience is strong, with an easy-to-navigate website or landing page that will drive conversions and a value proposition that centers around your buyer and how it solves their biggest problems.
- Consider the channels.
Digital campaign success comes from a strong strategy rather than a large budget. Your target audience will use many channels, so it’s important to determine which channel aligns with your strategy and will lead to awareness, conversions, and the nurturing of prospects.
There are several different options your business can utilize, including: search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing, content marketing, email marketing, video marketing, podcast advertising and more.
The timeline you have set for results will impact which channels are selected. With a limited budget, consider the following:
- How quickly do I need results? What are your short and long-term goals?
- What type of creative is needed for each platform?
- Do you have resources that can support asset creation, landing pages, and website development?
Answering those questions will help determine the right channels for your campaign and whether that should include organic or paid advertising.
- Set up effective measurement and reporting.
Throughout a campaign, ensure your established goals are properly tracked. This can be done through Google Analytics. Use the goals you have set as key performance indicators (KPIs) in Google Analytics to know what success looks like. Reviewing the data allows you to recognize wins and identify opportunities for improvement.
For example, targeting your specific audience is essential, but using analytics to ensure your limited budget is being spent wisely is an important KPI.
Also, determine if your conversions moved into new opportunities for sales. These ratios can forecast the value of your pipeline and how much new revenue to expect from your marketing campaign.
There is limitless potential for companies to increase their ROI through digital marketing efforts. By identifying clear goals, target audiences, the proper channels, a comprehensive strategy and KPIs, local businesses can set themselves up for success in the digital realm.
About the Author
Julie Warnecke is the Founder and CEO of Found Search Marketing, an agency specializing in performance digital marketing. Before creating FoundSM, she was the fourth employee at Google on the AdWords Ad Operations team from 2001-2006. During her tenure, she worked on initiatives such as launching AdWords Select, a new CPC platform that changed the digital landscape forever and the industry changing AOL syndication deal, which helped to assist an advertiser support infrastructure.
In 2006, Warnecke’s passions for helping businesses grow through data-driven and results-oriented advertising sparked a new venture, and she created Found Search Marketing. With a client retention rate of 95 percent year after year, she and her team at FoundSM have mastered the formula to continuously deliver outstanding results for clients.