A digital marketing plan is the core document you’ll use to map out how you market your brand or product in digital spaces.
You might have high-level plans for website optimization, content marketing, SEM, and social media initiatives in your digital marketing strategy.
Define your digital marketing goals and business objectives
Clear, measurable, and attainable digital marketing plan objectives help you define exactly what you want to achieve and measure. Be clear and concise when you set these goals.
You should also include specific numbers and timeframes to benchmark your progress.
Define audience segmentation and buyer personas
A key reason why digital marketing is important is that it allows you to target your audience with great precision.
For any digital marketing campaign to be successful, you need to know who you’re targeting.
Segmenting your audience and then building buyer personas for each of those segments can provide you with insights into what types of marketing will be most effective.
Conduct competitive analysis and determine the market share
If you want your marketing efforts to be effective, you need to know who you’re up against. A competitive analysis allows you to identify your competitors, calculate your market share, and determine the marketing strategies they employ.
Conduct a SWOT analysis
SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) is the counterpart to a competitive landscape analysis. It offers a framework to analyze your business against other forces in your market.
Use this process to identify what’s working, spot potential organic growth opportunities, and prepare for external threats.
Calculate your digital marketing plan budget
The next step in creating the best digital marketing plan for your brand is to calculate your budget. The budget will define how much you have available to spend on digital marketing activities, as well as guide you toward specific channels, strategies, and tactics.
Define your digital marketing channels
Before you develop a content strategy, you’ll need to define the primary digital marketing channels you’ll be using. Your choice of channels needs to take into account your audience, goals, and budget.
Develop your digital marketing strategies and tactics
After defining your channels, you need to develop the digital marketing tactics and strategies you’ll use within those channels.
For example, if you’re going to focus on search engine optimization, you need to determine the keywords you’re going to target and how you’re going to target them.
You may decide to create a comprehensive content hub, online courses, SEO topic clusters, or a series of online tools.
Create a marketing calendar
A marketing calendar allows you to map out exactly when you’ll implement your digital marketing campaigns and initiatives. It also creates accountability, ensuring that you hit deadlines and effectively execute the plan throughout the year.
A calendar also helps ensure that you are consistently reaching each of your various audience segments throughout the year.
Measure the results and KPIs of your digital marketing plan
The final step in creating a digital marketing plan and strategy is to measure your results through the definition of metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs).
You need to compare the outcomes of your marketing efforts to the baseline as well as the original goals. If the results are underwhelming, adjust and optimize, and then measure again.
