Attention 99.5% of all businesses on planet earth- everything’s changed again! If you haven’t noticed, and adjusted how you do business accordingly, you’re probably on your way to becoming irrelevant. If you want to succeed online today, your business must take a holistic approach towards your digital marketing.

What’s a holistic digital marketing plan? It’s what Aristotle was talking about when he was prattling on about how “the whole is more than the sum of its parts”. Here’s a few common ingredients to a well thought out holistic digital marketing program:

What’s Your Story?

There’s a reason we promote PatrickOrtman, Inc. as a collective of digital storytellers. We’re not just design freaks or tech-heads, we’re a bunch of people who thrive on helping our clients tell their stories in a digital age. That’s important, because people have been educating and entertaining each other with stories since caveman days. Storytelling is how we relate to each other, it’s how we relate to the world. It’s truly amazing and somewhat frightening to me that most companies spend huge amounts of money on traditional and digital marketing without taking the time to figure out their stories. What makes your company unique? Why do you stand out from the competition?

Once you have your company’s story sussed out, it’s time to make sure that all of your digital marketing reflects that story. Your website needs to mesh with your print materials, and so forth. Spend the time to really work on who you are. Then make sure you’re projecting that image everywhere you are. And where does your company need to be? Everywhere your audience may be. It’s awfully hard to define your audience if you don’t have a clue about your story. See why figuring out your story is important?

Websites Still Matter

Your company still needs a really good website, hopefully one that follows web standards and one which helps your company stand above the competition. This is your home base, and you shouldn’t skimp here. Your website is often the first (and sometimes the only) contact a prospective customer has with your business. You know that, it’s been that way for well over a decade, now. But these days, a great website is merely the start of your digital marketing efforts. “If you build it, they will come” no longer applies, and hasn’t for a long time.

Build Your Audience

Any holistic digital marketing plan needs a strong social media marketing program. Several of our clients are noticing that more of their website traffic is coming from their social media efforts (Facebook, Twitter, and so forth) than from their paid search advertising. Some are noticing better results from social media marketing than from their broadcast television commercials and other traditional advertising, actually. This isn’t limited to our clients- check this article from Social Media Today. This will only increase as businesses use social media correctly, to truly engage customers rather than just broadcast information. Google notices this, and that’s why they’ve introduced Google Buzz. Pepsi’s noticed, too- check out their twenty million dollar bet on social media and viral marketing.

Content Is King

Viral videos, web videos, blogs, email newsletters, discussion forums, and so forth. They’re all content, designed for your audience to consume, comment upon, share, mashup, or whatever. They’re what keeps your audience coming back to your website and social media presence for more. Digital marketing isn’t a one-time expense. Like any good marketing, digital marketing requires a constant effort. Your holistic digital marketing plan needs to account for the creation and distribution of new content on a regular basis, or your audience will drift away, uninspired and uninterested. Of course, as with any component of your holistic digital marketing plan, your content must reflect your organization’s story.

Keep Your Eyes Open

One of the great things about digital marketing, as opposed to traditional marketing like television commercials, is that you can easily adjust your campaigns to enhance the parts that are working, and change the parts that aren’t. The very nature of the web is that it’s constantly mutating and evolving. Your holistic digital marketing plan should allow, and even thrive on this.

These days, the whole really is more than the sum of its parts.  So get out there and go holistic, today!

Holistic photo by Mary Hodder