While a digital marketing agency may propose a large budget with multiple tactics, small business owners generally will be looking to get the most bang for their buck. Profit margins for most small business owners are tight, which means spending any money on marketing must produce results.
For this reason, it is crucial that small business owners to understand how to make that money work for them and don't always just follow the proposed budget given to them by a digital marketing agency.
This guide will help small business owners plan their own budgets and allow them to work with a digital marketing agency to create a strategy that works for everyone.
Digital marketing starts with understanding your audience
You may want to dive right into data and insights, but before you can even begin to think about what your strategy is or what platforms you want to use, you have to first identify who you are trying to reach.
As a small business owner, you know who you generally do business with. While you may not know exact demographics, you do have an idea of who you are trying to reach.
Your digital marketing strategy should reflect your audience. You want your message and marketing dollars to be spent where your audience is looking.
Identify your customer journey
Much like understanding your audience, you should also take some time to understand how your customers make purchasing decisions. This can play a significant role in determining what digital marketing services you should use.
One of the most important factors is the time to purchase. If your customers tend to take longer to make a decision or require multiple estimates or interactions before purchasing, your marketing budget will need to reflect that. In this instance, you will most likely need to be advertising on multiple platforms (targeted ads, email campaigns, social media, search, etc.).
Conversely, if your customers tend to make decisions quickly, you can generally stick to a smaller digital marketing budget, focusing more on the platforms where your customers spend most of their time.
Determine where you need to dominate
One of the most common errors by small business is stretching their budget too thin across multiple platforms. This may allow you to have a presence in multiple places, but never truly have a meaningful impact in any of them.
If social media is going to be a key player in your success, make sure you put enough of your budget into a social media campaign. If search is going to move the needle for you, find a Toms River SEO agency that you can place most of your budget.
You should focus on dominating one channel before you move on to another one. Most digital marketing agencies will try to persuade you to put marketing dollars in multiple channels. While this is a good strategy, if you are working with a small budget, try to focus on one or two.
Track and analyze all campaigns
The biggest advantage of digital marketing is the ability to track results. There is no hiding in digital marketing. The data tells the story. That is, as long as the correct tracking and reporting is set up.
The number one question you should ask any digital marketing agency is what type of tracking and reporting they use. If they only rely on platform-specific statistics (Facebook, Ad Exchanges, etc.) you probably want to stay away.
All digital marketing efforts should direct a potential customer to a website or some kind of direct action. These results can rarely be measured in platform-specific tools. Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager are two of the most trusted tools that should be used to measure success. If these tools or something similar such as AWS are not being used, it will be difficult to truly understand if your marketing is working.
Tracking and reporting should be included in any digital marketing campaign. If a digital marketing agency tries to add a "tracking and reporting" fee on top of your budget, chances are they are not credible.
If you're looking to get started with digital marketing for your small business, consider the above before starting. Digital marketing agencies are businesses looking to make as much money as possible and while many of them have your best interest in mind, it is also in their best interest to increase your budget as much as you can.
コメント