Now’s the time to develop a digital marketing strategy

Marketing can be a real struggle for those who have little experience in this complex area. Piperis Filippaios, MD of digital marketing agency digitalbeans, discusses how to make a start by getting your business out there on the web…

Whether you are developing a new revenue stream for your business or simply looking to increase sales, how you market and promote yourself plays a key role in driving sales and is an integral part of your business plan. At a time when businesses are looking to recover revenue lost during lockdown and there is even greater pressure on increasing sales; digital marketing can help you to reach new customers and ensure you stay front of mind for existing customers to encourage repeat business. 

Boosting your presence online is a cost-effective way to build awareness of your business in front of a captive audience. With a Covid-induced halt for the usual trade and consumer events calendar, opportunities to engage with potential customers face-to-face are limited. Whereas, months of lockdown and social distancing has meant people are spending more time online than ever before – in April 2020, UK internet users spent an average 4 hours and 2 minutes each day, according toOfCom. As a result, the opportunity to be seen by potential customers is higher than ever. 

Digital vs. traditional marketing

Traditional marketing and advertising can be expensive and, depending on the tactics, it’s also near impossible to measure how many direct leads you generate through activity. Digital marketing methods are far more flexible, enabling you to keep a tight hold on your budget and track exactly where online sales and enquiries come from. 

You can increase, decrease or pause spend at any time – allowing you to test how effective it is for minimal investment. Within a short space of time, you can pinpoint how much you need to spend for every sales lead, which makes planning and budgeting for marketing activity far easier. 

Create a digital strategy

Outsourcing activity to external experts will free up your time and energy. A specialist agency will help you to build a strategy around your budget and brand but in order to gain the most business benefits, it is important to understand what you want to achieve. Is it more sales for a particular product, raising awareness of an event, recruiting staff or driving more people to visit your website? If you sell multiple products across product categories, knowing your best sellers and average order value will make activity more effective. Outlining this expectation will help you to create messages that direct users to buy / book / apply or visit your website. Specifying a timeframe to achieve this will help you to measure success. 

The transparency digital marketing offers enables you to see very quickly whether it is delivering the desired results. Once set up, you can track the cost of each enquiry or sale. You can even attribute it to the exact channel – Google, Facebook, Instagram – and device used, and even the time of day. Using this data, you can focus your budget on the best performing areas. If you know that for every £12 spent, you get a customer, growing your business would be straight forward! 

Identify your target audience

Success starts with understanding who your ideal customers are. Information such as age, location, gender and interests, can form the basis for really targeted digital campaigns, which are seen by and resonate with potential customers. 

Once launched, continue to review the results to understand where you are making the most impact. What if you knew that it is cheaper to generate a sale from a 40 year-old man than a 30-something man? Think how much more targeted your messaging could be and how much further your spend could stretch.

Help customers find you

Understanding your target audience will help you to understand how they reach you in the first place. What do they enter into Google to find your products and services?

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) helps your potential customers find you and makes your business more visible in search engine results. As well as paying to advertise against key search terms, producing great content – articles, blogs and updates on your website – relevant to your audience will boost visibility. 

If you’re running a glamping business, develop an article around what to bring with you on a trip; if you run a consultancy, write about your area of expertise and answer your most frequently asked questions. Regular, quality content encourages website visitors to spend more time browsing and typically, the more time spent on a website, the more likely the user is to purchase.

Improve your visibility on Google

Listing your business correctly with Google Maps, will help customers to find you and avoid confusion – is this address a farm, is it a business park with multiple tenants, a glamping site? If customers visit your location or you cover a specific geographic area, make sure you set up a Google My Business listing. Complete all sections with well-written copy, include good photography, reviews and as much information as possible. Take inspiration from competitor listings to ensure you aren’t missing anything.

Get your listing included in directories via Google third party data aggregators and encourage customers to rate your service on Google Reviews to further increase visibility.

Advertise on social media 

Social media users are a captive and engaged audience, with the average amount of time spent on platforms expected to total 36 days in 2020, report GlobalWebIndex. It’s a myth to think users are predominantly young, almost 60% of people aged 55+ have social media profiles according to Statista. For businesses, social media platforms provide low cost advertising but allow you to specify exactly who your ads reach, making the most of your budget. 

Facebook Ads are hugely effective for consumer engagement. As with other digital marketing, Facebook charges you based on the number of times your advert is seen and your spend is capped so you won’t rack up huge bills. If you know who your best customers are, you can tailor your campaigns so they will only be shown to people who fit that criteria e.g. families within a 15-mile radius or single women in their 30s. 

Re-market

Have you ever added something to your online shopping basket and then been distracted before completing the purchase? Imagine how frustrating it would be to watch people reach your website but leave before buying or enquiring. Remarketing ads can solve this. These ads are specifically shown to people who have visited your website before but didn’t book, purchase or contact you. This can be incredibly powerful as you are marketing to people who have already expressed an interest. They keep your brand front of mind and can secure sales that may have otherwise been lost. 

The majority of your customers are spending more time online and without a presence, you are missing sales and opportunities to connect. Digital marketing can feel intimidating if you are new to it, so it’s important to find someone you can build a good relationship with, who will take the time to explain things clearly, avoiding jargon. If you choose to outsource, opt for a rolling contract – this ensures you work with a partner that delivers results, not because you’re contractually obligated to.

Graph: Comscore via Ofcom Online Nation 2020 Summary report