The first step for any successful digital marketing strategy

You are starting a company. In this day and age, In order to be competitive, you need an effective digital marketing strategy. More likely than not, one of the first priorities will be developing a website.

One of the first things to do, is to do decide which areas of the development to outsource and which to work on internally. According to Sajeel Qureshi, in an op ed in the Huffington Post, there are certain tasks that are best performed by employees of the company and others that should be left to the experts in the field (i.e. developers and digital marketers) to execute. 

In particular, content creation, digital strategy development and marketing/lead generation should be done in-house. These are the areas where people who are the closest to the product/service that your company is selling should be involved in. On the other hand, content design, digital strategy implementation, and technical work should be outsourced. It is more likely that developers/digital marketers will be able to excel in these areas.

Negotiating a contract with a developer

How do you bring website development costs down? As I mentioned in another post, it is important to first identify which areas of website development to outsource and which to retain in house. Once this is identified, the next step would be to begin a tender process – submitting the proposed requirements to a few vendors who are able to agree to your terms. 

Once a developer is chosen, it is essential to agree on the timeframes for the completion/testing and the monetary penalties that might be incurred it they are not met. Before any work begins, it is also important to agree and stipulate who owns the intellectual property of the website. Most of the time, it is important to negotiate for the owner to own the intellectual property of the website so that any future updates can still be carried out regardless of changes in the developer.

E Commerce in South East Asia

South-East Asia is a subregion of Asia, consisting countries south of China and east of India. This region has experienced high economic growth over the last decade but remains one the less developed parts of the world. 

E Commerce has tremendous potential for growth in this region. Despite internet penetration of 25 percent and as high as 40 percent in certain markets, E Commerce still accounts for less than 1 percent of the total retail market whereas internet advertising accounts for less than 3 percent of all advertising. The leading market of ecommerce is Singapore (at $1.7 billion revenue), the tiny and prosperous island state located at the tip of the Malay Pensinsula. The market is also growing in other regions like Indonesia and Thailand, but significant challenges exist in those countries, partly due to the   poor logistics infrastructure. Many companies such as A Commerce and Singpost have attempted to fill the void by providing end to end solutions, which involves building a robust digital and logistics infrastructure.

Inhouse vs. outsourcing when it comes to digital marketing

For a small business, the choice between hiring an external ad agency to manage the marketing efforts online vs. appointing an inhouse person is usually a difficult one. The article below provides a good starting point and breaks down the key work streams.

In brief, all ideas should be owned by the business. No one will know your customers better than you do and the business owner should play a decisive role in pinpointing the targeted segments. Once the "destination" is affirmed, let the agencies worry about all the design and technical details.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sajeel-qureshi/what-digital-marketing-ac_b_5548675.html