Reference no: EM134038688

Digital Marketing Analytics and Planning

Assessment Brief

You have recently joined an organisation as its new Digital Marketing Manager. The senior management team has asked you to review the organisation's current digital marketing position and develop a focused, data-driven digital marketing plan.

Your submission must demonstrate that you can critically evaluate digital marketing strategy planning, design a practical digital marketing plan, analyse suitable metrics and KPIs, and critically reflect on the role of data and analytics in improving marketing performance.

You must choose one organisation from the options below:

Organisation option Industry/context Country/market
Sephora Beauty and personal care retail Americas - specify the country or regional market clearly
Wise Banking, fintech and international money transfer services Any country/market, but you must specify this clearly
Starbucks Food and beverage retail / coffeehouse chain Asia - specify the country or regional market clearly
A direct competitor of your current employer Relevant to your own professional context Any country/market, but you must specify this clearly

If you choose a competitor of your current employer, you must not choose the organisation you currently work for. You must briefly explain (in your introduction) why the organisation selected is a relevant competitor and clearly define the country, region, product line or business area your assessment will focus on.

Your assessment should be presented as one professional report, but it must be clearly divided into the four tasks below. Each task should have its own heading.

Learning Outcomes

In this assessment, you need to demonstrate that you can meet the following module learning outcomes:
Critically evaluate the process of planning, formulating and executing a digital marketing strategy.
Design, develop and implement a digital marketing plan.
Critically analyse metrics used for measuring and optimising the success of digital marketing campaigns and strategies.
Critically reflect on the role of data and analytics in measuring and enhancing marketing initiatives.

Assessment Structure

This assessment consists of four tasks. You must respond to each task separately and clearly. Do not submit one general marketing plan without addressing each task, as this may prevent you from demonstrating achievement of the learning outcomes.

Task 1 - Critical Evaluation of Digital Marketing Strategy Planning Frameworks

Aligned to LO1: Critically evaluate the process of planning, formulating and executing a digital marketing strategy.

For Task 1, you must critically evaluate the process of planning, formulating and executing a digital marketing strategy. You should compare relevant digital marketing planning frameworks and explain how they support strategic decision-making.
You should include discussion of frameworks such as SOSTAC and RACE, although you may also refer to other relevant models where appropriate.

Task 2 - Six-Month Data-Driven Digital Marketing Plan

Aligned to LO2: Design, develop and implement a digital marketing plan.

For Task 2, you must develop a focused six-month data-driven digital marketing plan for your chosen organisation.

You must use SOSTAC as the main structure for your plan. You may incorporate elements of RACE where helpful, particularly when considering customer journey stages, channel objectives or performance measurement.
Your plan should be based on research and evidence. You should use your situational analysis to identify a clear digital marketing challenge or opportunity for the organisation. Your objectives, strategy, tactics and controls should then respond directly to that challenge or opportunity.

- strategic role of selected digital channels.

Your strategy should explain the logic behind your choices, not simply list possible activities.

Tactics

You should present the specific digital marketing tactics that will be used. You should justify why the selected tactics are appropriate for your objectives, audience and market context. This may include, where relevant, SEO, paid search, paid social, organic social media, content marketing, email marketing, influencer marketing, CRM activity, website optimisation or landing page improvements.

Action Plan

You should provide a six-month implementation plan showing how the proposed tactics will be delivered. This may be presented as a table. Your action plan should include key activities, selected channels, timings, target audience, intended purpose and any relevant resource considerations.

Control

You should explain how the plan will be monitored and optimised. This should briefly introduce the key performance measures that will be analysed in more detail in Task 3.
You should consider how performance will be reviewed during the six-month period and how insights may be used to adjust the plan.
This task should be written in a professional business report style. Tables, figures and frameworks may be used where they improve clarity. However, you must explain the meaning of your analysis in the main body of the report.

Task 3 - Critical Analysis of Metrics and KPIs

Aligned to LO3: Critically analyse metrics used for measuring and optimising the success of digital marketing campaigns and strategies.

For Task 3, you must critically analyse the metrics and KPIs that would be used to measure and optimise the success of your six-month digital marketing plan.
This task should go beyond listing metrics. You must explain why the selected metrics are appropriate, how they link to your objectives, and how they would support performance optimisation.

Task 4 - Critical Reflection on the Role of Data and Analytics

Aligned to LO4: Critically reflect on the role of data and analytics in measuring and enhancing marketing initiatives.

For Task 4, you must critically reflect on the wider role of data and analytics in measuring and enhancing digital marketing initiatives.

This task is different from Task 3. Task 3 focuses on the specific metrics and KPIs used to measure your plan. Task 4 requires you to take a broader and more critical view of how data and analytics support marketing decision-making and performance improvement.
Your reflection should consider:

how data and analytics support customer insight and audience understanding;
how analytics can improve planning, targeting, personalisation and optimisation;
- how tools such as GA4, CRM systems, social listening tools, advertising dashboards or email analytics can support decision-making;
how data can be used to monitor, test and improve marketing initiatives;
the limitations of data-driven decision-making;
risks relating to data quality, privacy, consent, bias, attribution and over-reliance on dashboards;
ethical considerations in the collection and use of customer data.

You should link your reflection back to your proposed plan where relevant, but the main focus should be on critically evaluating the role of data and analytics in digital marketing practice.
This task should be written in a critical academic style and supported by relevant academic and practitioner sources.

Presentation and Structure

Your submission should be presented as one professional report. It should include:

completed coursework cover sheet;
title page;
table of contents;
introduction;
clearly labelled Task 1, Task 2, Task 3 and Task 4 sections;
conclusion or final summary;
reference list;
appendices, where appropriate.

You must use Harvard referencing throughout. All academic, industry, company and data sources must be cited in the main body and included in the reference list.
Tables and figures should be clearly labelled and discussed in the text. Do not include tables, screenshots or figures without explaining what they show and why they matter.
You may include supporting material in the appendices, but the main arguments, analysis and recommendations must be included in the main body of the report. The following word-count is for guidance only.

Guidance on Use of Data and Research

Your work should be research-led. You should use relevant data to support your analysis and recommendations. This may include:
company reports;
industry reports;
market research;
competitor websites and digital channels;
Similarweb or other digital intelligence tools;
social media platform data;
Google Trends;
advertising platform insights;
CRM or email marketing examples;
academic literature;

practitioner reports.

You should avoid simply describing data. Instead, explain what the data suggests and how it informs your plan.
For example, instead of writing:

"Competitor A has more website traffic than Competitor B."

You should explain what this means:

"Competitor A's higher website traffic suggests stronger brand visibility and search presence. This indicates that the chosen organisation may need to strengthen its SEO and paid search activity to improve discoverability during the customer research stage."