While a digital strategy is pivotal to your business, you must know your company’s current online positioning against your competitors. In one of our other blogs, ‘What is a Digital Strategy?’, we briefly outlined the steps that should be included in any digital marketing plan. Now, we'll go into detail about what you need to do to ensure success in step one of building your digital strategy.

The first step that you must complete when developing your digital strategy is to research your business and gather all relevant information about your company and the industry you work in. This includes your target audience, your digital position and the assets you use. You also need to study your competitors’ digital presence and assets, as well as any possible disruptors that may affect your business in the future.

1. Your Digital Position and Assets

The creation of a digital strategy gives you the chance to build a better understanding of your business’ online position in the market and the assets and platforms you're currently using. Diving into your company’s assets presents you with an opportunity to improve your existing products and services. When researching, always make it a goal to answer the following questions:

• What do we offer our customers?
• Is what we offer still relevant?
• Do we offer new services or products (if so, what are they)?
• What services or products are we known for?
• What do we want to be known for?

Once you have reviewed your own products and services, study your website and social media channels. During this step, answer these questions:

• Has our website passed a UX (user-experience) test?
• Is our website mobile-friendly?
• Does our website load quickly, or is it slow?
• Is our design and font style consistent throughout the site?
• Have we considered the impact of SEO? 

For your social media accounts, measure and map your followers, engagement rates and trends over time. Here, you may surprisingly find that one of your channels is not working as effectively as others, and not providing the required Return on Investment (ROI). Or you might discover newer channels worth considering for your industry such as TikTok or Pinterest.

Next, examine your content marketing and keyword strategy. By doing so, you may discover that you aren’t posting and sharing as much content as you should be, or that your focus keywords from 12 months ago are no longer relevant. Sometimes you might also need to shake up the format of the content you're sharing as well such as incorporating short-form authentic videos instead of relying on stills or polished TVCs. Take note of all the areas that need to be changed, or what you think should be changed, so you can refer back to them in step two of your digital strategy creation.

2. Your Target Audience

Your target audience may have been set and determined months ago and hasn’t been reviewed since. This is a common mistake made by businesses who are playing in the digital space. It is crucial that you review and alter your target audience dynamically, as it can change as your company’s services and products develop. Not only may your target audience shift, but their behaviours and the ways they engage will also change over time. This is also important to consider in this review.

Compare your target audience against your recently gathered data to see whether you still have engagement and how that engagement may have shifted. During this step, you may also discover that you have gained a new target audience due to new services and products that your business now offers.

3. Your Competitor’s Digital Position and Assets

During step one of your digital strategy, you’re not only looking into your business’ presence online but also your competitors. This is an integral part of a good digital marketing strategy, it is essential that you research and gain knowledge on what your competitors are currently doing online. This includes keeping a close eye on their social media channels, website, and other forms of communication. Ensure you read their content, rate their assets and use the tools available to you to develop a rounded view on their activities and whether or not they're finding success. 

Take note on how often they post on their website and social media accounts. Look at their keywords, what their social following is, where their audience is from and what are they doing wrong or right. Join your competitors emailing lists to see how they are communicating with their customers.

It is important to know exactly what your competitors are up to, so you can alter your digital strategy to try and keep ahead of them. But remember, reviewing your competitor’s digital presence isn’t a once-off. A competitor’s review should be part of your quarterly business plan. You should never lose sight of what they are doing, how they are performing and where they are ranking compared to your company.

4. Potential Disruptors

To research potential industry disruptors, you need to keep up-to-date on studies and research papers that feature and surround the industry your business operates in. By understanding and looking into the reports, it will allow you to develop an understanding of what has changed, why it has changed and even preempt what might change in the future.

Sign up for as many research papers and websites as possible, so the results are delivered straight to your inbox. Speak regularly to industry heavy-weights and industry futurists, so you can further develop your understanding of what may disrupt your workspace. If you keep your knowledge of your industry as up-to-date as possible, it will eliminate the sense of surprise whenever a disrupter is released into your industry market.

5. Market and Industry

Having a concrete understanding of where your business is positioned within the digital space is important, as is researching and assessing your current industry and market. By doing this, it will give you a true grip on where your business currently sits within your sector. It will also help you develop and set your goals and objectives for your digital strategy at a later step (See our other blog, Step 4: Set Your Vision).

There are multiple ways you can keep your finger on the pulse of your industry, both online and offline. Ways to stay in the loop can be to sign up to databases, which release frequent newsletters; attend industry seminars regularly, keep an eye on LinkedIn groups and subscribe to publishing outlets who cover your sector on a consistent basis. Another tip is to form a mentorship with an industry thought-leader, who you can contact for advice, guidance and to gain knowledge. Again, this section shouldn’t be a one-off for your business. You should regularly review your industry, as it can help you stay relevant within your sector.

Conclusion:

Before putting together your digital strategy for your business, make sure you tick off each one of the above steps to ensure you are on the right track. You need to know exactly where your services and products sit in the market, before being able to set your objectives and goals as part of your digital strategy. In our next blog, which is part of our digital strategy series, we will go into detail about what to do with your collected research and how you can put it to good use for your business. See Step 2: Analyse Your Research.