This document outlines the importance of conducting discovery and research before developing a digital marketing strategy. It discusses researching the audience, market understanding, competitors, branding, messaging, available resources, initiatives, budgets, key performance indicators, channels, and sales conversions. The goal is to fully understand all relevant factors to create an effective strategic plan and execution process that can be continuously tested, measured, and improved.
3. Before any journey begins, you must understand
where you are, what’s around you, and where
you’re going. Every marketing employee, hired
consultant, or agency must work through a
discovery phase. Without it, you don’t
understand how to deliver your marketing
material, how to position yourself from the
competition, or what resources are at your
disposal.
4. 1. Audience - Who are you trying to reach? Audience and persona research is necessary so you can
understand who you are speaking to, where you need to speak to them, and when.
2. Market Understanding – Who are you competing with online? That’s not exactly who your
competitors are in your industry, that’s also who your digital competitors are. Digital competitors
are the sites, platforms, and influencers that own your audience.
3. Competitive Analysis – Have you fully defined what your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities,
and Threats?
5. 1. Visual Styling – how can you create a visual brand that is both recognizable and captures the
spirit of your business? Do you have a logo, a color scheme and a branding guide?
2. Voice Clarification – what tone do you wish to speak in on text, in audio, and on video, to
engage with your prospects and clients?
3. Messaging Alignment – are your sales and marketing messages aligned? Can your employees
effectively communicate your value to their network?
6. What time, talent, and other
resources do you have at your
disposal to build your marketing?
7. Now you have the tools to develop a baseline
strategy used to achieve your goals. Your strategy
should include an overview of your goals,
channels, media, campaigns, and how you will
measure success. Create an annual mission
statement, quarterly focus, and monthly or weekly
deliverables. This is an agile document that can
change over time, but has the buy-in of your
organization.
8. How will you measure success? What are your KPIs?
9. Given your resources, what media
can you execute strategies on
1. Owned media – your digital
assets and social channels
2. Earned media – media sources
that own or connect with your
prospects and customers
3. Shared media – media sources
that are not your own that can
be utilized for sharing to your
prospects and customers
4. Paid media – media sources for
native advertising, search
marketing, social marketing, and
other paid advertising
methodologies
10. What are the initiatives that you
will incorporate into your digital
marketing strategy?
• 1. Ongoing – strategies that
require constant attention
such as content, search, and
social initiatives
• 2. Campaigns – strategies that
have a start and end date and
require temporary attention
• 3. Events – in-person or
webinar strategies that
require temporary attention
11. How will you carve out your
budgets and measure your
return on marketing
investment?
12. With a clear understanding of your
company, your market positioning,
and your resources, you’re ready to
build out the foundation of your
digital marketing strategy. Your digital
presence must have all the tools
necessary to execute and measure
your upcoming marketing strategies.
13. Before developing your strategy, you have
to fully recognize the resources you have
and your strengths and limitations.
15. Where and how are you
going to get and measure
your sales conversions?
16. Key to an agile marketing process is ensuring you prioritize and execute your strategy.
1. Budget – are you on budget and getting an expected return on marketing investment?
2. Analytics – are you trending upwards on metrics that correspond directly to your KPIs?
3. Trends – are you observing search and competitive trends that can impact your market share and
ability to reach your goals?
4. Process – where are you at in your overall process to execute your strategy?
5. Prioritization – do you have a backlog and are you managing tasks and deliverables that are aligned to
your KPIs effectively?
17. Now that everything is in place,
it’s time to execute the
strategies you’ve developed and
measure their overall impact.
18. What mediums can you
utilize to share your
story effectively? What
processes can be put in
place to efficiently
transform between
mediums?
20. There is no completion of the Agile Marketing Journey. Once you’ve executed
your marketing strategy, you must test, measure, improve, and adapt it over
time to continue to maximize its impact to your business.
21. DK New Media specializes in growing
the awareness and market share of
marketing, technology, e-commerce,
and SaaS companies.
Contact us at info@dknewmedia.com or
call (844) 356-3963. Visit us at
https://dknewmedia.com
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Marketing Threats
In a PointSource study, businesses were failing and incapable from executing a digital marketing strategy for the following reasons:
Marketers lack clearly defined goals and direction - Less than half (44%) say they’re extremely confident in their organization’s ability to achieve its vision for growth and 4% aren’t confident at all.
Marketers struggle to unify cross-channel digital experiences - Just half (51%) say their organization addresses specific user needs across all platforms.
Marketers have legacy mindsets that create barriers for digital transformation - 76% say their department competes with other departments in their organization for resources and/or budget.
Marketers operate on outdated systems which hinder the ability to improve digital experiences - 84% say their organization has disparate legacy systems that impact the speed of development of new digital experiences.
Discovery
Before any journey begins, you must understand where you are, what’s around you, and where you’re going. Every marketing employee, hired consultant, or agency must work through a discovery phase. Without it, you don’t understand how to deliver your marketing material, how to position yourself from the competition, or what resources are at your disposal.
Discovery > Market
Audience - Who are you trying to reach? Audience and persona research is necessary so you can understand who you are speaking to, where you need to speak to them, and when.
Market Understanding – Who are you competing with online? That’s not exactly who your competitors are in your industry, that’s also who your digital competitors are. Digital competitors are the sites, platforms, and influencers that own your audience.
Competitive Analysis – Have you fully defined what your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats?
Discovery > Brand
Visual Styling – how can you create a visual brand that is both recognizable and captures the spirit of your business? Do you have a logo, a color scheme and a branding guide?
Voice Clarification – what tone do you wish to speak in on text, in audio, and on video, to engage with your prospects and clients?
Messaging Alignment – are your sales and marketing messages aligned? Can your employees effectively communicate your value to their network?
Discovery > Resources
What time, talent, and other resources do you have at your disposal to build your marketing?
Employees
Agency
Consulting
Development
Budget
Campaign
Strategy
Now you have the tools to develop a baseline strategy used to achieve your goals. Your strategy should include an overview of your goals, channels, media, campaigns, and how you will measure success. Create an annual mission statement, quarterly focus, and monthly or weekly deliverables. This is an agile document that can change over time, but has the buy-in of your organization.
Strategy > Key Performance Indicators
How will you measure success? What are your KPIs?
Awareness
Engagement
Authority
Conversions
Retention
Upsell
Experience
Strategy > Media
Given your resources, what media can you execute strategies on
Owned media – your digital assets and social channels
Earned media – media sources that own or connect with your prospects and customers
Shared media – media sources that are not your own that can be utilized for sharing to your prospects and customers
Paid media – media sources for native advertising, search marketing, social marketing, and other paid advertising methodologies
Strategy > Initiatives
What are the initiatives that you will incorporate into your digital marketing strategy?
1. Ongoing – strategies that require constant attention such as content, search, and social initiatives
2. Campaigns – strategies that have a start and end date and require temporary attention
3. Events – in-person or webinar strategies that require temporary attention
Strategy > Investment
How will you carve out your budgets and measure your return on marketing investment?
Per Medium
Per Channel
Per Campaign
Per Event
Implementation
With a clear understanding of your company, your market positioning, and your resources, you’re ready to build out the foundation of your digital marketing strategy. Your digital presence must have all the tools necessary to execute and measure your upcoming marketing strategies.
Implementation > Resources
Implementation > Channels
What channels will you be utilizing to reach your target audience?
Implementation > Conversion
Implementation > Reporting
Key to an agile marketing process is ensuring you prioritize and execute your strategy.
Budget – are you on budget and getting an expected return on marketing investment?
Analytics – are you trending upwards on metrics that correspond directly to your KPIs?
Trends – are you observing search and competitive trends that can impact your market share and ability to reach your goals?
Process – where are you at in your overall process to execute your strategy?
Prioritization – do you have a backlog and are you managing tasks and deliverables that are aligned to your KPIs effectively?
Execution
Now that everything is in place, it’s time to execute the strategies you’ve developed and measure their overall impact.
Execution > Mediums
Textual Content
Articles
White Papers
Case Studies
Customer Testimonials
Audio Content
Podcasts
Radio
Graphical Content
Infographics
Micrographics
Socialgraphics
Video Content
Explainer Videos
Testimonials
Thought Leadership
Tours
Tutorials
Execution > Mediums > Strategies
Advocacy
Community Development
Employee Advocacy
Partnerships
Advertising
Content Marketing
Owned
Native
Sponsored
Email Marketing
Lead Nurturing
Retention
Newsletter
Upsell
Campaign
Event Marketing
Owned
Sponsorships
Mobile Marketing
Mobile Web
Mobile Apps
Text Messaging
Public Relations
Interviews
Earned Media Articles
Owned Media Promotion
Sales
Affiliate
Ecommerce
Referrals
Sales Engagement
Sales Automation
Search Engine
Organic (SEO)
Paid
Social Media
Engagement
Influencer Marketing
Monitoring
Promotion
Networking
Paid Advertising
Traditional
Outdoor
Print
Television
Radio
DK New Media specializes in growing the awareness and market share of marketing, technology, e-commerce, and SaaS companies.
Contact us at info@dknewmedia.com or call (844) 356-3963. Visit us at DK New Media.