Digital marketing requires both right and left-brain marketers. You need someone to be creative and align with messaging, making an impact on others, and tapping into emotions. Left brain thinkers will understand the path in which digital marketing needs to take place in order for it to grow. Digital marketing is much more than traditional marketing principles, it is connecting with the audience and speaking to them digitally.
When we look at digital marketing teams, they cover a LOT of work. And most of the time, they are doing things that aren’t just “marketing.” Your digital marketing department or team winds up handling:
- Generating awareness to new audiences
- Facilitating inbound leads through social, websites, ads, and more
- Creating sales enablement content for your sales teams
- Managing the website and eCommerce options for customer checkout
- Supplying content for online customer portals, trainings, and digital help desks
- Discovering new ways to communicate through visual, verbal, auditory, and print
- Running online communities for prospects, customers, partners, and advocates
- Identifying digital influencers and managing relationships
And even this list above isn’t an exhaustive list of what your digital marketing team can be responsible for. I like to split them into multiple focus groups or segments including digital operations, go-to-market, lead generation, sales conversion, and customer advocacy. Your digital team could be doing all 5 of these roles and it’s important to understand exactly what they’re doing to get the jobs done.
What is “Digital Operations” for your Digital Marketing Team?
This is where we focus on the technical side of how we deploy our work. This is what platforms we use, the tools, the tech, the integrations, and the workflows.
What is “Go-To-Market” for your Digital Marketing Team?
This is where we focus on the messaging, story, value propositions, target markets, audience segmentation, buyer personas, positioning, and the buyer journey.
What is “Lead Generation” for your Digital Marketing Team?
This is where we build lead generation campaigns using the tools and the messaging foundations created by digital ops and GTM planning. It’s the strategies and focused tactics we use to generate awareness, facilitate leads, and create conversions.
What is “Sales Conversion” for your Digital Marketing Team?
In the sales conversion role of digital marketing, your team is focused on enabling sales to occur. Depending on your company this could be creating collateral, managing groups, creating content social media profiles, writing sales content, case studies, whitepapers, and everything else your team needs to close a deal.
What is “Customer Advocacy” for your Digital Marketing Team?
When your team puts on the customer advocacy hat, we’re talking about the digital marketing that it takes to market to existing customers like email campaigns and client events. We’re talking about creating advocates, partners, referrals, and other current client-inspired revenue.
In this blog, what I really want to focus on is some of the tools that your digital marketing team needs to be successful in the roles above. I’ve been in this business for YEARS as a solopreneur, a one-person digital marketing team, as an outsourced resource for in-house teams, and as a manager of a 15 person digital marketing team. Some things are universal regardless of size and these are the areas we’ll cover:
- Website
- Social Media
- Project Management
- Communication
- Content Creation
Website Tools for Digital Marketing Teams
GoDaddy – Domains & Hosting
GoDaddy is my one-stop shop to grab a URL for an affordable price, managing website hosting, setting up redirects, enabling my SSL, and syncing to my Google Workspace instance for emails.
WordPress – Website CMS
WordPress is one of if not the most popular website creation sites in the world. You are able to add so many different sections to it, you can code it specifically to make it as unique as you want, and selling products can be a pretty seamless experience. After purchasing a domain on GoDaddy, you can quickly redirect it over to the WordPress site you made.
Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and Google Tag Manager – Tracking & Analytics
Why make marketing a guessing game? When it comes to Google analytics, it shares the data with you right there! Google Analytics can tell you (for free) a ton of information about your website including where users came from, conversion statistics, and the general technical health of your website. I also add Google Search Console and Google Tag Manager to my list here as they integrate easily (of course, them being all from Google – they better be easy to integrate!) and all three provide much-needed info for your digital marketing team.
Email Tools for Digital Marketing Teams
There are a variety of different email tools that you can be used in order to stay connected with current, previous, and past clients. Some have more bells and whistles than others (and some cost more). It’s important to look at exactly what you are looking to get out of the email campaigns so that you can best choose a great option for yourself.
MailChimp
MailChimp has both a free and a paid version. Many people starting out with an email list go to MailChimp so that they can get started. This email tool is very beneficial. You can have a small list completely free and sort it through different ways the audience entered the list. Images, colors, and text are easy to input as well.
Constant Contact
Constant Contact is another popular way to send a mass business email or newsletter. It is very similar to MailChimp however it has more options. The analytics involved after sending an email campaign is also more in-depth making it more beneficial to find out what is working and what is not.
Hubspot
Hubspot is one of the most popular email tools out there for digital marketing. This allows more options for the digital marketer. Although it is not as user-friendly for newbies, once you get the hang of it you will be amazed at how many different types of campaigns are available as well as landing pages that can capture the audience’s information quickly. And yes, Hubspot isn’t an “email marketing” tool but I’m a fan of their entire product including their email marketing functionality so they make it on my list.
Social Media Tools for Digital Marketing Teams
When it comes to social media, most people don’t want to have to manually post daily on every single platform. That is why there are fantastic social media tools to allow you to better manage your accounts. Not only will these schedule your posts in advance, but some are also free, and some give more analytics to give you the best posting opportunity possible.
Hootsuite
Hootsuite is a basic way to schedule and post on social media. There is a free version for up to three channels. One can also see messages and comments coming in. Many people find Hootsuite not as well organized however, it still has great analytics options and is the most affordable even once adding a payment plan in.
Sprout Social
Sprout Social has been available for many years. The analytics that you can get from it regularly go into great depth. This is perfect for not only a digital marketer, but if they are sending it to a client as well. You are able to schedule content and organize future ideas easily and effectively. I have enjoyed using Sprout Social over the years but the price point can be hard for some smaller teams to swallow.
AgoraPulse
AgoraPulse is quickly becoming many digital marketers’ favorite platforms – including mine. This platform not only allows analytics and scheduling, but it also can help repurpose content and reshare past content easily which will save digital marketers a lot of time!
Project Management and Planning for Digital Marketing Teams
Having a digital marketing team that is well organized is key to the overall outcome of the success of the company. That is why project management tools are key. These will not only keep each individual person on the team organized, but it will help the team itself know who is working on which project at all times.
Asana
Asana is one of the most popular tasks to stay organized. Many people can assign tasks not only to themselves but to team members too. A due date can be assigned and when comments are made on the tasks, other members of the task are notified. This one is by far my favorite and I use this one DAILY.
Trello
Trello is similar to Asana but easily moves tasks throughout different days. Many people enjoy Trello as a project management tool because it is the perfect visual board. One can comment a lot under each task and it’s easy to find. Once the task is finished you can either check it as done or you can drag it to another day.
Communication Tools for Digital Marketing Teams
A digital marketing team is like any relationship in this world, communication is key. That is why there are great communication tools set up to help the company thrive and stay in rhythm with each other.
Slack
Slack is a great communication tool for digital marketing teams. No matter where the team is located in the world, this communication tool will keep everyone organized and on the same page. You are able to chat, phone, video, and tag other members within the Slack channel. People love slack because of the different channel topics that can be created making it easy to know the topic prior to reading the messages from team members. Our team is definitely a power user of Slack.
Zoom
Zoom is one of the most popular ways for digital marketers to stay connected. Whether they are on a call all together or on a call with a client, Zoom is the perfect spot to have clear reception to get work done. Zoom is free for 40-minute calls. After that, you will need to sign up for a monthly plan. Zoom also allows you to change your background making it fun to see others in the video!
Content Creation Tools for Digital Marketing Teams
Canva
This one’s a classic and one most people know even if you’re not working in the realm of digital marketing. It’s an easy drag and drop tool for content creation including cover photos, social media posts, email headers, infographics, ebooks, presentations, logos, flyers, anything you can think of – you can do it in Canva. The paid version is 100% worth it to be able to manage teams, add your own branding saved to the account, and access their PRO images and assets.
SEMrush
Having an online visibility tool for content creation is critical. I can use this tool to get data, insights, and inspiration for SEO, content marketing, competitors, PPC, social media, and more to guide my content creation plans. It does keyword research, runs audits for improvements, market research, and is an overall great tool for content optimization.
There are so many great tools in order to create a successful digital marketing team. Honestly, I didn’t even touch on conversion optimization tools, advertising tools, additional SEO tools outside of SEMrush, and on and on and on. We’d be here all day – but you do need the above categories to get started.
Many of these tools have usable free options and will help bring your company the structure and professional appeal you are looking for to grow. If you have any questions about various digital marketing tools, or you are interested in a free consultation for your business, contact me today! I’m happy to chat tools – talk about my favorites or give recommendations when you’re doing a search. I also offer some auditing and selection services for large tools like CRMs and websites. Chat soon!