Be Proactive: Get Ahead Of The New Year

When do you normally start to think of your New Year’s resolutions? A month before the new year? A week? The first time someone asks you about them? Maybe as you are counting down the clock till midnight? Not at all?

If you don’t make resolutions you might want to start.

Research has found that people who make resolutions are 10 times more likely to achieve their goals than people who don’t make concrete resolutions.

And if you do make resolutions?

You might want to get a head start.

Think of it this way: When everybody else is starting, you’ll already have results.

Applying that concept to digital marketing, there is no time like the present to start planning for the new year.

If you get some standard things rolling before new year comes around, then that only leaves more time to go the extra mile in other aspects of your digital marketing strategy. Or at least prevent you from being spread thin with too many tasks.

Here are some things we suggest you be proactive about, not January 1–now.

SET BUSINESS GOALS WITH A PLAN

Fitting with the theme of resolutions, setting goals is a fantastic thing to do before the new year.

To do this, you will of course have to first have a look back at your previous year of digital marketing. Look at your previous goals and the numbers and tactics linked to those objectives. You need to find out what was working and what needs improvement, or to be ditched altogether.

Based off of those numbers and what targets are being reached, think about your next year’s goals.

Use SMART goals and avoid generalizations.

I want to lose 10 pounds by going to the gym three times a week > I want to exercise more. Now in digital marketing terms; We want to get our Instagram following to 2000 people > We want to do better at social media marketing.

Write out your digital marketing goals.

This helps keep them in mind and keep everyone on the same page as you will be able to repeatedly use them. Studies have shown that people are 42% more likely to achieve their goals by writing them down. For a company, goals help to keep a team focused and unified.

Break your goals down.

Imagine you had a (slightly weird) goal to eat a whole pizza in 30 minutes. An extra large pizza. With mushrooms and sausage and peppers–the works. How are you going go about achieving your goal? You wouldn’t pick up a whole pizza and start biting into it (though I would love to see that). More likely, you would cut the pizza into pieces, and take it one slice at a time. Slices are much more manageable and measurable. Whether it’s eating a whole pizza in the break room or increasing your social media following, every digital marketing goal needs step-by-step plans in how to get there.

2018 will start on a much better note as you can approach your digital marketing team with “here are our goals and here is what we are already doing to work on them.” The alternative is standing in front of your team fidgeting and asking “anybody have any great ideas?”

CONTENT MARKETING

2017 was hopefully filled with a lot of great content leading to your business. 2018 should be the same. As will 2019, and the years to come. Fresh and relevant content is a year-after-year essential to getting leads and staying on top of your SEO game.

Therefore, you know 2018 will need a lot of content. If you aren’t swamped, you might as well get a head start. You can do this in three ways.

1. Create your content schedule.

Think about how often you will want to get content out during 2018. Once a week? Twice a week? Will you post daily on your social media accounts? Think about which seasons of the year you may want to post more frequently.

You don’t have to have every post planned out, but come up with a general markup. Then you can easily make future assignments and know when you will need to be coming up with new ideas.

2. Get writing, or working on videos, or whatever it is you do.

If you have a general schedule for your content, go ahead and start working on the first month or so of content you want out. Don’t forget to look back at worked well in 2017 and create content similar to your highest viewed posts.

3. Get the graphics.

Finally, you can work on appropriate graphics for your content. A blog post, for example, is greatly enhanced through a picture. Pictures can capture people’s attention immediately, while it may take paragraphs to grasp a reader’s attention.

The proactive won’t leave this step as an afterthought.

LEARN SOMETHING NEW

If you haven’t been keeping up with the latest digital marketing trends, take some time to do some research. It’ll help you know what your competition is up to, and what resources you have to get ahead of the game.

What can you do?

• Search the web
• Attend a digital marketing conference
• Join a relevant LinkedIn group
• Take a class in a niche marketing technique
• Talk to other digital marketing experts

Have fun and keep learning! 2018 is sure to bring new things to the digital marketing world. The sooner you know about them, the better.