Focus Article- Richard Shippee

Driving Digital Transformation Strategy through Content Automation

When did the digital transformation of marketing communications start? A good guess would be 1999 when the power of Web 2.0 encouraged users to provide and share data. This means it has been a quarter century from the earliest days of developing client-directed content to today’s comprehensive array of automation tools and analytic processes designed to speed personalized information to the brains of buyers and influencers.

The impact of this transformation has been significant. Consider the cumulative effect of digitally powered strategies on:

• Increased Efficiency

• Improved Targeting

• Enhanced Client Engagement

• Competitive Advantage

• Better Insights

Achieving these results has come through content development, with an emphasis on continuous improvement and measurement. It’s been an interesting journey for three digital marketing professionals as they explain how they got to where they are today and where they think the future is taking them.

Content Strategies

Building a robust content strategy took time to implement.At Johnson Lambert, based in Park Ridge, IL, Marketing Director Becca McGovern said that their digital marketing is more than a decade old and began with tools for website content development, followed by email marketing, webinars, digital advertising, and more.

“These tools and processes were initially stand-alone, but they have coalesced and now work together to support the firm’s over-arching growth initiatives. Focused on enhancing both the client experience and our internal processes, we've implemented platform changes and updates to streamline our client tracking process within a centralized Salesforce environment to seamlessly monitor and support the client lifecycle.”

It was a similar experience at Keiter, located in Glen Allen, VA, which also implemented their content strategy over 10 years ago.

"We started with our niche groups, since that was our growth strategy for differentiation and, most importantly, personal branding for our team members," said Fonda Lang, marketing and practice development director at Keiter. "Part of the participation requirements for niche members is to write at least one article a year on a relevant topic. Marketing reviews final content to add language that is understandable to our audience, as well as adding crosslinks, calls to action and SEO components before launch."

Lang adds that to augment the efforts of their writers, Keiter also shares the content on their blog, niche newsletters, social media, and LinkedIn ad campaigns.“Marketing also identifies potential topics that are trending online and uses marketing team members as ghost writers during busy times,”she explained.

Johnson Lambert’s and Keiter’s integrated content strategy now includes videos, webinars, whitepapers, digital ad campaigns, and specialized landing pages.Both firms find that comparing the analytics and rankings for blog content showcases which topics are having the most exposure. This aids in building personal branding for their writers internally and externally, as well as assisting with lead generation.

Maintaining Momentum

Outstanding corporate environments are identifiable by a positive tone at the top, and this is key when talking about maintaining the momentum that digital marketing has generated. Lang commented, “I am seeing more of our partners understanding the importance of content development for lead generation and personal brand building.This past year I have had multiple partners promoting article development on their own –without marketing suggesting it first. This is a culture change and is not seen as just part of a marketing “todo list”, but as a valuable area to spend time on for career growth.”

Also impactful are checklists. As McGovern said, “Checklists are important for us internally to help us keep our eye on the ball.”But of course, it goes much further. She adds, “we keep momentum going by celebrating success,”and then taking the added and often overlooked step of recognizing what could have been done better. “If an email mailing or webinar, that we thought was a success, didn’t garner the hits we expected, we research to find out why and take steps to improve performance the next time.”

When it comes to continuous improvement, Becky Weiand, digital marketing manager of Rea & Associates in New Philadelphia, Ohio, dug into one aspect. “Data is the biggest helper in measuring the impact of digital transformation efforts, but I don’t just mean your normal visits, clicks, and other standard data that we all look at. It is important to look one step further. We insist on reviewing quality time on site. Sure, it’s great to get 1,000 people on your website in one day, but if they only average 15 seconds, were they really the right people, and why did they leave so quickly? It comes down to reviewing the pages visited to find out what kept them engaged and what turned them away. Just looking at that one data point can really change how you look at and invest in your digital approach.”

Measurement and Beyond

Measuring and then benchmarking results is a work in progress. As 25 years’ worth of new tools and processes were being introduced at a dizzying (and expensive) pace, the idea of measuring success became a must-have, if only for budget justification purposes. Taking the time, however, to benchmark success was, if not an afterthought, at least not top of mind. This was largely true as digital marketing campaigns were emerging independently as one-offs and were so new that results weren’t necessarily comparable internally (or against industry standards, because there weren’t any) to what had gone before. So, while it was an obvious step to look at what kind of hits came from a digital campaign, there were not many ways to analyze those results. That changed with the onset of Google Analytics. As McGovern said when looking at how Johnson Lambert now measures success in their webinar program, “We've evolved beyond simply tracking attendee lists. Now, we delve into deeper insights by analyzing participant engagement during webinars. For instance, we examine the inquiries submitted via the Q&A, and we even take the time to analyze responses to our polling questions, which we strategically craft to provide valuable client and prospect insights to our marketing and business development teams.”

For Weiand, in addition to using both Google Analytics and Marketo to track client engagement, she said, “Customer Journey, from Acoustic, has now become my favorite tool, allowing me to track the client conversation from connection to conversion. I benchmark success against the industry standards through online research or through AAM resources.”

Crystal Ball Gazing: AI, Automation, and Personalization

The fast pace of digital transformation continues on, so we also asked our respondents to look into their crystal balls to see what’s coming next. Not surprisingly, they see AI, but it is not at all a Wild West scenario. Lang predicted that“our industry will embrace AI content development but at a cautious pace.By utilizing the tools that are available and monitoring their accuracy, marketing teams can further support content development through custom creation, analytics, and repurposing the content for the most reach possible for lead generation and specialized brand building.”

McGovern echoed this regarding the pace of AI adoption,“Automation and AI will make life easier for us to do more, but that doesn’t mean we can lose sight of the strategy behind using these tools and understanding what the purpose of it is. There is so much we must do on the front end in terms of research and testing before we can trust AI with our firm’s reputation.”

Weiand pointed to the increased emphasis on personalized marketing powered by automation.“While the idea of companies tracking our every movement online is a little scary, consumers love getting information they want in a way they want it. We are no longer in a world where we can just put up a big billboard and expect a line of customers to come to our door. We must tailor the journey based on the end user and what they prefer.”

Richard Shippee, managing director, Whitman Transition Advisors. Contact at shippeecomm@aol.com.