Let’s review the strategic digital marketing team. These are the people that will implement the Four-Step Process discussed in previous articles and make strategic digital marketing action plans reality.
Each major job function or role has been broken down into eight distinct areas. The position titles can change as needed, but the core functions remain the same for each position.
Web Marketing Team Action Items
Your job as a marketing leader will be to pull this web team together, understand their roles and assign action items to the appropriate team member. Here is a list of action items for each job function.
Internet Marketing Director/Manager
This is the strategic digital marketing lead responsible for the strategy and leading the entire strategic digital marketing process. Action items for this position deal with leadership, strategy and building a winning team to include the following:
- Researches and writes the strategic digital marketing plan
- Sets the strategy for strategic digital marketing efforts
- Ensures the strategy is being followed by the strategic digital marketing team
- Leads the strategic digital marketing meetings
- Suggests improvements to the strategy to improve results
- Reviews strategic digital marketing data weekly or monthly
- Asks questions of the strategic digital marketing team about results
- Evaluates the strategic digital marketing team’s performance and their results
- Makes the final decisions on strategic digital marketing action items when necessary
Internet Project Manager/Coordinator
This position is very. Many strategic digital marketing projects fail because of poor project management, or no project management whatsoever. It’s best for this position to be internal to your company and not outsourced. Here is a summary of a few key action items in this critical position:
- Schedules and organizes the strategic digital marketing meetings
- Organizes and follows up on action plans
- Is the taskmaster for communication between the strategic digital marketing team members
- Updates online project management software for improved team coordination
- Looks for inconsistencies in team member action items
- Checks the website for broken links and other errors
- Prepares due dates for action items
- Helps recruit and replace team members as needed
- Communicates with contracted team members and other subcontractors
- Organizes website content timing and placement on the website and in social media
Internet Marketing Specialist
This position is responsible for driving traffic to the website, and will have some crossover with the action items for the website research specialist. This position may also be broken into several job functions based on the variety of skills and action items needed to drive traffic. This position may be internal to your company or outsourced depending on the necessary skill levels.
- Prepares and implements a traffic generation plan for the website and social media
- Conducts keyword research and the development of keyword themes
- Responsible for the development and placement of title tags and meta descriptions for all website pages and modifications as needed
- Provides search engine optimization (SEO) of website code and content
- Conducts on-page content review to drive SEO results by targeted keywords
- Set up, management and review of AdWords and all online advertising programs
- Management of the monthly e-mail newsletter and other e-mail marketing efforts
- Oversees and sets up all social media efforts for consistent design, content postings and distribution through the best social media outlets
- Works with the content writer on regular blog posting topics and SEO coding for all blog posts and other content pages
- Develops and requests links from websites visited by the target market to the company website, and oversees the link building programs for the website, both locally and globally, tracking results
- Makes sure offline marketing efforts are coordinated with online marketing and traffic generation, and tracks direct traffic from offline marketing efforts
- Reviews and prepares analysis of website traffic sources as seen in web stats
- Sets up and monitors Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools
- Prepares reports on conversion rates by traffic source
Website Research Specialist
Accurately tracking website data and the site’s overall usability is the responsibility of this job position and may be combined with the Internet Marketing Specialist. Key tasks are focused on collecting data and research to improve results and reporting those findings to marketing and sales leadership.
- Reviews web stats weekly or monthly, comparing them against previous months/years, and spots trends in the data, making recommendations
- Develops user testing programs to gather feedback from website users
- Reviews stats and data from e-mail campaigns
- Sets up and reviews data and interactions from social media efforts
- Develops reports for the strategic digital marketing team and company leadership
- Researches and analyzes strategic digital marketing software and reports to constantly improve strategic digital marketing results
- Sets up tracking for all relevant website conversion points
Content Writer for the Web
This position is a dedicated writer of website content, to include service and product descriptions, website articles, blog postings, social media content and other forms of written strategic digital marketing content. This position can be internal or outsourced, depending on the amount of content needed.
- Meets with the strategic digital marketing team on a content plan that includes content topics, distribution channels and a schedule for generating written content
- Recommends content approaches for length of content and use of headers by content type
- Reviews web stats on the most popular content and how it is being read by website visitors and recommends new content topics
- Ensures all written content is in a format easily read and understood by online visitors
Photography and Other Media
This can be a team of people responsible for the website’s media including photography, video, audio, podcasts, slide presentations and other media. These team members follow direction from the strategic digital marketing team and are most likely outsourced contractors who are specialists in each area.
- Prepares photo shoots, captures the photos and edits them for online placement
- Prepares the story board and script for video production work
- Shoots, mixes the sound and edits online videos
- Records and edits audio recordings, such as podcasts, music and other audio clips
- Works with the graphic designer on layout and placement of all media elements
- Insures all media is easy to use on the website and provides value to visitors
Graphic Designer
This position is the site’s graphic artist and is responsible for the website’s overall graphics and design. The graphic designer’s ongoing action items include several key areas.
- Prepares the home page and interior page designs
- Updates the home page rotator and graphics as needed
- Integrates the website’s messaging and taglines into the graphics of the website
- Ensures all photos, videos and other graphic elements have the proper copyright for use on the Internet and that they look professional on the site
- Works with the technology team so graphic elements are properly added to the website and coded for SEO purposes
- Provides design elements for all social media sites and other online graphics
Technology Professional
The technology team converts graphic designs to website code, handles the site’s hosting, is responsible for the website’s technology platform and all other technical issues associated with online marketing efforts. Most likely, this position is best outsourced.
- Selects the appropriate website platform that meets the needs of the website strategic plan and can also be edited by internal team members
- Establishes the hosting environment for the site, along with e-mail accounts
- Sets up access to the website’s administrative sections with passwords and training for making website edits and updates
- Sets up and oversees the security functions for the website and other spam and malware protections
- Oversees the integration of the website with any company software modules such as accounting systems, CRM software, inventory or other types of software
- Other technical issues that impact the usability and success of the website
Summary
Use these action item summaries to develop action plans for each team member. Remember to avoid giving action items to any team members without the skills and knowledge to do excellent work in their area of focus. Be cautious of team members who claim to have multiple skill sets, such as a technologist who is also a designer. It is best to build a team of specialists and provide clear direction based on your strategic digital marketing strategic plan. Keep in mind, the strategic digital marketing team will be a mix of internal and outsourced people. The effectiveness of the team is driven by excellent project management and by putting the right people in place to implement your web strategy.
Action Items
- Develop your strategic digital marketing team and assign tasks to each person. Start with a project manager.
- Schedule time to meet with each team member to review their assigned action items and to build accountability for results.
- Determine who is needed in regular strategic digital marketing meetings.
- Schedule and run regular strategic digital marketing meetings to keep the team on track.
- Use the content in this book to write job descriptions, assign tasks to internal employees and to recruit contractors to build your strategic digital marketing team.
- Adjust budgets as needed based on strategic digital marketing ROI to determine which team members are internal to the company and which are outsourced as contractors.
