Onboarding Stages with a New Client in Digital Marketing

When starting to onboard with a client, it is a must that each member of the team understands the purpose of the digital marketing project.

Everyone needs to have a clear grasp of the goals, along with their respective roles, to achieve success. No one should be left in the dark. Here are five stages on how to smoothly establish momentum when working with a new team.

Review the online assets – Find out what needs to be improved on their website, social media, and other existing digital footprint. Identify what initiative is working and how it can be better. Draft your initial recommendation.

Conduct a kick-off meeting – It is necessary to see the point-of-view of the client and his staff. Align the expectations. As you walk them with your analysis regarding their online presence, try to also listen and dive into their thoughts and business experiences. Understand how they define their achievements and how they manage the challenges. Sift through the pain points. Know who’s doing what. Ask questions.

Present the strategy plan – Be more creative, show more visuals, and lay down the numbers on your deck. Explain the metrics and why it is important. How onpage optimization can help increase website inquiry? Why boosting a post is necessary to get more private messages?  Welcome the inputs and tweak the campaign as you see fit.

Create a realistic timeline – Don’t over promise or commit to rank them on search engines in less than a month. Knowing the schedule will guide each one to their deliverables and will also help them be more committed to it. Assign an owner/co-owner of every task. Build on trust.

Depending on the size of the business, you might need to allot additional meeting time per department so you can discuss their assignment in detail. Managing a recruitment agency, for example, I met with the team heads first then the associates per practice areas. It is much easier to get the interest and contribution of the staff when the head has given an approval since some activity may require extra office time. 

Writing a blog and pushing their expertise as a resource person equally gives the company and the staff online credibility but of course, quality writing takes a while and allotting extra hours from this task may require approval from the boss. Publishing articles is also ideal for SEO and content marketing campaigns.

Implement the strategy and get everyone moving – results do not happen overnight, there will be hiccups on the process but as long your action is anchored to the plan and timeline then you will remain on track! Having a supportive team means a lot too and a huge factor to a successful campaign—more of this from my last month’s blog.

It is always exciting to begin a new project and keeping the fire has to be strongly maintained.

What Hinders the Success of a Digital Marketing Team?

Digital marketing plan is like a blueprint of your online campaign. It is created so the team can maintain direction, know each other’s role, and keep the goal. It includes a timeline so we know if we are on track and if the identified activities are implemented properly. When things get a little off, you can always go back to the plan and direct it back to the right path.

Reality: No matter how smooth we aim for it to go, there will surely be drawbacks; at most time it is fixable especially if you are working with a Team eager to troubleshoot and repair without a fuzz.  (Thankful that I mostly work with a supportive batch!) But we cannot avoid a scenario that can signal real trouble! Major commotion in a project does not only come from software glitch or malfunctioning platform… it is rather the behavior of the people we are working with that can cause a real burnout. Here are some signs that a plan would likely not succeed unless each one sorts the issue as soon as possible.

• Indecisiveness – Cannot keep an eye on one objective and changing directions weekly, even daily. No focus.

The company might have too many overall goals but the Team must identify what to prioritize under the digital marketing scope and given the budget. If you are a new company, awareness must be the main step. Pin the most important and realistic approach. It is not right to build a campaign as you please or instantly imitate what the competitors are doing. All the efforts should be anchored by what you aim to achieve along with proper metrics.

Quick fix: Stick to the plan and don’t be swayed easily.

• Not communicating – Making abrupt changes without advising the team.

Let’s not forget that we are a “team”, regardless of size. Everyone has to move in sync with the known plan and adjustments must be made in alignment with those involved. It is not ideal to alter the content of your homepage without signaling your Web and SEO Team. They made codes and onpage optimization that can affect, worse omit, the company’s SEO approach.

Quick fix: Reach out and be open to the Team. Discuss new ideas without hesitations.

• Not listening – sometimes you wonder why the owner hired a digital marketing team if he will apply his own process and deviate from the plan he took part to create. Trust the expertise of each team member. Listen to their recommendations. Ask questions. Share your thoughts.

Quick fix: Listen to expert.

• Not telling the truth – lay down the cards and let the team know the real standing of the company so everyone can function accordingly.

If you are launching an app and you are aware of the glitch, then tell it to the team. Don’t go around the bush and make sure to present the real hurdles  so they would know how to tackle the situation. If you aim to immediately release the next version in three months then the team must know the schedule.

Quick fix: No sugar coating.

• Rushing – not following the timeline. Digital marketing is not magic, you have to work and wait and analyze and tweak the strategy and obviously, it can’t be done in a snap. You have given the list of keywords last week and you wish to rank today, wake up.

Quick fix: Respect the timeline.

Another red signal— those procrastinating the tasks and functioning in pessimistic mood. The quick fix is to do it according to timeline and maintain positive attitude. If you don’t get “send message” to your Facebook campaign, no need to be harsh. Review the targeting and creative strategy, adjust according to the data gathered.

We cannot be in control of algorithm changes, privacy restrictions affecting results of reporting, or even faulty dashboard update but we can always manage on how we deal with the challenges on and off line. Make real goals. Keep the cool. Stay committed. Move on. Learn. Work happy.