The Stages of a Successful Digital Marketing Campaign

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Digital Marketing; The year is 2019, and the majority of businesses now understand the value and the power of digital marketing. It allowed businesses of all sizes to make an impact regardless of how large their marketing budget is, or how big is their marketing team.

Any company of any size can now succeed through digital with the right digital marketing strategy in place, everywhere you look online there is some sort of an ad or marketing happening, and the amazing thing is, marketing is no longer about pushing a sales message, but it is about connecting, and growing communities and tribes around your products or services.

Brands now understand the power of affinity, something that was only exclusive to either the very large corporations with a cult-like following or the small local business owner.

But this is not a blog post to talk about the power of digital marketing nor the case studies and success stories, we will do that in another blog post, this post is about executing a successful digital marketing campaign; you have the right product, the right target market in mind, and the right message crafted, now it is about planning your marketing campaign the right way!

So, below are the three stages that we have identified as must-haves in order for your digital marketing campaign to succeed;

Stage One: Awareness

The stages assume that you are embarking on a new campaign or you are marketing a new product, you might be at a later stage within the marketing cycle, but for any digital marketing campaign to be on the road to success, you have to start with awareness.

Unfortunately, many brands and business treat digital marketing as a classified ad in an old school newspaper, only trying to sell to complete strangers! You have probably heard that metaphor before but let me re-tell it; Business is like a relationship, the customer is the person you are interested in asking out, and the way most brands and businesses do marketing, they go out there and ask for the sell straight away, like asking the person you’re interested in to get married on the first date.

You guessed it right, they will most likely run for their life! same applies to consumers, selling without building interest or rapport will just push them away.  So to conduct a successful marketing campaign you need to show your prospects that you exist first, that should be your only goal at the first stage.

I’ve seen them somewhere before

That’s the goal, you want your prospects to say “oh I have seen them somewhere before”, don’t try to sell to them from day one. It will help your prospects build trust with your brand and business before they commit to purchasing.

You need to position yourself as a person and not just another company with a product to sell, in the awareness stage you want to be relatable, showcasing what your brand is about, educating your prospects on who you are and what you stand for.

Share your message with them, get them to be invested emotionally in your brand, give them something to rally behind and relate to.

Stage Two: Attraction & Nurture

Now it is time to start educating your prospects, they now know what you are all about, they understand your brand message and can relate to the brand’s personality.

The second stage of digital marketing is Attraction and Nurture, which go hand in hand, you need to display your products and services in a way that would be attractive to your prospects, again with minimal selling, you want to create attraction to features of your products and services, and showcasing what life would be like with your products or services implemented.

You want to answer questions your prospects might have, entice and educate them on the benefits of dealing with your brand or business. The goal is not to sell at this stage, it is to build rapport, and shine a light on your products and services.

Typically this stage includes not only ads but a content marketing strategy in place, it is about sharing information and giving to the community, if you would like to learn more about the first two stages, Gary Vaynerchuck really hammered the point in his book Jab Jab Jab, Right Hook Would highly recommend reading it, it should be part of your digital marketing book arsenal.

Stage Three: Action

Selling O’clock! After you have helped your prospects become aware of your brand, and helped them see why you are different and why your products are better than all the others out there, it is time to go for the ask.

But, don’t be too pushy, you simply want to work on the engagement you have seen from your previous two stages, you want to show that your products and services are the solutions to the problems they have.

Another tip to keep in mind when selling online is not to sell with every single post, try and pace your ask, try to align your selling and nurturing efforts. Every post where there is an ask/sell make sure your content and copy is engaging and informative, weave in the sale rather than make it the main feature of the post.

It is a Circle!

You’re not done yet! The stages are not linear in any way, they are an ongoing effort, you need to always run different campaigns targeting different customers at a different stage of the sales cycle.

You need to be consistently showing your business, educating prospects and selling to interested customers, a successful marketing strategy would encompass efforts across different channels that target customers at different stages, and with the right analytics and tracking in place, you can truly personalise your marketing for an optimised conversion.

Conclusion

Every digital marketing effort you take or embark on should be tailored to a specific demographic and target audience, a final note would be, make sure your tone of voice is appropriate for your target audience and your brand persona, make sure your message sticks.

Go out there and test, there is no one-solution fits all when it comes to digital marketing, you need to test and keep on testing till you find the right combination of messages, graphics and target audience that will relate to you and your brand. Make sure you first craft your strategy and spend some time on it before you get started, it will save you a lot of time and money down the road.

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