When I returned to work after maternity leave at the start of 2023, I had a confidence wobble. In digital marketing, a year out feels like a long time with all the advances in technology and tools. In that year alone, ChatGPT (the first real breakthrough in AI) launched and Google Analytics was moving from Universal Analytics to GA4 - both major changes to the industry.
I spoke to a wonderful colleague who was a couple of years ahead of me in her career after childbirth. She said that maternity leave would make me better at my job. I’d be more efficient because you just have to be with a child. It was a turning point for me because she was completely right. My time management and prioritisation skills have always been pretty good, but nothing really sharpens them up like having a baby (well, maybe a baby, a toddler and a business to run).
So I wanted to share some of the ways I make my digital marketing more efficient to help you fit it into your day. This article focuses specifically on making time efficiencies, but this will have a secondary impact on monetary efficiencies too.
Step 1: Get organised
As I’ve already alluded to, digital marketing is a fast-paced industry. If you’re a business owner or manager, you also have many other plates to spin, and so getting organised is essential to fit everything into your day.
The right project management tools can really help here. I find Kanban-style tools like Trello give you a broad overview of everything going on in a team with assigned owners, deadlines and the ability to add documents and updates. If you want the ability to automate repetitive admin tasks then tools like monday.com are a great shout.
It also helps to block dedicated time in your diary to digital marketing and avoid meetings being booked. If you find emails take over, then approach these with a different mindset. Email was never intended as an instant messaging service, so don’t feel you have to respond immediately. Dedicate time in your week for your inbox, set an out-of-office letting people know when they can expect a response and another contact method if their message is urgent.
Step 2: Use scheduling tools
Sitting down each day to write social media posts for your different networks is not efficient. Instead, ring-fence time each week or month to write a bulk of them in advance and schedule them through a tool such as Hootsuite.
Step 3: Automate
There are tools out there which can do the boring repetitive tasks for you, so you can focus your time on more valuable activities. In terms of digital marketing, this can include things like sending out automatic emails when someone on your database reaches certain criteria, regular reports and passing social media leads straight into your database. This can be done through most CRMs (customer relationship management systems) such as HubSpot and Active Campaign, or through integrations like Zapier.
This is particularly useful if you want to cut down the amount of time you spend on writing and sending emails. Rather than thinking up new email content every week, you can write a series of emails (often known as lifecycle comms) that automatically send to recipients based on the interactions they have with your brand. As they are triggered and based on user behaviour, they tend to be more targeted and therefore more effective.
Step 4: Use AI
AI has seriously taken off in the last few years and is only going to keep growing. Businesses who fail to adopt this technology may fall behind. There are many applications for AI use in digital marketing - from writing ads, to creating designs, to data analysis. However, the quality of the outputs are only as good as the strength of input that a human gives it. Therefore you need to make sure you give it a thorough brief and review the outputs critically, questioning whether it would appeal to your audience and hit your objectives. Often, it gives you a good starting point for you to polish, rather than a finished product.
Step 4: Repurpose content
You don’t need to reinvent the wheel every time. Reuse your content across different channels and at different times of the year to save time. For instance, I have written this blog post to draw people into my website, but I have also recorded a video as much of my audience prefer to consume content in this way (plus YouTube is the second largest search engine after Google)! I will also promote it via LinkedIn as my target audience is business professionals, but use a personal anecdote within the post to give it a human touch. I will also promote it at different times of the year when businesses tend to be more busy, and so searching for this type of content (e.g. during the run up to seasonal campaign launches).
Step 6: Hire a freelancer
Even after putting some of these tips into practice, it can still be very difficult fitting digital marketing into your day, especially when you’re wearing many hats in your business. Consider whether it is better to hire a freelancer with the expertise and knowledge to run your digital marketing for you - particularly if you can’t afford to hire more full time staff and would prefer the flexibility to scale up and down resources as your requirements change. That’s where I can help - check out my case studies and testimonials to find out how I’ve worked with other businesses.
In summary
There are many ways to make your digital marketing more efficient. Here’s 6 tips you can start actioning today:
Get organised with project management tools
Consolidate time with scheduling tools
Offload with automation
Get a head start with AI
Repurpose content
Hire a freelancer with digital marketing expertise, knowledge and scalable resource
Please contact me to find out how I can help with your digital marketing needs.
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