When working in digital marketing, some things that you become quite familiar with are thinking outside the box, brainstorming a million and one ideas and mapping out a full year’s worth of content and strategy. As digital marketers we strategize, create, execute and report on our ideas, all of which culminates into what is more commonly known as digital marketing campaigns.

What is a digital marketing campaign?

The easiest way to describe a digital marketing campaign is a promotion created to reach a specific goal — whether it be launching a new product, getting people to watch a video or even increasing your online sales for a specific product. The best way to go about launching a campaign is to create clear and concise goals, know what you are trying to achieve and then from there build off that.

How do you create a digital marketing campaign?

An essential part of creating a campaign is to identify your outlets. Are you using email marketing? Do you have a large following on Instagram and want to leverage that? Maybe you’re just going to use influencer marketing and word of mouth! There are endless ways in which you can “get the word out”.

Once you have identified your outlet, you should think about the marketing funnel and how it applies to your campaign. Keep reading to find out the steps of the marketing funnel.

Step 1: Brand Awareness

When creating your campaign, the first objective in the funnel is to create awareness about your brand. This can be targeted to a large audience initially, and then as you continue your campaign you will narrow that down to a more precise group. Usually at this step, the viewer doesn’t have a need yet and may not even be looking to purchase anything, but this is your prime opportunity to spark their interest.

Step 2: Demand Generation

The second step is demand generation. Now that you’ve gotten people’s attention and notified them about your brand or service, you want to entice them with engaging creative. At this point, the buyer has developed a need and is searching for a solution. You want to create the demand for your product or service. This is a great opportunity for you to build trust with your potential consumer before you move into the next phase of your campaign.

Step 3: Acquisition

As you move past demand generation and begun gaining consumers trust, it’s time to look toward acquisition. This can be gaining a new email address, signing up for a coupon or a variety of other ways to receive information in return for something that the consumer can gain.

Step 4: Transaction

The last step in our digital campaign strategy is transaction. Once you’ve acquired your leads from your acquisition step, you can target these people directly. You can upload a CSV file with all of the emails you’ve generated.

What’s next in the digital marketing campaign creation process?

Next, we like to map out our plan of action! What’s the duration of your campaign? What is your call-to-action? What do you want people to do? After you have those details figured out, it is time to think like a consumer. What would make you want to purchase something? Is it a referral code from your favorite influencer? Is it a buy one get one free deal? Is it a “watch this video and you’ll be entered to WIN a trip to Hawaii” promotion? You need to strategize the best ways to get consumers interested in your product, video, post or whatever it is you’re trying to sell.

When creating your campaign, it’s very important to keep your target audience in mind. For example, if you are selling mascara, you’re likely going to be mainly targeting women. Beyond women, you’re going to want to find the age range that will resonate best with your product. Our tip is to start with a location and an age range. With Facebook’s elimination of partner categories, where they have removed the ability for marketers to use targeting information from third party data miners, patience will now be key. It may take slightly longer to find your niche target. But fear not: there are still various ways in which you can reach people, such as lookalike audiences, “friends of friends” targeting and retargeting.

Use Your Creativity

I can’t speak for you, but my favorite part about creating campaigns is the creative brainstorm. Don’t hold back! This is the where all of the fun, eye-catching and, not to mention BIG, ideas come into play and complete the entire vision. Benefit Cosmetics did an amazing job for the launch of their BAD GAL BANG Volumizing Mascara. They hid ALL… yes I said ALL of their Instagram posts and had a “fresh start” with a series of fun, interactive, and intergalactic 😉 videos promoting their new mascara. Talk about a BANG!