3 Tips for Organizing Digital Marketing

Angela Hausman, PhD

It’s easy to find yourself falling behind — failing to achieve as much as you expected each day. Plus, digital marketing is getting harder and more time-consuming. Organizing digital marketing is the key to getting everything done without driving yourself crazy or working until 3 am every day.

Like you, I’m pretty busy –

• I’m CMO at Groupsurfing and we launched hexsee a few weeks ago
  
• I run Hausman Marketing Letter without a staff
  
• I head up Hausman & Associates with a small staff of virtual employees who work with high growth clients
  
• I’m building a new startup – AcreBnB to match landowners with farmers
  
• I have a family, pets, a home, I need to get to the gym more, and am active in my synagogue

You probably have similar demands on your time. So, let’s dive right in to learn tips for organizing digital marketing.

#1: Prioritize

First, determine what’s most important:

• What things absolutely MUST get done on a consistent basis regardless of other commitments:
  
  
  
  • Analytics – daily, no excuses
    
  • Customer service – respond to messages daily, thank supporters, build engagement
    
  • Create/ curate content, at a minimum, you need
    
    
    
    • 1 piece of new content on each site every week for strong SEO
      
    • Daily curated content
    
    
  • Read what’s going on in digital marketing – keep a little notebook (in my case, on paper) with content ideas, headline ideas ..
    
  • Update clients on progress – at least 1X/week
    
  • Respond to client queries
    
  • Meet new, prospects and put together proposals (as needed) – I have a proposal template that requires very little effort to prepare a customized proposal designed to meet each client’s needs.

My advice is to get these things out-of-the-way early in the day when you’re fresh and use appropriate tools to help with organizing digital media tasks. So, every morning I run through my digital media dashboard (Cognos, IBM) analyzing stats from the previous day and trends, I check my Hootsuite dashboard for comments from my social networking sites, Use Sproutsocial with integrated feeds from Feedly to create posts to my social networks.

I repeat for each client.

Craft a proposal template in Word, then build customization elements for each activity you’re proposing to each prospect. Then, it’s a simple matter to cut and paste various elements together for a custom solution.

• What things are nice to have when organizing digital media (when you have time):
  
  
  
  • New infographics, images, video – it’s really nice to have great visuals for your content. Visuals are a great, legitimate source for linkbait, but they’re time-consuming and, with my skill set, require significant dedicated time and concentration.
    
  • Blogger and media outreach – you don’t need to build this in every week, but you should have a consistent outreach program
    
  • Networking – in face, online, etc.
    
  • Pay it forward by commenting, sharing, and Retweeting posts from others
    
  • Email marketing – soliciting subscribers should be part of your website design and you should spend some time crafting valuable content to encourage subscriptions. I offer 3 different options for rewards — a white paper on building a digital marketing strategy, the first chapter of my book on Digital Marketing Analytics, and a white paper on Content Marketing Strategy. Then, follow up with periodic email newsletters or blog broadcasts to share valuable content with subscribers.
    
  • Updated digital marketing strategy and SEO plan (things change over time)

• Here are some other activities to consider when organizing digital marketing:
  
  
  
  • Search new plugins to discover time-saving or traffic boosting options. Delete old plugins you don’t use frequently.
    
  • Check out competitor’s websites to ensure you’re staying abreast of current web design standards
    
  • Check for 401 (page not found error) and put in redirects (you don’t want visitors going to an error page when they’re looking for something on your site
    
  • Look for trending topics and plan future posts to capitalize on these topics

If you prioritize it’s much easier organizing digital marketing for success. Now, your priorities might be different from mine, and you still have to schedule time to be a partner, parent, child, etc, but making these priorities explicit helps with organizing digital marketing so you succeed without driving yourself crazy.

Just as important, ditch the stuff that isn’t important.

• Don’t feel the need to read all your emails. Many can be deleted without reading more than who sent the email. That does for snail mail, too. I go straight to the trash can with my mail and pitch much of it in the recycling without even opening it.
  
• Always have something to work on so you’re not wasting time waiting for the doctor, picking up kids, on hold … I keep much of what I do digital so it’s always on my smartphone.
  
• You’re not June Cleaver, so don’t feel you have to make your bed everyday, alphabetize your spices, edge the lawn, clip coupons, wash the car … Give yourself a pass. As long as everyone is fed nutritious food, your home is free from hazards and hygienic, the city isn’t condemning your yard, and the car isn’t falling apart, relax. Your family and friends would rather enjoy your company than watch you clean.

#2: Create a schedule

For me, creating and maintaining a digital calendar is essential. My Google Calendar helps me stay on top of things and ensures I don’t double book my time.

I also schedule activities throughout the day, based on my priorities.

First thing in the morning, I check my analytics and schedule posts to social networks for Hausman and Associates and my clients. I then read a little and jot down any ideas that occur to me for future posts, activities, or opportunities. At the end of each day, I prioritize the next day’s activities.

I keep a little notebook next to me as I work — yeah, I know — pretty old-school, but it works for me. I track things according to date and make little notes from meetings, ideas, and things I need to accomplish for the next day or so.

#3: Lists, flow charts, PERT charts

OK, I’ll admit it — here in front of everyone.

I’m just enough OCD that I’m compulsive about organizing. I have lists for everything. I stage things the night before so I can just dash out of the house without forgetting anything. I create flow charts and PERT charts (Microsoft offers this easy template to make creating PERT charts easier) to make sure everything comes together. Commonly, your PERT chart contains dates along the critical path to visually depict how long various activities and the entire project are projected to take.

Poor organization actually costs more time and makes your efforts less successful — more time, more money, less reward is a recipe for disaster.

An important distinction with PERT charts is they visually portray activities and critical paths to success and can monitor performance toward reaching your goals.

Final thoughts

I shared my 3 tips for organizing digital marketing. Obviously, not everyone is the same and businesses have different processes. I’d love to hear from you about organizing digital marketing in your business. Just add to the comments below.

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