How to Start Your Digital Marketing Strategy

With so many businesses now online, a digital marketing strategy is more important than ever. From writing blog posts and sending out newsletters to creating Facebook ads and social media posts, you can tackle digital marketing in a thousand different ways. This is why you should first implement a digital marketing strategy. It helps you see what works for your business and help you stay focused on your goals – making them easier to accomplish.

As an experienced digital marketing agency, we know all there is to know about creating the right marketing strategy for your business. This guide will help kickstart your digital marketing the right way.

1. Define Your Goals

One of the first things you should do when creating a digital marketing strategy is to set achievable goals. It’s essential you know what you want to accomplish from the start, be it conversions, brand awareness, social media followers, likes on social media, or newsletter opens.

Getting people to buy your products and services online isn’t as easy as it sounds because there’s a lot of competition. Most UK businesses now have an online presence (83.4% in 2019), so it’s more important than ever that you understand how to use digital marketing to your advantage.

If, for example, your goal is to be found more easily on Google, then ensuring your content is optimised with the latest SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) practices can help you achieve this. You will need to make sure you’re using the right keywords, have unique and informative content, taken title tags and metadata into account, applying Schema to website pages and that your website loads quickly.

All this can help you rank higher in search engines, which helps your digital marketing strategy by implementing a solid SEO campaign. SQ Digital has been offering digital marketing services for over two decades, so we understand what it takes to set a business up for long-term success.

Think about your goals and how you can get there, whether you want to generate more leads, have more people interacting with your brand on social media or sell more products.

2. Adapt Your Strategy to Fit New Shopping Trends

The revenue of online retail sales in the UK has been rising consistently in the past few years, as Statista shows – in 2012, the value of online sales was £33.24 billion and, in 2020, this figure was £99.31 billion. It wasn’t all because of the pandemic, though; in 2019, online retail sales were already high, with revenue of £76.04 billion.

As of May 2021, online sales represented 27.3% of all retail sales in the UK. So, if you haven’t already, be sure to capitalise on this trend.

Shopping habits are changing, and businesses, including SMEs, can take advantage of this. One way is to start using paid search more aggressively. You can find out where your target market spends most of their time online and figure out if they’re searching for products on Google or browsing social media platforms.

You’ll need to dig through your site’s analytics to get this information. Once you have some data on this, you can focus your attention on a Pay Per Click (PPC), Google Shopping or paid social ads approach, depending on where your target audience is.

Consider where to place your advertising budget when choosing products to promote on your website. If you have any products or services with high demand, make sure to advertise them more aggressively.

Figuring all this out can take some time, including making sure mention your research is done well. If you don’t put enough time into your research, you risk putting money behind digital marketing campaigns that don’t work.

As an SME owner, you’re already busy running your business, so you may want to consider using a digital marketing agency to take care of your paid search campaigns.

3. Consider What’s Popular

Capitalising on products that are in demand is an excellent way to build a successful digital marketing campaign. If you’re experiencing a spike in sales or have some products that sell more than others, it may be time to focus on advertising them online.

Adverts allow you to bypass lengthy SEO campaigns to organically rank for keywords. Instead, you can build a robust Google Ads campaign or use social media advertising to maximise your exposure to your target audience. When done well, SEO campaigns offer excellent long term results, but if you’re looking for quick wins, paid ads are a great option.

If you find that a product or service has soared in popularity and is flying off the shelves, make sure to stock up and market it extensively. Add a prominent banner of the product on your website, advertise it across all channels and create informative content to drive users towards a conversion.

Planning for the future is important too, so consider potential popular products and services. If you have items that sell well in winter, prepare for when the hot weather comes to an end since you might see a spike in business. Stay ahead of the competition, especially if you have a fully optimised website and a ready-to-go advertising campaign to match.

4. The Importance of Consistency

Strategy is crucial for a successful digital marketing campaign, as it gives you focus and allows you to understand better what will work for your business and what won’t. Being consistent in this strategy is equally important – not only can this help you to see results more quickly, but it also shows your audience what to expect from you.

A consistent digital marketing strategy also means using marketing techniques, such as posting daily on social media and regularly publishing blogs.

For help or advice on how to best prepare your business for the next steps, our team is more than happy to assist you. Feel free to contact us to learn more about the digital marketing services we offer and our approach. Or get a free SEO audit to see how your website is performing.