I know that eating healthier and exercising is the way to go, that’s a no brainer, but where do I start? In the past I’ve taken time to go to the gym and I tried to eat more of what I thought were healthier foods, but soon I realized that I really didn’t have a game plan. Without a more solid idea of what I wanted to achieve beyond the general “lose weight” I would quickly become unmotivated and any time I had previously dedicated was eclipsed by some other lesser important priority. What I really need is something beyond my intuition to give me some baseline knowledge that could help me understand my situation better. I might then start moving in a direction that felt like it had some purpose.

That brings us to last week, when I ran into a friend of mine named Kevin. I hadn’t seen Kevin for many months and he had visibly shed some extra pounds since last we talked. Asking him how he did it, he introduced me to a mobile app and website that helped him in one simple way … it provided him the actionable intelligence he needed to evaluate his current state and point himself in the appropriate direction to towards his desired goal.

How does this all relate to the usual topics covered here on SME? It’s simple. There are countless folks out who are blindly stepping into the world of digital marketing each month. Analysts continue to compile ever increasing numbers and upward trending graphs representing the dollars that are expected to be spent by businesses on social media and online marketing over the next couple years. Six months later, many of those businesses will become frustrated with their results and many will give up. Why? Not because digital marketing is a load of crap, but because they invested time, money and expectations into something without actionable intelligence.

Actionable intelligence, in the marketing sense, is any information that enables you to understand, improve and ultimately become more efficient with your marketing efforts. In this case, I am most specifically talking about folks who are treading the waters of digital marketing/social media for the fist time and the foundational information needed to make better decisions during the inception of a digital marketing strategy. Many brands fall victim to the fact that there are tons of free or relatively low cost online tools and services available within a few clicks. Nobody has to break out the credit card to upload a video to Youtube or start a Twitter account. This low barrier to entry inspires many to dive in head first with nothing to guide their actions. Digital marketing, specifically social media, is a long term commitment that often needs some time to ramp up before its impact is fully felt. That said, in order to make it to that tipping point, most efforts related to social media marketing should be sustainable over the long run.

Bringing it back to the fitness application, the first step in getting usable information is to put some in. You must answer some questions that will help the application better understand who you are and what results you expect. Answering questions like age, activity level and current weight are pretty standard.

Most fitness apps out there provide the following actionable intelligence:

1. An overall goal in the form of a “goal weight” so that you can understand what you want to achieve.
2. Daily caloric intake milestones, that if met, help keep you on track over time
3. Metrics related to food choices so you can better understand the difference between eating something that will push you closer or farther from your overall goal

How does all of this relate to marketing?

Just omit the fitness related words and you get…

1. An overall goal so that you can understand what you want to achieve.
2. Daily goals, that if met, help keep you on track over time
3. Metrics related to choices so you can better understand the difference between something that will push you closer or farther from your overall goal

Businesses are unique in the sense that they each face their own set of challenges and have their own set of goals. As tempting as it is to just dive in, think about those challenges and goals before moving forward.

With actionable intelligence you can:

• Understand the eb and flow of your content and digital marketing efforts so you can quickly adapt to new discoveries and changes in the market.
• Stay motivated because, rather than blindly pushing content and walking away,  you can see how your content is being engaged.
• Gather real information that can be used to obtain buy in from management and stakeholders who may not fully understand the medium.
• Gauge if you have more than enough resources (time, money, and personel) to dedicate to to your digital marketing efforts or not enough to achieve what you had hoped.

You might think that much of what I am discussing is simply metrics or the “listen before you leap” approach. You would be mostly right. Although, I believe that the kind of information I am referring to is not what you measure during the process. This information is what you use to better understand the mechanics of the process and how it relates to what your hoping to get out of it. This information makes you a better, faster, stronger marketer because your now more intimately aware of the moving parts and how they might be utilized to achieve success.

Over two weeks ago I started using the fitness app Kevin recommended. Within a couple days I found the new knowledge I had influencing my food choices, meal portions, and frequency eating. On a day to day basis I can make adjustments depending on what the day throws at me. I know what my overall goal is so I can keep pressing forward with a clear understanding of what I am trying to accomplish. My choices have to be sustainable so I don’t give up too soon or become frustrated due to lack of results. Slowly but surely I am moving in the right direction and I have lost three pounds so far.Although there is a great deal more I could do and learn, having some basic information that I can put into action immediately has been the catalyst to get me excited about pressing forward.

What was the discovery that helped you understand more about your digital marketing efforts and got you really excited about pressing forward?