How to Build a Digital Marketing Strategy That Delivers Results

Looking to generate and secure new leads with an effective digital marketing strategy?

Crafting a digital marketing strategy can seem like a daunting task if you’re not prepared.

So, where do you begin?

Establishing goals, defining audiences and earmarking what you need to successfully execute your digital marketing strategy is crucial for your marketing efforts to reap rewards.

At Media Village, we’re no strangers to devising a digital marketing strategy that deliver real results.

In this digital marketing strategy guide, our experts share their expertise and walk you through how to build a digital marketing strategy that packs a punch.

Set clear goals and objectives

Prior to devising your digital marketing strategy, you need to pinpoint your goals.

You don’t just want any old goals though. It’s important your objectives are SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and timely).

Ask yourself, what do you and your business want to get from your digital marketing output? Not only will this help steer what your digital marketing strategy looks like, it will help you measure the success of your work too.

What are SMART goals?

SMART goals are a framework used to set clear, achievable objectives in both personal and professional contexts.

The acronym SMART stands for:

• Specific – Clearly defined and unambiguous.
• Measurable – Quantifiable and trackable to monitor progress.
• Attainable – Realistic and achievable within available resources.
• Relevant – Aligned with broader business or personal objectives.
• Timely – Set within a specific timeframe for completion.

How can setting SMART objectives help my business reach its goals?

We asked Michael, our in-house digital marketing expert and a self confessed SMART marketer, to explain:

“Setting realistic and attainable goals is crucial. Too often, brands set lofty goals without committing the necessary resources or budget, and struggle to understand why results aren’t coming. Using SMART objectives means you will set smaller, attainable goals which allow your digital strategy to develop momentum, with small wins quickly snowballing into larger, long-term objectives.” – Michael Hickey, SEO Consultant

By using the SMART criteria, businesses like yours can create goals that are well-structured and more likely to lead to success.

Real World SMART Criteria Examples

Here are a few examples of SMART criteria:

Consider buyer personas

Understanding your target audience is crucial to carve out an effective digital marketing strategy.

You can do this by earmarking ‘buyer personas’ who represent the traits of your ideal buyers or service users. But, it’s crucial that you do this with tangible data and research.

For example, you can conduct in-person Q&A sessions, online surveys and other methods. Ultimately, you want to ensure you gather enough of the right information to craft these buyer personas.

Make sure you consider their:

• Location – Web analytics tools will show you where your visitors are coming from.
• Income/occupation – This is especially useful for B2B’s but ensure you ask customers if they’re happy to disclose these details.
• Hobbies/interests – Online forms or focus group sessions could help to show what interests people. You can also use search trends to explore popular hobbies for certain demographics.
• Goals/aspirations – Your customers have goals too! Discover what is driving them, what do they want to achieve? What are their goals?
• Challenges/pain points – What is it that gets in the way of them achieving their goals? Speaking to customers as well as your own sales teams can help you to understand this.

Choosing the Right Initial Strategy

So you know your audience, and you’ve set your goals and objectives, but how do you know which is the right digital marketing strategy to start with?

The initial choice in your digital marketing approach can significantly influence how quickly you achieve your objectives.

For instance, a well-optimised PPC campaign can generate immediate ROI, providing quick wins and valuable data that justify investing in a long-term SEO campaign. This approach allows you to see results quickly, build momentum, and gain insights that can inform broader, more sustained efforts. By starting with strategies that offer immediate returns, you can ensure that your marketing efforts are both effective and scalable, setting a solid foundation for future growth.

For long-term visibility and lead generation, a smart SEO strategy can become the highest ROI channel in your mix.

Agency Tip: Tailoring Your Strategy to Your Business

To further explore this concept, we sought advice from our in-house digital marketing expert.

“There is no single initial digital strategy that is perfect for all brands. You must conduct in depth research to identify which channels present the largest short term opportunities according to your goals and resources. If you are a local business, then your starting strategy may involve Local SEO via a Google Business Profile, while eCommerce stores may find Google Shopping Campaigns as the most profitable starting point.” Michael Hickey

Suggested Starting Strategies for Businesses

To help you choose the right initial strategy tailored to your specific business type, here are some example starting strategies for popular business niches along with explanations for each:

Not sure where SEO fits in your business model? Our SEO company can help you map it into your wider strategy.

Audit your assets

Assessing where you’re at digitally is imperative for your marketing strategy.

You should sift through your current assets, auditing them to see how effective they are, so you know which areas require more work.

A good example of auditing is an SEO focused content audit. Here’s the steps you’d typically follow:

• Crawl the site by gathering all the URLs for blogs, service pages and other relevant pages. (Website crawling tools such as Screaming Frog will come in handy for this step)
• Identify gaps within content where you’re missing the mark with your target audience and campaign goals. (Google Search Console and Search Term Report in Google Ads are useful tools for highlighting keyword gaps)
• SEO insights can be discovered by not only looking at existing URLs but new keyword research relevant to your industry and target audience.
• Compile the data so it’s easy to access by inputting it into a spreadsheet, this will also help you make strategic assessments.
• Create tasks to kickstart your digital marketing efforts that are clear recommendations for improving existing rankings and building new ones.

Our team regularly runs content audits that identify where your rankings are stuck – and how to unlock growth through technical and content SEO support.

Agency Tip: Transforming Your Existing Digital Assets

To provide deeper insight into auditing your brand’s assets, we asked our in-house content marketing expert for her advice:

“Your assets include far more than just your brand’s content; they also encompass visual assets. Consider transforming your existing content assets into compelling video content, which is far more engaging than text. In fact, videos can increase user engagement and conversion rates significantly, and you already have the script!” – Haley Neville, Content Marketing Expert

What types of digital assets should I audit?

Here are the key types of digital assets you should audit:

A. Website Content

Blog posts, landing pages, product descriptions, and other web content.

B. SEO Elements

Keywords, meta tags, alt text, backlinks, and overall site structure.

C. Visual Content

Images, videos, infographics, and any multimedia content.

D. Social Media Profiles

Posts, engagement metrics, profile information, and follower demographics.

E. Email Marketing

Campaigns, newsletters, email lists, and performance metrics.

F. Paid Advertising

PPC campaigns, display ads, social media ads, and their respective performance data.

G. Analytics and Performance Data

Google Analytics, social media insights, and other tracking tools.

H. Technical Aspects

Website speed, mobile responsiveness, security certificates, and usability.

Auditing these digital assets helps identify strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities for improvement, ensuring your digital marketing strategy is effective and up-to-date.

Plan your content creation resource

If you were to continue with a digital marketing content campaign, you now need to decipher how the recommendations will materialise. To deliver on recommendations means making a number of considerations on the following key aspects. . .

• Budget – Do you have a sufficient budget to create the content required? Be sure to create a budget and stick within it. Most of the factors below will have an impact on the budget too.
• Resource – Can your current team deliver with their skills? Or do you need to look for support elsewhere?
• Tech – Will you require new software to deliver?
• Deadlines – What are the timescales for the content to have an impact but for your team to produce meaningful content. Be realistic here.

By considering these aspects, your digital marketing strategy stands in good stead of being effective in yielding results.

Can an agency help with content creation?

Yes, digital marketing agencies like Media Village house skilled content creators who can produce high-quality content tailored to your brand’s voice and objectives. This includes blog posts, social media updates, videos, infographics, and more.

Learn more about our creative graphic design and branding services.

Distributing your content

A holistic approach can often be most effective when it comes to the content distribution of your digital marketing strategy. However, you must first consider what you’d like the content to be?

• Paid – Promoted content is classed as ‘paid’ and includes PPC and any other promotional content too.
• Earned – This type of content relies on others to write or interact with your content.
• Owned – Content that sits on your own website, blog and social media is classified as ‘owned’.

Agency Tip: Repurposing your best content

“Make your content go further. That in-depth blog article you created can be transformed into multiple pieces for social media, spliced into TikToks for quick FAQs, and converted into an infographic for backlink opportunities. Repurpose and recycle your best pieces of content across various channels to make your best pieces of content continue to generate value.” – Michael Hickey

Pinpointing your KPIs

Right from the word go, your digital marketing strategy should be tracked and measured so that key performance indicators (KPIs) can be assessed to determine the effectiveness of your strategy.

For example, you may want to measure:

• Cost per lead
• Click through rates
• Customer lifetime values
• Digital conversion rates
• Returning website visitors

Agency Tip: Measure What Actually Matters

To give you a deeper understanding of the importance of KPIs, we asked our digital marketing expert for their insights:

“Defining and monitoring KPIs is one of the biggest challenges our digital marketing agency regularly helps businesses to overcome. Often, clients set the wrong KPIs and fail to work towards what truly drives business. Moreover, conversion tracking issues can lead to incorrect data, affecting future decisions. Focus on KPIs that directly impact your business objectives, and make sure you are tracking those KPIs correctly” – Michael Hickey

How do I know if my digital marketing strategy is working?

To ensure your digital marketing strategy is effective, you need to set up tracking and reporting mechanisms for the KPIs relevant to your goals.

Regularly monitor these KPIs to gain insights into the performance of your campaigns. Tools like Google Analytics, Google Ads, and CRM systems can help you track and measure these indicators accurately.

However, KPI tracking can be complex and time-consuming. This is where professional digital marketing services can provide valuable assistance.

An creative agency like Media Village can help set up comprehensive tracking systems, ensure accurate data collection, and provide regular reports and insights. They can help you understand the effectiveness of your strategy and make data-driven decisions for continuous improvement.

Why should I consider hiring a digital marketing agency instead of doing it myself?

Hiring a digital marketing agency can save you time and resources, allowing you to focus on running your business. Agencies have specialised expertise and access to advanced tools that can optimise your marketing efforts and drive better results.

How can a digital marketing agency help me set and achieve my goals?

A digital marketing agency can help you set realistic, attainable goals based on industry benchmarks and your specific business objectives. They can then create and execute a strategy to achieve these goals, providing regular performance updates and adjusting tactics as needed.

Let the experts devise your digital marketing strategy

Ready to take the next step and kickstart your digital marketing strategy? We can help.

At Media Village, our team of experts are fully equipped to help you generate leads and reach your goals – that’s what makes us the leading SEO agency in Lancashire.

From SEO and PPC to social media, email marketing and more – We won’t just help build your strategy, we will become an extension to your internal team, sharing the same common purpose, to deliver results.

Get in touch with our team to learn more!