Choices are the essence of strategy. It’s not always about what you actually implement, but what you choose not to allow as a distraction. Arguably the biggest challenge marketers face today is how to do more with less. With so many options, especially in the digital ecosystem, marketers must focus on making the right choices. Here are three principles to help navigate the complexity of a digital strategy and implementation.
Put business first.
Digital is not a channel, or a tactic or a silo P&L function. Too many marketers—often influenced by board members and senior executives who are not marketing oriented—get caught up in the tactical “shiny-objective” syndrome. They don’t consider the role of digital in contributing to the overall business objective, usually growth.
Marketers need to clearly articulate the job to be done in terms of business contribution. For example, do you to want steal share from competitors? Increase share of wallet or average purchase frequency from existing customers?
Identify your primary source of volume and how and where digital can influence that core target through a customer journey.
Focus on behaviors that impact the business objective.
This is really quite simple if you know your targets. Analyze and document behaviors across a customer journey. How and what do they search? How do they consume content? How do they use your current website? What is the role of mobile in their life?
Once you have a handle on customer needs, you should also evaluate how your competitors address your target needs. Look for whitespace and seize upon it for a competitive advantage or point of difference.
Most importantly, focus on digital strategies that will impact the kinds of behavior that you need to meet your business objective.
Filter your strategies and tactics.
Choose a path that makes the most sense for your business and for your customer. I recommend the following simple exercise for evaluating options.
Create a matrix with an X- and a Y-axis. The X-axis could be “Meets the needs of the business.” Then evaluate each tactic by answering a series of questions. For the X-axis:
- What impact will this have on the overall business objective?
- What resources will this require, internally and externally, and will it impact other activities or initiatives?
- Are there any organizational barriers that will impede implementation?
- Is this fast and easy to implement, or slow and hard?
On the Y-axis, ask the following types of questions about your core target.
- Does this address a desired need or want?
- Is this the most effective option for influencing the desired behavior?
- Has the target adopted this type of behavior or is this still an emerging trend?
- Is this the simplest way to influence the desired behavior?
- Will this contribute to the overall brand experience and align to the brand personality?
Create a scoring system, and plot your results. There is no right or wrong answer, unless you have the data to help you answer the questions. But it will help you evaluate and compare your choices. And in this complex digital age, we all need all of the help we can get.
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