Develop your digital strategy

If you’re planning to sell products or start marketing online, you need to understand who you’re selling to.

Do some research to find out:

• who your current customers are
• any other market segments you could target
• their behaviours and preferences
• which online channels they use
• the best ways to engage these people online.

Write down your business’s digital goals. You can draw on:

• your market research
• your business plan
• your marketing plan
• a SWOT analysis.

Think about how you could use digital tools or platforms to:

• build on your business’s strengths
• address weaknesses
• take advantage of opportunities.

Examples of digital goals:

• create a mobile-friendly website
• set up an online store
• start using social media
• use online ads
• add a customer support chatbot to your website
• move to a cloud-based accounting or customer relationship management (CRM) system
• create a cyber security policy
• go paperless in your office
• improve your search engine optimisation (SEO)
• automate one or more time-consuming tasks
• adopt tools and policies so your staff can work from anywhere.

Use your research to choose the best:

• online channels to reach your audience
• digital tools to achieve your other business goals.

Online channels

You can use digital tools in your business for more than just marketing. This includes tools for:

• accounting
• inventory management
• project management
• staff scheduling
• customer relationship management
• online meetings
• collaborating on documents
• storing files and data.

Set measurable targets for each of your digital goals. Have a plan to measure your progress towards them.

Free tools like Google Analytics can monitor many aspects of website traffic. This includes showing how effective your content and digital ads are at driving sales.

Social media platforms and tools can measure how engaging your posts are.

You can use data from analytics reports to decide what’s working and what you might need to change.

Cyber security is essential for a digital business. Your digital strategy should outline:

• how you’ll protect accounts, devices and information from cyber threats
• how you’re going to keep your customers’ data private
• cyber security policies your staff need to follow
• a plan for regularly updating your software and tools to prevent vulnerabilities.

Break down all the costs involved in achieving your digital goals. Include any ongoing expenses as well as upfront costs.

Some of the costs you might need to consider:

• buying new software
• upgrading computers or other hardware
• ongoing subscriptions for platforms or tools
• development costs for your website or custom software
• training your staff to use your new tools
• hiring new employees
• outsourcing tasks
• digital advertising.

Review these costs against your overall budget to work out what you can afford.

An action plan breaks your digital goals down into smaller tasks. This will help you work out what you need to do and stay on track.

To create your action plan:

• list the tasks you need to complete for each goal
• make sure every task will benefit your business
• give each task a priority and due date
• assign each task to someone to complete.

If your employees don’t have all the skills to implement your digital strategy, you’ll need to give them training.

This might involve:

• internal or on-the-job training
• external courses
• mentoring.

Encourage a culture of learning and embracing new things to ensure your staff get the most out of digital technologies.

You should update your strategy over time in response to:

• changes in your business
• analytics and customer feedback
• new digital tools and technologies.

Plan to regularly review your strategy against your digital and business goals. Use monitoring data to identify what you might need to change. Be flexible and adjust your strategy if you need to.

It’s also important to plan for future technologies. How will you stay informed about new digital tools in your industry?

Use our grants, adviser and events finder tools to find digital support relevant to your business.