5 Mistakes to Avoid When Developing a Digital Marketing Strategy

The internet is now the place to be when it comes to contemporary marketing. Most of today’s consumers will be shopping and interacting with brands online before they ever set foot in a physical store. This means businesses have everything to gain from meeting and interacting with their audience in digital spaces, no matter how big their brand is or what they might be selling.

You can’t just pull an effective campaign out of a hat, however. You’ll need a sound digital marketing strategy to ensure that your marketing initiatives reach the right audience—and, moreover, that they spark enough interest in your offerings to actually generate sales. The trick to achieving this? Figuring out just what works (and what doesn’t!) for companies today.

We’re all about helping all kinds of businesses reach, and even exceed, their digital marketing goals. Read on for a rundown of some common digital marketing mistakes and how to avoid them like an expert.

Not Putting Enough Effort into Website Design

Imagine what it might be like to run a physical store. No matter what you might be selling, you’ll always draw in more customers with a fresh, eye-catching display rather than a drab and dull one. By the same token, you want your website to capture and hold the attention of those who visit it. Users who don’t enjoy the experience they have when they get there will generally not hesitate to leave in favour of a competing brand.

A well-designed website needs to be as functional and user-friendly as it is appealing to look at. Plan out a simple, logical navigational structure with clear call-to-action buttons and well-organised menus. Take steps to boost your loading speed, such as compressing large elements like images and videos. Lastly, make sure that the elements on your page are scalable to a variety of different screen sizes, so your site performs just as well on a mobile device as it does on a desktop computer.

Skipping Out on SEO Optimisation

According to Search Engine Journal, 93% of online experiences originate on search engines. They’re the go-to tool for pretty much everyone when it comes to finding any kind of information, so you definitely want your content to rank highly on people’s search results. The more visible you are on search engines, the more organic traffic you can draw toward your brand online.

Search engine optimisation (SEO) needs to play a major role in your digital marketing strategy if it doesn’t already. The first thing you need to do is get savvy with keyword research. Investigate what queries your audience is sending to search engines about your brand, your industry, and your competitors. Then integrate these keywords into your website and social media so that your brand appears more prominently in searches for those terms.

It’s worth noting that SEO is a rapidly evolving and frequently unpredictable field. Keeping abreast of research and updates from SEO authorities can ensure that you’re always implementing current best practices. Alternatively, we are more than happy to take the SEO reins for you.

Overlooking Content Marketing

Many businesses overlook blogging because it doesn’t show immediate results—but trust us, they’re worth the wait. The truth is that blogging is a long game with plenty of benefits for businesses that choose to be patient with it. It’s not just a way to drive traffic; blogging builds your brand’s personality and helps you become the go-to expert in your field. It also gives you more chances to interact with your audience and cultivate more personal relationships with them.

Consistency and a commitment to quality content are your keys to blogging effectively. Keep your blog updated regularly so your audience has more chances to find you. But on the flipside, don’t rush to throw up updates just for the sake of posting something. Take time to create quality content that your audience will both enjoy and be able to use. How-to guides, product recommendations, or thinkpieces on topics relevant to your industry could all work for these purposes.

Failing to Maintain a Strong Social Media

Most people today spend a lot of time on social media, but it would surprise you to find out how many practically live there. A recent study by WebFX, in fact, reports that the average internet user is on their chosen social network for as much as 28% of their total online time. This means that establishing a prominent presence on your audience’s favourite platforms can only work to your business’s advantage. Fail to do so and you’ll lose out on major opportunities to connect with your current customers and potentially reach out to new ones.

Before all else, you’ll need to find out which social media sites your customers favour and set up a page for your business there. Once your profile’s up, get posting! Share content regularly to keep people coming back for more. You may also want to invest in social media advertising if you want to level up your strategy even more. Social media advertising lets you appear prominently on users’ newsfeeds if you have specific content or offerings that fit their interests.

Investing Too Much in Paid Ads

Paid advertising is a popular digital marketing tactic for the quick traffic it generates. Be aware, though, that spending too much on it without a well-defined strategy can lead to diminishing returns and wasted resources. You need to take time to regularly optimise your campaigns, or else your business may keep spending on underperforming ads that use ineffective messaging or target the wrong audience. You also run the risk of tiring out your audience if you bombard them relentlessly with the same ads.

The key to using paid ads effectively? Balance them with organic tactics like social media engagement, content marketing, and SEO. Focusing on customer retention strategies and diversified advertising channels are also good ways to achieve a balanced marketing mix and pave the way for sustainable growth.

Digital marketing can feel like a minefield, but get clued up and you’ll avoid most of the big mistakes. Want to take your marketing efforts to the next level and shine your brightest online? Let’s work together to make sure you get the results you deserve. Contact us today and we’ll provide you with personalised advice on how to make the most of your every campaign.

A note

Henry Blackwell

Henry Blackwell is a marketing professional. He has spent the last 10 years working in-house and within agencies, growing profitable businesses through brand and customer-centric digital marketing in New Zealand, Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom and Europe.

“My approach to marketing is a combination of heart and head. My heart brings an empathetic and intuitive approach to deeply understanding the qualitative requirements of marketing that many simply do not care to do. My head brings an analytical mindset that leverages data-driven insights to deliver profitable performance for the businesses I work with.

This skill set allows me to deliver systematic customer acquisition, conversion, and retention.”

– Director

5 Tips for Getting Quality Backlinks to Your Website for Better SEO Performance

Backlinks are like votes of confidence for your website. The more you’ve got from trusted sites, the higher your SEO ranking will climb. These links, which serve as a cornerstone of search engine optimisation (SEO) campaigns, figure heavily in driving targeted traffic to a website and determining its domain authority and rank.

The act of backlinking refers to the process of placing hyperlinks on other websites with the goal of directing users to your website. These inbound links tell Google that your content is worth linking to. In addition, getting an established website’s endorsement can help your brand gain credibility and consumer trust. This, in turn, can keep your website the top-of-mind option for organisations and individuals that require your products, services, or niche knowledge.

How is Backlinking Done?

A trusted SEO services provider can lean on several strategies to offer businesses like yours high-quality backlinks. As part of our bespoke SEO campaign for your New Zealand- or Australia-based business, for example, we can employ the following techniques to acquire backlinks and ensure that these efforts translate to tangible benefits for your organisation.

Focus on Creating Quality Content That Other Websites Will Want to Link To

Create content that people actually want to link to. Not just any content, but stuff that answers burning questions or solves a problem that your readers have. That’s how you’ll earn those valuable backlinks.

Articles, ebooks, infographics, or videos that answer common questions or offer expert insights can serve as reliable sources that readers and other content creators will want to link back to. Adding a hyperlink from their website to yours lets these users show where they got their information. It also serves as a recommendation on where to get similar content. This gives your organisation the added benefit of building a reputation as a leader in your field.

More than easy access to insider knowledge, you need to understand what your readers need to provide them with engaging and useful content. Identify the content format that is best suited for delivering the information you want to impart. If website visitors want to understand how a certain product is processed before it’s ready for the market, for example, you can post a guide that tackles every step. In case they want to use the said guide as a reference for their own articles, these readers can post a hyperlink on their websites that leads to yours.

Write Articles for Reputable Websites with Deep Connections in Your Industry

Getting your content featured on a respected site in your field? That’s gold for SEO. It’s a win-win for everyone, too, as your article helps the said website’s audience, and you get a valuable backlink in return. Using this strategy means posting an article, one with an inbound link to your website, on another person or organisation’s website. The benefit goes both ways since you can get a link from a trusted website, while the website can post a high-quality article that offers in-depth knowledge to its respective audience.

Identify Broken Links on Other Websites and Fix Them

It’s possible that a portion of the existing backlinks to your website no longer work as intended. This can happen when a linked page on your website has been deleted or its URL structure has changed without proper redirection. Users who click on these links are directed to an error page instead of finding your website, which can subsequently dampen their experience.

The good news is that it’s possible to fix these broken links and make them work again. First, you need to identify them by using a tool like Ahrefs that can scan your website for such irregularities. Then, you can reach out to the owners of the websites where these broken links are posted and work together to fix the issue. This partnership allows webmasters to improve user experience on their website, while your website can regain endorsements from authoritative sources.

Offer to Write Testimonials and Reviews for Products and Services Your Business Uses

Not all backlinking techniques need to be resource-intensive. Don’t underestimate the power of a well-written review. Share your thoughts on products you use and post these reviews online. This is an easy win for backlinks, plus it’s a great way to build relationships with other businesses.

Many business websites feature testimonials from their current and former clients. Take this chance to build better relationships with other businesses and get backlinks from reputable websites. Post an honest review, and make sure to focus the write-up on the products or services that your business uses. You can add the link to your website in your by-line or include it in the body of the review.

Participate in Collaborative Projects That Can Be Linked Back to Your Website

Being an active participant in industry events such as case studies, webinars, or even charity activities can make it easier for your businesses to find opportunities for backlinking. Collaborating with companies that complement what your brand offers allows you to reach a shared audience. At the same time, you’ll have the opportunity to include backlinks to your website on the promotional materials for the event.

Partner with Author Digital and Maximise the Benefits of Quality Backlinks

We know that getting the right backlinks is more important than getting loads of them. Our bespoke digital marketing agency in New Zealand makes it a point to obtain backlinks from industry-specific websites or those that are closely related to your company’s niche. This signals to search engines that your content is highly relevant and valuable to that particular field, thus improving your chances of appearing in related searches and reaching an audience that is specifically interested in what your business has to offer.

Let’s work together to widen your brand’s reach. Get in touch with us today by leaving a message on our contact page.

A note

Henry Blackwell

This skill set allows me to deliver systematic customer acquisition, conversion, and retention.”

– Director

5 UX Elements That Can Significantly Improve Your Website’s User Experience

User experience (UX) is a term that describes how the end user of a product or service interacts with and perceives it. Most assume that UX mostly has to do with user-friendliness, but it actually extends beyond that. At its core, UX doesn’t just shape how users interact with your site but also how they feel about your brand overall.

Almost all customers today will seek out a business’s website first if they’d like to learn more about it or browse its offerings. These individuals will, without a doubt, be expecting a superior user experience. Good UX in the context of websites typically has to do with how easy it is for users to navigate through the site, find information, and complete any other tasks they seek to accomplish during their visit. Online environments that feel memorable, legitimate, and secure to users also indicate effective UX. This is especially true if the website contains an online store or otherwise requires visitors to share sensitive personal information with the company.

One of the best ways to optimise UX design for your business’s website is to invest in professional web design services from a reputable third-party organisation like us. Our team is not only highly skilled and attentive to the unique needs of every client we work with, but we also pride ourselves on our familiarity with current industry best practices. In this feature, we’ll walk you through some key elements that can enhance user experience on your website:

Optimised Loading Speed

Customers in the digital age have better things to do than wait around for a page to fully load. People expect instant access and will bounce without a second thought if your site takes too long. Lots of research backs this up—just a five-second delay can send your bounce rate skyrocketing by over 20%, according to Section.io.

Fortunately, there are many relatively simple ways to boost your page speed, such as using caching techniques and minimising the code and markup on your web pages—a process known as “minification.” Large images are one of the biggest culprits when it comes to a slow-loading web page, so make sure to compress all the images you intend to use on your site before loading them on.

Intuitive Navigation

Your website’s navigation system is one of the pillars of its overall user experience, so it needs to be easy to figure out. As a rule of thumb, you want to help users accomplish anything they set out to do on your website in as few clicks as possible. That might be looking up specific information, making a purchase, getting in touch with your support team, or anything else.

Put yourself in your visitors’ shoes and ask yourself what they’re here for. Once you know that, you can make it easy for them to get stuff done. Make sure that the vocabulary you use in your labels and headings especially is both appropriately descriptive and familiar to the user, so they don’t have a hard time understanding which options to choose to get where they need to go. Don’t hesitate to spend time trying out different navigation options and testing these with real users before committing to one particular scheme.

Appropriate White Space

Packing your pages with too much content is like shouting at your visitors. Give them some breathing room. It’s better to incorporate enough white space around your text and titles, as this actually makes it easier for users to focus. You’ll end up with fresh, modern-looking pages that your visitors will surely enjoy browsing.

Of course, it’s also possible to have too much of a good thing. Aim for a balanced approach where all the most important information your viewers need to know is above the fold—that is, in the upper part of the page that they can immediately see without scrolling. You can then surround that information with white space to highlight the text and any supplementary images.

Mobile-Responsive Design

Everyone’s glued to their phones these days, so your site needs to look and perform like a dream on every kind of screen–not just desktops. In fact, it’s safe to assume that a large chunk of the traffic your website gets will be coming from mobile users! Responsive layouts, big, easily clickable buttons, and text that users can easily read without zooming in are all must-have elements for a mobile-friendly site.

Properly Differentiated Hyperlinks

Besides your main menus and section headings, users will probably be finding their way around your website through hyperlinks—clickable links embedded within the written content on your webpages. Make sure to use visual cues that make these links easy to identify, such as underlined text or differently colored text. Most content management platforms, for instance, will readily default to the blue underlined text as a clickable link, so it may benefit you to stick to this convention. Just make sure not to cluster too many links together, as this makes it harder to click them, particularly for users on mobile.

Now that you know a little more about what goes into effective UX design for websites, it’s time to work on getting your own up to snuff. We help businesses of all sizes craft websites people actually enjoy using. Let’s chat about how we can do the same for you.

A note

Henry Blackwell

This skill set allows me to deliver systematic customer acquisition, conversion, and retention.”

– Director

10 Important Reasons Why Website Maintenance Is Crucial for Your Business

There’s no getting around it. Website maintenance can be incredibly tedious. For many businesses, this is reason enough for site maintenance to take a backseat to other activities. Given their labour limitations, this is often the case with microbusinesses and small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs). However, it’s also surprisingly pervasive among larger businesses.

No matter the size of the business, it’s not uncommon for decision-makers to see site updates as overwhelming or irrelevant, especially if they have non-technical backgrounds. Even when a business does have an IT team, chances are that they are already too stretched thin, with few resources to space for a proper update.

To be clear, a lack of site updates won’t necessarily make an immediate impact on your business. Rather, what happens is a slow and steady degradation of your business’s online visibility, reputation, and visitor experience. Eventually, you will just find that your business is no longer easily searchable on major search engines, which can significantly hamper your online sales.

In this day and age, the value of a good website isn’t even debatable. Ensuring regular upkeep should no longer be regarded as a technical obligation but, instead, an essential investment in your brand’s success. Below, we’ve prepared several reasons why your site maintenance should never be overlooked. If you’re interested in keeping your site up-to-date, contact us to learn about web development services tailored for New Zealand businesses.

1. Keeps Your Site and Users Safer Against Emerging Cyber Threats

Hackers love outdated websites. Old plugins, expired security certificates, and neglected updates are basically an open invitation. Thanks to the emergence of next-generation generative AI tools, hackers have been able to dramatically step up the volume and sophistication of their attacks, increasing the risk for all businesses. At the bare minimum, you should be regularly installing security updates and performing backups to ensure your website’s data and sensitive customer information remain secure.

2. Enables a More Engaging Visitor Experience

Without periodic maintenance, even the best-built websites will eventually slow down. What’s more, they may also develop broken links and feature outdated content that can further frustrate visitors, especially if you’ve been making undocumented changes to the website, potentially driving them to your competitors. Routine check-ups keep your site running smoothly — so visitors stay, enjoy, and actually want to come back.

3. Helps Your Business Dominate Search Engine Rankings

Human visitors are not the only ones who care about your site’s user experience. Search engines like Google and Bing also send out virtual visitors or ‘bots’ to explore websites so that they can be assessed for relevance and usability. Regular optimisation of your site’s navigation, experience, and content signals to search engines that your site is active and is, therefore, trying to engage with visitors, which can boost your rankings. Without periodic updates, search engines may assume that you’re not particularly interested in organic traffic, which can cause a drop in your search rankings.

4. Enables You to Reach Users Across All Devices

If you still imagine desktops when you think of the internet, it’s time to rethink your assumptions. Not only are the majority of global internet users browsing on mobile devices these days, but there are tens of thousands of different device types with various configurations being used at any given time. Regular maintenance ensures that your site remains accessible across all devices, boosting your brand’s visibility to a wider range of internet users.

5. Avoids Expensive Outages

Old content can be funny…or just plain embarrassing. Keep things fresh so your site always reflects your best. Though daily updates aren’t always necessary, adding a few updates every now and then ensures your website reflects your current offerings and customer needs. Many search engines see regular updates as a good indicator of a healthy website that’s worth updating on their respective search results, so it’s important to keep your content fresh and constantly updated.

7. Increases Conversion Rates

For many businesses, this is what it really comes down to. If your website also functions as an e-commerce channel, consistent maintenance is a must to guarantee the site performance and overall experience needed to turn visitors into paying customers. As mentioned earlier, site performance tends to degrade with time, so you will need frequent maintenance to keep your site converting as designed.

8. Helps Your Site Grown With Your Brand

Whether by design or due to external forces, your business must continuously evolve. As this happens, your website should evolve with it. Regular maintenance sessions provide opportunities to add integrations, design enhancements, and updated branding to reflect your growth. With consistent updates, your site can become a truer representation of your brand, inspiring more confidence in its current and future customers.

9. Avoids Serious Legal Challenges

If you haven’t updated your site in a few years, you might already be violating some laws. Across the world, privacy laws such as NZ’s Privacy Act 2020 are constantly being rolled out, often at short notice and with little fanfare. Regular updates and audits help ensure your site meets the regulatory requirements of all the countries and territories it operates in, safeguarding your business from expensive regulatory fines.

10. Maximises Your Site's Return on Investment

Your website isn’t just a digital placeholder—it’s one of your biggest business assets. Treat it that way. When well-maintained, it can be foundational to your brand’s credibility. Even if visitors don’t convert on your site, its performance can still have an impact on their trust by potentially securing their conversion through other digital and offline channels. Keeping your site tidy and optimised is necessary for protecting its value and ensuring it continues to deliver traffic, leads, and sales.

Author Digital Offers Web Maintenance Services That Moves Your Business Forward

Website maintenance is more than just keeping the lights on—it’s about showing you care about your business and your customers. It shows that your business cares about its impact and, by extension, its customers. Investing in site maintenance is just as much an investment in your credibility as keeping your physical stores and offices clean.

The real challenge, though, is ensuring that your maintenance activities consistently support your business goals. We specialise in helping businesses like yours surmount their digital marketing challenges, not just through big actions like site redesigns and rebranding but also through critical but overlooked activities like consistent and comprehensive web maintenance. Whether you just need someone to implement security updates or need thoughtfully crafted content to push your business in a new direction, we’re ready for the task.

Get in touch with us and explore our extensive client portfolio. Let’s talk about how we can support your website maintenance needs. We can handle the technical details and anything else you need so you can focus on shaping your business’s narrative and its long-term growth.

A note

Henry Blackwell

This skill set allows me to deliver systematic customer acquisition, conversion, and retention.”

– Director

SEO and Paid Advertising: The Winning Combination for Digital Marketing Success

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is all about getting your content to rank higher in search results—think Google, Bing, or even internal searches on Amazon and Facebook. Nail your SEO, and you’ll boost your brand’s visibility, attract better leads, and reduce your reliance on paid ads. Not bad, right? Tailoring your content to appeal to search engines can increase your brand’s baseline web visibility, which minimises the need for paid ads while also attracting more qualified leads.

SEO works, but here’s the catch—it takes time. Especially for things like link building, which can feel like digital networking on hard mode. Results are also dependent on how search engine owners choose to develop their products. This could mean that it takes several months of consistent work before your campaigns produce any fruit. What’s more, there may be short-term dips and spikes in traffic as the search engine makes algorithmic changes in the background.

Why Pair SEO With Paid Ads?

In contrast to SEO, paid ads are far simpler. All it boils down to is to pay the search engine their asking rate for a keyword, and they will put your content on top of the search results. This simplicity is probably why so many businesses gravitate towards paid ads rather than SEO.

The catch? Paid ads only work as long as your budget does. If your content isn’t pulling its weight, those gains vanish the moment you stop paying. If your content isn’t optimised for its audience, most of your advertising gains will disappear as soon as you stop paying. And with the value of global digital marketing activities likely to hit USD 1 trillion by the 2030s, you can be sure that the cost to be seen is only going to keep increasing over time.

Fortunately, you can make a paid ad campaign sustainable with relatively modest investments in SEO. Properly executed SEO bolsters paid advertising by improving quality scores, enhancing your business’s credibility across a wider audience, and reducing costs for PPC (pay-per-click) campaigns. Better still, it may enable you to preserve some of your gains from paid ads.

Simply put, SEO and paid advertisements amplify each other to maximise your brand exposure. Let’s explore key ways this winning combination works for digital marketing efforts.

1. Better Contextualised Keyword Strategies

Think of paid ads as your SEO testing ground. The data they generate tells you which keywords work best—so you can fine-tune your SEO strategy and get better results long-term. PPC campaigns can help you rapidly identify which keywords drive the most conversions for your business, allowing you to integrate these findings into your SEO strategy without delay. This way, as your content draws in more organic traffic, you can start reducing your reliance on paid ads over time.

2. Heightened Brand Visibility and Authority

These days, many users understand that businesses can simply pay to be on the top paid search results. While paid ads might still help boost your business’s credibility, there is a limit to just how much they can do. On the other hand, if you earn your visibility through SEO, users will think that your site is more relevant than its competitors since search engines often prioritise positive user experiences.

Combining organic and paid visibility helps take customer trust to a different level, putting your brand in front of more potential customers regardless of the specific keywords they use. This is highly desirable, as research ties consistent, multichannel messaging with authority and conversions. SEO + PPC is a dream team for product launches, seasonal campaigns, and any time you need to grab attention—fast.

3. Better Customer Retention and Retargeting

SEO helps attract first-time visitors to your website through high-value content. However, not all first-time visitors who have good conversion potential will necessarily understand your value proposition the first time around. This is where paid ads can help.

You can leverage paid ads to quickly retarget leads who have already visited your website. These ads can be tailored to match the behaviour of these customers, keeping your business on top of their mind and increasing the odds of a later conversion. This kind of integration ensures no potential customer is left behind.

4. Improved Quality Scores for Ads

Even if you’re paying, Google still judges your ads. A high-quality score means lower costs and better ad placements—so good SEO actually makes your paid ads cheaper.

As you might have guessed, proper SEO implementation plays an important role in improving ad quality scores. When your website’s content and keywords are well-optimised, it tells search engines that your landing page provides a valuable user experience, resulting in better scores, lower CPCs, and a much more sustainable paid ad campaign. In this way, investing in SEO can also be seen as a way to reduce the often steep cost of paid online advertising.

Transform Your Online Presence With Smarter Digital Marketing

As digital marketing becomes more complex, it’s easy to lose sight of how different strategies work together. SEO and paid ads aren’t competing strategies—they’re two sides of the same marketing coin. Combining the two can help your business achieve greater visibility and authority without the need to seriously ramp up your marketing budget.

Getting the balance right takes skill. Whether you’re fine-tuning your SEO, launching killer ad campaigns, or doing both, having an expert team makes all the difference. Contact us today to start building your digital success story.

A note

Henry Blackwell

This skill set allows me to deliver systematic customer acquisition, conversion, and retention.”

– Director