Get SMART: How to Transform Your Digital Marketing Investment Mindset
Adjusting marketing strategies so they best serve your business sometimes requires a fundamental shift in mindset. Because many business owners don’t fully understand existing marketing strategies, they aren’t aware of the value a digital marketing investment can bring to their business. In the past, they’ve seen additional marketing investments as niceties rather than necessities.
Now, more business leaders are considering supporting a go-to-market strategy rather than haphazardly assembled marketing tactics. Business leaders recognize the need to create an entirely digital asset infrastructure and a digital marketing strategy framework, but they’re often unsure how to get started. It’s a science they haven’t yet learned. Fortunately, with careful planning and consideration, a go-to-market strategy might be just what you need to keep your marketing efforts competitive and attract a broad audience to your business.
What Is a Go-to-Market Strategy?
A go-to-market strategy puts a digital asset infrastructure at the heart of all marketing actions. It includes four core pillars — assets, audience, offers, and strategy — all supporting the overarching business goals.
This four-pillared infrastructure creates what we call a lean canvas. The canvas is where marketers can test assumptions, examine metrics, and learn new lessons about consumers. Part of this work is looking at competitors’ achievements, how they have invested successfully in their digital marketing strategies, and choosing parts of those success stories to emulate.
After a set of goals is established from this testing ground, the true value of investing in digital marketing becomes more apparent.
The Importance of Managing Client Expectations and Setting Goals
When business owners begin developing a new strategy or evolving out of old thinking, they expect the process to meet a specific predetermined vision. They have an expectation for the value of their business. Thus, they have an expectation of what success means, from bank balance to reputability.
Managing and adapting these expectations is at the forefront of working with clients. You can begin by exploring which metrics the business owner wants to see. For example, is the business looking for more inbound phone calls? More phone calls will inevitably require new leads — perhaps 20 new leads to get four new calls. You can work backward from this specific metric and use KPI-driven thinking to imagine what kinds of digital marketing touchpoints you will need to make that happen.
Managing expectations and setting marketing goals are complementary activities. Working backward from a goal can help you understand what a key performance indicator (KPI) means in practice and what actions will be necessary to meet and surpass your goals.
When leaders align business goals with metrics, expectations become more realistic and manageable. It also becomes possible to see how customers use their digital presence to connect with your business. From there, you can measure this digital interactivity in a way that leads to increased profitability.
How to Create a Go-to-Market Strategy for Your Business
In this age of digital transformation, it isn’t feasible to spend your way to success. Establishing your own brand of success online will depend on your ability to shift your mindset. If the world is transforming into a digital ecosystem, how will you take the lead in your own transformation? Follow these three steps to bring your company up to speed and see how a go-to-market strategy can do wonders for your business.
- Learn how to self-diagnose – The first step in setting marketing goals that lead to success is acknowledging the gaps in your existing strategy. What is your digital footprint like, and how does your brand appear online? Is there a crossover if you compare your digital touchpoints to the places your audience is showing up? If you’re not equipped for a digital world, your business could be in jeopardy. To break it down even further, do you know what CAC and LTV mean? If you don’t have a digital language, you might soon be overtaken by businesses that do.
- Identify your motives – Once you’ve diagnosed your business’s digital standing (the hardest part), you can work on setting goals. Goals come from motivating factors, so it’s essential to ask your marketing team, Why are we doing this? What will it bring us? What is most interesting about a digital marketing strategy for our business? and Why is now the time to do it? Being able to qualify these questions and more in your own voice is a crucial step toward making a go-to-market strategy that succeeds on your own terms.
- Appraise your infrastructure – Whatever the status quo of your digital footprint is right now, there will be ways to update and improve your infrastructure. From refining and creating more profitability to inventing what digital content means for you, a go-to-market strategy means completely evaluating your existing infrastructure. For infrastructure to work as people and expectations change, it has to be agile and respond to where audiences are engaging.
Business leaders acknowledge that a digital marketing strategy is no longer a nicety; it’s a necessity. Now is the time to set business goals and discover the many benefits of a successful marketing strategy. Learn more about transforming your digital marketing mindset and see how a go-to-market strategy can work for your business today.