Here at Parqa, we get a lot of questions from business owners about how and why they should invest in digital marketing. The world has embraced entirely new ways of communicating, sharing, and making their purchasing decisions—it’s only natural that your company’s marketing strategy should keep up with those ever-evolving trends. The advent of social media and search engine optimization have made inbound marketing efforts more valuable than ever, meaning your strategy no longer has to rely solely on cold-calling or brochures; you can incorporate inbound digital marketing to attract clients to you. Here are some of the most common questions we hear from business owners about the ever-evolving realm of digital marketing—and our responses to help you get started.

How do I know how much to spend on digital marketing and how do I justify the investment?

Before jumping into the digital marketing space, business owners need to understand what their goals are. Your ROI can come in many forms depending on your objective, whether it’s exposure, conversions, or buzz. This is the most important piece of the puzzle: determining what your end-goal actually is. One of the first questions to ask once you determine your end goal is “what is that goal worth to my company?” In the case of recruiting, an average placement fee is typically in the range of $25,000. If you can accomplish the same placement with a $2,000 investment in digital marketing, the ROI is incredible. If done properly, you don’t need to justify the investment in digital marketing—it justifies itself. 

Is offline marketing still important? How do I continue to think about offline marketing while focusing on digital marketing initiatives?

Marketing as a whole should be though of as a pie. Digital marketing is just one piece of that pie, and offline and traditional advertising are other pieces of the pie. Start by understanding your target audience and how your message should be placed in front of them. How do they consume media? How do they make their buying decisions? A multi-channel approach is typically the most effective, but not every type of marketing is applicable for every industry. For example, traditional billboards are still highly effective for some industries and businesses, but so is social media. The same marketing mix won’t work for every industry, but it’s important to ensure that every aspect of marketing is being considered when putting together a marketing plan. 

Is blogging dead?  Why or why not? Where does it fit/what’s its role?  Who does it best fit?

Blogging is as important as ever. It’s one tool to have in your toolbox to create a rich mix of content. Your content helps generate exposure, contribute to your credibility, and allows you to be viewed as a thought leader in your market. Blogs give a company—and employees—a voice in their industry. Blogs can increase overall site traffic, assist in marketing automation efforts, serve as additional content to publish on social channels, and become a resource to send people more information about your business. The best blogs are those that can serve multiple purposes at once, benefiting your company in different ways simultaneously. 

What are the key analytics that I should be paying attention to when it comes to digital marketing? Once I’m looking at the analytics, how long until I can make decisions on the metrics I’m seeing?

Which analytics you look at will depend on your end goals and objectives for digital marketing in the first place. Again, it’s different for everyone—which is why it’s important to have an objective in mind before you start. Whether you’re most focused on sessions, time on site, conversions, or another factor, track that specific metric first. Next, keep an eye on secondary metrics within analytics to see if any other trends can be uncovered, as some metrics can play into others.

The amount of time needed to make decisions based off this data really depends on how much traffic a site receives as well as what your goal was to begin with. Sometimes this data set is a month and other times it is a quarter. It’s important to remember to be patient and make any data-driven changes independently of others. Rapid changes can make it hard to see how things are working, so changes (along with tests) should be rolled out on a consistent schedule with full tracking in place to see how they affect the analytics. 

What digital tools should I use or consider; which is the best one?

There are dozens of tools out there, ranging from paid to free, and not all of them will be a good fit for your business. First, you must determine what you are looking to accomplish. From there, you need to be realistic about the size of your business as well as the in-house resources, expertise, and overall knowledge concerning who would be responsible for the tools. That said, one tool that every single company with a web presence should have is analytics to be able to measure online activity. Google Analytics is a free website analytics tool that is a good fit for most businesses as a baseline. The Parqa team is here to help you decide what you need to track in terms of analytics to accomplish your goals, and then which tools to utilize to take your marketing efforts to the next level. 

Digital marketing continues to evolve at a constant pace, so it helps to have a team on your side to navigate the latest changes and help you get solid results based on your unique objectives. Have more questions about what your company’s digital strategy should look like?  Chat with our digital marketing team today.  https://parqamarketing.com/contact-us/free-assessment/