At Flax Digital, we do more than just build websites. Our approach makes your website part of a broader digital strategy that serves your business’s specific goals.
Digital strategy is an approach that integrates digital and online services into your business’s wider strategy. Online marketing’s a big part of that, but digital strategy can touch any part of the business from inventory management to team morale.
Step back and look at the big picture
When someone comes to us and says “We need a new website“, “Everyone says we should get SEO“, or “We think we need to hire a social media manager”, we stop and ask “Why?”
There’s a lot of generalised advice out there that’s not tailored for your business. What “everyone does” or “experts say” is not always right for you.
Can’t see the wood for the trees? Step back and take a wider view.
Here are some of the questions we like to discuss:
- What are your business goals for the next few years?
- Who’s your ideal customer, and how do we reach them?
- Who are your competitors in the digital space, what are their online strengths and weaknesses?
- What digital channels and activities best match your business’s values and brand identity?
- What’s the right digital marketing mix for your target market?
- How will we measure whether your online marketing is working effectively?
- Can digital processes or services streamline your business, beyond marketing?
Every digital strategy consultation has different activities and deliverables. However, we always want to leave you with a clear understanding of how your online presence fits into the bigger picture.
Integrate your website with your whole business
Many small business websites are essentially an online brochure: a few nice pictures, a description of what you do, and some contact details.
You wouldn’t expect your printed brochures to manage customer relationships for you, talk to your accounts department, or recruit volunteers. Yet your website can do all these things (and more), letting you spend more time on what matters.
Here are some examples of what digital integration can do:
- Turn leads into sales: When a potential customer contacts you via your website, we can add them to directly your CRM (customer relationship management) software or begin an automated email conversation that will guide them toward buying your product.
- Automate bookkeeping: Your online sales can be added directly Xero, or any other accounting system that offers integration with common e-commerce platforms.
- Manage memberships: Let your website take care of membership applications, payments, and renewals.
- Expand your market: you can reach beyond your local area by offering online services such as training courses, remote consultations, or downloadable products.
- Streamline workflows: get rid of paper forms or clunky data entry with online forms and integrations.
- Maintain relationships: stay connected with your customers and the wider community, leading to referrals and repeat business.
- Collaborate better: use team-oriented tools to create, communicate, and plan your online marketing or your business as a whole.
This is why we say we specialise in building “your second website”. We don’t want to make brochure sites. We want to make you more effective at what you do.
Strong digital strategy will help you focus on what you do best.
Get good ROI for your digital marketing dollar
Your online marketing – website, social media, SEO, and whatever else is in the mix – needs to serve your business goals. If it’s not generating paying customers, it’s not worth spending money on.
We love metrics, because they help us make good business decisions. One of the first things we do with our clients is setup good analytics, because otherwise we’re fumbling in the dark.
If you’ve taken a look at analytics in the past and been confused or overwhelmed, that’s not surprising. There’s a wealth of data in there and it can be hard to know what’s useful. Some of the most important things we look at are:
- How many paying customers is your website (or other online marketing) bringing you?
- What is the dollar value of that?
- What marketing channels or activities are most effective at bringing in that income?
If SEO brings you highly qualified customers and makes you five times what you spend on it, it’s worth your money. If Instagram takes up a heap of your time but none of your followers spend money, it’s not worth it.
A strong digital strategy, with metrics to back it up, helps you get the best return on your investment for your website and online marketing. If you’d like to know that you’re spending your money on something that works, contact us today.
