Six Traits To Look For When Building Your Digital Squad

As marketing trends shift to focus more on digital strategies, might require biting off more than you can chew. Digital strategies haven’t been around long, but change more in a year than traditional marketing methods have over decades of being used. When you start to dive into the world of digital marketing strategies, you may find yourself lost. What is CRO? How can businesses collect and apply data on website visitors? What are the secret tips for reaching the top page of search engine results for specific searches?

When you start asking yourself questions about digital marketing strategies and how your business can bring in more leads and customers online, it’s time to form a digital squad.

What Is A Digital Squad?

A digital squad is a team who supports your business and helps you reach your growth goals with ethical, sustainable solutions for long-term success.

Outsourcing has many benefits, especially in the fast-changing, technology-driven world of digital marketing. An outside agency that focuses solely on digital marketing has access to more knowledge, more equipment, and more industry secrets than an in-house team. Not all digital squads look the same; some may consist of SEO experts, web developers, or content marketing gurus. No matter what industry you work in, you can find a digital squad that can help you sort out your online needs and implement best online practices.

If you are looking to outsource your digital marketing efforts, or simply consult with experts who can help you form your next campaign, you’ll need to form a digital squad who can take you through each step of your SEO and online journey.

What To Look For In a Digital Squad

Skills That Match Your Needs

Before you reach out to agencies, think about what strategies you plan on using for your next marketing campaign. Different marketing goals require different skills, and not every digital agency has the skillset or personnel to help you out.

What are your goals for this next campaign, or the next year?

If you are hoping to appear on the first page of search engine results, you will need an agency that specialises in search engine optimisation (SEO.)

If you want to appear even higher in search engine results with paid ads, you will need an agency that specialises in AdWords marketing.

If you want positive news about your company to appear higher in search engine results, you will need an agency that specialises in online reputation management.

If you are hoping to lead customers through the buyer’s journey with blog posts, eBooks, and more, you will need an agency that specialises in content marketing.

If you are satisfied with your traffic, but want to convert more of your traffic into leads or customers, you will need an agency that specialises in conversion rate optimisation (CRO.)

If you are an ecommerce business who wants to boost conversions and bring visitors back to their carts, you will need an agency that specialises in remarketing and retargeting.

Ability to Manage Content

Content creation is a top focus for businesses of all sizes and across all industries. “Content” is an umbrella that covers social media (Facebook posts, Pinterest pins, etc.,) website content (blog posts, landing pages,) email marketing (newsletters, downloadable content,) and more. If you are not creating content for each step of the sales funnel, you may find website visitors are dropping off the face of the Earth before they become customers (or you might not have a desired number of website visitors in the first place.)

Talk to potential squad members about who can write or produce different pieces of content. Not all digital marketing agencies have the ability to hire cameras or video equipment, but can put you in contact with local businesses that can produce content for you. This expands your digital squad even further, and boosts the quality of the content you produce to your audience.

Love for Research

One of the advantages of handing over your digital marketing strategy to an agency is that your team can focus on your specialities without taking on additional research or education. If skills and knowledge like coding, data collection, or web design are unfamiliar to your current team, invest in the experts. Add new team members who have already taken the time and effort to gain this knowledge.

When you are talking to potential members of your new squad, ask them about their time conducting research, both past and present. If your team members can’t give you the latest updates on social media marketing trends, search engine algorithms, and how to optimise your content to meet customer expectations, you are better off going with someone else.  

Passion for Ethics

There are a lot of ways to get a larger social media following, higher rankings, and more sales. In the world of making money, these methods may be ethical…or not. SEO is no different.

In the digital marketing world, “white hat” SEO consists of ethical, sustainable tactics that ensure long-term success (if you have a little patience and put in the right work.) “Black hat” SEO tactics will boost your rankings quickly without much work, but you won’t be celebrating for long. Eventually, Google catches up to unethical websites and businesses and your rankings drop lower than ever before, for a longer period of time.

When you are looking for an SEO agency, ask them about the different methods they use to boost rankings and how fast your business will see the results you want. If the answers are too good to be true, run and find digital squad members who prefer a more ethical and professional solution.

Consistency

Outsourcing to an agency saves your team quite a few headaches when the holidays or other staff events arise. No matter what your team is up to or who is taking on different projects, you can rely on your digital squad to optimise, monitor, and adjust your strategy based on current trends. Find an agency or team members who will live up to that promise and have already made a habit of frequently checking up on their clients.

Ask potential agencies the following questions about their consistency and dedication to each client:

• How often do you check a client’s rankings for focus keywords or AdWords ads?
• How often do you send out reports regarding marketing goals and progress?
• How long do your marketing campaigns last?

Don’t be left out to dry by your digital squad members. Find a crew that will have your back and optimise your marketing materials through every algorithm change and Google update.

Accessibility

Since the Google algorithm and keyword rankings are changing every day, you may need to access members of your digital squad at a moment’s notice. Your website needs constant monitoring, and if you’re not always thinking about your next content pieces, you may fall behind. Whether you communicate best through email or over the phone, you should be able to hear back from your squad within 24 hours.

The best way to ensure that you have an accessible team is to partner with a smaller agency. This may sound counterproductive, but hear us out. Smaller teams form a closer partnership with their clients, and you want to have a team member that you trust will pick up the phone and remember previous conversations about your campaign.

Why You Should Reach Out To the Experts at Digital Squad

If your business is looking for digital experts in Auckland, you’re in luck: you can recruit Digital Squad for your digital squad.

Digital Squad is a small agency that takes on clients as partners. We only work with one client per industry; after all, we use our expertise and SEO knowledge to reach for the top spot on Google. We don’t take on competitors who could be vying for that same position.

How do we get there? We grab knowledge from our thousands of hours researching the Google algorithm. Our team creates content and optimised website pages that Google recognises as trustworthy, relevant resources for your customers. And we get your team there in an ethical, professional manner.

We are a results-driven white hat SEO agency that makes your long-term success our goal. Even when we first take on a client, we are thinking about the future. The first month of working with our partners is crucial for long-term success. After we set up a Google AdWords campaign or begin to optimise your website, we check your rankings every day. From then on, we provide monthly reports on the progress you are making and how you can continue to optimise content.

In addition to SEO, we also provide the following digital marketing services:

• Content Marketing
• AdWords Marketing
• Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO)
• Online Reputation Management
• Remarketing and Retargeting
• Facebook Marketing

When you are forming your digital squad, don’t just choose any SEO agency or digital marketers. Choose a top digital agency in Auckland; choose the Digital Squad. We are a b2b marketing agency with expertise in SEO services, Facebook marketing Auckland, LinkedIn marketing, AdWords management agency Auckland and more. Contact us to find out more. Coffee is on us.

Reach out to Digital Squad today to learn how we can help you reach your digital marketing goals.

Megan Okonsky is a copywriter and content marketing specialist with Digital Squad. She is originally from Philadelphia but has landed in Melbourne after traveling for eight months in Southeast Asia and New Zealand. She also teaches vinyasa yoga online.