The creative process can take a long time to cultivate and is heavily dependent on the project’s goals. An idea for a project might be easy to come up with, but the execution can take time. When we think in terms of digital marketing, we might imagine that six months is an eternity. In the grand scheme of things, however, it’s actually a relatively short amount of time to measure success.
Here are some reasons why we at Clix believe that having a long-term plan as part of your creative digital marketing campaign is beneficial and, in the long term, brings success.
“Results” Are Time (and Budget) Dependent
Just as time is a limitation on the amount of work that can be accomplished in a day, so too can the budget determine what kind of creative output occurs. It is short-sighted to think that a carefully thought out marketing campaign will be totally successful if time is not a consideration to see those results.
And what kind of time period can a business owner expect to see results? As in most aspects of digital marketing, the short answer is “it depends.” What industry are you in? Are your typical customers local or do they come from all across the world? What goals are you aiming for? Are they realistic, or are you expecting too much?
We often tell clients to give their campaign one year and compare the progress of the campaign to when they started. We have seen that there is almost always an increase in leads, improvement in search visibility based on their approved keywords, and better site experience overall.
Not everything will skyrocket during that time; it is likely going to be an incremental change rather than a radical difference. But if realistic expectations and goals are set and our suggestions are taken to heart, the improvements can be striking.
Rankings Are Important, But Not The Only Factor Driving Results
Search engine rankings alone are often seen by our new clients as the most important goal their business can achieve online. They want to outrank competitors on keywords they feel are relevant to their industry.
Many business owners do not realize that inbound marketing is changing every day and the relevancy of “SEO factors” is changing, too. For example, we are seeing more and more emphasis in search engines on local profiles, and we’re seeing mobile usability and load speed as increasingly important. If your local SEO isn’t up to par, or if your website isn’t mobile friendly, your competitors will show up before you do.
However, search engine rankings aren’t the end-all and be-all of success, and a well-designed and well-ranking website might not drive the results you want right away. For one thing, it takes time to get to that place in search engines, but another factor that affects your business growth is what you do on the ground.
Yes, it’s true – your “real world” presence will affect what happens in the digital world!
Here’s an example: You are a flower shop and you hire five employees. Two are full-time and work in customer service, one answers your calls and emails, and the other two help with flower arrangements. You have someone build you a gorgeous website that looks better than all of the other flower shop sites in your area and you begin the wait for the phone to ring.
Business is slow to build and picks up over time. You see more calls and receive more emails. But then you start to read your reviews online and realize with horror that your full-time staff is rude to customers and your flower arrangement team keeps messing up orders. The person you hired to answer your emails isn’t getting back to people on time, causing them to cancel orders before they even start. “How could I have prevented this from happening?” you ask yourself. Your business is literally in jeopardy, a feeling no business owner wants to have.
Believe it or not, inbound marketing could have mitigated this problem! With options like call tracking and recording, plus a vigilant eye on your online reviews, a team like the one we have at Clix can help you make decisions about your business and improve your customer experience. We offer marketing automation to help you follow up on orders, send out surveys, and many other campaigns to streamline your business services.
How Can I See Results Faster?
If a client comes to us and wants to begin driving leads faster, there are some campaigns we can run, but they often involve other services outside of inbound marketing, such as paid media campaigns and the previously mentioned marketing automation. The latter is especially effective if you already have a contact database instead of building one from scratch.
If you’re only interested in inbound marketing and want to see results, many business owners with a local presence begin to see improvements after we have worked on their local listings. And website redesign projects can make a website better from a technical standpoint (as well as from an aesthetic one), giving your site a boost with better optimized content and technical changes.
There are so many ways to impact your digital marketing campaign, but it all boils down to giving the campaign time to show results. Patience and persistence are absolutely necessary, and when you find a digital marketing partner focused on your business growth, there’s no telling what you can accomplish.
If you’re ready to grow your business through the digital marketing mix, contact Clix and learn how our team has helped many businesses see results.
