How to Create a Digital Marketing Plan & Execute it with Nimble?

“Not having a digital marketing plan is akin to building your house from the roof down.”

A strong foundation is crucial for any marketing strategy, and a well-structured digital marketing plan serves as the cornerstone of success. Companies must leverage strategic planning to effectively manage the complexities of content marketing, SEO, social media, and automation. Without a clear plan, marketing teams risk inefficiencies, misalignment, and wasted resources.

With billions of people actively engaging online, digital marketing has a direct impact on business growth and customer engagement. To stand out in a crowded marketplace, brands must execute every aspect of their marketing strategy with precision. This article will guide you through the process of structuring and executing a digital marketing plan using Nimble, ensuring your efforts are focused, efficient, and results-driven.

Step-by-Step Guide to Creating a Digital Marketing Plan

1. Define Business Objectives & Marketing Goals (SMART Framework)

• Specific:
  • The goals should be clearly defined with no ambiguity. For example, instead of saying “Increase sales,” specify “Increase sales by 15% within the next quarter.”
  • Focus on what exactly needs to be achieved (e.g., increasing brand awareness, driving website traffic, generating leads).
• Measurable:
  • Identify concrete criteria to track progress. This could include metrics such as website traffic, social media engagement, lead generation numbers, conversion rates, or sales figures.
  • Use tools like Google Analytics, CRM systems, and marketing automation platforms to track these numbers effectively.
• Achievable:
  • Goals should be challenging yet realistic. They need to align with available resources, including budget, personnel, and time.
  • For instance, if you’re limited in budget, a 20% increase in sales may be too ambitious. Instead, aim for incremental growth that is attainable.
• Relevant:
  • Goals must be aligned with broader business objectives. For example, if your company is focused on customer retention, a goal to reduce churn by 10% could be a relevant objective.
  • Consider market trends, consumer behavior, and internal business priorities when setting these goals.
• Time-bound:
  • Deadlines should be set for achieving each goal to create urgency and accountability.
  • For instance, “Increase organic traffic by 25% over the next 6 months” ensures that there is a clear timeframe in which to measure success.

2. Identify Target Audience & Buyer Personas

• Target Audience:
  • Define the broad segments of your market based on demographics (age, gender, income), geography (location), psychographics (values, attitudes, interests), and behavioral data (online activity, past purchases).
  • Use tools like Google Analytics, social media insights, and surveys to collect this data and create detailed audience profiles.
  • Segment the audience into different categories such as potential buyers, current customers, and former customers for targeted campaigns.
• Buyer Personas:
  • Name and Role: Give each persona a name and job title to make them more relatable.
  • Demographics: Detail their age, location, income, education, and other key demographic information.
  • Pain Points and Challenges: Identify their main problems that your product or service can solve. This will inform your content and messaging strategy.
  • Goals and Objectives: Understand what they aim to achieve (e.g., efficiency, productivity, personal growth), and align your offering to these goals.
  • Buying Behavior: Look at their buying patterns (e.g., online shopping, value-driven purchasing, brand loyalty).
  • Communication Preferences: Determine which channels they prefer (email, social media, phone calls, etc.), to help target campaigns effectively.

3. Select Marketing Channels (SEO, PPC, Email, Content, Social Media, etc.)

• SEO (Search Engine Optimization):
  • Optimize website content, meta descriptions, and on-page elements (headings, keywords, alt-text for images) to rank higher in search engines.
  • Use tools like Google Search Console, SEMrush, or Ahrefs to find the right keywords and track rankings.
  • Improve website speed, mobile responsiveness, and user experience to enhance SEO performance.
• PPC (Pay-Per-Click):
  • Focus on high-intent keywords to target users who are already searching for products or services similar to yours.
  • Platforms like Google Ads and Bing Ads can be used for keyword-targeted search ads, while social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram can also be used for targeted paid ads.
  • Ensure to optimize ad copy, targeting, and bidding strategies to improve ROI.
• Email Marketing:
  • Build segmented email lists based on buyer personas and customer journey stages (awareness, consideration, decision).
  • Personalize emails with relevant content, product recommendations, or exclusive offers.
  • Monitor open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, and unsubscribe rates to refine email marketing efforts.
  • Tools like Mailchimp, HubSpot, or ActiveCampaign can help automate and optimize email campaigns.
• Content Marketing:
  • Develop diverse content types such as blogs, eBooks, videos, case studies, and webinars to engage your audience.
  • Align content with the buyer’s journey: awareness (blog posts, infographics), consideration (case studies, webinars), and decision (demo videos, testimonials).
  • Plan content around keywords identified in SEO research to ensure visibility and relevance.
  • Create a content calendar to plan and organize content production and distribution.
• Social Media:
  • Choose platforms where your audience is most active (e.g., LinkedIn for B2B, Instagram for B2C).
  • Develop platform-specific content: short-form videos for TikTok, professional posts for LinkedIn, and customer testimonials for Instagram.
  • Use social media to engage with followers, respond to queries, share valuable content, and participate in trending discussions.
  • Track social metrics such as engagement rates, follower growth, and shares to gauge success.

Each channel must be evaluated based on your target audience’s preferences, budget, and expected ROI.

4. Develop Content Marketing Strategy & Calendar

• Content Strategy:
  • Identify the goals of your content: Are you trying to educate your audience, increase conversions, or raise brand awareness?
  • Choose the content types and formats based on your objectives: blogs for education, videos for engagement, case studies for conversions.
  • Address the pain points and challenges identified in your buyer personas through content.
  • Determine the tone of voice—whether formal, conversational, or authoritative—based on the preferences of your audience.
• Content Calendar:
  • Map out content publishing dates for each platform (blog posts, social media updates, videos, etc.).
  • Coordinate content with product launches, seasonal campaigns, and industry events to ensure relevance.
  • Use tools like Google Calendar, Trello, or Asana to visualize deadlines and ensure consistency.
  • Plan content production time for writing, design, review, and approval to prevent last-minute delays.

5. Establish Key Metrics & KPIs to Measure Success

• Website Traffic:
  • Track the number of visitors to your website, as well as the source of traffic (organic, paid, social, referral).
  • Google Analytics provides insights into user behavior, such as time spent on site and pages per session.
• Conversion Rate:
  • Monitor the percentage of website visitors who complete a desired action, like signing up for a newsletter, downloading a resource, or making a purchase.
  • Use A/B testing to optimize landing pages and conversion funnels.
• Engagement Rates:
  • Measure likes, comments, shares, retweets, or any other engagement activity on social media.
  • Higher engagement indicates that the content resonates well with the audience.
• Click-through Rate (CTR):
  • Evaluate the effectiveness of email and PPC campaigns by measuring the percentage of people who click on the links in your emails or ads.
  • A high CTR indicates compelling subject lines and ad copy.
• Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC):
  • Calculate how much it costs to acquire a new customer, including marketing and sales expenses. This helps determine the efficiency of your campaigns.
• Return on Investment (ROI):
  • Measure the revenue generated by each marketing activity against its cost to determine profitability.
  • For instance, if you spent $1,000 on a PPC campaign and earned $5,000 in sales, the ROI would be 400%.

Establishing KPIs ensures that your team remains focused on results and can make data-driven adjustments to the strategy.

How can Nimble help in executing Digital Marketing Plan ?

Effective goal setting is the cornerstone of any successful digital marketing strategy. By clearly defining your objectives and key metrics (OKRs), you align your marketing efforts with broader business goals. This ensures that every campaign, whether it’s lead generation, brand awareness, or customer retention, has measurable outcomes. With Nimble’s OKR feature, you can set and track goals at various levels within your organization, ensuring alignment and progress in real-time. This data-driven approach enables you to stay focused, optimize strategies, and consistently deliver results.

1. Setting Clear Marketing Objectives (OKRs):

Example: Let’s say one of your digital marketing objectives is to increase website traffic by 30% over the next quarter. This objective would be defined as the Objective (O) in Nimble’s OKR framework. The Key Results (KR) could be:

KR1: Increase organic search traffic by 15% through SEO optimization.

KR2: Drive 10,000 social media referrals to the website.

KR3: Increase paid ad click-through rates (CTR) by 5%.

Nimble OKR Feature: You can set these objectives and key results at different organizational levels (team, department, company) in Nimble. This alignment ensures all teams are working towards the same overarching business goals, with individual marketing teams focusing on specific, measurable outcomes. Each key result can be tracked with specific metrics, like traffic numbers, conversion rates, or engagement levels.

2. Tracking Performance in Real Time (Outcome-Driven Analytics):

Example: After implementing your marketing campaign, you need to track if the KR1 (increase organic search traffic by 15%) is on track. Nimble’s Outcome-Driven Analytics can help track the performance against the defined OKRs by presenting the relevant data through visualizations like graphs, charts, or reports.

Traffic Trends: A line graph can show organic traffic trends over time.

Keyword Rankings: A pie chart or bar graph can track keyword rankings across search engines.

Conversion Rates: A bar graph comparing conversions from organic vs. paid traffic.

Outcome-Driven Analytics Feature: In this case, Nimble’s analytics helps you evaluate how well each marketing channel is performing. It supports data analysis with multiple chart types to visualize and interpret the data, ensuring that your marketing strategy aligns with the desired outcomes. For instance, you could use a Cumulative Flow Diagram to track the velocity of your digital marketing content through the various stages of the campaign, helping you understand bottlenecks or areas requiring more focus.

3. Assessing Progress and Making Adjustments:

Example: After a few weeks, you notice that your organic traffic is growing at a slower pace than expected. Based on the data visualizations and the outcome metrics, you identify areas for improvement (e.g., SEO optimization on specific pages). The KR2 (social media referrals) may be doing well, but KR1 needs more effort.

Nimble OKR & Analytics Integration: The ability to see live progress within Nimble allows for quicker decision-making. If the progress on one key result is lagging, the marketing team can shift focus to optimize SEO efforts. By having real-time, outcome-driven data, you can quickly assess whether your strategy needs refining.

4. Reporting and Iteration:

Example: At the end of the quarter, you compile a report on the digital marketing campaign’s performance. The Outcome-Driven Analytics gives you an overview of how each key result has progressed, helping you visualize where improvements were made or areas that fell short.

You can also segment data based on specific marketing channels or campaigns (e.g., SEO, social media, email marketing) to see which area delivered the best results.

Nimble Analytics: Nimble helps you not only with real-time tracking but also with historical data analysis. By using Hierarchy-Based Analytics, you can segment and analyze performance across various organizational levels. If you’re running a global campaign, you can track regional performance and adjust the approach for markets that are underperforming.

5. Optimizing for Future Campaigns:

Example: Based on insights gathered, your next goal might be to improve engagement rates from your paid ads, increasing the CTR from 5% to 8%. You could set a new OKR:

Objective: Improve paid ad campaign efficiency.

KR1: Increase CTR by 8% through A/B testing of ad creatives.

KR2: Decrease cost per click (CPC) by 10% through better targeting.

Nimble OKR Feature: You’ll be able to define new OKRs for the next cycle, ensuring that your objectives are in line with business goals. You can use Outcome-Driven Analytics to track KPIs (such as CPC and CTR) in real time, analyze past campaign data, and make informed adjustments to future strategies.

6. Campaign Planning & Strategy Development

Nimble Hybrid Agile – Nimble’s hybrid agile approach helps in the planning of campaigns with milestones, baseline tracking, and sprint planning. It integrates waterfall-style high-level planning with agile execution, allowing flexibility to adjust strategies as campaigns unfold.

Example: 

Imagine you’re planning a quarter-long campaign aimed at launching a new product through multiple channels like email, social media, paid ads, and SEO. With Nimble Hybrid Agile, you would approach it in the following way:

• Waterfall-Style High-Level Planning:
  • Campaign Milestones: The overall campaign is broken into key milestones (e.g., product announcement, influencer partnerships, email marketing blitz, post-launch analysis). These milestones represent major goals and deliverables to be achieved by specific dates.
  • Timeline Creation: Set up high-level planning for the entire quarter, defining key dates for the campaign, such as launch date, mid-campaign review, and final assessment. This gives everyone involved a sense of direction and deadlines.
• Agile Execution:
  • As you move forward with the campaign, the agile execution part of Nimble comes into play. For instance, as the email campaign rolls out, you might see that open rates are lower than expected or that social media engagement is higher. These insights allow you to adjust your approach quickly.
  • Sprints: You can break down specific tasks into shorter sprints, such as weekly adjustments for SEO keywords, creating new social media content, or refining email content. If something isn’t working as planned (e.g., a specific social media post format isn’t engaging), you can quickly change tactics and move in a new direction.
  • Tracking: Milestones are tracked regularly, and the performance of each sprint is assessed, enabling timely adjustments without losing sight of the long-term objectives.

Real-World Examples:

• Email Marketing Campaign: The team sets up the initial high-level plan for sending 5 emails over 3 months, each leading up to the product launch. However, mid-way, the team notices that certain email subject lines perform better than others. Nimble’s Hybrid Agile allows the team to adjust the next batch of emails based on what’s working, fine-tuning the campaign as it progresses.
• Paid Social Ads: A Facebook Ad campaign might be planned for the entire quarter, but based on A/B testing results during the first month, the team can pivot strategies (e.g., change targeting, adjust creative, or alter the bidding strategy) without missing the overall deadline.
• Fixed Date Tasks & Multiple Scheduling: Use Nimble’s scheduling capabilities to define campaign timelines, ensuring that critical deadlines are met while adjusting tasks dynamically based on priorities.

7. Fixed Date Tasks & Multiple Scheduling in Digital Marketing:

Nimble’s scheduling capabilities ensure that all marketing tasks, from content creation to campaign launches, align with critical deadlines. With fixed dates, digital marketers can maintain focus on campaign timelines while also being able to adjust tasks based on real-time needs.

Example:

Let’s say you’re managing a product launch that spans multiple activities:

• Content Creation (e.g., blog posts, social media graphics, landing pages)
• Paid Ad Management (e.g., Facebook Ads, Google Ads, and Display)
• Influencer Partnerships (e.g., timing social media posts with influencer promotions)
• SEO & SEM (e.g., optimizing landing pages before launch)

Here’s how Fixed Date Tasks & Multiple Scheduling work in this context:

• Campaign Timelines: Define fixed dates for essential tasks such as:
  • Content Deadline: The deadline for blog posts, social media updates, and landing page content.
  • Paid Ad Launch Date: Fixed date for when ads should go live across different channels.
  • Influencer Posts: Schedule when influencers post on their social platforms based on the campaign’s timeline.
• Dynamic Task Adjustments: If an influencer’s scheduled post has to be delayed due to unforeseen circumstances (e.g., product shipment delays or approval issues), the task can be dynamically rescheduled without disrupting the rest of the campaign.
  • For instance, while the influencer’s post may be delayed by 2 days, Nimble can adjust other tasks (like email send-out or paid ads) to fill in the gap and keep momentum going.
• Fixed Date for Critical Tasks: Some tasks have non-negotiable deadlines (e.g., Ad launch date, Email send-out, SEO optimization). Nimble ensures that these fixed tasks are tracked and prioritized, while other tasks remain flexible and can be rescheduled if necessary.

Example:

• Campaign Milestones with Fixed Deadlines: If you’re running a Black Friday sale, the Email Blast must go out on a specific date—no exceptions. With Nimble, you can set this as a fixed task and ensure all preparatory work (like content creation and design) is completed on time. Similarly, if you have a Facebook Ad scheduled to go live a day before Black Friday, it’s a fixed task that needs to be done by that date, and Nimble allows you to adjust or reschedule the tasks leading up to it.

Execution & Workflow Automation

Effective collaboration and workflow automation are vital in a fast-paced digital marketing environment. Nimble provides several features that allow for efficient team execution, task management, and celebration of successes.

Nimble Cafe (Social/Collaborative Execution)

Nimble Cafe serves as a central hub for team collaboration. In a digital marketing context, it becomes a space where teams can celebrate wins, recognize team members’ contributions, and stay aligned with ongoing tasks. For example, as a paid ad campaign reaches a milestone (such as achieving a set click-through rate or reaching a certain ROI), the team can share this achievement on Nimble Cafe, boosting morale and encouraging continued collaboration.

Pull-Based Execution

Pull-based execution allows marketing team members to take on tasks when they are ready, reducing the burden of top-down task assignments. For instance, when an email marketing specialist completes their task, they can pull the next content creation task or even opt into social media content writing if they are ahead of schedule. This flexibility fosters ownership of tasks, ensuring teams feel empowered and motivated to complete tasks effectively and efficiently.

Gamification with Badges

To keep marketing teams motivated, Nimble’s badge system helps recognize milestones such as completing an SEO audit, driving a certain amount of web traffic, or reaching a conversion rate goal. For example, when a content marketing team member hits their target for organic traffic growth, they can earn a badge that signifies their contribution to the success of the campaign. This gamification ensures that team members stay engaged and aligned with marketing goals.

Lead Generation & Nurturing

Nimble’s tools help teams streamline lead generation, nurture leads, and align their activities with broader business goals through intelligent automation and real-time tracking.

AI-Powered Similar Workitem Recommendations

Nimble’s AI-driven recommendations suggest similar successful past marketing tasks, helping digital marketers identify best practices and optimize strategies for lead generation. For example, if a particular email subject line in a previous campaign led to high engagement, Nimble’s AI will flag that subject line for future campaigns. Additionally, if a landing page design has historically driven strong conversions, the system will suggest using similar layouts for new campaigns.

Nimble OKR (Progress Tracking)

Aligning lead generation efforts with overall business goals is simplified by Nimble’s OKR tracking. For instance, if the goal is to increase leads by 20% over the quarter, Nimble tracks progress through key results like conversion rates, ad clicks, and content engagement. Real-time tracking ensures that teams can evaluate their tactics against the broader objectives and make data-driven decisions about where to allocate resources for better lead nurturing.

Campaign Monitoring & Performance Tracking

Continuous tracking of campaign performance ensures that digital marketing teams can adjust strategies on the fly to improve outcomes.

Flow Analytics (Cumulative Flow Diagrams & Throughput)

Nimble’s flow analytics helps track campaign performance using cumulative flow diagrams and throughput analysis. These tools are essential for understanding the efficiency of campaign workflows. For instance, you can assess how many marketing tasks (such as content creation, landing page optimization, or paid ad management) are moving through the campaign pipeline. If tasks are stalled in a certain phase (e.g., copywriting), it might indicate a bottleneck, prompting the team to shift resources to ensure smooth execution.

Cards Needing Attention

Nimble’s cards needing attention feature flags high-priority tasks that require immediate action. For example, if a social media post has been delayed due to a content review issue or a paid ad campaign isn’t delivering results, these tasks are flagged, ensuring that they are addressed promptly and don’t negatively impact the overall performance of the campaign.

Optimization & Refinement

Continuous improvement is key to long-term success. Nimble helps marketers optimize workflows and campaigns based on data-driven insights.

Continuous Improvement with Card Aging

Nimble’s card aging feature shows how long tasks have been in the system without progress. This helps identify delays in the workflow, such as an ad creative being stuck in approval or a blog post not progressing past the drafting stage. By identifying aging cards, digital marketing teams can intervene earlier, identify process bottlenecks, and streamline workflows to improve efficiency.

Retrospectives for Continuous Improvement

After each campaign, Nimble’s retrospective feature helps teams reflect on their successes and challenges. For example, after a seasonal sale campaign, the team can use retrospectives to assess what worked (e.g., email automation and retargeting ads) and what didn’t (e.g., social media strategy). Insights from the retrospective can be used to inform future campaigns, leading to continuous learning and refined strategies.

Scaling & Growth

As campaigns grow and become more complex, Nimble offers tools to manage and scale marketing efforts efficiently.

Portfolio Planning with Nimble Boards

Nimble’s portfolio planning enables teams to manage larger campaigns across multiple channels. As digital marketing efforts grow in scale, marketers can use Nimble Boards to oversee ongoing campaigns and ensure alignment across various teams (e.g., content, ads, email). For example, if multiple campaigns are running simultaneously (e.g., a product launch, SEO optimization, and a paid ad blitz), portfolio planning allows managers to see high-level progress and adjust resources accordingly.

Intelligent Resource Management

As the complexity of campaigns increases, Nimble’s intelligent resource management ensures that the right people with the right skills are allocated to specific tasks. For example, if a campaign requires specialized SEO expertise, Nimble can allocate the SEO expert to keyword research and landing page optimization while a social media manager handles ad copy. This ensures the marketing team is always working at maximum efficiency, especially as the campaigns scale.

Conclusion

In highly intricate workflows specific to the digital marketing domain, keeping your campaigns on track while adapting to changes can be challenging. That’s where Nimble comes in. It’s more than just a tool; it’s a partner that helps you and your team plan, execute, and optimize marketing campaigns with ease. With Nimble, you have everything you need to stay aligned with your goals, whether that’s through real-time performance tracking, or workflow automation that keeps your team on the same page.

Nimble’s flexible approach to hybrid agile planning, along with its emphasis on collaboration and continuous improvement, means you can keep refining your campaigns as you go, ensuring better results at every turn. Whether you’re tackling a single campaign or managing multiple channels, Nimble adapts to your needs, helping you scale with confidence while ensuring that each step is as effective as possible.

If you’re looking for a way to simplify your digital marketing process while delivering better outcomes, Nimble is here to help you make that happen.

Start by trying out Nimble for yourself. Experience how its features can help you streamline your campaigns, boost team collaboration, and improve your results. Sign up for a free trial and let’s make marketing smarter and more efficient together.