We’re sure you’ve seen the term quite often in our articles and on our socials, and that’s because we’re firm believers in the benefits of having a ‘Digital Marketing Strategy’. Having a strategy in place helps your team aim for a target and keep focused to convert all those potentials, into customers. In the international education sector, as well as all other industries, the needs of the customers are always evolving and so must your strategy in order to keep up with the trends. Below is a list of tips on how you can set up a digital marketing strategy that is 2023-proof.

Scope out Your Target…

….audience. Yes, you guessed it! And then create buyer personas based on your research. If you’re a school you might want to focus on age, what works for your adult students might not necessarily be engaging to parents who wish to send their juniors to your school. Other identifiers like geographical locations can help you focus a bit further on what your target audience needs and wants. The buyer personas you create will then enable you to create more compelling content. 

Set Your Goals

Knowing what your ideal end result should be helps you measure the efficiency of your campaign. Using SMART goals - Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound - enables you to evaluate your strategy's success by providing clear insights. While your KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) help you focus on fewer indicators that will help drive conversions to growth.

Use a Funnel

Marketing funnels help you navigate at what stage in the customer journey your target audience is, helping you focus your digital strategy more effectively. Are they returning students, have they gone to other schools similar to yours before or are they looking for their first experience in study abroad? Each one has a different need from the other: the first-timer would probably react more to educational types of marketing on social media, while a  returning customer would be more responsive to an email with an offer that you’re running or a post that’s promoting your offer on social media.

Build Your Content Marketing Plan

This may include having great content, but more importantly, having a content strategy in place will help strengthen the goals you’ve already set and the way to achieve them. Do not be afraid to show off what you know in your content, go a step further and see what your competitors are sharing and see what you can offer that’s different so you stand out. Setting up a content calendar can also help you get organized, even better if the software that you use can help you track, trace and measure all of it.

Automation, Personalisation, Optimisation

Three essential words to go by in 2023! You can now set up your first automatic responses to be more personal. At its most basic functions automation marketing can help you narrow down what your customer’s needs are by asking questions. Other marketing automation software can also generate the right content based on the customer’s demographics, needs, and interests. As far as optimisation goes, whatever your content may be and whatever platform you use, you need to make sure that it is mobile-friendly. More and more people are using their phones nowadays, not as an extension for their online research, but as their main medium. This is not just limited to your social media content, but also having an optimised website, and more importantly those actionable landing pages need to be mobile-friendly so as not to discourage the user to go to the next step.

The Importance of Engagement

The experience rather than the product or service is what makes a customer tick. While still focusing on providing your customers with top services and excellent lessons you must also focus on giving an exceptional experience right from their initial contact. Engagement comes in many forms, from replying to social media comments, asking customers for feedback and implementing what they suggest, replying quickly and effectively if there are any complaints, providing a seamless experience, and using FAQs where possible. The more you involve the customer the more their sense of belonging increases and there is nothing better than adding those loyal customers to your list.

Each and every point mentioned above is important in setting up your digital marketing strategy, but it all goes to waste if you do not measure your results. Nothing can guide you better on what works for you and your audience than the results of your campaign - use Google Analytics and insight tools on social media to get this info. Find out what works for you and implement that in your next campaign; always keep in mind that the world is ever-changing and evolving and what may have worked in the past may not be as relevant today. Do not set your digital strategy in stone… improve on it and that will ensure success!