If digital marketing is the future, then digital market audits are how we make sure we’re headed down the correct path. Just having digital marketing by itself is like blindly charging ahead. Sure, sometimes it works, but most of the time, you end up in a ditch. What is a digital marketing audit, and how do we perform one in the first place?
Digital Marketing
Before we talk about digital marketing audits, let’s talk about what digital marketing is to begin with. Digital marketing is basically all of your online marketing attempts put together. It can include websites, whether made by you in-house or made by a web design company, pay-per-click (PPC) ads, social media accounts, etc.
Why Do I Need a Digital Marketing Audit?
Digital marketing audits give you the information you need to be able to move forward. They show you which of your attempts at keeping relevant and gaining more customers are working and which are not. Without digital marketing audits, you’re essentially acting blind, pouring money into initiatives that may or may not be working. For example, you could be underfunding website development when it is actually one of your strongest performers.
These digital marketing audits are a great opportunity to see what’s working and what’s not. If you see an area of your digital marketing that’s lagging behind, that’s an opportunity to shore it up, thus improving your overall performance.
How Do I Do Digital Marketing Audits?
There are several areas that you need to focus on to be able to successfully pull off a proper digital marketing audit. These areas are:
1. Reporting
In order to make sure your reporting is functioning, ask yourself the following questions:
● Does ongoing reporting even exist in my marketing strategy, and if it does, do I have good Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in place to measure?
● Does online call tracking exist in my marketing strategy?
● What patterns can be identified from my online form submissions, phone calls, live chat leads and other data?
These questions are all focused on whether or not you collect data and how you use the data you’ve gathered. If you aren’t collecting any data or you don’t understand what this data means, then you need to consider changing your strategy. You need all this data in order to accurately plot where you are and where you want to go.
2. Objectives
You need to have a plan in order to get anywhere. That’s true in life, but especially true in business. You need to have a solid roadmap to follow if you’re trying to do digital marketing.
The normal advice for business planning applies here with a few caveats. Besides just having defined objectives with measurable goals, you need to make sure you have KPIs in place and that your KPIs are checked regularly to see if they still fit the current market.
3. Marketing Technology
In short, you need to make sure your systems are up to date. Check all your systems, see if there are outdated ones or clunky applications and buy new ones.
Conclusion
Digital marketing audits are a great tool to help your business make sure that it’s spending its money wisely. Without audits, you’ll be wandering around in total darkness. So make sure to focus on those areas, and you won’t be stumbling around in the dark for long.
In need of a digital audit? Contact Shuttle today! We are a team of creatives, designers, developers and marketers who specialise in digital marketing.
