Digital Marketing Strategy: a Cohesive Customer Experience?
“There’s only one boss; the customer.” –Sam Walton
Have you given any thought to your digital marketing strategy? The digital world is wide and varied…people get information from many different places, offline included Customers don’t really make a distinction, and neither should you.
While the wealth of information offers endless possibilities for you to reach your target audience, it also makes it more difficult to reach those same people with a strong, cohesive message.
In today’s digital marketplace, your customers are not going to distinguish which channels they use to find information about you. But they will expect the same experience and attention from your organization. Once you figure out how to send the same message across multiple channels, you’ll have a wonderful, time-saving and efficient resource at your disposal. According to a study by Harvard Business Review, customers who find you across multiple channels are more profitable to the tune of 10% online and 4% in-store.
Digital Marketing Strategy Approaches
First remember, it’s all about your brand identity or your brand story. No matter where you reach your customer, it’s vital for them to have the same brand experience. You need to know what your story is and be able to tell it to someone in 30 seconds or less —the traditional elevator pitch. You also need to make sure that your employees know this brand story as well. More often than not, they may be the first (or only) contact your business has with a customer.
You also need to know who your customers really are — their wants, needs and the problems your product or service can solve. We’ve got a great worksheet for you to get started on identifying your own ideal customer.
Humans are a product of habit and familiarity. Customers want to know that you’ll represent yourself similarly across all platforms, including email, social media or blog posts. According to Qualtrics, customers don’t make a distinction between digital channels in the same way a business using its marketing strategy might. Ultimately wherever your customers are engaging with your brand through the internet, to them, it’s a digital experience. Further still, they have come to expect the same, seamless experience no matter where they are.
Some Important Digital Methods to Reach Out
Content marketing strategy. Creating content for any of your digital channels means meeting your audiences where they are. You may be writing content for awareness such as on social media. Or you may be writing content for blogs to establish your expertise and authority.
No matter what you are writing, make sure your voice and the customers’ expectations can be met on your website, in an email or in a blog post. If you don’t have the time or the staff to help you with this, consider hiring out to get it done. (Though be sure you have a solid marketing roadmap before you try to do this!)
SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Because you are familiar with your Ideal Audience and you know their pain points, you’ll be able to write about those issues that your customers are searching for.
At its essence, SEO is a means by which people can find your website when their search issues are solved by the information on your site. All of us have searched the web to solve a problem and gotten results that matched what we were looking for. So, it should not be a huge leap for you to come up with content for your website that does the same thing for your customers (and potential customers).9
Website (online presence). Your website is the hub of all of your digital presence. All channels should point back to your website. After all, for many, this is the front door to your business and you need to ensure that your messages on social media, in SEO or any other place provide the same experience that the customers will find on your website.
Customer Service. Yes, this can count as a digital experience. Most people will contact you either through your website via live chat, by email, or by phone. No matter where the customer contacts you, the experience needs to be the same.
Outbound marketing (email). According to Hubspot, 64% of small businesses use email marketing to reach customers. And, in fact, those who use segmentation—sending emails to various audiences based on their preferences and habits—can see as much as a 760% increase in revenues.
Because you’ve done your homework and identified your target audiences, you should be set. Just remember that your brand and the customer experience should be the same no matter which segment of your audience you are targeting.
Digital Customer Feedback
There are huge dividends to be had when you pay attention to negative customer feedback. Turning a negative experience into a positive one can create a powerfully loyal customer.
And, frankly, all feedback is valuable information for you as a business owner. You need to know if your product or service is resonating with your customers…or if not, why?
There are several ways a business owner can seek out customer feedback, starting with creating a Google Business profile. You can also post polls on Facebook and Instagram, surveys on your website or in emails, or just simply “listen in” to what’s going on in social media.
You also want to have some criteria to know which customers to prioritize, since you won’t have the time or resources to focus on everyone. But no matter where the feedback comes from, you’ll learn a lot by paying attention.
If you want to get an idea of how well you are doing at promoting your brand, offering a digital presence, monitoring customer relations or using outbound marketing tools, we can help. Take our free, 10-question quiz and get results right away.
From there, you can figure out the strength of your marketing foundation, create a roadmap and ensure that your digital marketing provides a coordinated experience no matter where or when your customers want to find you.
Tomato Fish Is An Indianapolis Consulting Company Focused On Helping Small And Midsize Businesses Make Good Strategic Planning Decisions.
