Top 3 Things I Learned that Make Our Digital Marketing Services a Success
Kathleen is a very successful client account manager and digital marketing services specialist at Holistic Web Presence. In this article, she shares some of her top learnings in her first year. Learn more about Kathleen.
1. The Answer to ‘What Does a Digital Marketer Do?’
All my friends and family were excited that I got a new job, but inevitably they always asked, “So, what does a digital marketer do?” Just starting out, I usually answered with a simple, “SEO.”
Within the first few weeks, I quickly learned that I was really only explaining the tip of the iceberg. Simply put, I have learned that a Digital Marketer needs to at least have a basic understanding of (what feels like) everything!
Mastering Multiple Mediums: Social Media, Advertising, Graphic Design, Branding, Video, Audio, Photography
I got asked that all the time and I kind of learned that with digital marketing, it’s actually becoming a, a jack of all trades. In a lot of times when you say you do digital marketing, you need to be a jack of all trades to some extent and then have what you specialize in.
So you have to understand how social media works and how advertising works because you can advertise on Google, you can advertise on social media in plenty of ways that people search. You have to understand visually graphic design to some extent. I would not say I’m a graphic designer. I don’t understand. I don’t have the deep knowledge of typography, for example, but I know some of the basics to know when things are not looking correctly or what things need to be adjusted. You do need to have a deep understanding of branding, understanding video, audio, photography, kind of understanding all of those things as you go into it.
Producing GOOD Content Means You Need to be a Storyteller
One of the biggest role of any good marketer is being a storyteller.
As mentioned above, I have learned to create content across a variety of mediums. But even if I had the skills and knowledge about each one—it would all fall flat if I simply couldn’t tell a story! To produce good content, you need to connect with individuals, understand different perspectives, and adjust your story to your audience.
What Makes a Good Storyteller?
Understanding how to tell a story. That’s the biggest thing I notice with a lot of other SEO companies or who produce content. There’s a lot of people who don’t understand the niche well. And it’s not because you could learn all the little intricate details about how all the parts work and the technical terms and this and that, but that’s not what’s necessarily the key to getting it right with understanding the niche, the key is being able to tell a story and be a storyteller. That means. Well, I guess. What do you think that means to be a storyteller?
Connection: Emotions, Empathizing, and Sympathizing
No, no, it’s about a connection, even to the point of connecting with them enough to click to go to your website. You have to create a connection, emotions, plays into that, which you know is connected to being sympathetic and empathetic. People who are not sympathetic and empathetic are going to have a hard time doing SEO really well. So thinking about that and tapping into that is going to be important.
If it you can pull from experiences you’ve had or relate in that way, you’re pulling from an emotion. If you can connect to emotion, emotions make good stories.
Audience
Has anyone ever told a story in a group of friends and it’s a funny story, but it’s the wrong group of friends and it just falls flat and everyone feels really awkward? Have you ever had that happen before?
I’ve had that happen. It will happen. If it hasn’t at some point in your life where you’re like, this was such a funny story, but maybe it’s a story you tell your friends, but you tell your parents and they’re like, “that’s kind of inappropriate.” And you’re like, no, it’s funny.
Audience, your audience matters. That changes the way you tell the story. So, I mean, even the way that I communicate with a client versus my own team is going to be different because everyone are different people with different experiences and different goals.
Delivery
So understanding your audience makes you a good storyteller. That also is going to help you understand what forms of content work best. Will they connect on social media? Do they want a video? Do they want pictures? You know what? It starts to make you really think, okay, who are they and what do they want? Which will you want to connect with them emotionally then?
There’s things that are conveyed in the way that it’s told.
All of these also applies to communicating with my clients. No, I don’t make-up stories with my clients but I need to understand what style of communication and which elements stand out to each client. And I have learned to adjust my communication methods accordingly.
Value
Your content actually needs to have a story. It needs to have meat on that bone! That’s really important with SEO because Google doesn’t want you to rehash the same thing everyone else has said.
It’s like if you sat down in a group and someone told a story about when they went to camp and they got like, they were really little and someone did some hazing and totally made them think that snipes were real or whatever some made up character was in the forest and then someone’s like, oh yeah. And then I had that experience and tells pretty much the exact same story. Doesn’t have the same impact, doesn’t have the same delivery. People want something, feel like there’s value added to it. Whether that’s in a twist of it or new information or different insight. You need to have value added to it, not just a rehash of the same thing.
2. Skilled Communication Is More Than Just Showing the Finished Product
I stepped out of the cold, dreary customer service job knowing there were just some things wrong with the way my boss communicated with our clients.
I stepped out of the cold, dreary customer service job knowing there were just some things wrong with the way my boss communicated with our clients. I just couldn’t figure it out: did they not know how much work we did? Did they not care? I thought back about how much we got trampled and wondered ‘how could they not see we met near-impossible deadlines and requirements?!’
What I realize now, is we just said ‘Yes, sir’ to everything, worked our tails off, and gave a finished product. The client was not informed throughout the process, and essentially that created a wall over time between our communication. Our relationship became unfair to both parties—we were working our tail off, and they weren’t learning what we were doing and working with us on an agreed end result.
Making a To-Do List Isn’t Enough
Sticky notes (physical or digital) are my BEST FRIENDs. I love to have lists, make checkmarks, and work through a ‘To-Do’ list. This is great for organizing, strategizing, and prioritizing my projects. However, I was not getting everything I could out of my lists!
At Holistic Web Presence, I have learned to make my ‘To-Do’ lists work for me. I learned to communicate these lists with my clients in a way that enabled us to work together and more effectively.
First, we review and prioritize together
We look at the list and discuss each project and the expected length of time, and then decide which projects we want to work on. The client now has the control to decide what is important and where the focus should be while understanding the time that project will cost.
Secondly, we draw a line on how many projects to focus on
Previously, I would feel like I was continuously on a treadmill on high, sweating my butt off just to get through the projects. Now I can run at a good pace that doesn’t wear me out. Because the client knows how much time each project involves, they understand why and where the line needs to be drawn for us to accomplish anything meaningful and at an effective pace.
Thirdly, we create simplified ‘To-Do’ lists for each project
Longer projects are no longer daunting to me. When the client and myself walk through the basics of what the project entails, they are given the opportunity to understand the amount of work you are doing. As well, this allows you to create the expectation that things can change, depending on the complexity and issues that arise with each step of the process. Essentially it puts everybody on the same page, and gives them insight into the process and work involved!
Consistent Communication Is Key
At my previous job, my boss, co-worker, and I dreaded meeting with our clients. We tried to avoid it as much as possible, and I would feel so relieved the longer we went between talking with them. That should be an indication that there is something wrong!
Pro-longed communication strained our relationship. I have learned to consistently communicate with my clients through various mediums: e-mail, the phone, video conferences, etc. Not only do we know each other better, but we both feel comfortable reaching out to each other—even for little things.
As well, my clients ALWAYS know what I am working on. They never have to worry that I am slacking off, because I am constantly showing them developments in projects, working with them on it, and communicating new ideas that could benefit their site.
How to Incorporate the Numbers Without Getting Glazed Eyes
If you’re like most people, staring at columns of data and graphs might make your eyes gloss over. But numbers aren’t just data—they tell a story. One of the most powerful things I’ve learned in digital marketing is how to use numbers as a guiding light rather than just a performance report.
When I meet with clients, I’ve learned to pull out the most relevant, human-understandable insights from Google Analytics, search console reports, and SEO tools that tell a story. That is the art of data analytics in SEO–we’re still telling a story.
Instead of saying, “Your bounce rate went up 10%,” I say, “It looks like your visitors are leaving quicker—let’s check if the page is loading slower or if we need to adjust the content for quicker clarity.” The data is merely there to back-up and be the source of the story.
Understanding numbers is about translating analytics into problems, solutions, and actions. If you don’t have a takeaway, it’s just a bunch of numbers. And when you present them in a relatable, goal-oriented way, clients not only understand—they care. They start looking forward to data meetings instead of dreading them.
3. You Need to Treat Your Digital Marketing Strategy like a Living Organism
Digital marketing isn’t a one-time launch—it’s more like a garden you’re constantly tending. I used to think that once a site was live and had great content, we were mostly “done.” But I quickly learned: your digital presence is a living, breathing entity.
Content needs to evolve with trends, user behavior shifts, and algorithm changes. Your audience changes. Your products shift. If you treat your marketing plan as static, you’ll fall behind.
We’re always learning from what’s working—and what isn’t. The best strategies adapt in real time. I’ve learned to revisit, revise, and re-optimize pages regularly. Whether it’s updating a blog post, adjusting a call-to-action, or restructuring a page layout, the little tweaks add up over time to create big gains.
No Such Thing As ‘One and Done’
There’s a myth I had to unlearn early on: that you can “finish” your SEO or “complete” your marketing campaign. So many people treat SEO as a checklist. They say “Well I did that already 2 years ago.” In reality, digital marketing success is built on consistency and iteration and continual work.
Every campaign teaches you something. Every update reveals new data. Every piece of content can lead to more ideas, more questions, and more optimization. Even when a project ends, you often find yourself circling back to improve it based on what you’ve learned since.
But more so than that, things change. Competitors improve or implement new tactics; Google shifts its priorities according to competitors and users; world views change; people WANT different answers; terminology changes. In SEO, keeping up the Joneses is actually important. Just because something was in place before, doesn’t mean it is “enough” now.
And that’s the beauty of this work. There’s always another layer to discover, another test to run, another story to tell, and another way to beat out the competition. It keeps things exciting—and effective.
SEO: Google Likes to See a Website Thrive, not Survive
When I first started, I thought SEO was mostly about stuffing keywords into pages and checking boxes. But real, impactful SEO? It’s so much more—and Google can tell the difference.
Google rewards websites that are actively growing, evolving, and engaging users. That means fresh content, internal linking, updated visuals, and most importantly—real value for the visitor. You can’t just build a site and let it sit. You have to nurture it like a garden.
I remember working with a client in a highly competitive industry who thought their website was “good enough.” It was clean, had some optimized pages, and they had done SEO in the past. But traffic had plateaued.
Together, we took a different approach. Instead of coasting, we ramped things up: we refreshed content, added location pages, created a blog strategy, optimized old posts, and implemented a monthly analytics review. Within a few months, their traffic jumped—and better yet, leads started pouring in again.
The lesson? SEO isn’t about just keeping up—it’s about getting ahead. You can’t settle for doing the bare minimum when your competitors are trying to outpace you every day.
Google doesn’t just want to see that your website is alive. It wants to see that it’s thriving—constantly improving, staying relevant, and staying active in your niche. That’s what gets rewarded with better rankings, more visibility, and ultimately, more business.
