Digital marketing
strategy
A digital marketing strategy decides which online channels you use, in which order, with how much money and what each one has to deliver. Your website, Google, Meta, email and CRM working as one machine instead of five unrelated invoices.
Free: a 30-minute call, an action plan and a price range in writing.
What goes
into the mix
The place every channel sends people. If it doesn't turn visits into calls, every other channel costs more.
People who need you now. For local businesses, the Google Business Profile often brings more calls than the website.
Fast, measurable demand capture. Expensive in many US niches, so keywords and landing pages must be tight.
Facebook and Instagram reach people before they search: good for visual offers, events, new services and remarketing.
The cheapest repeat sales you'll ever get, as long as consent and CAN-SPAM and TCPA rules are respected.
Where leads are tracked so none get lost, and where you see which channel actually produced paying customers.
A plan in
three phases
-
01
Months 1–2
Foundations
Tracking, Google Business Profile, a website or landing page that converts, a place for leads to land.
-
02
Months 2–4
Capture demand
Google Ads and local SEO for the searches that are already happening in your area.
-
03
Months 4–8
Create demand
Meta ads, remarketing, email to past customers, reviews. Budget shifts toward what the data favors.
-
04
Every quarter
Review
Numbers against targets, channels cut or scaled, the next quarter's calendar adjusted for seasons.
Plan, tracking
and execution
Prices in US dollars, final. Ad budget is paid directly to Google or Meta.
The full digital plan: channels, order, budget, targets and calendar.
- Channel mix and priorities
- Monthly media plan
- KPIs per channel
- Zoom walkthrough
GA4, Tag Manager and pixels, so the plan can be measured from day one.
- Forms, calls, bookings
- Google Ads and Meta conversions
I run one channel of the plan every month.
- No minimum term
- Monthly report
What a digital marketing strategy decides
A digital marketing strategy is a set of decisions, not a list of channels. Which channels you use and which you deliberately skip. In what order you start them. How much each gets per month. What result each must deliver before it gets more money. And how they pass customers to each other, for example a Meta ad that sends people to a page, which feeds a remarketing list, which a Google campaign then catches when they search.
Without those decisions, small businesses tend to run everything a little: a few boosted posts, a small Google campaign, an SEO retainer, a newsletter that goes out twice a year. Each piece is too thin to work, and none of it can be measured.
How I choose the channels
The choice comes from three questions. Do people actively search for what you sell? If yes, Google Search, Maps and SEO come first. Is your offer visual, new or impulse-friendly? Then Meta ads gain weight. Do customers buy repeatedly? Then email, text messages and a CRM can earn more than any new-customer channel.
The marketing audit adds the reality check: what already works, what is broken, and how much budget is realistic. A plumber in Phoenix and an online jewelry shop need very different mixes, even with the same budget.
The media plan
The plan becomes a month-by-month table: channel, budget, goal, and who does the work. It includes the US seasons that matter for your business. A landscaping company plans around spring; an HVAC business around the first heat wave and the first cold snap; a retailer around Black Friday, Cyber Monday and December; an accounting firm around tax season. Hurricane season on the Gulf and Atlantic coasts or harsh Midwest winters can shift demand by weeks, and the plan leaves room for that. My US seasonal marketing calendar lists the main peaks.
Measurement comes first
I don't put budget into a channel that can't be measured. Before any ads run, the plan includes GA4, Tag Manager, conversion tracking for forms and calls, and a CRM or at least a shared inbox where leads are logged. It costs $550 for the analytics setup, and it is what lets you see in month three whether Google or Meta brought the customers, rather than guessing.
Privacy matters too. If you track visitors, your privacy policy should say so, and depending on your state and audience, laws such as the CCPA in California may require an opt-out for sharing data. Healthcare businesses need extra care with tracking pixels because of HIPAA. I set things up sensibly and recommend that you confirm the legal side with your attorney.
Several locations or several states
If you serve more than one metro or cross state lines, the plan splits budget and targets by area. Each location needs its own Google Business Profile, its own reviews and often its own landing page, and ad budgets follow the areas with the best return rather than being divided evenly. Time zones matter for call handling too: an ad that runs at 8 a.m. Pacific brings calls at 11 a.m. Eastern.
Common traps
- Starting with the channel the owner personally uses instead of the one customers use.
- Splitting a small budget across five platforms, so none gets enough data to learn.
- Judging channels by clicks and likes instead of calls, bookings and sales.
- Copying a national competitor's playbook with a local budget.
- Running ads to a homepage that doesn't match the ad.
Budget and next step
The budget side of the plan is covered in detail on the marketing budget and KPIs page. The whole digital strategy is part of the $1,900 audit and strategy. If you want me to carry it out, I run Google Ads, Meta ads, SEO, analytics and CRM myself, and outsourcing of one channel starts from $600 a month with no minimum term.
Channels in
the plan
Digital strategy
questions
How is a digital strategy different from a general marketing strategy?
A general strategy covers the customer, the offer and positioning, plus offline pieces like referrals, partnerships or signage. A digital strategy zooms into the online channels: which to use, how they hand customers to each other, what each costs and what it must deliver. With me, the $1,900 strategy includes both layers.
Which channel should a small business start with?
For most local service businesses: tracking, a solid Google Business Profile and a page that converts, then Google Ads or local SEO for searches already happening. Meta ads usually come next. Exceptions exist, for example visual products or events, where Meta can lead. The audit decides, not habit.
How much should I spend on ads?
It depends on what a customer is worth and on click prices in your niche. As a rough floor I recommend about $1,500 a month in ad budget, paid directly to Google or Meta, because clicks in many US niches are expensive. Below that, campaigns learn slowly. The plan calculates a figure for your business.
Do I need daily social media posting?
Usually not as a lead source. A profile that looks alive and answers messages matters; posting every day rarely moves sales for a small local business. Budget is usually better spent on ads, reviews and follow-up. If social content is important for your brand, I deliver social media management with a trusted partner.
How often is the plan updated?
I recommend a short review every quarter: what each channel delivered, what to scale, what to cut, and which season is coming. If I run the channels, that review is part of the work. If you run them, a one-hour consultation each quarter usually covers it.
Which channels
should you fund?
Tell me what you run now and what you spend. I reply within one business day with a first view.
- 9 short steps
- No obligation
- I reply personally
- I reply within 1 business dayPersonally, by email or on WhatsApp, whichever you prefer.
- A 30-minute call, freeI ask about your business, customers and budget. Beforehand I review your website and ads.
- A proposal with a price, in writingWhat I’ll do, by when and for how much. You decide with no pressure.
What do you need most?