4 Objectives
This stage of the planning process focusses on the objectives of your strategy. Without objectives, there’s no way of gauging the success of your strategy.
You might have different objectives for different stages of the online customer lifecycle. So, for example, you could write objectives relating to brand awareness, lead generation, acquisition, conversion, engagement and retention.
However, for your objectives to be of any real use, they need to be SMART:
- Specific – are you focusing on something very specific
- Measurable – how will you assess the performance (e.g. quantitative or qualitative measures)
- Actionable – will it help improve performance if achieved
- Relevant – is the issue relevant to the digital marketing team
- Time-bound – have you specified the time period
Here are a few examples of SMART objectives…
Acquisition Objective: Over the next 12 months, use content strategy to increase monthly site visits by 20%, and acheive a 5% increase in newsletter sign-ups by visitors.
Conversion Objective: During the first quarter, nurture leads through email and social-media in order to convert 100 online enrolments.
Retention Objective: At the end of each course, use surveys to engage with completed students and encourage at least ten to complete a Facebook review within three months of their completion date.
These examples are specific, measurable, actionable, relevant and time-bound.
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