6 Steps To Follow When You Start A New Digital Marketing Campaign

Executing well-planned digital marketing campaigns can do wonders for your business.

However, not every campaign is successful. 

For example, Dove launched limited edition shampoo bottles depicting different body shapes back in 2017. Despite all the efforts and clever marketing tactics, it backfired and caused a lot of chaos.

A backlash like this can impact a business's reputation and brand image, causing customers and prospects to doubt their brand loyalty and purchase decisions. 

Fortunately, you can typically avoid failures like this as long as you follow some key steps when organizing your campaigns. 

In this post, we’ll explain these steps and provide examples of successes so you can nail your next digital marketing campaign. 

What is a digital marketing campaign?

A digital marketing campaign is an organized effort by a business to promote a product, service, or event through digital channels. 

Successful campaigns can:

• Drive more engagement
• Convert prospects
• Bring more traffic to your website or landing page 

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A digital marketing campaign may include a series of paid and organic strategies involving (but not limited to):

• Social media ads
• Email marketing
• PPC ads
• Social media posts
• Blog posts 

Traditional marketing vs digital marketing campaign

Traditional marketing is any promotion that isn't online. The channels for this type of marketing include:

• Direct mail
• Print media
• Billboards

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Like a digital marketing campaign, a traditional marketing campaign aims to reach its target audience. While digital marketing campaigns can fulfill various goals such as conversion, retention, and generating traffic, traditional marketing targets the masses and focuses on brand awareness. 

In traditional marketing, one can't calculate the engagement on an ad. Often, a campaign's success depends on the number of billboards an ad is on. 

Moreover, creating a digital ad costs significantly less than a print ad. In fact, you can get an $8 return on every $1 spent on PPC advertising. 

By targeting users based on their search history and shopping behavior, you can tailor a digital marketing campaign for a particular set of specific audiences.

What digital marketing channels should you target?

Digital marketing allows you to reach every touchpoint of your target customer and advertise to them. You’ll want to cover all the channels a potential customer will likely engage on. 

The terms multichannel and omnichannel are often used interchangeably, but they differ.

Multichannel marketing refers to leveraging different channels to promote your brand, whereas omnichannel marketing targets multiple channels to deliver one common message, creating a single user experience.

For example, Sephora, a beauty brand, uses omnichannel strategies to engage and inform its customers. With every in-store purchase, they offer their customers unique and personalized mobile app experiences, from new products to video tutorials and the latest trends. 

Digital marketing campaign examples

When a campaign goes viral or receives good responses, remember there's a well-thought-out digital marketing strategy behind it. 

Let’s walk you through three of the best campaigns the world has seen and break down their strategies. 

1. Lego's "Rebuild The World"

Lego launched an inspiring campaign in 2019 (their first campaign in 30 years). It shows a live-action film on the importance of creativity and independent play in kids and how this quality can help them change the world. 

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The film shows a bunny being chased by a hunter and how the bunny applies creative thinking and problem-solving to dodge the hunter. 

Why is it a good campaign??

In the ad, we see multiple themes framed within the backdrop, which makes the narrative more appealing. 

This way, the ad tries to reflect the Lego Universe. Even the ad's characters are printed like Lego characters, with the same color themes. 

Key takeaways

The campaign celebrates creative thinking and how it helps children develop early emotional and mental growth. Additionally, it communicates the message that Lego takes pride in making that happen! 

Lego acknowledges the daily challenges and creative blocks its consumers (including children and grownups) face. 

The brand sets itself apart from the competition by letting the world visualize how far a child's imagination can go and how impactful independent and "judgment-free" play can be. 

Their beautiful storytelling makes the films even more impactful and memorable! 

2. Stay home today but travel tomorrow

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During the pandemic lockdowns in 2020, the World Travel Organization (UNWTO) launched a campaign called Stay Home Today but #TravelTomorrow to encourage people to social distance but remain hopeful about traveling once things got back to normal.. 

Why is it a successful campaign?

The campaign encouraged people to travel again once the pandemic was over to support a hard-hit economy, explore different cultures, promote sustainability, and, most importantly, support those who lost their jobs. 

It showcased eight countries, boosting enthusiasm about visiting those destinations. The beautiful thing about this campaign is that it offered hope to all who suffered during the pandemic and felt lost during this crisis!

Key takeaways

The campaign showed different activities and adventures one could experience in these destinations, which most travelers are looking for today. Later, when the travel ban was lifted, many countries used these hashtags to announce their re-openings. 

As a result, this helped people plan their travels to "COVID-safe" countries and make informed decisions. 

3. Oreo's "Dunk in the dark"

In 2013, during the Superbowl showdown between San Francisco and Baltimore Ravens, the power went out for 45 minutes in the Superdome. Oreo then tweeted the below picture, and the rest was history!

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Since 1987, Oreo has been telling its consumers to "Twist, Lick, and Dunk" the cookie. However, the company brought a fresh twist and gained an edge in this power-outage situation. This created a huge buzz in real-time.

Why is it a successful campaign?

The fact that it wasn't even an ad and just a social media post created in the spur-of-the-moment makes this campaign extra special. 

Consumers found it clever, engaging, and witty.

Key takeaways

This inexpensive and easy-to-execute marketing campaign urges marketers to look beyond traditional marketing approaches and think outside the box. 

It shows the impact of low-cost social media marketing on a brand!

How to create a digital marketing campaign

Now that you know what a successful digital marketing campaign looks like, let's talk about how you can create one! 

We'll take you from ideation and preparation to actually getting the campaign live. 

1. Define your goals

Before you begin, know why you’re creating this campaign and your goals and objectives. Remember, we’re not talking about your overall marketing goals but the specific campaign's goals. 

Also, ensure you're defining the KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) for these goals. Your KPIs could include the number of followers, number of clicks, number of visitors, or number of sales.

Here's a list of potential goals you might have for a digital marketing campaign: 

• Branding: Increase your brand awareness by making sure your brand shows up in front of your target audience. 
• Lead generation: Create targeted ads to find new leads, people who may qualify as your potential customer. 
• Nurture existing leads: Send exclusive promotions to your existing leads and try moving them down your sales funnel. 
• Direct sales: Launching something new? Promote the new launch with a campaign launch offer.
• Upsell: Encourage customers to upgrade their product or service to meet their requirements.

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Look at this graphic from The Content Marketing Institute, which elaborates the goals and metrics for each buyer journey stage. 

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2. Set your budget

Before you move on to the next stage of building your campaign, define your budget. This budget should include all stages of your creation process, including planning, research, creation, and optimization. 

Here's everything you need to consider while allocating the budget:

• Will you be using paid channels, organic channels, or a combination of both?
• How many resources will you need for the campaign?
• Will you require new hires or resources or can you work with existing ones?
• What tools will you be investing in, and what's the cost?

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Follow a 70-20-10 rule for budget allocation. 70% for strategies you know work well, 20% for new strategies, and 10% for experimentation that might blow up. 

3. Do audience research

How could you tell what your audience expects? By studying them.

This involves trying to get into their shoes and understand a few traits about them like: 

• How they think
• Where they consume information
• Where they spend their time
• What they like to spend their money on

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Above all, get a clear picture of the stage of the funnel you're targeting them for. These stages include the following:

Awareness

Are they new to your channel, and have they just found you? 

You want to let them get to know you first and share targeted content to raise awareness about the problem your product can solve for them.

Consideration

If they're aware of the problem you're trying to solve but haven't decided on a solution yet, you can share the unique selling point of your solution.

This will allow them to see your offering as a viable solution.

Decision 

They're convinced they need a solution and are considering your offering, but they need a nudge to purchase. 

Now might be the time to show them testimonials and case studies to drive home the message that you’re the best fit for them. 

4. Choose your channels

Your customers could be present anywhere. The key is to hang out where they are and reach them!

However, before jumping to conclusions, check out these statistics for various digital marketing channels.

• 86% of B2C marketers have content marketing as the basis of their strategy.
• 75% of B2B buyers and 84% of C-suite executives make buying decisions through social media.
• 27% of internet users find new products or services through paid ads.

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Clearly, consumers like to channel hop before making a decision. They're sure to check out your socials, websites, and emails to get to know you better before buying from you. 

Here are the different channels you could target for your campaign: 

• Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Through strategic keywords and internal and external SEO practices, rank your website high on the search results to show up when your prospects look for you.  
• Digital ads: Run paid ads on social media and Google to reach your target market.
• Content marketing: Create content for websites, blogs, social media, emails, videos, and more to increase brand awareness and nurture existing leads or customers.
• Email marketing: Reach your email subscribers who've subscribed with consent and look forward to receiving marketing communications from you.
• Social media marketing: Provide real-time updates about everything your brand does, and engage the audience with useful content, leading them down your sales funnel.

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Remember to keep your budget in mind while choosing channels. You don't want to exhaust your resources before you start seeing results from your campaign. 

5. Create campaign content

Now that you’ve mapped out the foundation, it’s time to create the collateral for your campaign. Before creating content, you should first research what's already out there and what your customers are searching for. 

You can use tools like Copy.ai’s content idea generator to generate content ideas. Alternatively, you can check Google Trends to see what your target audience is searching for the most.

Depending on your campaign, you’ll create different content assets. For example: 

• To increase organic search engine traffic, double down on blog production. 
• To run social media ads, produce creative materials and landing pages to direct your audience to. 
• To execute a video marketing campaign, create, edit and publish a series of videos. 

6. Measure performance

Your campaign is up and running, but don't forget to track its performance and adjust accordingly. Three out of every four marketing leaders base their marketing decisions on data analytics.

Luckily, we have tools to track every bit of progress for your campaign, be it a video ad, a new SEO strategy, or an Instagram post. 

Here are some metrics you should consider tracking for your campaign: 

• Number of organic website visits
• Email open rates and click-through rates
• Average time people spend on a page
• The most viewed pages of your website
• Posts and pages that get the most traffic
• Engagement in content (likes, shares, saves, comments, etc.)

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You can track most of these metrics using Google Analytics and the analytics offered through the marketing channel itself. For example, you may want to check your dashboards on Instagram Insights and Facebook Ads manager.

Ready to nail your digital marketing campaign?

There's a lot that goes into creating a digital marketing campaign. Everything has to align with your marketing goals and the overall digital marketing strategy to get the best results. 

Keep optimizing your campaigns to see what gives you the best results. Now that you have a step-by-step process of creating a digital marketing campaign, you are well on your way to successfully executing your campaign! 

Finally, don’t forget to use Copy.ai’s suite of free writing tools when you start executing your campaign. They can help you generate email subject lines, Instagram hashtags, and much more!