Nadia Babar

Digital Tools: maximising your marketing

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One of the most important parts of being a digital marketer, if not the most important, is use of data. We are lucky enough to live in a world where access to data is easy and instantaneous. For the modern digital marketer, it is also invaluable. In this blog, I will break down how to maximise the digital tools available at your disposal to ensure that your marketing campaigns work as effectively as possible.

What are digital tools?

Digital tools are the modern marketer’s bread and butter. They include any technology that can be used to improve your marketing, whether that be through creation, optimisation, or results. They are important for making marketing processes more secure, stable, consistent, and effective. There are thousands of different tools out there, and determining which ones are right for your and your business is a huge task where the answer might change constantly.

SEO

There are so many options available for maximising SEO to the point where it can be overwhelming. However, finding a good SEO tool is essential for any digital marketer. For base-level SEO, the Yoast plugin on the back end of WordPress is a great starting point. This is especially true for those who don’t specialise in SEO. Yoast gets updated every two weeks with Google’s latest algorithms, making it a reliable choice to start with. Paid plans offer further customisability and features.

But with two million installations, All In One SEO appears to take the prize for the best WordPress SEO plugin. It isn’t free, but it is personalised. It provides you with an actionable checklist so that you can ensure that you aren’t making any common errors.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics can seem like one of the most daunting tools to conquer. But once you have determined your pathways for using it effectively, it can be a fascinating rabbit hole of discovery. This isn’t to mention that the software is free, whilst also being one of the most in-depth metrics tools that exists. For the modern digital marketer, having a baseline understanding of Google Analytics is a business imperative.

Email Marketing

The good news is, options are plentiful. MailChimp is probably the most popular, with an easy to use interface and a very digestible breakdown of how your campaign performed. Mailchimp also allows for integration with a number of other SaaS businesses.

Moosend is another option, which allows you to optimise the customer journey through personalisation and segmentation. We also have Omnisend, which is easy to use and provides a number of automation features.

Automation Tools

Hootsuite, monday.com, Marketo – whatever your choice, automation tools make life exponentially easier for the digital marketer. Rather than recommending any one in particular, I have found that a marketer’s choice of automation tool oftentimes comes down to personal preference. For example, some are daunted by the thousands of options of integrations that monday.com provides. Setting them up can take some practice and technical expertise. However, doing so properly can reduce a marketer’s workload by a significant amount. Others prefer Marketo, as it essentially functions as a one stop-shop for all your automation needs, whether that be via email or something else. Ultimately, finding your automation tool of choice and leveraging it to its maximum is key to building a strong portfolio as a digital marketer.

Pursuing a Level 3 Digital Marketing Apprenticeship will introduce you to all of the above tools. More information on the apprenticeship can be found here, along with a directory of all the other types of marketing apprenticeships available.

For more on this topic, check out Hubspot’s post on the best marketing tools for digital marketers in 2023 here.

Supply Chain Leadership Professional Level 6

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Supply chain. This is a phrase that is never far from peoples’ lips anymore. Since the onset of the pandemic, it feels like every other news headline involves supply chain struggles, disruption, or interruption. Furthermore, it doesn’t seem like these issues are letting up any time soon, with increasing geopolitical tension compounding the problem. Chief Supply Chain Officers have never been in such high demand across the globe, making this the optimal time to pursue an apprenticeship in supply chain leadership. In fact, the industry is expected to continue to grow in size, at a CAGR of 11.1% from 2023 to 2030.

What is supply chain?

Supply chain involves the procurement, production, movement, and delivery of a product or service from a supplier through to a consumer. Today’s chains are global, complex, and sensitive, but absolutely vital to making the world go round. Therefore, working in this industry can be extremely challenging, but extremely rewarding, with the potential for a lucrative and fruitful career.

Here is a breakdown of this integrated degree:

  • Typical duration is 48 months
  • Maximum government funding for this course is £21,000
  • It is equivalent to a degree
  • Typical assignments will involve:
    • Achieving an advantage in the market through logistical superiority
    • Leverage technology to improve infrastructure
    • Manage relationships with suppliers and intermediaries
    • Manage investments into R&D
    • Crisis management when disruption occurs, implementation of solutions

In addition, a significant amount of work is required to meet the requirements for this apprenticeship, including a portfolio and a project report.

Areas of Work

Throughout the course of the apprenticeship, you can expect to gain skills in a wide variety of areas, including:

  • Capacity planning and forecasting: inventory, metrics, seasonality, fluctuating schedules
  • Supply network design: principles of design strategy, delivery models and modes, the value of proposition of any given product
  • Finance and procurement: budgeting, profit & loss performance, sourcing strategies, managing costs effectively, control of information and material flow
  • Inventory: strategies for managing optimisation of inventory, relevant techniques and tools, maintaining quality and speed
  • Operational design: the various contexts of storing and delivery, including environmental, ethical, social, and commercial
  • External environment: exploring alternative solutions for continuous improvement of the network, manage inbound and outbound distributions
  • Technology: where to invest, how to seek specialist advice on new technologies, managing and staying on top of innovations within the sector
  • Law: employment law, study of national and international legal frameworks that will impact a business, tariffs and taxes, trading protocols, guidance on meeting legal requirements for sustained business operations
  • Reverse logistics: sustainability, recycling, tracking the transparency of chains, reporting on best e-commerce practices for the environment
  • Leadership: management of direct reports, communication and collaboration, effective project management

Furthermore, he apprentice must also cultivate uphold certain behaviours:

This will culminate in a holistic set of skills that are not only in high demand, but are extremely transferrable across industries as well. As a result, this guarantees the foundation for a solid career in the transport and logistics category, with the potential for movement into the procurement, FMCG, or manufacturing industries as well.

Conclusion

This apprenticeship is linked to a number of professional bodies, including the Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply, the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, and the Institute of Export and International Trade.

Above all, this apprenticeship is challenging, but provides a very strong basis of vital skills and a unique set of integrated knowledge that will prove valuable for the foreseeable future. For those who are motivated by unique challenges, problem-solving and taking an integrated approach to strategy development, this is a perfect pathway.

Read more about the various types of apprenticeships available to you here.