Now more than ever a digital marketing strategy is an important component to the overall marketing mix of your business or organisation.
If you want to grow your business’s online presence you need a digital marketing strategy.
One of the notable effects of the global Covid-19 pandemic, and consequent lockdown enforced by governments, is that many business owners realised that they were not adequately equipped to ‘go digital.’
‘Going digital or online,’ however is not the same as digital marketing.
Right now, there are 4,6 billion internet users worldwide. In Africa almost 527 million people have access and use the internet.
What is a Digital Marketing Strategy?
A digital marketing strategy is a series of actions that enables you to use online marketing channels to achieve your business’s goals.
It is the combination of multiple building blocks to reach as many people in your target market that are using the internet.
Have you ever searched for a product online?
Have you ‘Googled’ for information to find out more.
Do you browse Facebook or Instagram every so often?
How many mailing lists do you subscribe to?
Have you made a donation online recently?
What about watching videos on YouTube?
These are just some of the obvious examples of where digital marketing takes place every single day.
However, no two internet marketing strategies are identical.
Each business or brand has its own DNA and a solid digital strategy needs to address this and asses the best channels to achieve the goals set out.
Short, medium and long-term goals are important to develop a business plan and the same principles should be adhered to in your digital marketing strategy.
Digital Marketing Strategy vs. Digital Marketing Campaign
A digital marketing campaign lives within the digital strategy.
In fact, a good online marketing strategy will have multiple campaigns over time or even at the same time.
A digital campaign is what you use to achieve the goals in your digital strategy.
In summary, to use internet marketing correctly you need a strategy with the short, medium and long -term goals clearly identified and then identify the campaigns needed to achieve this
Digital Channels
A digital channel is how your product, service or brand gets delivered to the consumer/user/donor/follower online.
Entry-level marketers often define digital marketing as social media marketing, search marketing or digital advertising etc.
Here is a summary of the most commonly used digital channels:
- Organic Search
- Paid Search
- Digital Advertising Channels (e.g. Display Ads)
- Affiliates
- Social Media Channels
- Online Public Relations
Using these channels, we apply the following subsets:
- Content Marketing
- Search Engine Optimisation
- Social Media Marketing
- Marketing Automation
- Email Marketing
- Digital Advertising
- Digital Marketing Analytics
- Mobile Marketing
- Conversion Rate Optimisation
- Affiliate Marketing
Many small to medium-size businesses have digital campaigns running but have not tied this into a 360 strategy to maximise results.
For example, they will run an ongoing Facebook display advert campaign, or a Google search campaign but do not consider content marketing in their mix.
The old adage of ‘the sum of all the parts,’ is the first step to understanding how to create a successful online presence.
In Part Two we shall break down the five key steps to creating a solid Digital Marketing Strategy.