THE 4TS OF DIGITAL MARKETING OPERATIONS (Version 7.1) New Concept by Joe Ghantous
As a digital marketing specialist and the founder of a digital agency since 2000, I continuously seek new concepts to resolve any conflicts people or companies face during implementing their digital marketing practices
Imagine yourself traveling to a whole new country!
To ensure that your stay will be as planned and you’ll visit your intended sites all what you have to do before you go is get the country’s right and detailed map — you can’t visit Italy using France’s map.
As well you have to know which transportation method you’ll use, the airplane, metro, taxi, bus… etc, without forgetting that each transportation method requires a different know-how that you shall learn about & each city has different ways of doing stuff such as knowing the detailed route the bus or train takes and where and when to buy your tickets.
After knowing where you’re going and how, you have to keep your eyes on the road, to know where you are & how much time you still have to arrive to your intended destination.
Follow the above steps and have a great trip!
The same analogy shall be also followed nowadays in creating your effective digital marketing operations, representing the main pillars of “The 4T’s”.
Each “T” answers a different question and denotes a group of actions assuring the success of any digital marketing operation.
Let me introduce you each component of this mix:
TACTICS:
“How you should pave the road toward your final destination?”
You can’t build a great building on a weak foundation. You must have a solid foundation if you’re going to have a solid superstructure. -Gordon Hinckley
The first pillar of the “4Ts” it’s the base of any effective digital marketing operation.
It represents the “how” of everything (who, what, where, when & why), simply it is your digital marketing strategy.
TACTICS is made of the below ingredients:
• T: Target Audience: Defining the online target audiences’ demographics and challenges to be targeted in all the digital marketing campaigns.
• A: Approach: Helping in determining the main digital marketing operations’ goal with its date of accomplishment.
• C: Competitors: Studying the direct competitors’ online activities & bench mark the most important ones.
• T: Trajectory: Assigning customers’ buying journey to understand their purchasing behavior.
• I: Interests: Signifying the targeted audience interests that will help in determining how and which digital marketing tool to be used to reach them, and select the influencers who affect the decision of this target audience.
• C: Communication Strategy: Setting the methods of the online activities including the way to share the brands message with the public and whom to reach.
• S: Situation Analysis: Reviewing the brand’s current situation, capabilities & activities to discover its strengths and overcome the weaknesses online.
TOOLS:
“Which tools you should use to reach your final destination?”
The second “T” represents the needed digital marketing tools to achieve the companies’ objectives. From social media to email, mobile & search engine marketing, you know that there are numerous ways to boost your business online and hundreds upon hundreds of digital marketing tools to choose from.
TOOLS are made of (or represent) the below ingredients:
• T: Technologies: Choosing the appropriate marketing technologies constantly, that helps in achieving the digital marketing operations’ goals.
• O: Oder: Setting the working module of the digital marketing operations to assure its synergy and defining the time line for each activity.
• O: Operations: Activities and actions that should be implemented using the appropriate technologies & tools.
• L: Liquidity: Assigning the needed budget for the selected technologies (systems), content (stuffs), Ads (Media spent), people (internal and external).
• S: Stuffs:: Preparing the required content for the digital marketing campaigns, which could be written content, images, designs, or a videos, to educate, inform, entertain, inspire, reward and help the brands target audience.
TRAINING:
“How to effectively use the selected tools in order to arrive earlier to your final destination?”
I am still learning — Michel Angelo at 87 years old.
After defining the digital marketing tactics and determining the needed tools, now it’s time for the 3rd “T”; Training.
You need to learn how to standalone in order to keep pace with these continually evolving digital marketing tools. To do so, you must gain the knowledge needed by frequently (recommended each 6 months) attending or organizing in-house digital marketing training sessions alongside capturing the needed indicators stating to which end these training sessions had supported their main goal.
TRAINING is made of the below ingredients:
• T: Team Building: A strong team equals a strong company. Digital marketing training sessions will empower the team’s knowledge to help in growing a business.
• R: Result: This result should be shown in the team’s reactions during & after a training through class engagement, reviewing the supportive materials and personal satisfaction.
• A: Abilities: Training program can be an occasion to evaluate the team’s intention and ability to develop their skills & help in growing a business.
• I: Investment: Training should be considered an investment in people who invest in you by rewarding hard working team members through providing them digital marketing workshops that have a positive impact on their personal brand and the whole business.
• N: Needs: Provide customized training sessions in reference to the brand’s team digital marketing needs.
• I: Impact: The improvement of the team’s online performance after attending digital marketing workshops.
• N: New Skills: Digital marketing industry continuous development requires frequent skills updates that are covered during successive training sessions.
• G: Goodwill: The team’s intention in taking corrective actions at work after their apex satisfaction in the training sessions.
TRACKING:
“Where to look to keep track on our trajectory on the way to your final destination?”
The last “T” is tracking. It is an essential aspect for the success of any digital marketing operation.
According to a survey of senior marketing executives published in the Harvard Business Review, “more than 80% of respondents were dissatisfied with their ability to measure marketing ROI”.
For that reason, you should focus on the last but not the least “T” — Tracking.
By tracking your KPIs, Google Analytics numbers and social media insights you will stay on the right track during the whole operation.
TRACKING is made of the below ingredients:
• T: Traffic: Determining the website & social media visitors gained from each digital marketing activity in a specific period of time.
• R: ROI: Reveal the return on investment that reflects the selected key performance indicators of the digital marketing campaigns.
• A: Analytics: Analyze the digital marketing operations performance.
• C: Correction: Make the needed corrections based on the frequent review of the daily activities.
• K: KPI’s: Setting the leading, current & lagging indicators of the well being of the digital marketing operations.
• I: Insights: Read between the lines and conclude the results.
• N: Numbers: Determining the most important numbers to key tracking.
• G: Guidance: The right numbers leads the way to the ultimate goal.
I didn’t wake up one day and just build “The 4Ts of Digital Marketing Operations” it’s a result of 17 years of experience, and there will be evolving versions of this marketing concept every quarter of the year.
Click here to watch one minute explainer video about this concept.
For the importance and effectiveness of this concept we at Right Service had decided to re-shape our digital marketing solutions and make them compatible with it.
If you are interested to implement this new marketing concept at your company, click here to contact us.
Note: Every quarter of the year a new updated version will be created.
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