Learn how to program your digital marketing actions!
Just like any other business strategy, digital marketing actions need a proper planning to achieve success.
This should be the first step for those who want to get the most out from their investment and have a proper plan before any decision making. In addition to clarifying what is required, the initial plan acts as a map to be followed in the development of campaigns.
See what steps you should take to mount this plan:
Charting goals and objectives.
What do you expect that digital marketing should do for your business? This is the first question that must be made. After all, it is of use to start planning without defining the reason for its existence, and it is only possible to trace solutions based on problems.
Set your goals and list them clearly if you want to achieve them. The more clarity you have where you want to get, the greater the chances of conceiving strategies and choose tools that will help you get there.
Defining the target audience.
With the agreed goals, it’s time to define who your targeted audiences are. The choice of media, content and the way in which, in general, you will reach the public only makes sense and works only when you know who you’re talking about.
Try to understand the profile of your potential customer and map your data, interests and behaviors.
The public profile will help you target the actions and to best set up your content for a personalized communication. In addition, it is essential to choose the media that fit in your potential customers’ requirement. For example, while social networks perform better for young people, the email marketing can cover the older audience well.
Invest in which media?
With objectives and target audience defined, you can select the media in which to invest. Importantly, the strategy should, first of all, to be in line with the targets set and must be built on a platform that is part of your audience’s behavior.
After that, analyze the budget available to invest. If you still have doubts as to what media to choose and do not want to take risks, prefer those that offer free or flexible budgets to test the performance, such as sponsored links and social networks.
Remember, too, which is not required to be present in all available channels. Of course, the more channels are worked, the greater the chances of return and visibility. However, some options may not make sense to your audience or your goals.
Moreover, it is more valid to focus efforts on a media only with consistent publications and quality than trying to handle multiple channels and end up having no output that was expected.
How much should you invest?
The calculation of costs must be previously planned.
For many small and medium enterprises, which weighs more time to think about digital marketing strategies is the budget available to invest.
Although the cost of digital strategies is less compared to traditional marketing, custom hire specialized services and cannot get out as cheap as expected. It is essential to prepare and understand the company’s priorities to decide how to apply the available budget in actions that bring good results.
Next, you will understand and better estimate how much to separate the budget for the strategies:
What will the project cost?
The first step in the budget organization is knowing what needs to be funded in the course of the campaigns. After all, distributing the budget is only possible when you map all the points that require investment. In general, you must pay the following:
- Professionals and Services: Payment to the contractors to put activities into practice: Agencies, freelancers, employee’s salary.
- Media and tools: Various forms of marketing and digital communication tools have free access, but others require investment: Google Adwords, sponsored links, Facebook ads, banners and e-Mail shooting tool for example.
- Infrastructure: You will need to invest in computers, paid software for research, cameras, and workstation. In short, all the necessary equipment required to set up a team within the company.
How much to invest in paid media?
To use strategies such as sponsored links and ads on Facebook, we need to spend some amount. Budgets are flexible and there is no pre-established rule of how much you should pay in each case.
The tools allow very affordable values, but, of course, the more the investment is, the greater the visibility and reach of your campaign is.
How much to invest in specialized agencies?
Hiring an agency specializing in digital marketing requires a slightly higher budget than other options, but it is a complete production assurance and professional contribution to meet the demands.
Prices charged by service providers vary widely. It all depends on the region, the needs of each client and, of course, of the agency itself. Forms of payment also vary according to the service.
How much should you invest in freelance professional?
The first step in hiring a freelancer is to hit all the details of the service: activities, deadlines, and deliveries. In negotiation, try to understand if the professional can meet all your demands or not. It is common to find people specialized in specific functions and, unlike agencies, the freelancer will not have the support of a complete team.
In common with the agencies, freelancers’ prices also show great variation ranges, depending on time, professional and the type of work to be done.
In this case, the most common forms of payment per unit or per package – for example, the production of five posts for the blog or the development of a layout for the site.
With this information in hand, you can now go ahead and start working on your digital marketing strategy and its execution.
