4 Stages in a Digital Marketing Plan

How do you bring an idea to life? Follow these four stages in your planning, and you will build a foundation that lasts.

I help businesses grow by implementing and optimizing digital marketing systems in four critical areas: subsidize, socialize, monetize, and advertise. It’s my experience that there are four stages in every digital marketing plan, with each stage positioned as an integral part of optimizing and maximizing a business growth potential. It starts with great content. Let’s take a look:

1. Subsidize

Build your content! I’ve known for a long time that quality not only matters to your audience, but it also matters to the search engines. Quality matters when it comes to content, and it matters when it comes to link building. You’ll definitely want to integrate a strong SEO plan within your digital space, which may include key words, back linking, and quality content. There are many ways to add quality content to your website: calendar of events, maps, before & after experiences, pictures from your customers, articles, blogs, Q & A’s, FAQ’s, how to guides, short tips, historical data, statistics, and of course customer input and engagement.

2. Socialize

Grow your audience!  Be social with your audience. Monitor your social channels and keep it positive. When done right, you can generate goodwill and good conversation. Making use of the right tools, you can get proactive and show your audience that you are paying attention. Social channels can be integrated with  your website and other channels, enabling proper tracking and metrics. Integrating social media into your marketing mix is a natural extension of the audience’s own personal interactions. Take advantage of the digital word of mouth!

3. Monetize

Create income streams! Aside from offering and promoting your very own products and services, there are many ways to monetize your website and digital marketing space. You could make extra money through affiliate marketing, and selling someone else’s product on your website. Pay per Click advertising put Google Adsense on the map, while a solid Kickstarter Plan may provide you with the funds, through crowdsourcing, to put YOUR idea on the map. You could sell ad space, or offer a digital ebook, depending upon the amount of traffic, and the demographics of your audience.

4. Advertise

Target your market! With first setting up your base of operations at your website, a good digital marketing plan will include specific marketing objectives to match with the most appropriate advertising products or channels. Organic ranking on search engines is one thing, while target marketing is another. Offering content to the blogosphere can be very useful to bring new audiences to your door. Retargeting your casual audience may be a great way to remind your potentials to come on back. Pay per click is great when your end user is searching for your products or services, while social media channels like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter offer robust Profile Target Marketing capability at the top of your sales funnel.

Read more at: Chip’s Tips