Launching into social profiles without having a digital marketing plan is one of the most common (and serious) mistakes many small businesses make. You should have a step by step digital marketing plan in 2021
Not having objectives and an action plan to achieve them is like sailing aimlessly on a boat.
Currently, 95% of SMEs make publications on social networks without having a tactical criterion.
And this is what I call, the filling technique.
If you want to have visibility in search engines as well as in social networks, it is essential to have a digital marketing plan.
Although social networks have created the myth that everything is free, you must remember that management and planning is NOT free.
It is essential to have qualified personnel to manage a corporate digital presence, and not the typical Sobrinity Manager who knows how to handle social networks.
Because it is necessary to generate content, humanize the brand , create advertising ads, send email marketing campaigns, monitor performance metrics, etc, etc, etc.
What is the Marketing Plan?
The marketing plan is, in short, a document that contains all the information necessary to reach our goal.
However, it is important to remember that the digital marketing plan is a part of the Marketing Plan, and must be aligned with the business objectives.
It is no longer fashionable to make marketing plans that are infumable. That is, with too many pages and little relevant information.
A good marketing plan is one that is designed to separate the dust from the chaff and get straight to the point.
That said, your marketing plan should be a maximum of 2 duplex pages.
The first page should have a summary of information about the analysis of the digital situation and the marketing objectives.
And on the second page, where the strategies and tactics, as well as the KPIs that we are going to measure, are reflected.
Step-By-Step Digital Marketing Plan in 2021
Now that 2020 is ending, with this article, I want to encourage you to create your step-by-step digital marketing plan in 2021.
We are going to see the 5 keys to success with your digital marketing plan and thus not die trying.
#Step 1 – Analysis
The first step in creating a digital marketing plan is to carry out an analysis of the digital situation.
You should bear in mind that this research consists of doing three types of analysis:
Internal Analysis
Here it will be necessary to make a diagnosis that allows us to know the current situation of our company.
This will help us to identify where the business is, as well as detect possible improvements to optimize the digital presence.
To do this, we must analyze the 7 most important points of our internal digital situation, which are:
- 1- Website: WordPress or free platform like Wix? Is it responsive?
- 2- Blog: Is it updated? What is the posting frequency? Is there an editorial calendar?
- 3- SEO: Do we rank on the first page of Google? What is our organic position? What words position us?
- 4- Social Networks: Are they updated daily? What is the participation rate? Who is responsible?
- 5- Email Marketing: How many subscribers do we have? Average opening percentage? Average percentage of clicks?
- 6- Digital Advertising: What are the metrics in Adwords, Facebook Ads, Twitter Ads, LinkedIn Ads?
- 7- Web Analytics: How much is the visitor traffic? What pages are most visited? Number of conversions? What is the residence time?
External analysis
In this type of analysis we must thoroughly investigate the market and sector where we compete, as well as the trend for the near future.
And it is that, knowing if we are competing in a market that is mature or emerging, will determine a lot the actions that we are going to carry out.
We speak of a mature market when there is a lot of competition, and an emerging market when there is little competition.
When analyzing the market, it is necessary to identify who our target audience is, although in some cases there may be several target audiences (eg: you sell men’s and women’s clothing).
Once we identify our audience, it will be essential to create the profile of our ideal client based on their interests, behaviors, concerns, demographics, etc.
On the other hand, doing an investigation of our most direct competition will allow us to know where they have a digital presence, what actions have achieved good results, and what mistakes they have made.
SWOT analysis
The SWOT analysis, also known as SWOT analysis or SWOT, is the best tool to know the real situation that a company is in.
This type of analysis allows us to discover our internal strengths and weaknesses. As well as identifying opportunities and threats externally.
In this way, we can determine what actions we must take to take advantage of the opportunities detected, as well as be prepared against threats, being aware of our strengths and weaknesses.
All the information collected in this analysis will be key to designing our strategies in the digital marketing plan.
The acronym SWOT is composed of the following terms:
- Strengths: The strengths (extensive experience in the sector, cheaper price, etc.).
- Weaknesses: Weaknesses (new to the sector, low brand awareness, etc.).
- Opportunities: Trends (healthy lifestyles, increase in cell phone repair, etc.).
- Threats: The environment (competition, financial situation, human resources, etc.).
Next, you have a matrix so you know how to design your SWOT analysis.
It is recommended to add a minimum of 3 or a maximum of 5 key points in each box.
#Step 2 – Objectives
The second step in a digital marketing plan is to define the objectives you want to achieve for a specific period of time.
As a general rule, the planning of strategies in a digital marketing plan is at least 6 months or 12 months maximum.
Having well-defined objectives is of vital importance, since this way we do not lose our way when establishing what strategies and actions are going to be carried out.
The objectives will depend a lot on the current digital situation as well as the human and economic resources that the company has.
You should also remember that to measure the return on investment (ROI) of your strategies it will be necessary to define SMART objectives.
And, the SMART objectives must be: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and temporary.
There are different types of objectives that we can define in the digital marketing plan:
- Branding: publicize our company and the services or products that we sell.
- SEO: optimize web positioning and increase organic traffic.
- Leads: generate a database with potential clients to build a relationship via email marketing.
- Sales: increase the purchases of our products or the contracting of our services.
- Retention and loyalty: strengthen our relationship with customers through exclusive promotions.
When establishing SMART objectives in your digital marketing plan, it is recommended that they be a maximum of 3 or 4.
On this basis, some examples of SMART objectives can be:
- Increase visitor traffic by 20% in 6 months.
- Reduce the bounce rate by 10% in 3 months.
- Increase qualified lead conversions by 30% in 4 months.
- Get up to 45% open rate in email marketing in 6 months.
- Boost sales of our online store by 15% in 6 months.
#Step 3 – Strategies and Tactics
The third step in our digital marketing plan is to define which path we are going to follow.
Both strategies and tactics will always depend on our objectives.
But as I have already mentioned, human and financial resources will also determine whether it is possible to achieve them.
#Step 4 – Actions
The fourth step in a digital marketing plan is to define a roadmap that allows us to achieve SMART objectives.
Every marketing plan requires a tactical development that makes the strategic plan a reality, it is how to do things in the short term.
An action plan must answer the following questions for it to be carried out:
- Why do I say things?
- What do I have to say?
- Who do I tell?
- When do I let you know?
- Where do I communicate it?
- How do I do it?
- How many times do I have to say it?
If you have answered these questions, you have developed the tactical plan for your digital marketing plan.
Once we have identified WHAT objectives we want to achieve and how we are going to achieve it with our available resources, we must go to the HOW.
To do this, and taking into account the series of previous questions, we have to design our action plan.
The action plan in our digital marketing plan must contain the following 9 fields and information:
- goals
- Medium / Channel
- Who
- That
- Where
- How
- When
- KPIs
- Investment
#Step 5 – Measure, measure, measure
The fifth step of our digital marketing plan basically consists of knowing how to measure our actions and return on investment (ROI).
It is true that measurement does not excite many people, but if you do not measure you will be wasting time and money.
That said, we will have to run reports on a monthly basis to follow up and check if we are meeting our expectations.
However, first we must have the KPIs defined in our digital marketing plan.
Key performance indicators or KPIs are metrics that allow you to know the performance of any specific strategy and action.
For the measurement of results or KPIs, it will be advisable to make reports for each strategy, since its interpretation will be easier and more comfortable.
Let’s suppose that we want to make a report for:
Website / Blog
In this report we should reflect the following metrics such as:
- Total sessions.
- Number of unique page views.
- Pages per session.
- Number of conversions (Leads).
- Sources of conversions (leads).
Sessions by:
- Sources (Organic, Direct, Social, Referential, Email, Others).
- Social channels (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc).
- Devices (PC, mobile, tablet).
SEO
For a web positioning strategy it is advisable to make an SEO report with the following metrics:
- Organic traffic.
- Sessions and length of stay (average) by type of user (new and returning).
- Sessions by traffic channels and length of stay.
- Percentage of conversions by traffic channels.
- Most visited pages and time spent (average).
- Organic sessions by keywords.
- Conversions for organic and paid traffic (adwords).
- Pages with the highest number of conversions.
Social media
Although social platforms offer their own statistics, you must create your personalized report with the metrics of each social network.
- Number of fans.
- Organic reach.
- Interaction level.
- Actions on the page.
- Clicks on the page’s call to action.
- Clicks on the website.
- Response rate on Facebook Messenger
- Response time on Facebook Messenger.
- Number of followers.
- Profile visits.
- Number of tweets.
- Number of mentions.
- Impressions
- Tweets with link to the profile.
- Number of followers.
- Scope of publications.
- Number of impressions.
- Profile visits.
- Clicks on the website.
- Most outstanding publications.
Youtube
- Display time
- Average Playback Duration
- Average percentage reproduced
- Audience retention
- Playback locations
- Traffic sources
- Audience interaction
- Number of subscribers
- I like and I don’t like
- Comments
Email Marketing
If we are conducting email marketing campaigns, it is essential to include the essential metrics such as:
- Open rate.
- Click rate.
- Total number of openings.
- Number of clicks.
- Bounce rate.
- Claims of abuse (spam).
- Main links clicked.
- Main locations.
Conclusion
It does not matter if you are an SME, micro-SME or freelance, you need a digital marketing plan if you want to have a presence on the Internet.
I know that making a digital marketing plan can be a very boring task, but the time invested is well worth it.
And you, have you designed your marketing plan for 2021? Have you fallen istanbul escort asleep or did you make it to the end? Any suggestions to improve the content?
I would really appreciate if you would take a minute to leave a comment and get your opinion or experience. Or give that headache to the best digital marketing agency in Pakistan.
