3 Reasons Your Digital Strategy Will #Fail
J Haselwood
Ampla’s Digital Marketing Strategy Blueprint series is perfect for small and medium sized businesses, nonprofits, and digital marketers seeking a fresh perspective on digital strategy. This is part 7 of 7.
Over the last six blog posts, we’ve covered the complete loop of digital strategy development, implementation, and reporting. It is a cycle that repeats over and over, with modifications each time based on newly acquired knowledge and technology. Even though the best plans can be laid out, there are many reasons your marketing efforts could fail before they even begin. Many of your companies won’t have these problems, yet many will. This final installment covers three traps that will hold you back from reaching success in digital marketing.
1. Lack of Time
Have you ever heard or been part of a conversation that went like this:
· Person 1: “How’s work?”
· Person 2: “Work is good, we’re really busy right now. Totally slammed.”
· Person 1: “Well, that’s good. I know it’s a bummer to be slammed, but at least it’s job security. Rather be slammed than twiddling your thumbs, right?”
· Person 2: “Yeah, I guess so.”
While being busy at work oftentimes implies job security, it can also be a detriment to job security. Busy does not always equate to working smart or productive. If other responsibilities or ad hoc “fires” take priority over executing your marketing masterplans, then performance will suffer. Time that was dedicated to implementing and overseeing a campaign’s success can evaporate without you realizing it.
The best way to negate risk of time thieves is to handle the “time issue” from the onset. If you’re in a marketing planning meeting and your ideas exceed the headcount that exists, then some of those ideas may need to be scaled back. You may also plan on obtaining temporary help from a consultant or contracted worker to open up a new pool of available time. If a project is properly scoped from the beginning, then time will be less of an issue because that will be estimated as part of the project scope.
2. Lack of Resources
Another way that I’ve seen companies fail in their marketing efforts is by not having the resources available to pull off a project. Contextually, I’m referring to resources as human capital and technology.
An example of this would be that your marketing plans include an A/B testing schedule that you’d like to be automated, yet you’re not working with a platform that will perform these functions. It’s time to modify your plans based on the technology you have at your grasps, or plan on having the right technology in enough time to test before launching your marketing.
Another resource example examines the human capital aspect. Perhaps your marketing plans have an increased budget and an additional headcount will be required to achieve your revenue goals. If you don’t add headcount, then you risk burning your current employees out, possibly losing members of your team. As simple as it may sound, your chances of marketing success are much better when human capital is lined up appropriately with the marketing goals.
3. Lack of Knowledge
Let’s assume you have all the time in the world and a bounty of headcount at your fingertips. However, nobody knows their way around a CRM platform, how to set up Google Tag Manager, or do other digital-specific tasks that may be required to execute and measure your marketing plan. Again, I say your marketing plan with #fail.
I completely believe that people can be trained and develop skills for the in-the-trenches work when it comes to digital marketing. Digital marketing changes all the time and many in the digital world are self-taught. However, some things are trickier to learn, and a knowledge set should be available to set a marketing plan up for success.
One remedy for this is to hire specialists, contractors, or consultants that can lend a hand to execute a function and train others. Further, an internal training schedule can be developed to share digital marketing skills. As knowledge increases, your likelihood of success will join in formation.
The 3-Link Chain
Think of time, resources, and knowledge as a 3-link chain bracelet. They all connect with each other to complete a circle. If even one link breaks, failure will occur. For example, if you have time and resources, but no knowledge, then your plans will fail because nobody knows what they’re doing. If you have knowledge and resources, but no time, then everyone is too busy to make it a priority. You get the picture.
Digital Marketing Strategy Blueprint Series Summary
Thank you all for taking the time to read our seven part series. Our hope is that you can take some of the things you learned and immediately put them into play with your digital marketing. We’ve uncovered why you need a digital strategy and how to put it into action. If there are any questions about the content that was covered in this series, please reach out to us. We’d love to hear from you!
What are other roadblocks that you’ve run into that impeded the success of your marketing planning?
In case you missed the other blogs in this series, here’s a link to each of them:
Part 1: Framework: Digital Strategy vs. Digital Tactics
Part 2: A 30-Point Digital Audit Checklist
Part 3: In a Perfect Digital Marketing World
Part 4: The Unfair Reality of Digital Marketing