By Don Nicholas ? ?? 01/28/2013
Whether you?re outsourcing your Internet marketing services or building an internal Internet marketing services department, these 11 content marketing job functions are key
I?ve been running marketing services departments and companies for the better part of 30 years. Mequoda Group is an independent co-operative Internet marketing services company that currently supports 20+ client organizations. The most common marketing system configuration we?re supporting is a daily portal or blog at the core with one or more subscription websites, and an online store that sells books and videos. Our organization doesn?t produce any of the original premium content, but we do produce a lot of the affinity content that is used for audience development including white papers, blog posts, and social media. We also produce and analyze the email newsletters, email promotions, and landing pages that are used to generate revenue.
I?ve also helped a number of clients build their own internal Internet marketing services department. Unsurprisingly, the organizations I?ve helped build very closely resemble the organization that I currently manage. While I won?t tell you that the way I do it is the only way to run an Internet marketing services company, I will tell you that I?ve evolved my structure over time and that it works pretty well.
Let me share the 11 functional areas that are integral to the services we provide.
To give you a better picture of what I?m describing above, let me briefly describe each of the 11 areas and what the people in those groups do for a living.
Internet marketing strategy
This is the idea department for the organization. It?s tasked with figuring out what the Internet marketing program should be and what it should be trying to accomplish. This could involve taking a legacy magazine and looking for ways to leverage the content. A typical strategic initiative might include building a subscription website and initiating digital additions to be distributed through Apple, Amazon, and other digital retailers. Another typical initiative might be building an online portal to act as an audience development nexus that can be used to build email newsletter circulation. This same initiative would also include coming up with an email publishing and marketing program that would maximize the revenue per subscriber through product sales and advertising support.
Internet marketing operations
This is the practicality group inside the larger organization. It?s their job to measure the resources required to meet the business plan objectives and develop a financial model that validates the goals and the process. With each business plan and budget in hand, it?s their job to make sure that the plan stays on schedule and on budget. This group is also responsible for tracking all of the resources being used to accomplish the group?s goals, while making sure that corrections and modifications are being made as needed.
Internet marketing technology
You might think of these folks as the ?how? team. It?s their job to keep track of all the technology that?s available in the market place: hardware, software, and services. They are also responsible for project management and systems integration. They select platforms, build project plans, supervise their implementation, and make sure all the other players in the organization are working together to meet their common goals, schedule, and budget. Once a system is up and running, this team is responsible for ongoing troubleshooting, maintenance, and upgrades. At the highest level, this group maintains the technology roadmap that shows where the organization is going over the next three to five years, so that resources can be allocated in an efficient manner.
Internet marketing analytics
The analytics team is responsible for combing through all the data available and coming up with intelligible reports that the operators can use. The analytics can be used to measure system performance and discover system anomalies. Analytics can also be used to measure operator performance, content performance and other parameters that define the day-to-day operations of the systems. On a really good day, these are the folks that point out opportunities that can be acted on within the resources of the existing operation.
Internet marketing content development
This group is responsible for the short and long-range planning for content development related to marketing programs at all levels. On a day-to-day basis, they produce the blog posts, email newsletters, landing pages, and other materials necessary to promote the organization?s messaging and drive traffic into commerce activities and sponsor websites. This group works closely with the analytics team to evaluate the performance of their individual efforts and test and use that data to create new test programs that will maintain or improve system efficiency. While domain knowledge is helpful, the members of this team must be excellent copywriters who understand how to motivate users to take actions that could go from signing up for a free newsletter to making a purchase that costs thousands of dollars.
Internet marketing design
The design team comes into play any time a new system or module is being built or a redesign is being implemented. The team usually includes graphic artists, information architects, and usability experts. They are tasked with developing design that support and enhance the brand, and that support website functionality, usability, findability, and shareability. The design team works closely with the content team and the software team to make sure that their design fits the larger communications plan and software capabilities.
Internet marketing software development and support
The software team is responsible for choosing, supporting, and customizing the various software applications that make up the larger Internet marketing system. For us, they must be experts in WordPress and all of the various plugins that extend WordPress into a customer experience management system. They must also be experts in the third-party systems that include email management, payment processing, product fulfillment, and customer service.
While these other applications are normally freestanding systems, our software engineers must maintain the application protocol interfaces that allow those systems to communicate with the whole customer experience management system. Most sophisticated marketing systems are really a group of integrated applications that have been connected to work seamlessly under the hood. When necessary, this group also updates third party plugins and creates new plugins or software extensions that add functionality not found in the existing marketplace. For example, our software engineers currently maintain 17 proprietary plugins and support an additional 40 or so through the vetting, upgrading, and maintenance process.
System hosting and management
This group is responsible for maintaining the hardware and foundational software that keeps your website up and running. The group typically includes both lamp software engineers and hardware specialists. System security and performance are also primary job functions of this group. On a good day, this group will go completely unnoticed. It?s only when they?re not doing their job, or something gets by them, that anyone takes notice of the systems management team.
Email broadcast and management
The email team is responsible for maintaining the system that stores, segments, and tracks email usage. They support operators in the establishment of segments, tests, and other enhancements to the email marketing program. The email team is also responsible for email delivery and email security, maintaining relationships with hundreds of Internet service providers and monitoring services.
Fulfillment services
If physical books, periodicals, DVDs, or other products are part of a marketer?s mix, a fulfillment service operation becomes a requirement. The fulfillment team is responsible for the timely selection, packaging, and shipping of all physical orders that are produced by the system. In some cases, there may be multiple fulfillment vendors who are supplying this service for different types of products. In the best of cases, the fulfillment system is fully integrated with the customer experience management system and the customer service system.
Customer service
Whether your products are physical or digital, customer service will be part of the program. Your customer service team will be in the position to answer questions about missing products, product features, and even how to use a sophisticated software application or subscription website. Your customer service team will be evaluated by both the quantity of emails, phone calls, and even letters they can process properly; and the quality of service and the customer service ratings they?receive. As with your fulfillment operations, it?s possible to have multiple customer service operations that provide service on different product types that might include periodicals, products, and live events.
The process of running a modern Internet marketing services department or company is both challenging and rewarding. We are in the enviable position of pioneering new ways of bringing our product to market so that customers can access them whenever they want them, however they want them. We also have the challenge of running an organization that requires a diverse set of skills, personalities and people to make things happen on a day-to-day basis.
If you?re in the process of building an Internet marketing services department, please feel free to contact me to discuss how we might be able to help. If you?re looking to outsource your Internet marketing services or some part of it, please also feel free to contact us to discuss the alternatives.
Happy marketing in 2013!
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