Digital Marketing is a System

By adopting the Strategy First approach you're building a foundation for sustainable growth and a strong online presence. It ensures that all marketing efforts are aligned with the core of what makes your business the unique solution for your ideal clients.

The second, equally important role of your website is to be found by potential leads for your business and turn visitors into customers. This goes beyond a nice design; it's about making your website a solution-oriented platform for your clients. To achieve this:

• Focus on your client's problems: Your website should immediately address the problems your clients face. It's not about you; it's about them and how you can solve their issues.
• Differentiation: Explain how you solve these problems, what makes your approach unique, and why clients should trust you over competitors.
• Process: What are the main steps you guide your clients through to get them from where they are to where they want to be?
• Call to action: Make it clear what the next step is for the visitor. Whether it's contacting you, downloading a guide, or scheduling a consultation, guide them to the next phase of engagement.
  

Dramatically improved efficiency of operations with a custom warehousing and inventory system, integrated with an eCommerce website and Quickbooks Online.

Read more: Integrated Warehouse Management, eCommerce & Bookkeeping

Your website is an essential component of your digital marketing strategy. Integrate it with your business systems to save cost and eliminate inefficiency, and optimize it to efficiently engage visitors and convert them into loyal customers.

Clients often come to us for a “website refresh”. They ask for a new design and tell us to copy over the content from the old website. With the new design, they hope to attract more visitors and generate more leads. 

Well, that won’t work.

Design is important, but it is the content that will attract visitors to your website, and it’s the content and functionality that will convert an anonymous visitor from a self-identified lead.

In digital marketing, content is the voice of your strategy. It speaks directly to your customers' needs educates your clients, and positions you as a thought leader in your field.

When you take a strategic approach to content creation, then it’s not confined to your website but extends to emails, social media, press releases, ebooks, and more. The key is consistency and relevance across all platforms.

Marketing, at its core, hasn’t changed. It’s still about building a relationship where customers get to know, like, and trust you. This journey leads them to try your service, buy your product, return for more, and refer you to their network. Content plays a pivotal role in this journey by providing value and building trust.

At its core, the content that you generate should answer all questions and concerns your clients may have, and establish your company as an authority in your industry. 

Creating a comprehensive content strategy involves the following steps:

1. Identify all relevant topics: outline all the topics relevant to your business and your customers' needs.
2. Create a content directory: Choose a main broad topic relevant in your industry, and and create a directory of subtopics and individual articles that cover this topic. This will become the roadmap for your content creation.
3. Create hub pages: once you have a substantial amount of content on a particular topic, consider creating a hub page on your website. This page links all related content into a comprehensive treatment of the topic, showcasing your authority and making your website more findable in Google search results.
   

For our client Lift & Shift we created a comprehensive hub page titled "The Ultimate Guide to B2B Loyalty Programs" This page links to all relevant blog posts, forming a rich resource hub. Such an approach enhances user experience and confirms your authority on the topic to search engines like Google. 

By aligning your content with your strategy and the customer journey, you inform and educate your audience and build a lasting relationship. Content marketing is not just about producing articles; it's about addressing your customer’s needs and establishing your business as the expert in your field.

Search Engine Optimization makes your website findable

Having a website that can’t be found on Google is like printing a brochure and locking it away in a cabinet. The holy grail in digital marketing is to rank number 1 spot on the Google search engine results pages. 

Getting to number 1 takes a lot of consistent effort over a period of time. It’s the domain of the SEO specialists who will work on optimizing your website and its content for Google ranking. If you ask them what they to make that happen, then they’ll make it sound very complicated, but essentially it’s about three things:

1. Website structure - Is your website well-structured? Is it safe and secure? Is it easy to navigate on a mobile phone? Does it load fast?
2. The content on your website - Does each product or service have its own page? Is there sufficient content on your website to answer the questions of your clients? Is the content organized so that search engines can easily understand it? 
3. The attention your website gets from other websites - Which other websites are linking to your website? Are these authoritative websites? These “backlinks” act like votes of confidence, signalling to search engines that your content is valuable and relevant.

Search Engine Optimization is not a one-time setup; it's an ongoing strategy to ensure your business is easily found by potential clients. 

Google is very good at identifying the intent of a search. For example, if you search for “how to fix toilet”, then you will find YouTube videos with instructions. If you search for “plumber near me” then you’ll find a list of plumbing companies in your area. 

Getting found for locally relevant searches is important if your business has one or more physical locations that target local customers. That’s where local SEO comes in: 

• Optimized Google Business Profile: This allows you to list your services and contact information, post articles, and even let people book appointments.
• Presence in business directories - Your business details should be consistently listed across directories such as Yelp, YellowPages, and the Better Business Bureau.
• Location pages on your website - Do you have a page on your website dedicated to each location, with relevant information such as opening hours, contact information and services provided?

Since 2017, we have optimized the web presence of Horton Automatics of Ontario for search engine ranking. In 2022, our Digital Marketing System delivered 20% annual growth and $1.5M in sales, with 15x Return on Investment. Based on this success, the ten sister companies of Door Services Corporation have now merged into a new web presence that competes well with its nationwide competitors.

Search Engine Optimization makes your website findable on the web. It means having a well-structured website with relevant content that answers the needs of your target audience and working on improving how your website is perceived and talked about across the internet.

Social media marketing builds awareness

Social media has had a massive impact on the way we communicate. Just one example says it all: Facebook has 3 billion monthly active users, and they spend an average of half an hour per day on the platform! For businesses, social media is a powerful platform to create awareness of their products and services, connect with their target audience, and showcase the human side of their business.

However, many businesses don’t have a clear plan on how they can use social media to connect and engage with their customers. They often worry about the time and effort required to produce content for social media, and they find it difficult to measure the return on their investment.

When you implement a comprehensive Digital Marketing System, those concerns are no longer relevant. Social media is essentially a free publishing platform for your business. And when you have a clear strategy and produce relevant content for your website, most of the work of creating social media posts is already done. 

In your strategy you have defined your ideal client. Which social media platforms does your target audience use, and which online communities do they engage with? Establish a presence wherever your ideal clients are, and engage them by repurposing the rich content you have created for your website. 

Simply turn every article and blog post into a series of engaging social media posts and spread them out over the year. This approach not only saves time but also ensures consistency across all your digital platforms.

There is another important role social media can play for your business:

Social media excels in showing the personal, human aspect of your company. It's not just about business updates; it's about connecting with your audience on a more personal level.

Personal stories and glimpses into your company culture often see far more engagement than standard ‘business’ posts. For instance, a remodelling company we worked with shared a post featuring the owner's baby in a company polo. This post got a lot more engagement than any of the others, showcasing the power of personal touch in social media.

The key to successful social media marketing is authenticity. It's about capturing and sharing moments that resonate with your audience. This isn't something that can be outsourced or faked. It's about taking those genuine moments from your business – be it a team event, a behind-the-scenes look, or customer stories – and sharing them with your audience.

By using social media within a comprehensive Digital Marketing System, you repurpose the content you create to answer the needs of your audience into bite-sized engaging posts and spread them out over the year. By sharing genuine personal stories from your business you engage with your customers and build a community.

Manage your online reputation

Online ratings and reviews are your digital word-of-mouth. Here is a great statistic: according to research by Brightlocal, 91% of people read online reviews, and 84% trust them as much as personal recommendations. 

Good online reviews are important for every business, but particularly for those companies that have a local presence. Many of our clients are B2B field service companies. Their technicians will service clients from local offices within a certain geographic region. Their potential customers will often look for help with the a “near me” question:

Getting good ratings and reviews online involves the following steps:

1. Customer service
   The first step, of course, is to provide excellent service to your customers. Your digital marketing strategy has made that possible by focusing on your ideal client and identifying your differentiator. 
2. Asking for reviews
   Many of your customers will agree to publish a review online if you actively reach out and ask. We use the Net Promoter Score approach and generally get a 2% to 5% response rate with our review request process. That may not seem high, but it will lead to a consistent stream of positive reviews over time.
3. Reply to reviews
   Replying to reviews is important. A study published in the Harvard Business Review found that hotels that respond to customer reviews increase their occupancy rates if they respond to at least 50% of the reviews they receive. 
4. Showcase your reviews
   Publishing your best reviews on your website helps to build trust and credibility with visitors. A less obvious advantage is that relevant reviews on a web page help with Search Engine Optimization. 

Customers are hesitant to engage with businesses that have low ratings. Start by delivering great service to your ideal clients and then actively ask them for an online review. Think of reputation management as a digital megaphone that amplifies the voice of your satisfied customers and grows the credibility of your business.

Keep your clients engaged with a regular email newsletter based on the content you generate for your website. Grow your email database by building a sales funnel with a content upgrade and by reaching out to our target audience with a LinkedIn outreach campaign.

Online advertising captures existing demand

Google Ads and Bing Ads are powerful tools for capturing “high-intent” leads. When someone searches on Google for a specific service or product, your ad will be at the top of the page (see Google Search Engine Results Page Explained). When your ad is formulated correctly, you will capture those leads who are ready to make a purchase and bring them to your website.

Does it work? Absolutely! Advertising income is currently almost 80% of Google’s income (Statista). All those companies wouldn’t advertise on Google if it didn’t work!

The nice thing about online advertising is that you can precisely measure the return on your advertising spend, so you will know whether your advertising is profitable or not. 

Online advertising can also be used to leverage the name of a strong competitor. You can target people who are searching for your competitor's brand name and entice them to visit your website instead!

In the B2B market space, people buy from people, not from companies. Facebook and LinkedIn are great for reaching out to your ideal clients because these platforms know so much about you! You can target your ads to individuals based on their demographics, interests, and behaviours to make sure you reach the people who are most likely to be interested in your product or service.

The advantage of online advertising is that you can get results quickly at a measurable return. The disadvantage is that in the long run, it’s more expensive than attracting leads to your web presence organically.

Read more: SEO vs PPC: what is better for your business?

Online advertising is a great tool in your digital marketing system to attract leads quickly and at a measurable return on investment. Use Google Ads and Bing Ads to capture demand from people who are already looking for your product or service. Facebook and LinkedIn Ads are great to reach reach out to your target audience.

This completes the digital marketing system for B2B companies. However, this overview wouldn’t be complete without a quick review of analytics. 

One of the main advantages of digital marketing is the ability to measure results in real-time. This allows businesses to see what's working and what's not and adjust strategies accordingly.

It’s important to decide upfront which results you are trying to achieve with digital marketing. What are your business goals, and what results do you expect from digital marketing to achieve those goals. When the goals are defined, then you can select the metrics to measure progress towards these goals.

At its most basic you will want to implement Google Analytics as well as a call-tracking system.

Google Analytics is a free tool that helps you understand who visits your website and how they interact with it. It tracks data like the number of visitors, where they come from, and which pages they spend the most time on. It allows you to define the metrics you want to track as conversion events and track them over time. This allows you to make informed decisions about your digital marketing.

Call tracking lets you see how potential customers find your business phone number. It works by assigning different phone numbers to each of your marketing efforts. For example, you can have a dedicated phone number on your Google Business Profile, another number on your website, and even dedicated numbers on your vehicles. When someone calls a number the tool records which campaign they responded to. With call tracking, you can better understand what attracts your clients. 

Implementing Google Analytics and call tracking allowed us to know precisely how much revenue we generate for our client Horton Automatics. Our Digital Marketing Systems delivered 20% annual growth and $1.5M in sales in 2022, with 15x Return on Investment.

Read more: Case Study Horton Automatics

When set up correctly, analytics gives you the insights that guide your business and marketing decisions. Refine your marketing strategy and your digital marketing system with real-time reporting on key metrics.