Digital marketing incorporates some of the best ways to target and engage your audience. There are many different aspects to digital marketing; social media being one of the most important with users spending up to four hours daily on various platforms. However, there are also other digital marketing activities and elements to consider and the all important question – who manages your digital marketing endeavours.
Digital marketing is not an easy process. For every success story there is also a failure; these can cost businesses significantly.
Those companies who have a qualified digital marketing team are finding their online marketing activities highly successful and are achieving a high return on their investment. Getting the best digital marketing team does take time and each business needs a different digital marketing strategy. Employing someone new to manage your endeavours may provide benefits in the long term but it will take time for the results to be seen.
A more cost effective method could be to train a member of your current team in the principles and implementation of digital marketing. There are several benefits for this compared to hiring new employees. Here are some of the benefits you can expect for training your current employees as to hiring in someone new.
Cost Effectiveness
The average salary of a Digital Marketing Specialist is £37,500. If you were to hire in someone new for the company you can expect that their productivity would be less than 100% for the first 5-6 months. According to research, for the first three months their productivity could be less than 50%. This can be a significant drain on your financial resources.
Eric Koester of MyHighTechStart-Up estimates that the total costs of hiring a new employee is approximately one and half to three times the cost of their annual wage. Therefore, hiring a new Digital Marketing Specialist could be as high as £112,500.
Training a member of your current workforce is a significantly lower cost with diplomas costing less than £1,000. You’ll also benefit from your staff member having more productivity because they don’t have to go through the on-boarding process a new employee has to. However, there will be some productivity loss as they develop and get used to their new responsibilities.
You’ll also have a limited long term rise in costs; even if you offer your existing employee a pay rise.
Content Is Instantly In The Brand’s Voice
It takes time for a new employee to gain an understanding and appreciation for your brand’s voice. When they start working within your company it is likely the content they develop will lack the experience to portray your brand’s identity.
On the other hand; those who have been with your business for a long time understand the business’ personality intimately. Therefore, they are able to maintain the relationship with your audience better by producing a consistent brand message. This will build trust between you and your audience which is very important in digital marketing for processing new leads and converting them into paying customers.
Current Employees Know What Makes Your Customers Tick
Some of the most profitable online marketing avenues are blogs, social media and email. Creating content for these avenues is very easy; creating content your audience will want to engage with is very difficult.
Whatever method you use to attract your target audience you are likely to rely on keywords and terms. To get the terms right you are going to need to know what your audience are actively searching for.
The majority of internet users don’t search for products directly but rather solutions to problems they are experiencing. For instance: how to fill in a tax form, how to employ a new member of staff, etc. To get the most out of your digital marketing, you need to identify and create content to match this.
A new employee might not have worked in your industry before and therefore will have little understanding about the current needs or problems your customers experience. A new employee would need time to get to know your audience, in order to create the ideal content.
In contrast, an existing employee has interacted with your customers for a long time. Through previous contact, your current staff members will know exactly what the common questions your core audience ask and they are likely to know how to solve them. They can put this to good use in their content and create material which is more tempting for your target audience and yield better results.
Improves Staff Morale
Improving staff morale is beneficial for retention and productivity. One of the best ways of achieving this is to offer your staff opportunities for skill development. The fourth most desired skill in 2013 was digital and online marketing.
Giving your employees these skills will increase their morale, giving you higher productivity and decreasing the likelihood they will leave your organisation.
Digital Marketing Improves Soft Skills
There are many different skills required for digital marketing; not all of these are exclusive to the marketing. Training your staff in this discipline allows you give them a new responsibility and improve their proficiency in other areas of your business.
Here is a list of some of the key soft skills your staff can improve in when they have taken a course in digital marketing:
Communication skills are one of the key requirements employers look for in their staff. Digital marketing is all about delivering the right message to your key audience. By learning the skills and process to talk to your customers, they are also learning the skills to develop better communications with your management team and their peers. Better communications will lead to less confusion and errors being made. This will create a business which is more cost effective.
Writing and editing skills are not often thought of as being a core skill, but more jobs in the current market require staff to complete at least some paperwork. When mistakes are made on paperwork it can be costly for your business. An example of this would the inaccuracies of measurements on the paperwork which cost a French rail network £12.1 billion. An important aspect of digital marketing is ensuring that marketing materials released are free from errors. Digital marketing is another method to train your staff in getting their written work accurate. It can also improve the speed in which they are able to write and edit.
Budgeting is an important skill for any member of your team. Most forms of digital marketing require strong budgeting skills. Pay-per-click is one digital marketing avenue requiring budgeting skills. Daily budget needs to be set and distributed to return the most effective results. If they can learn the necessary skills during their digital marketing diploma they can then employ these in other areas of your business. This will help cut costs and give you better profit margins.
Time management is always difficult; however an individual who manages digital marketing needs to be aware of exactly how long they have to spend on each task. Spending too much time on one task (i.e. social media) is very easy but can be very inefficient and drive costs up. Staff properly trained can learn how to manage their time more effectively and increase their productivity. This can then be implemented in other areas of your business. A more productive workforce will return higher revenues and better profits.
Resourcefulness and creativity are skills required for successful digital marketing. They can also support other business activities. There will be times in your business when you have problems you’ve not experienced before. Traditional and normal crisis management solution might not be able to solve the problem. Having someone who is creative and resourceful can aid your business’ management team to develop solutions for your problems.
Conclusion
Digital marketing is one of the most effective ways for your business to acquire new customers and generate leads and sales. However, it is not an easy process and you need a fully qualified team in order to gain substantial returns on your investment.
Hiring a new employee might seem like a good option but they are likely to cost your business significantly in the hiring process and during their on-boarding process. There would also be concerns they would not be able to match your brand’s voice quick enough and as they continue to create your brand content; your audience may look elsewhere.
However, training your staff to manage your digital marketing activities can be highly successful and not just for your marketing efforts. They can instantly give you a return, speak in your brand’s voice and know exactly what your customers are looking for. They’ll also be more willing to stay with your brand and have a higher productivity as you show your commitment to their professional development.
Finally, the skills that they will learn during a digital marketing diploma can be transferred to other areas of the business. This will make your business sleeker; save you money and improve your profits.
Download a copy of the Diploma in Digital Marketing syllabus or read more about how your business could benefit from enhancing your teams digital skills through studying a professional marketing qualifications such as the Diploma in Digital Marketing which is accredited by The Chartered Institute of Marketing.
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