And yes you can (make a silk purse from a sow's ear)
Well of course, we will say yes since we’re in the business of selling but for non-marketers, having a ‘go-to’ team to devise, manage and execute a digital marketing plan has so many benefits. We’ve listed them here and should convince you to at least think about it. Contact us, if you want to know more:
- Cost-effective
- Peace of mind
- Long term strategy
- Utilising experts
- Free your time
- Consistency across all things digital
We’ll now take a look at these benefits in more detail…
Cost
It’s not always easy to justify a full-time marketing salary particularly when so many companies have struggled during the COVID pandemic. Business owners are only too aware that they should be executing a marketing plan but when that means paying the going rate, it’s difficult to justify, let alone find the cash to do it.
If you decide to outsource your marketing, you’ll discover that a full-time marketer might not be the route to go and that having someone working with you on a retainer basis means you’ll get expert support costing a fraction of what you were expecting to commit to.
Peace of mind
Many business owners opt to take on the marketing function themselves. In our experience it’s not the right approach. Of course you know your business better than anyone but are you prepared to put time aside to manage your website, social media, email campaigns etc. when that time could be allocated to doing what you do best?
In other words - running your business.
If you decide to outsource your marketing, commit some time to interviewing your prospective marketing ‘bods’. Remember that across your digital comms channels, they will be the voice of your company. You want to be able to trust their day to day management, the content they write and the imagery they select (specifically for social media). Pick their brains and use their expertise to devise a long term strategy that will ensure your marketing isn’t an eclectic mix of tasks but is a thoroughly thought out, cohesive plan spanning a minimum of 6 months which will target the people you want to reach.
Equally, it’s just as important that you share as much as you can about your business and what you want to achieve. Remember that your outsourcing goal is to ensure you and your marketer are totally in sync. It’s crucial that your decision to outsource adds to your team and you’re confident that the marketing guys ‘get you’ and the company persona. Your clear communication of the vision you have for your business will ensure everyone is reading off the same page.
And ‘note to self’: Don’t fall into the trap of micro-managing because this merely adds to your workload and you may as well do the whole shebang yourself!
Long term strategy
We’ve already touched on this but having a long term marketing strategy can help keep your business on track and prioritise profitable projects. It helps your sales staff focus on who they should be talking to, steers bus dev managers as they nurture ongoing client relationships and maintains your consistent exposure to the wider community.
A marketing plan is not just about telling people how great you are. A good social media marketing strategy should focus on educating, adding value and providing insight. Being brazen and arrogant won’t go down well on social media and researching good, shareable content is exactly what your outsourced team should be providing and disseminating.
Use the experts
Many believe that marketing is somewhat ‘Mickey Mouse’ and that if you have a mild disposition towards the creative, you can be a marketer. We’re not going to dispute this at all but you may discover, over time, you lose direction and enthusiasm and then easily justify why you are now spending time elsewhere. Perfectly understandable but ideally you want to outsource right from the start and avoid ending up exactly where you were 2 months previously.
Select your marketing team based on their experience. Ask for examples of websites they have written for, blogs that have been published, social media accounts they manage and crucially how they propose to devise a marketing strategy - completely tailored to your business and not based on a template they’ve copied and pasted from the web. Once you have a real understanding of what they can deliver for you, this will give you a degree of trust.
Also bear in mind that it’s highly unlikely that you will see immediate results - gaining thousands of followers, reaching number one in Google and receiving a sudden deluge in purchase orders is not going to happen. However, over time, you will gain loyalty, interest, and trust from your key market who, by the time they make contact with you, will already have researched what you offer and feel assured you can deliver what you promise.
Free your time
Now that you’ve outsourced your marketing function, you’re no longer bogged down with producing marketing content (and we all know how time-consuming that can be). By all means continue to revisit the marketing plan because this should be sitting side by side with your business plan.
Devote this freed up time to your business plan. It should be a constantly evolving beast as you adapt to challenges posed within your industry. Revisiting the business plan means you may have to reassess where you’re most profitable and apply that to future marketing activity.
Ask yourself a few questions:
Do you need to adapt to the online climate?
Is your business in a position to exploit current attitudes?
Should you be redirecting your messaging to a different arena?
Only by continual review and looking at empirical data can you truly exploit a marketing plan and convert that plan into business success.
Consistency across all things digital
The number one priority of any marketing activity (whether that is managed in-house or outsourced) is consistency. Any marketer will be totally focused on this and ensuring that you’re ‘on brand’ across all channels. However, every platform is nuanced and you need to know how and why, a slightly different approach is necessary.
Choose The Digital Doctor for your marketing partner
Has this blog stimulated some thoughts? If you are considering outsourcing your marketing then The Digital Doctor has the depth of knowledge and understanding of online marketing to launch and manage your marketing strategy.
At The Digital Doctor, because we like to get involved in every aspect of marketing - you can be assured of a constant online experience. We write web content, research and publish blogs, manage social media campaigns and more…so contact us.