You already know that the use of digital devices is constantly increasing. According to one survey conducted in 2024, it was found that the average adult uses digital devices (computers, phones, and other devices with Internet access) for about 7.3 hours per day.
This dependency may seem scary, but it gives companies a real opportunity to proactively communicate their brand to customers who spend a lot of time online.
That’s where a digital marketing strategy comes in. “Your digital marketing strategy is a series of actions taken to achieve your corporate goals using carefully selected online marketing channels.”
Let’s face it: creating your own digital marketing strategy is a serious undertaking. So why is it important? We’ll share examples that will definitely inspire you.
Why do You Need a Digital Marketing Strategy?
Here’s the short answer: As with any business activity, you need an overall strategy to help you plan and improve your performance. It will help you make choices with the end goal in mind.
This is especially important in the field of digital marketing, because this area includes many areas. What types of digital marketing do we know? These may include:
- Content Marketing
- Email Marketing
- Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
- Contextual advertising
- Social Media Marketing
- Affiliate Marketing
So what is the main goal of a digital marketing strategy? It brings all these elements together into a single plan, allowing you to save time, money and effort.
How to Create a Digital Marketing Strategy?
Like what you just read? Now, you are faced with the task of creating your own digital marketing strategy. It may seem incredibly complicated, but it is not.
Let’s start small and outline five simple steps that will help you choose the right direction. Consider this the basic structure for your future strategy.
1. Study your audience
Before you can develop a marketing mix, you need to understand who you are reaching out to. So, your first step should be to research your audience.
There are many ways to do this, but some of the most popular and effective include:
- Analytics (on your website, email marketing platform, and social media)
- Surveys and feedback forms
- Discussions with sales and customer support staff
These three methods alone will give you valuable information about who your customers are, what goals they have, what problems they face, and how your company can help them.
Armed with this information, you can create different buyer personas so you always know who exactly you’re reaching out to and target your messages accordingly.
2. Set goals
Your overall digital marketing strategy should be tied to a larger goal—something more specific and inspiring than “advertise your company” or “grow your audience.”
One of the best ways to set marketing goals is to use the SMART methodology . This acronym means that the goal you set should be:
- Specific — specific
- Measurable — measurable
- Attainable — achievable
- Relevant — comparable
- Time -bound — limited in time
By working through each letter, you can set goals that will actually move you in the right direction. For example, a SMART digital marketing goal might look something like this:
Grow our email list by 2,000 subscribers in Q1 to get enough audience to promote our webinars.
If you want to use an alternative method, you can use the OKR (objectives and key results) methodology to achieve maximum results from your marketing activities.
3. Evaluate past work
Developing a strategy is quite a complex task, and it may seem like you are starting from scratch every time, but this is not entirely true. You have done marketing before (even if it was not on a large scale), which means you already have some experience.
Analyze your past actions to understand in which cases you achieved the desired results and in which cases you did not. This will help you understand where you need to put in more effort.
It also gives you a great opportunity to collect content and assets, from social media images to important information, that you can reuse to avoid doing unnecessary work. For example, a quote from a previous blog post could be used as an Instagram image.
4. Think carefully about all the main points
No matter how high your creative imagination, there are always many insurmountable circumstances that must be taken into account. Developing a strategy has nothing to do with dreams. Rather, it is an attempt to understand what you can achieve with the existing limitations.
Now here’s where you need to think. The Digital Marketing Institute uses the term “identifying your resources,” which means you need to consider the following factors:
- Your Budget: How Much Can You Spend on Digital Marketing?
- Your staff. Who is responsible for the result? Will you have to subcontract some tasks or responsibilities?
- Your Channels: What marketing channels will you use and what is the goal associated with each channel?
These key elements need to be figured out in advance so that you can develop a strategy that will be successful under any constraints.
5. Make a plan
Once you have all the basic elements in place—your audience, your goals, and your resources—it’s time to put them together into a single digital marketing strategy template.
Start with a simple calendar (either in a spreadsheet) that holds all of these elements. For example, you might plan a single email campaign in your calendar, and then start adding other pieces to it.
Be prepared for your initial plans to evolve into something completely unexpected over time, but sometimes you just have to start moving forward to find the best possible path for you. As with any process, it will be trial and error!
Five Digital Marketing Strategy Examples to Inspire You
Do you know what first steps you need to take to get started but feel unsure? Sometimes all you need is a little inspiration.
Below are examples of well-known brands that have focused their marketing efforts on three different areas: content marketing, social media marketing, and email marketing.
Which digital marketing trend brings the best results? These brands prove there is no single answer. It all depends on how you execute your plans.
1. Content Marketing Example: Buffer
When it comes to content marketing, it’s hard not to think of the most popular social media post scheduler, Buffer. The company that created this service is often cited as an example of content marketing done “correctly.”
In the early days, the company’s leaders relied primarily on guest posting. The content they created was posted on a variety of sites because they wanted to make it recognizable. One of Buffer’s co-founders claims that this strategy helped them attract their first 100,000 customers.
However, they were unhappy with the neglect of their own website. But in the following years, the company gained credibility in the industry by publishing high-quality content on their blogs.
Did you notice that the previous paragraph referred to “blogs” rather than “blog”? That’s right – they had two different blogs, each targeting a different audience:
- Buffer Blog : All about social media, marketing, and Buffer features and updates.
- Open blog : everything about remote work, corporate culture and company development.
And while content marketing typically focuses on creating ebooks and blog posts, Buffer has proven that marketing strategy is not limited to the written word. They launched a podcast called “ The Science of Social Media ,” where they share insights and valuable information about social media.
2. Social Media Marketing Example: Glossier
There are many factors that have contributed to the undeniable success of the Glossier makeup brand, and social media posts have played a significant role in this success.
The company’s leaders prioritized social media advertising (primarily Instagram) from the start, and they even managed to attract 13,000 Instagram followers before the first product was released.
But how? Part of this impressive success was due to the fact that the company’s employees understood their audience very well and were able to create publications that resonated with readers.
“The modern woman has five minutes to put on makeup and run out the door. That’s the world she lives in, but she still wants to look good and do it with minimal effort,” Glossier founder Emily Weiss told Entrepreneur.
This is the image they portray in their publications. The images do not look overly stylized or polished and usually show us real people in realistic settings (with children, animals, in an airplane cabin, etc.).
While other brands try to reach thousands of people to promote their products, Glossier takes a different approach by relying on its loyal customers and fans.
During one of the launch of a new product, the company management came up with the idea of giving samples of the product to five hundred of the most devoted fans who constantly bought their products or actively interacted with the brand online. These girls advertised the product on their own pages in social networks. And what was the result? A very original social media campaign that turned out to be incredibly successful.
3. Email Marketing Example: BuzzFeed
The folks at BuzzFeed are so good at digital marketing that it seems like they’ve conquered the internet. But of all the marketing efforts they do, email marketing stands out.
Nowadays, when our inboxes are filled with emails, email marketing is becoming a real challenge. How to make sure that people open and read your emails, and do not delete them without looking at them (or, even worse, do not unsubscribe from the mailing list)?
BuzzFeed is a great example of how personalization is key. They know that in order to get people to open their emails, they need to deliver content that they want to receive. But it’s hard to send targeted content when you’re reaching out to your entire audience.
So BuzzFeed has segmented its newsletters to the point of catering to very specific interests (for example, you can sign up to receive one photo of a cute dog every day).
They have dozens of different newsletters to sign up for, and subscribers always know what they can expect from the content being sent out and how often they will receive new messages. They also offer users various challenges to sign up for to take small steps toward achieving their goals.
The end result? High-quality, targeted content that users expect.
4. Email Marketing Example: Adobe
Segmentation is a powerful tool. However, unless you have a huge audience like BuzzFeed, the idea of creating multiple different newsletters can seem suicidal.
The good news is that this isn’t the only way to send personalized content via email or learn about your subscribers. A great example of this strategy is Adobe. Even though they have a huge audience, they take a slightly different approach to personalization.
Take a look at the email example below, where two calls to action are placed next to each other. This allows subscribers to choose their own adventure, so to speak, and also helps Adobe learn more about a particular customer’s interests.
Adobe also offers the Adobe & You newsletter, which delivers even more personalized content to subscribers, including digital marketing news, Adobe tips, and information about local events and training.
Create your own digital marketing strategy and attract your audience
Digital marketing has become a necessity these days for companies looking to build a recognizable brand and engage their audience. But that doesn’t change the fact that creating your own strategy can be a daunting task.
But you can break this task down into simple steps:
- Research your audience.
- Set goals.
- Evaluate past work.
- Think carefully about all the key elements of your digital marketing strategy.
- Make a plan.
Do this by taking inspiration from the examples given, and your digital marketing efforts will start to yield more significant results.
Once you have a solid digital marketing strategy in place, you can begin to execute your plans.
Conclusion
In conclusion, a comprehensive digital marketing strategy is crucial for maximizing your online presence. By integrating key digital marketing services such as SEO, content marketing, and social media marketing, you can effectively reach and engage your target audience. These strategies not only enhance brand visibility but also drive traffic and conversions. With a well-crafted plan, you’ll be well-positioned to achieve your business objectives and stand out in the competitive digital landscape.