Assessing Digital Marketing Effectiveness

Project Report
on
An Assessment Framwork for Strategic Digital
Marketing Effectiveness
Prepared by
Name: Saurabh Kaushik
An Assessment Framework for Strategic Digital Marketing Effectiveness
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Table of Contents
Problem Definition: ...............................................................................................................................4
Coverage of industry & company .........................................................................................................4
Research Design.....................................................................................................................................5
Research Methodology ..........................................................................................................................7
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Executive Summary
The purpose of this project is to propose and test an assessment framework to analyze an organization's
Digital Marketing Strategies and its effectiveness using a Digital Marketing Consulting model. This
consulting model is based on a comprehensive Digital Marketing Strategy Framework and Planning process
to map an organization’s Digital journey.
To test this framework, an online survey and consulting exercise with an organization have been conducted
to gather market data and analyze it on Strategic Digital Marketing parameters of KPI and ROI. It was
observed; most companies are effective at reaching and engaging their digital customer base but fail to
convert and nurture them for long-term profitable relationship. The analysis and outcome from this
assessment framework allow upper management to have Dashboard view of their Digital Marketing
performance as well as enable them to take any required course correction on their current Digital Strategies.
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Chapter 1: Introduction:
Problem Definition:
Today, most organization has explicit or implicit Digital Marketing strategies and they have been using all
the possible and available channels. Belief is that, if an organization is communicating on all channels and
getting traffic to their websites, it is good enough. But this may not be all.
Also, these organization are very good with optimizing their operations and financial, but when it comes
does to their Digital Campaign, they might not have proper measurable criteria as they might have
understood Digital customer and its life-cycle.
And most important, organizations are always looking for most effective way in utilizing every dollar spent.
In Marketing, ROI is most challenged topic as marketing objective are long terms. It became imperative for
organization to track their Digital Marketing spend more precisely. Digital Marketing is not a Silver Bullet
for all kind of organization’s marketing strategy. Few channels works best for one organization and other
may not be. It is important for an organization to know, what right combination is and what best Return on
their Investment are.
Coverage of industry & company
Digital has touched every aspect of our life across the world. Today, every business all over world has their
websites and their Facebook pages, where they are communicating and promoting their brands. So, this
Strategic Digital Marketing Framework and its assessment tools are applicable for any organization that has
any Digital presence. E.g. Website, Facebook & Google Plus pages, twitter feeds, etc.
About Organization Chosen for Consulting Assessment:
Following organization was chosen for Digital Marketing’s Consulting Assessment.
 Name of Organization – <Confidential Data has been removed>
 Brief Description – <Confidential Data has been removed>
 Digital Marketing Needs – <Confidential Data has been removed>
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Chapter 2: Methodology:
To conduct Analysis of Strategic Digital Marketing, following two methodologies have been adopted in this
project.
 Assessment Survey – To understand and analyze a group of organizations on their Strategic and KPI
aspects.
 Consulting Assessment – To understand and analyze an organization on individual basis on their
Strategic, KPI and ROI aspects.
Research Design
Type of Market Research:
 Type of Market Research carried out was Descriptive in nature. Descritive research is a structured data
collection technique that provides detailed, factual information that's useful in decision-making.
Objectives of this research is understand current landscape of an orgniazation's Digital Marketing
Strategies and provide them useful suggestions to improve it.
Type of Data Collection:
 For this research, only Primary Data has been collected.
Type of Questionnaire:
Following were Evaluation Criteria for Questionnaire for this research.
 Accuracy – High
 Cost – Low
 Time – Less
 Respondent Convince – High
Following are Determinants of this Marketing Research.
 Degree of Finality of Research
 Respondent Ability to Answer Direct Questions
Based on above Criteria and Determinants, following type of questionnaire is best suited for this research.
 Structured Type
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 Non-Disguised type
Types of Assessments
Following three types of Digital Marketing Assessments are conducted with participants.
Digital Marketing – Strategic Assessment
Consulting Assessment is a set of questionnaire based on Strategic Digital Marketing Framework. This helps
an organization to know their stage and status in Strategic Digital Marketing Journey. This will also enable
them to take further corrective action on their future Digital Marketing Strategies.
This will be carried out as Online Survey based on Structured & Non-disguised Survey Questionnaire.
Type of
Data
Source of Data Adopted Method Sample Techniques Sample
Size
Strategic
Assessment
Primary Linkedin
Contacts
Online Questionair
Survey
Non-probabilistic
Sampling
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Digital Marketing – Key Performance Indicators (KPI) Assessment
KPI Assessment is a set of questionnaire based on KPI defined for each strategy from Digital Marketing
Framework. This helps an organization to know their current performance level of their present Digital
Marketing strategy. This will also enable them to take further corrective action on their future Digital
Marketing Strategies.
This will be carried out as Online Survey based on Structured & Non-disguised Survey Questionnaire.
Type of
Data
Size
KPI
Assessment
Primary Linkedin
Contacts
Online Questionair
Survey
Non-probabilistic
Sampling
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Digital Marketing – Return on Investment (ROI) Assessment
ROI Assessment is Form Based financial data gathering tool based on Digital Marketing Channels. This
helps an organization to know their current Return on Investment on different digital marketing channels.
This will also enable them to take further corrective action on their future Digital Marketing Strategies.
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This will be carried out on individual basis with a selected organization’s representative. This will have both
Survey Questionnaire and Quantitative Questions.
Type of
Data
Size
ROI
Assessment
Primary Direct Personal
Contacts
Telephonic
Questionair Survey
Non-probabilistic
Sampling
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Limitations:
 Due to short project duration, could not reach out large organizations for better and relevant data
collection.
 Online data is collected with assumption about their real identity on Linkedin (Professional Network
Site) and provided inputs in survey.
Research Methodology
Strategic Digital Marketing – Introduction
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Introduction to Digital Marketing
By Definition "Digital marketing is the use of internet connected devices to engage a customer with online
advertising in order to promote products and services. Internet connected devices are those such as web
browsers, smart phones and game consoles. As technology develops more devices become able of internet
browsing and the digital marketing potential that comes with it."
A digital marketing strategy is a channel strategy which means that it should…
 Be informed by research into customer channel behaviour and marketplace activity = intermediaries,
publishers and competitors
 Based on objectives for future online and offline channel contribution %
 Define and communicate the differentials of the channel to encourage customers to use it,
 BUT, need to manage channel integration
So put another way, digital marketing strategy defines how organizations should:
 Hit our channel leads & sales targets
 Budgets for Acquisition, Conversion, Retention & Growth, Service
 Communicate benefits of using this channel to enhance brand
 Prioritise audiences targeted through channel
 Prioritise products available through channel
Types of Digital Marketing:
Two different forms of digital marketing exists:
 Pull digital marketing in which the consumer must actively seek the marketing content often via web
searches or the recipient has given permission to receive content that is sent to the consumer by
email, text message and web feed.
 Push digital marketing technologies in which the marketer sends a message without the consent of
the recipients, such as display advertising on websites and news blogs.
Success Factor for Digital Marketing:
An effective digital strategy will help in taking the right decisions to make an organization successful online.
A strategy process model provides a framework that gives a logical sequence to follow to ensure inclusion of
all key activities of strategy development and implementation.
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In this project, a 5 phase planning approach has been adopted.
Digital Strategy:
In the fields of strategic management, marketing strategy and business strategy, digital strategy is the process
of specifying an organization's vision, goals, opportunities and initiatives in order to maximize the business
benefits of digital initiatives to the organization. These can range from an enterprise focus, which considers
the broader opportunities and risks that digital potentially creates (e.g., changes in the publishing industry)
and often includes customer intelligence, collaboration, new product/market exploration, sales and service
optimization, enterprise technology architectures and processes, innovation and governance; to more
marketing and customer-focused efforts such as web sites, mobile, eCommerce, social, site and search engine
optimization, and advertising.
There are numerous approaches to conducting digital strategy, but at their core, all go through four steps:
1. Identifying the opportunities and/or challenges in a business where online assets can provide a
solution
2. Identifying the unmet needs and goals of the customers that most closely align with those key
business opportunities and/or challenges
3. Developing a vision around how the online assets will fulfill those business and customer needs,
goals, opportunities and challenges.
4. Prioritizing a set of online initiatives which can deliver on this vision.
Within each of those stages, a number of techniques and analyses may be employed.
Digital Marketing Channels:
Digital marketing is done via multiple marketing channels with multiple methods within each. Following is a
simplified channel map.
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Channels Selection is not “One Size Fit All” process. Organization should carefully select channel to their
needs. After selecting a set of channel, it should also monitor its performance. Most marketer associate RPI
measurement criteria for each channel usage and review their strategies based on performance.
Following is short description of these channels and its methods.
Channels Channel
Methods
Description
Advertising
Channel
Online Ad buys Ad buys are display ad formats such as banners and skyscrapers
with placements bought on specific sites.
Google AdWord, Facebook Ads
Ad network These are blind networks where ads are not placed on specific sites
but to target an audience. Lower CPM than Ad buys, may have
CPC options.
Search
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Channel
Paid search
Pay Per Click e.g. Google Adwords. Calculated based on CPC in
combination with budget total to give the number of visits.
Natural search This delivered through SEO. It is here calculated on a similar basis
to Paid search.
Partners
Channel
Affiliates
These are cost per action. They are calculated by working back
from the the number of sales based on the cost per sale and
investment in this channel.
Aggregators
Aggregators are comparison sites. They are calculated in a similar
way to affiliates. Some aggregators will also offer CPM or CPC
deals which will need to be treated separately.
Sponsorships
Sponsorship is a fixed amount based on the percentage of budget
and estimate of the reach of a period.
E-mail lists
Email lists are typically purchased on a cost per thousand basis
often as part of an ad buy. Ads in 3rd party enewsletters or co-
branded emails are other options in addition to rented lists.
Online PR
Online PR is typically done via Blog Expert and News Sites.
Internal
online media
Channel
In-house e-mail
list/Ddirect Mail
M
This is ogranization's own email database which they may have
built over a period of time being in business.
Own-site ads
(other footfall)
This is their own website ads.
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Digital Marketing – Consulting Model
Digital Consulting - Overview
Considering complex nature of Digital Marketing and its custom nature for each business, it opens a large
field for expertise and consultation. Digital Marketing Consulting is turning out to be a niche area for many
marketing professionals.
There is huge need to create a credible plan to take advantage of digital channels to markets. Marketing
Consultant works with organization to develop and refine their digital marketing plans starting with a review
of their current digital marketing capabilities within their marketplace and then creation of a prioritised
roadmap of strategic initiatives. Organizations often ask consultants to focus advice on their main strategic
challenge such as growing sales through improving traffic quality, increasing conversion or engaging
existing customers more effectively.
Digital Consulting - Objectives
This consulting process brings following benefits to an Organization’s Digital Marketing Planning and its
effectiveness.
 Results-oriented
 Helps to prioritise recommendations according to their potential value and ease of
implementation allowing quick wins initially and leading a roadmap of future strategic priorities.
 Insight-based
 Based on data analysis, it should identify quick wins based on insights from a range of specialist
digital marketing sources including market analysis, customer data, campaign data and web
analytics.
 Process-based
 To facilitate easy implementation, it should offer detailed checklists for benchmarking different
E-marketing tactics like search marketing and email.
 Integrated
 To offer expertize in integrated communications approach of digital marketing from strategy
development through to detailed knowledge of best practice in the most important tactics
including search engine marketing, social media email marketing, web site design and web
analytics.
Digital Consulting – Model
This consulting model has three components.
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 Digital Marketing - Strategy Framework
 Digital Marketing - Planning Process
 Digital Marketing – Assessment Methodology
Both of these are detailed in following sections.
Digital Marketing - Strategy Framework
Question - “How to grow Digital business?”
Just like any other Marketing Framework, Digital Marketing framework takes holistic approach to address
Marketing for a business. This framework is designed to answer following question by every business.
Strategy Framework – Objectives
The objective of this framework is to:
 This framework should be a simpler framework to help small and large businesses alike takes advantage
of the opportunities available from digital marketing. This framework should provide a structure to help
understand, review and prioritise options for better results.
 This framework should be a practical framework to help manage and improve results from digital
marketing. Ultimately it’s about using best practice web analytic techniques to get more commercial
value from investments in digital marketing. This is to simplify general approach to reviewing the
performance of online marketing and taking actions to improve its effectiveness.
 This framework should be based on KPI for each of the Critical phase to help review performance and
identify problem areas.
 This framework should have Social built into it at each step of process. The popularity of participation
in social media with web users means that how to reach, interact, convert and maintain ongoing
engagement of customers through social networks is vital to the success of a brand.
 This framework should have integration of all the Marketing Channel online as well as offline. Digital
channels always work best when they’re integrated with other channels, so digital channels should be
combined with the traditional offline media and channels.
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RECN - Strategic Digital Marketing Framework
RECN is acronym for Reach, Engage, Convert and Nurture. These are four strategic phases an organization
goes through in their Digital journey. This is designed to keep digital customer lifecycle in mind.
To bring digital customer lifecycle in context, organization first starts using traditional media to raise aware-
ness of the value of the online presences and drive visitors to the website(s) at the Reach and engage stages.
Second, at the Convert and Nurture steps stage customers may prefer to interact with customer representat-
ives as part of the buying or customer service process.
Following table gives specific objectives to each one of these strategic phases.
Strategic Phases Objective
Reach Build awareness on offline media and other sites to drive Web presence
Engage Engage and encourage audience to interact with brand on its websites or other online
presence
Convert Achieve conversion to marketing goals such as leads/sales, fans in online as well as
offline
Nurture Nurture and build customer and fan relationships through time to achieve retention
goals
Following diagram shows RECN’s four strategic phases of Digital Marketing campaign, designed to help
organization engage their customers throughout the customer life-cycle.
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Strategy 1 – Reach
Reach means building awareness of a brand, its products and services on other websites and in offline media
in order to build traffic by driving visits to different web presences like organization’s main website,
microsites or social media sites.
Strategy 2 – Engage
Engage is about persuading site visitors or prospects take the next step on their journey when they initially
reach organization’s website or social network presence. It may mean finding out more about an organization
or it’s products, searching to find a product or reading a blog post. It’s about engaging the audience through
relevant, compelling content and clear navigation pathways so that they don’t hit the back button. The
bounce rates on many sites is greater than 50%, so getting the audience to act or participate is a major
challenge.
Strategy 3 - Convert
Conversion is where the visitor commits to form a relationship which will generate commercial value for the
business. It’s where marketing goals such as leads or sales on web presences and offline.
Strategy 4 – Nurture
This is long-term nurturing relationship, building customer relationships over time through multiple
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interactions using different paid, owned and earned media touch points like organization’s website, social
presence, email and direct interactions to boost customer lifetime value
Digital Marketing – Planning Process
Digital Marketing Planning Process (DMPP) is a planning model to act a guiding principal for Strategic
Digital Marketing Planning. It has Six Process Steps to ask Questions to complete cycle from Analysis to
Control.
This model can be used to review planning process and manage Digital Marketing. But at time, this model
can be too much burden to go through. There is flexibility to use its Micro version. It Micro version will
consist of first four steps including Situation Analysis, Objective Setting, Strategies and Tactics.
Situation Analysis
Question - Where are we now? How well are we using digital media now?
This stage covers the relevant background information necessary for plans to be formulated and decisions to
be made. It includes detailed analyses of the current market situation, the organization's existing
products/services situation, the competitive situation and the SWOT analysis. The outcome of the current
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situation analysis and the SWOT analysis in particular provides a foundation for the next stage in the
process.
Following activities can be carried out in this phase.
 Marketing Audit
 Goal Performance (5S Objectives)
 The environmental analysis
 Brand Perception
 Internal Capability and Resources
 Customer research & analysis
 Planning Research Approach for Digital channels
 Customer Insight
 Competitor analysis & benchmarking
 Partner analysis
 SWOT analysis
Digital SWOT - Analysis and Strategy:
SWOT analysis helps to get a better understanding of the strategic choices an organization faces. It helps to
ask, and answer, the following questions: How does a organization:
 Make the most of its strengths?
 Circumvent its weaknesses?
 Capitalize on its opportunities?
 Manage its threats?
A SWOT analysis is an essential part of any business or marketing plan. It allows an organization to create a
plan of action based not on what they are interested in doing or on their gut-feel, but what they need to do
given the situation in the marketplace. It considers their capabilities for marketing against competitors plus
looks at opportunities created as new technologies are introduced.
When creating a digital marketing plan, SWOT analysis is also an essential step. But, it’s sometimes seen as
an academic exercise and there’s the feeling that the time should be spent on improving the execution of the
tactics like email or search marketing or improving the site, but the SWOT analysis will give organization
the strategic view of the main opportunities and challenges available from online marketing. The high-level
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view will help this organization see the most important issues which need to be managed for their online
success.
The Internet and other digital technology offer new opportunities and threats, so creating a SWOT specific to
the Internet is important to help meet this challenge.
The Orgnization Strength – S
1. Existing Brand
2. Existing Customer Base
3. Existing Distribution
Weakness – W
1. Brand Perception
2. Intermediatory Use
3. Technology / Skills
4. Cross -Channel Support
5. Churn Rate
Opportunity – O
1. Cross Selling
2. New Market
3. New Service
4. Alliance / Co-branding
SO Strategy
Leverage Strength to Maximize
Opportunity = Attacking Strategy
WO Strategy
Counter Weakness by Exploiting
Opportunity = Building Strength by
Attacking Strategy
Thread – T
1. Customer Choice
2. New Entrant
3. Competitive Product
4. Channals Conflicts
5. Social Networks
ST Strategy
Leverage Strenght to Minimize
Threat = Defensive Strategy
WT Strategy
Counter Weakness and Threat =
Building Strength by Defensive
Strategy
Digital SWOT Strategies:
Once an organization identifies its place in SWOT quadrant, it can choose its strategy accordingly. Following
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are four Digital SWOT strategies.
 Strengths and Opportunities (SO) – How to use strengths to take advantage of these opportunities?
Example:
 Migrate Customers to Web Strategy
 Refine Customer contact Strategy across lifecycle or commitment segmentation (Email/Web)
 Partnership Strategy (Cobranding and Linking)
 Launch new Web-based product and Value Adding Services. E.g. Video Streaming, Comparisions,
etc.
 Strengths and Threats (ST) – How to take advantage of strengths to avoid real and potential threats?
Example:
 Introduce New Internet Only Product/Services
 Add Value to Web Services (Refine OVP)
 Partner With Complementory Brand
 Create Own Social Network / Customer Reviews
 Weaknesses and Opportunities (WO) – How to use opportunities to overcome the current weaknesses?
Example:
 Countermediation Strategy (Create/Aquire)
 Search Market Mediation Strategy
 Affiliate Based Aquisition Strategy
 Refine Customer Contact Strategy (Email/Web)
 Weaknesses and Threats (WT) – How to minimize weaknesses and avoid threats? Example
 Differential Online Pricing Strategy
 Aquire/Create Pure-Play Organization with Low-Cost base
 Customer Engagement to Increcrese Conversion, Average Order Value and Lifetime value
 Online Reputation Management Strategy /E-PR
Objective Setting:
Question - Where do we want to be? Which goals and KPIs should we use?
At this stage, marketing managers are fully aware of the factors in the organization's current situation which
will influence its marketing activity so will look at corporate objectives in the light of this information to
develop marketing objectives and evaluate strategic alternatives.
 Objective Setting Process
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 Defining 5Se Objectives for Digital Marketing
 Defining Key Performance Indicators (KPI) for marketing campaign
 Calculating Return on Investment (ROI) on Marketing budget
Objective Setting - Process:
In order to define Digital Marketing Goals for organization, following process needs to be followed.
 Vision and Mission setting
o Moving to the new digital world doesn’t happen over night; the change is too big. So
organization needs a long-term vision to help explain this required transformation.
 Goal setting and evaluation
o Setting the right goals for digital marketing isn’t so easy, but this RECN framework should
help organization select the right goals.
 Google Analytics
o Google Analytics is a fantastic tool, but to get the most from it and so get more commercial
value from Digital marketing needs careful setup.
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 Managing digital marketing
o Managing digital marketing will often need new skills, new staff, new technologies and new
processes for marketing. It’s a big change! Marketer need to look at digital marketing
governance the – best way to structure teams and update processes in larger organization.
Bigger the organization, bigger the change.
Key Performance Indicators for Digital Marketing
Following is detailed description for each of the KPI attributes.
Strategy
Stage
KPI Definition
Reach Unique Fans and
Visitors
 First, it is important to know total count of unique visitors on all
digital hubs.
 Second to it, to have good understanding of all the fan, which can
be considered as registered users/customers.
Audience Share  Identify segment and find out total number of audience in that
market. Having understood total size of audience, now find out
percentage of audience share for organization’s digital presence.
Revenue/sales per
Visit
 Need to find current rate of total revenue/sales divided by total
number of visits.
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Engage Bounce Rate  The percentage of visitors who leave immediately after viewing
only one page.
 This need to be reduced as much possible by improving
presentation and attractiveness of landing pages.
Pages per Visit
(PPV)
 Pages viewed divided by the number of visits. The total number of
page views divided by the total number of visits during the same
timeframe.
 Page Views / Visits = Average Page Views per Visit
Product Page
Conversion
 There are many ways to define product conversion rate.
 When customer reviews page views on a site, product and service
pages are often those with the highest total page views. These
visitors are also showing great levels of intent, so improving the
experience here can reap benefits.
Convert Conversion Rates  It is the percentage of visits to site that result in a “conversion”.
Mostly, a conversion is either a sale, or a lead of some kind,
typically related to the number of visits or sessions:
 Conversion Rate = Number of Sales / Number of Visits
 In other words, if a store is visited 100 times & 5 of those visits
ends in a sale, there is a 5% conversion rate.
Lead and Sales  Total number of leads and sales generated within a period.
Profits and Margin  A ratio of profitability calculated as net income divided by
revenues, or net profits divided by sales. It measures how much
out of every dollar of sales an organization actually keeps in
earnings.
Nurture % Active Hurdle
Rate
 The hurdle rate for engagement is simply the percentage of
customers who perform an activity, they have jumped over the
hurdle set target.
 The proportion of customers that fall within a particular level of
activity or engagement with a brand typically within a time period.
This is usually expressed as a target percentage and the number
who have achieved it.
 For example, the percentage of members of an email list that click
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on the email within a 90 day period, or the number of customers
that have made a second purchase.
Fan Engagement  This is to measure Fan activity on orgnization’s digital presence. In
social, it could be counted no of likes and comments on
organization social page.
Repeat Conversion  Repeated interactions that strengthen the emotional, psychological
or physical investment a customer has in a brand
 Customer engagement places the strategic emphasis on the creation
of valuable relationships and encourages both parties to see mutual
advantage in that relationship. Frequently this will mean that
tactics require a multi-channel approach incorporating the best of
digital and traditional media. There is a ability to effective blend
media in its type,quantity and timing (known as Right-touching) as
one of the key challenges for those interested in engagement in the
coming years.
Return on Investment (ROI) for Digital Marketing
Measuring a return on marketing investment starts with this assumption: The realized profit from the sale of
goods and services cannot be less than the cost of the marketing phases of reach, engage and convince.
The actual calculation of Marketing ROI is a percentage using this formula:
(Profit from all sales – Cost of marketing) / Cost of Marketing
A marketing ROI calculation can be used to
 Show how effective investment in digital marketing programs have been (looking backwards)
 Decide which marketing programs are the most successful (deciding what to keep and what to cut)
 Justify an expenditure on a new marketing program (deciding what to switch to or start)
It sounds so simple but ROI calculations get really complicated with factors like:
 Lifetime value of a customer: Marketing is about making friends for life, customers who keep buying
over and over again. Any calculation of ROI should take into account profits on all sales to all
customers.
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 Customer Acquisition Rates: Predicting number of customers for next year and the year after as a result
of on-line marketing outreach efforts is also tricky. Need to step back to think about number of customer
to get permission from to grow relationship with them.
 Cost of Marketing: Need to add up all the associated marketing costs from all running programs
including software products and people services.
In Digital Marketing, Clicks are considered to be one of the most important measure for tracking a users
interests in a organizations.
Following cost types are widely used terminologies for ROI purpose.
 CPM – Cost Per Thousand Impressions served
 CPC – Cost Per Click
 CPS – Cost Per Sale
 Fixed – A Fixed Cost for any Channel
Digital Marketer needs to plan their channel strategies based on ROI from each channel. Each Digital
Marketing channels can be assigned with a Cost Type.
Channels Methods Type
Advertising Channel
Online Ad buys CPM
Ad network CPC
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Search Channel Paid search
CPC
Natural search Fixed
Partners Channel Affiliates
CPS
Aggregators
CPS
Sponsorships
Fixed
E-mail lists
CPM
Online PR
Fixed
Internal online media Channel In-house e-mail list/Direct Mail list
NA
Own-site ads (other footfall)
NA
Strategies:
Question - How can we achieve our goals? How do we get there?
Strategy is based on the idea of a game plan, as in chess, or in military strategy. Thus, marketing strategy sets
down the game plan by which the objectives are to be achieved. Each objective should be viewed very
closely and strategic alternatives drawn up. For example, a desired increase in sales revenue from a particular
service could be achieved in a number of different ways; by greater market penetration, for example, or by
enhancing the service offering and charging a higher price.
Strategic options should be carefully evaluated for each objective and the best possible course(s) of action
selected in each case. The next step is therefore to establish plans of action for each selected strategy.
 Customer segmentation and targeting
 Digital marketing strategy can start with the different types of targeted customers and markets.
 Brand development
 Online media and digital technologies can be used to bring different perspective about brand.
 Content marketing strategy
 With the increasing importance of content to commercial viability, content is not something to
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leave to an intern; it needs a strategy to ensure it really supports marketing.
 Integrated marketing communications
 Research always shows that 1+1 = 3 when incorporating more marketing channels into a
campaign.
 Defining and Designing Online Value Proposition (OVP)
 The online value proposition is customer value proposition. It’s important to clearly communicate
its online experiences and content brand on each site, app and social presence.
 Tactics:
Question - Which digital marketing activities do we optimize? how exactly do we get there? What Happen
When?
As for the base model, this is simply working out the details of the strategy. Exactly what types of data are to
be collected and analyzed?
Following tactics can be adopted based on Strategic phases and ground situation.
Reach Tactics:
 Search engine optimisation (SEO)
o Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is arguably THE most cost-effective digital marketing
technique, but also the most challenging to get right.
 Paid search marketing (PPC)
o Paid search marketing opportunities includes Pay Per Click Ads via Google and Bing plus ads on
the display network – a third of Google’s revenue.
 Affiliate marketing
o Affiliate marketing is still an essential digital media channel for many transactional Ecommerce
sites for retailers, travel and financial services. Affiliate marketing is also a revenue model to
consider for site owners, especially online publishers.
 Internet advertising
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o Internet advertising is about display advertising, still more commonly known as banner ads.
 Online PR
o Online PR is one of the most cost-effective marketing approaches for all types of business.
 Social media marketing
o Social media marketing is to navigate social media with a strategic approach from the leading
commentators and organizations.
Engage Tactics:
 Home page optimisation
o The home page gets too much attention since it’s not always the main entry point for the site.
Still, for most sites it is the page which is viewed the most so it warrants improvement to get the
the right messages across and get the visitor on the right journey.
 Landing page optimisation
o First impressions count even more online, so landing page optimisation is often a good starting
point for conversion rate optimisation.
 AB and multivariate testing
o Best practice in creating structured experiments to improve page designs by varying different
elements and comparing against an original.
Convert Tactics:
 Conversion optimisation
o Conversion rate optimisation (CRO) isn’t only important for Ecommerce and transactional sites.
Every site should have conversion paths to marketing outcomes which contribute to the business.
 Ecommerce
o Our content on Ecommerce focuses on techniques to increased sales from a range of
transactional Ecommerce sites including retail (of course), travel and financial services.
27

 Lead generation
o Online lead generation creates new selling opportunities by converting site visitors to prospects.
Prospects are classically qualified through completing a profile form and then tailored
communications delivered.
Nurture Tactics:
 Content marketing strategy
o With the increasing importance of content to commercial viability, content is not something to
leave to an intern; it needs a strategy to ensure it really supports marketing.
 Enewsletter marketing
o Enewsletters are a key customer communications tool for most organizations even with social
media marketing.
 Email communications strategy
o Success with email marketing involves integrating all the main activities into email
communication.
 Customer service and support
o Online is often the first place customers look for support now and often it’s not the organization
website, instead it’s Twitter or a specialist support site like Get Satisfaction.
 Mobile marketing
o Mobile marketing is massive already and forecast to exceed desktop Internet access in many
developing countries.
 Social CRM
o Given the power of social media marketing, many larger organizations are creating Social CRM
programmes to achieve the transformation needed to make social media interactions effective.
Implementation
Question - What is our plan? Who does what and When?
28

This stage is concerned with the operationalization of marketing strategy. The strategy defines the broad
areas of marketing activity which must be undertaken to enable the organisation to meet its marketing
objectives. These must be translated into programmes of action to be carried out by the various functions
within marketing.
 Designing action programmes
 Acquiring Internal Resouces and Skills
 Building Structure and assigning Responsibility for their execution
 Costing the programmes
 Managing External Agencies
Control
Question - Did to get there? How to monitor Performance?
The last stage in the digital marketing planning process sets in place control techniques for monitoring the
plan's performance. Usually this entails a systematic review of all aspects of the plan against targets set,
usually on a monthly or quarterly basis. The review must be carried out regularly to ensure prompt attention
and action in areas when the results lag behind targets set. Managers and others responsible for
implementation of all elements of the action programme should be involved in the monitoring process.
Control mechanisms should be in place based on the components identified below:
 Establishing required performance targets
 5Se + Web Analystics - KPI
 Monitoring performance against targets
 Usability Testing and Mystery Shoper
 Site Visitor Profiling
 Customer Satisfaction Survey
 Process of Reporting and Action
 Frequency of Reporting
 Designing corrective courses of action where required
 Contingency planning
29

Digital Marketing – Strategic Consulting Matrix
Situation
Analysis
Objective
Setting
Strategies Tactics Implement Control
Reach Analyzing
awareness of
brand and
customer base
Goal setting to
build brand
and increase
customer base
Defining
Strategies to
build brand
and improve
customer
reach
Selecting
different
tactics to
build better
brand
awareness
and customer
reach.
Implement
Strategies &
Tactics into
actions to
reach
customers
and build
brand.
Monitor and
Control KPI
( Unique Fans
and Visitors,
Audience
Share,
Revenue/sales
per Visit)
Engage Analyzing
present
activities with
customer
interactions
and gaps
Goal setting to
develop more
interaction
with
Brand/Sites
Defining
Strategies to
persuade
more visitors
to take next
steps.
Selecting
different
tactics to
drive deeper
interaction
with digital
presence.
Implement
Strategies &
Tactics into
actions to
increase
interaction
with digital
presence.
Monitor and
Control KPI
(Bounce Rate,
Pages per Visit,
Product Page
Conversion)
Convert Analyzing
Current
Conversion
rate and issues
Goal Setting
with improved
targets for
Conversion
Defining
Strategies to
encourage
customer to
generate
commercial
value
Selecting
different
tactics to
convert leads
into Sales
and build
revenue.
Implement
Strategies &
Tactics into
actions to
convert
leads into
sales.
Monitor and
Control KPI
Conversion
Rates, Lead and
Sales, Profits
and Margin)
Nurture Analyzing
present
customer
engagement
strategies and
results
Goal Setting
to improve
Customer
Engagement
Defining
Strategies to
develop long
term
relationship
with
customers.
Selecting
different
tactics to
build and
retain
relationships
with
customers.
Implement
Strategies &
Tactics into
actions to
engage
customer on
routine
basis.
Monitor and
Control KPI (%
Active Hurdle
Rate, Fan
Engagement,
Repeat
Conversion)
30

Digital Marketing – Assessment Methodology
Assessment methodology is design to understand organization current Digital Marketing landscape and
analyze to improve it. This methodology will have three phases.
 Consultation – In this phase, interview sessions are organized with organization’s digital marketing
representative to understand organization profile, its objective, current digital strategies and its issues.
 Assessment – In this phase, questionnaire based survey/interviews are organized to understand
organization’s Strategic nature, KPI and Return on Investment.
 Analysis – In this phase, analysis are carried out based on earlier phase and reports and
recommendations are presented to organization management.
Strategic Assessment – Survey Questionnaire
Based on RECN Strategic framework, Survey Questionnaire has been categorized into five phases – Plan,
Reach, Engage and Nurture.
Strategic Assessment is point based and grades each assessment for each organization. These assigned grades
can be described in a given Grading and Description table.
Key Performance Indicators (KPI) – Survey Questionnaire
Based on KPI attributes defined Planning Process – Objective Setting section, Survey questionnaire has been
31

designed.
Return on Investment (ROI) Assessment
This ROI assessment is based on Digital Channel definitions in Digital Marketing channel section. ROI
calculation is done for each of those channel and analyzed in comparison.
Following is the process to arrive on ROI value for each of the Digital Channel.
S No. ROI Calculation Process Cost Breakup
1 Media costs  Setup / Creative / Mgt Costs
 Cost Per Thousand Impression (CPM)
 Cost Per Click (CPC)
 Media costs
 Total cost : Setup & Media
 Budget %
32

2 Media Impressions & Response  Impressions or names
 Click Through Rate (CTR)
 Licks or site visits
3 Conversion to Opportunity (Lead)  Conversion rate to opportunity
 Number of opportunities
 Cost per opportunity
4 Conversion to Sales  Conversion rate to sale
 Number of sales
 % of Sales
 Cost per sale (CPA)
5 Revenue  Total revenue
6 Costs  Cost of goods sold
 Media costs
 Total costs (Inc media)
7 Profitability  Profit
 Return on Investment
33

Chapter 3: Data Analysis
<Confidential Data has been removed>
34

Chapter 4: Findings
35

Chapter 5: Recommendations
36

Chapter 6: Conclusions
With lines blurring between traditional and digital marketing vehicles, how consumers shop, socialize, and
absorb content is rapidly changing. Consequently, driving brand engagement and loyalty by weaving a
conversation with customers, across multiple touchpoints, throughout the decision-making cycle is critical.
Brand building is no longer solely driven by paid advertising, but also by leveraging the digital marketplace
and providing consumers with two-way, real-time feedback.
Digital marketing has evolved from primarily using Google for promotion and sales-based activity into a
highly creative platform that drives brand engagement through social media, such as Facebook, blogs and
mobile apps. Since most marketers tend to be brand, digital, or loyalty experts, those who can figure out how
to build and execute integrated brand strategies in this complex, new world by employing both analytical and
innovative thinking will be in extremely high demand.
37

Chapter 7: Learning Outcomes
Designed Strategic Digital Marketing Model has proven to address most aspects of Digital landscape of an
organization. This model was able to embrace full customer lifecycle journey for a brand of an organization.
This model was able to address all the digital channels of communication and bring out an integrated
marketing communication (IMC) for all digital frontiers.
Digital Marketing Assessment framework was model could comprehensively analyze Key Performance
Indicators (KPI) of all digital aspects from Website to Social Network. It was able to give a Dashboard
assessment for upper management of its organizations performance on different aspects of digital strategies.
Digital Marketing Return on Investment (ROI) methodology was able to capture all the investment on
different digital channel and could give ROI figures to allow upper management to take decisions on digital
strategies.
Learning outcome of this project approves the designed assessment framework for Digital Marketing
Strategies.
This project lay the fondation of ongoing work in this direction. Initial plan was to cover full rang of
consulting aspect of Digital Marketing. But due to time constraint and part-time nature, this project could
address only a limited scope than actual desired depth level of subject. To take this research further, other
enthusiastic marketing students can pick up threads from here on and attempt to enrich this methodology and
framework to make it more comprehansive, practical and useful.
38

References
 RECN Inspiration:
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REAN
 http://www.blackbeak.com/2008/01/29/measuring-online-engagement-re-visited-and-
introducing-the-rean-model/
 http://www.blackbeak.com/2008/11/30/mobile-analytics-and-multi-channel-measurement/
 http://www.knockknockwebanalytics.com/marketing.php
 Others Calculation
 http://blog.webanalyticsdemystified.com/weblog/2007/10/how-to-measure-visitor-
engagement-redux.html
 SWOT/TOWS Analysis
 http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newSTR_89.htm
 Consulting Model
 http://jclarkconsultinggroup.com/?page_id=138
 Digital Marketing Strategies
 http://www.webanalyticsworld.net/2011/06/digital-marketing-strategy.html
39

Annexure:
40

Assessing Digital Marketing Effectiveness

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