Grassroots Digital Marketing Studio

Digital Marketing Consultant

What is a Small Business Marketing Consultant? And why might you need to hire one?

Hiring a consultant can help you answer some of the questions you might be asking yourself in how to get your business going or getting your business growing.

Technology moves fast, making meaningful connections with your customers challenging at times.  Identifying who your target market is, where to find them and how best to communicate with them is all part of a marketing consultant’s job.

A large businesses and organizations can have difficulty navigating the technology landscape.  In fact, larger businesses are slower to respond to change in general, so the ability to adapt in technology is a strength to smaller businesses.

"every small business is on the verge of out innovating their larger competitors"

But if you own your own business and are doing the books, making sales, buying inventory, and everything else that goes along with running a small business you might  not have the time to invest in learning digital marketing.

That’s why a  consultant is the best option to reach your customers , get more leads, and to grow your business.

In this article, we will show you what you should look for in a consultant.  Not all digital marketers have the same skillset and depending on your needs not everyone will be right for you. 

A  consultant’s expertise is in utilizing digital marketing channels to build awareness, lead people to sales channels, and convert.

Some consultants specialize in a very narrow field, and do it very well.  Others, like Grassroots Digital Marketing Studio, provide a deep depth of knowledge on a variety of digital marketing to provide a more holistic approach.  

Neither approach is better, it really depends on your needs. 

Either type of digital marketing specialist you choose ,they will help you navigate your issues, identify problems, and explore solutions.   

A consultant will help you avoid costly mistakes of investing time and money into digital marketing channels that are not the right fit for your business or for the challenges you’re facing.

"it's not about going after every customers, it's about going after the right ones"

The best digital consultants have a background in marketing, advertising, data analytics and more.  It’s a constantly evolving field that requires constant attention to digital innovations, trends and human behavior.

They understand what type of content will best be suited for your business and how to get your messaging across to your key demographics.  Digital marketing is not just about marketing, its also communications, PR, sociology, and advertising 

Marketers understand consumer behavior psychology.  This is important that that when you are delivering you brands key value strengths that they resonant with your key demographics. 

Free internet marketing experts Consultation with one of the top digital marketing companies

As a top digital marketing agency, we offer a free digital marketing constant free for one 1/2 hour free please fill out the form below.

At Grassroots Digital Marketing Studio, we strive to provide services that your business or organization needs. 

By chatting with us we can research your business before our call and then spend some time talking to you about your needs and what your goals are.

We will not try to sell you any services on our call.  We will just talk about your business and what you are looking for. 

Read more about our marketing philosophy on our about page.

Digital Marketing Consultant

The role of the web marketing consultant

What Does a Digital Marketing freelancers Do?

Digital Marketing Consulting Services

Developing a Marketing Plan/Strategy

A marketing plan is your guide to all of marketing activities  you’ll do.  You need a plan and strategy to be successful.  

A marketing plan outlines your marketing strategy for both the short-term and long-term. 

A marketing plan should includes:

The key factor in developing a marketing strategy is a deep understanding of who your customers are and who you want your potential customers to be.  Making sure that you have the right channels, with the right messaging, will ultimately determine the success of your marketing efforts.  

What can a digital marketing specialist do to help you with your marketing strategy:

When most people think of a brand, they envision a logo.  Creating a brand goes far beyond that.  A brand is about about your physical assets, but it’s also about how people feel about you, the feeling you envoke, the perception of your company and how your brand is viewed.

A marketing advisor will help you define your  brand identity.  Creating a brand identity is important because if you don’t, others will define you.  

Your brand identity is all of the things that you do to convey the desired image to your customers.  It’s how people feel about you.  Think of a brand like Apple; they have a distinct identity that their customers have a strong connection to.

A digital marketing veteran will explore the following in developing your brand identity.

A prepared digital marketing plan will help you to achieve long-term growth and success.  

Digital Marketing Consultant

Free Digital Marketing Consultation with one of the top digital marketing companies

As a top digital marketing agency, we offer a free digital marketing constant for one 1/2 hour free please fill out the form below.

Digital Marketing Consultant

Free Digital Marketing Consultation with one of the top digital marketing companies

As a top digital marketing agency, we offer a free digital marketing constant for one 1/2 hour free please fill out the form below.

Creating a digital marketing strategy with a marketing consulting agency

Content Creation

At it core, marketing is all about creating content.  Lots of content.  You need to have a plan before you start churning out content on your website and social media platforms.

A digital marketing advisor will walk you through your goals and objectives and create a content calendar that will help you achieve success. 

A content calendar is the best way to plan out the direction of your business and ensure you are not just producing content for the sake of it.  

A content calendar will make sure that you aren’t overselling.  Especially on social media, you should only be selling 20% of the time, 80% of the time you should be entertaining, informing, conversing, and sharing with your customers and potential customers.  

You can create a content calendar using almost anything.  But there are several free and paid services you can use.  HubSpot offers a great free template, or we’ve used services like TrelloAsana, Hootsuite

You can even use your Google Calendar 

"Content will always be King"

Creating content can be challenging, and a digital marketing consultant can help you develop one.

You content calendar should include:

Agile Project Management

How to be agile with a digital marketing agency

A digital marketing consultant can ensures that the feedback from your marketing campaigns can be acted on quickly and that changes can be made quickly based on that feedback. 

Relate to your customers with help from an online marketing consultant

Tell a compelling narrative

Engagement with your customers, or soon to be customers, requires that you entertain, delight and inform them about your brand, goods, and services.

Creating a brand story from the start will allow you to identify how to relate to your target audience.

A marketing plan should includes:

SEO

The key factor in developing a marketing strategy is a deep understanding of who your customers are and who you want your potential customers to be.  Making sure that you have the right channels, with the right messaging, will ultimately determine the success of your marketing efforts.  

How can a digital marketing consultant help you with your brand story:

Digital marketing, and SEO are always changing and evolving and staying  up-to-date on best practices takes time and energy.  

This is where a Digital Marketing Consultant can help.  Marketing agencies, like Grassroots Digital Marketing Studio, offer many services for search engine optimization.  The more optimized your content is, the higher it will rank in search results. 

SEO is a long-term strategy, it’s not a one and done process or something you can quickly plan out and execute.  A digital marketing consultant will help guide you to achieve success.  

SEO Strategies include: 

A digital marketing consultant will explore the following in developing your brand identity. A prepared digital marketing plan will help you to achieve long-term growth and success.  

Free Digital Marketing Consultant Consultation; we are a full-service DIGITAL MARKETING COMPANY

A digital marketing strategist will have a firm grasp of seo concepts

Heirarchy of Needs for SEO 1 1

other digital marketing services an online marketing expert can do

A digital marketing consultant will also have expertise in these areas:

Paid Media Marketing

This includes PPC, social media advertising, search and display advertising among others.

Earned Media Marketing

This includes backlinks, social media mentions, content creation, everything that generates buzz around your business.

Owned Media Marketing

These are all of the channels you have direct control over. Your website, blog, and social media channels.

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Hiring a Digital Marketing Consultant

Having a clear purpose for one is the biggest factor for hiring a digital marketing consultant.  What are you looking to do? What are your goals?  Depending on a Digital Marketing Consultant to come up with these will likely need lead to the best results.

Certainly if you or no one in your organization has the time to invest in learning digital marketing or already has those skills; then it might be a good time to consider hiring one.  This could especially be the case if you’re a small business.

Marketing Analytics

Analytics

Consultants are constantly looking at data to see what creates awareness for your brand.  This can help you determine what content works and  what your target audience’s likes and doesn’t like

Creating meaningful stories with content that appeals to your audience builds  relationships which leads to more engagement, leads, and conversions.

If you are looking for a digital marketing agency near me or digital marketing near me, Grassroots Digital Marketing Studio is for you!

 

Things to Consider When Hiring A Digital Marketing Consultant

Hiring a digital marketing consultant is an investment. So make sure you hire the right one based on your business needs and goals.

1. Your Business Needs and Objectives

You need to know what you want or need help with.

Setting SMART goals that you want your digital marketing consultant to achieve will give him or her more direction.

Some examples that you can direct to your digital marketing consultant:

  • I want to an increase in business sales by 50% in 12 months

  • Using organic strategies, I want a 300% boost in traffic on my website within 5-6 months

  • I am open to paid advertising but only with a budget of $1,000 a month. Use this to generate an increase of 35% in online sales in 3 months

These listed above are straightforward cases to get you started on thinking about concrete directions for your digital marketing consultant.

To understand better how it goes, check this out for some abridged versions of case studies where digital marketers assisted real businesses.

SMART goals also help your digital marketing consultant’s choice in what to use to make these happen, from the content types down to the distribution channels, and tools to use.

2. The Tools You’re Using

Whether you use a spreadsheet or a full-blown customer relationship management (CRM) software to manage your email marketing, you need to make sure that the digital marketing consultant knows how to use this. This will make the onboarding process more manageable.

3. Match Expertise with Industry and Business Needs

Some digital marketing consultants would only service businesses belonging to specific industries.

Make sure that the digital marketing consultant you choose has experience working in your industry. That way, you can be assured he or she can cater to your specific needs.

Hiring a digital marketing consultant with knowledge and experience in your industry gives you the following advantages:

  • More in-depth understanding of the consumers you’re targeting.

  • More knowledge on industry trends.

  • Greater awareness of the best practices observed when promoting your products.

4. Your Budget

Hiring a digital marketing consultant doesn’t come cheap.

The average hourly rate for digital marketing consultants worldwide is around $140 per hour. This varies based on years of experience, the scope of service, and the level of understanding in specific industries and digital marketing trends.

As you can see, digital marketing consultants don’t come cheap. Naturally, you’d want to make sure that when you hire a digital marketing consultant, you’ll get the results you’re expecting.

It’s for this reason why many companies would opt to pay the digital marketing consultant they choose to hire by using the value-based pricing model.

With this model, you pay your digital marketing consultant a percentage of the revenue you generate as a result of the marketing campaigns they launch.

But, if the target wasn’t reached, then you need to place a minimum payment agreement based on actual results, either as a fixed fee or a lower percentage.

With this pricing model, your digital marketing consultant will be motivated to work harder because better results equate to higher earnings.

Either way, you need to set your budget wisely. Here are some tips to help you allocate your budget:

  • Study your books to refocus the marketing budget since a part of this will go to your digital marketing efforts.

  • Match your budget with the size of your company.

  • Identify your strategy’s complexity to focus on specific digital marketing tools (e.g., SEO, PPC, content, and social media).

  • Match your digital marketing goals to the consultant’s experience.

5. Testimonials and case studies

A digital marketing consultant’s track record is something you should always look at when deciding who to hire.

Some digital marketing consultants would feature a list of case studies on their website.

These give you details about a specific marketing campaign they launched for one of their clients. Here, you’ll get an overview of the process the digital marketing consultant went through in developing and implementing the marketing campaign. You’ll also see the results they achieved.

At the same time, you get to see the type of marketing strategies they implement and see if this matches your style.

Make sure to review the testimonials on their website.

Testimonials serve as social proof that can elicit a level of trust from prospective clients that they can do what they claim.

Check feedback from previous clients about their knowledge, skills, and professionalism.

Finally, take the time to speak to their previous clients.

You’ll get a better idea of their experience with the digital marketing consultant you’re considering. At the same time, you’ll get more insight into the results they got from the working relationship.

Some questions you can ask the consultant’s previous clients are:

  • How did [consultant name] work on your company URLs’ Google rankings over the last six months? And how has this impacted your business?

  • Can you show some examples of the processes that [consultant name] engaged in to achieve targets for organic online marketing?

  • How did [consultant name] ’s expertise as a digital marketing consultant fit your business needs?

  • Were there particular roadblocks that [consultant name] encountered? What steps or techniques were undertaken to overcome them?

  • During [consultant name] ’s time as a digital marketing consultant for your company, were there techniques that were passed to your team and yourself?

Hiring a digital marketing consultant can help your business grow

Digital marketing consultants lend their expertise to help you develop, launch, and monitor your marketing strategies in a more organized and efficient manner.

Make sure you’re hiring a digital marketing consultant that best fits your business needs, knows your industry, and a proven record of delivering results.

To help you begin, consider my growth-driven marketing course to get the following benefits:

  • Generate quality leads,

  • Shorten your sales cycle, and

  • Get published in leading online publications

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