Your 2016 Digital Marketing To Do List

Yes, it might seem a little early for 2016 to do list when you have one hand on the computer keyboard and the other trying to open a bottle of bubbles, but if you're anything like us, making a to-do list now, might save some post-holiday stress. (Does anyone ever remember what they were planning to work on after two weeks on holiday?) To make sure your new year rolls out stress-free, we’re sharing our top 3 action items for 2016.

1. Put your advertising and analytics together

We've been waving the flag for this for a long time, but many businesses have yet to take full advantage of the value created by getting these two tools working together. Announcements earlier this year make this a great objective for 2016! Whether it’s boosting the power of your remarketing campaigns, sharing lists from your MCC account or using Smart Goals, the value created by the Google AdWords / Google Analytics combination is worth the effort.

Need some help (or to help someone) get started? Pick up a copy of Learning Google Adwords and Analytics and put it on your New Year's resolutions.

2. Step outside your comfort zone

We all have our preferred platforms – ones we already know all the reports and functions for. Learning a new tool can be daunting but staying comfortable can mean missing out on new opportunities to engage with your users, clients or customers.

Look at 2016 as a new year full of new opportunities to experiment and expand your online marketing! Google has introduced plenty of new advertising opportunities such as allowing Cards in YouTube videos and expanding the functionalities around shopping.

TrueView and Gmail ads have also been brought under the Google Adwords umbrella. You’ve gotta give it a try!

If you've been thinking about increasing your use of social, Instagram launched advertising to all businesses worldwide back in September. So, if your business has been in a bit of an advertising rut, why not test and experiment with a new platform? Get out there!

3. Create campaigns people love

Good online advertising presenting relevant and useful information in interesting ways is good for business and good for attitudes towards advertising. It’s also an antidote to Ad Blocking.

Ad blocking made news for what seemed like months on end when mobile content blocking functionality was discovered in the documentation from Apple’s Worldwide developer conference. There has been no advertising apocalypse, but there are some important takeaways.

Mobile friendly advertising, transparent privacy policies and less disruptive content can all help keep paid online advertising viable for the benefit of users, publishers and advertisers. So for 2016, we ask, “Have you capped your remarketing frequency?”