Start With Primary Research: The Foundation of Your Online Plan
To make the best of online marketing, you first need to prepare the structure of the plan and know exactly what you need to do and how to proceed. The first step is primary research.
Conducting research about the market and competitors is the basis and foundation of a marketing plan. The importance of doing research is equal to the importance of constructing the foundation of a building. If you don't build the foundation right, there will be no justification for continuing the construction, because greater losses will be imposed by building it.
Research these questions: What is currently happening in the market? What path are other companies taking? What is the latest status of technology? What are the state-of-the-art tools of online marketing? What tools do your competitors apply and what is the result in the market? Write down the results in a scratchpad and take notes.
Research what tools are most widely used and most popular in your niche. Popularity has two meanings: the popular tool is the most appealing one in the market, and the popular tool is pertinent to your business. Create a table and write the popular and practical tools in the first column, such as Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube. You will add further columns in the next stages.
Find out which tools your competitors use and write down how they use each one. For example, you may realize they have been mostly active on Instagram and yielded the best results from the advertising campaign method, but failed in influencer marketing because they chose the wrong influencer.
There is always a dilemma about research: you don't know how accurate your understandings are. Therefore, bring in a market research expert. Two lines of expertise, one in online marketing and the other in your business, analyze the data together and yield reliable results.