Are you looking for the best way to spend your digital marketing budget? With so many different options out there, it can be hard to know where to start. That's why it's important to understand the different tactics available and how to allocate your budget to get the most out of your campaigns.
But before you can do that, you first need to know what you’re aiming for. Check out the first blog in our Digital Marketing Campaign series on goal setting here.
Which way to go?
From SEO to cost-per-click (CPC) campaigns, there are a variety of strategies that can help you drive qualified traffic to your site. To ensure your budget is spent effectively, it's important to create great content and then allocate a proportionate amount to promoting it.
Three big questions you need to ask:
- Who are my target audience?
- On what platforms can my target audience be found?
- How am I going to divide my budget between those platforms?
So if you find that your ideal target audience is likely to be found on Instagram, for example, you need to lend more focus to developing eye-catching visual content rather, than, say SEO and search ads.
Or if you’re in the B2B space, you’re likely to need more long-form content to educate your audience and explain complex products and services. Here using SEO-optimised content is vital to help your audience find your business and learn about what you have to offer.
Cost per click (CPC) is a strategy that can help you get more qualified traffic to your site while still staying within your budget. The key to making this work is to focus on outcomes rather than vanity metrics like impressions. You'll also need to choose the right tools and platforms to help you achieve your goals.
Overall, if you're allocating a budget for a lead generation campaign, roughly 60-75% should go towards content production (workflows, emails, landing pages, assets, social copy and designs), with the remaining 25% used to reach your target audience.
How much to spend?
Know how much you need to spend on average to acquire a new customer? That value will help you predict how many new customers you’re likely to acquire based on how much you’re spending. But you will need some historical data to work from, and a CPC campaign can provide that insight without having to spend a fortune on advertising first.
Try simply using Google's Keyword Planner to find the average cost per click of the keywords most likely to convert in your campaign. A high CPC is sure to mean a high cost per acquisition (CPA). It means that in a competitive market, your budget simply won’t go as far.
If your CPA is too high, you won’t see a good return unless your revenue earned per customer is also high. A lower revenue per customer necessitates finding more cost-effective ways to acquire new customers or lending more focus to retention to make up the higher CPA with recurring revenue.
And, of course, you need to know how much you’re spending as a percentage of the business’s total revenue. You need to know how much is appropriate to spend for a company of your size.
Writing for Forbes, John Keeler said, “What I've consistently found is that most higher-growth companies spend closer to the average (roughly 8.6%, as per Deloitte's CMO Survey) and most lower-growth companies underspend on both advertising and internal resources.”
Timelines really matter
Creating a successful campaign takes time, no matter how much money you spend on it. If you're just starting off, you may have great content but no one to interact with it because you don't have any followers yet. On the other hand, if your campaign is too long and you don't have enough budget, you'll run out of money before the campaign is over and miss out on leads.
It's essential to map out realistic timelines for your budget. We generally recommend at least three months to see what is performing and what is not. The advantage of using digital marketing is that you can check the data at any time to see if your efforts are successful or if you need to focus them in another direction. You can use this information to adjust your budget if necessary.
Learn more about using reporting tools in our blog.
Source the right expertise
When you partner with our agency, you gain access to a team of experienced professionals who can help you with every aspect of your campaign. We will work with you to allocate funds to the right channels for optimal growth and success. With years of experience and a proven track record of success, you can trust us to use your money wisely and maximise the return on your digital marketing.
