Digital Marketing just got a whole lot more relevant to a lot of brands now switching their strategies and going online.

If you’re just starting out, needing to climb a big old learning curve or just want a wee refresher, we’ve lifted the lid on a few secrets of the Digital Marketing world:

Get your tracking set up…properly.

Yes, yes, we know. BORING. Snooze. Fest.

But it’s so blimmin’ easy to set up, and basically unlocks a whole world of what’s going on under the hood of your website.

There are loads of options out there, but don’t spring budget on something super fancy when you don’t need to - Google Analytics is free, and does a good job for you - the key is setting up your dashboard so it makes sense for you.

Chances are you don’t really care how many page views your T&Cs got, but you probably care who landed on your checkout page, and maybe didn’t go on to convert.

Give Google Data Studio a whirl for a more visual dashboard, ‘cos if it’s prettier, chances are you’ll want to check it more regularly.

You can also add Facebook, LinkedIn and ALL sorts of other tracking software in to the page code, but even easier is popping Google Tag Manager in (and update your privacy policy to tell your lovely customers you’re tracking their cookies), once Tag Manager’s in place, you can hook up all sorts of tracking within it - saves you bothering your developers, and costly time and budget spent in pasting bits of code.

Digital Marketing channels are only as effective as the tracking that supports them, so get tracking!

2. Snoop on your competitors.

Thanks to certain…voting-user-data-sales-based-indiscretions from a social media behemoth, things got an awful lot easier lately to track what your competition’s up to.

On Facebook, the ‘Page Transparency’ section can be found on the bottom right of every page.

Here you can find:

Details if the page name has changed
Access the ads being run by that page
Or search via the Ad Library

On LinkedIn, you can also access your competitors ads via their pages.

So go ahead. Have a snoop around.

Of course, you won’t be able to see performance, but if an ad has been running for 3 or more months, chances are, it’s working.

Check out any pricing changes, tweaks or strategies you can unearth.

Perhaps your competition has made moves to change their product offering?

3. Find what others are searching for - and check in on yourselves

Google trends is an amazing tool to check in and see what the world, your current market or prospective markets are searching for.

See also great inspiration for home-made pub quizzes.

Remember when everyone was searching for what a ‘Super Over’ was? Heady days, indeed.

Been caught Googling yourself?

Searching for your own brand if you’re fast growing or in a competitive market isn’t vain, it’s a worthwhile, stopgap insight into how your brand is performing out there.

A free and cheap snapshot into brand tracking. Not flawless, but a good way to get a feel for what the masses are up to.

Are people starting to search for you by name?

Good!

Are people searching for related terms to your category as overall awareness grows?

Good but watch those PPC bids on keywords as things get more competitive.

There are loads more to share, but you’re busy.

Check back soon for the next instalment.