In these corona virus times I thought I would share a typical day with you. Because of the nature of my work, I am able to continue providing search engine optimisation and other digital marketing services which means that I continue to support to my clients – those who are still trading anyway.
My day typically starts at 8am which is when I get to my desk, boot the PC, switch on the radio (Nick Ferrari’s morning show on LBC) and go and make that essential first coffee of the day.
The first task of the day
The 1st task of the day is to open my dairy to see what appointments are upcoming, what preparations are required and how any meetings are taking place – a physical meeting, a phone catch-up, a video meeting etc.
Next, it’s a look at my To-Do list to see what’s on the agenda for the day.
The hunt for content
Then it’s time for a look at the news to see whether there are any IT/Marketing/SEO/IT Security stories worth sharing and then I start my proper hunt for content for Social Media.
Tools that I use include Drumup.io, Google Alerts, Search Engine Watch and Search Engine Land.
- Drumup is like a search engine for articles. I save some keywords and it finds relevant news articles for me to share. I only use the free account
- Google Alerts, another free tool, carries out the same process on Google. I save some keywords and Google emails me a list of new content that includes my saved terms.
- Search Engine Watch is a website dedicated to search engines and search engine optimisation. It was where I learned a lot of my craft in the early days. It was started by Danny Sullivan who went on to found
- Search Engine Land and now has a pretty high flying job with Google. With both sites, I look for interesting/helpful articles to share
I open each story or article from all sources in a new browser tab. I’ll simply hold the CTRL key down as I click – which forces my browser to open the clicked link in a fresh tab. Then I scan thorough each article to check quality and relevance before using another free tool, Buffer, to add the stories to my social media posting queue. This means that I can easily and quickly build a content list that will be shared by Buffer at a time of my setting.
I may also look at one of my pre-written “Top 10” hints and tips lists. Update the publishing dates, ensure the content is up to date and then upload the spreadsheet to Hootsuite where the platform will share the tips to the platforms of my choice at the times I have set.
Then I’ll repeat the exercise for those clients for whom I manage their Social Media activity.
Email Time
Now it’s Email time. I open Outlook and work through my emails. Spam gets deleted, urgent mail is responded to, acted on or added to my “To-Do” list – which is on paper. Even though I love my technology, and have tried numerous digital To-Do applications I still find that pen and paper works the best for me.
The To-Do list
Now it’s time for me to look at the top items on my To-Do list and start working through the day’s tasks.
Number one task every day is to log in to ManageWP where I have registered all the WordPress sites that I am responsible for. ManageWP has them all stored in a dashboard and reports which sites have plug-ins that need updating or whether any particular site needs attention.
Once any updates have been applied it’s now time for my second coffee and logging on to a site to start on the required search engine optimisation activity.
This could include a fresh scan of competitor websites to see whether there’s anything different that I should be targeting, another round of keyword research to make sure that I am targeting key words and phrases used by prospects and making sure that all the elements of the site are well optimised, particularly where the client has access to the site and may have added fresh content or swapped out images and a hunt for opportunities to build more backlinks
Second look at Emails
Before lunch I’ll take another look at my emails, delete all the junk, act on urgent ones and “To Do list” those that need action but which are less urgent.
It’s probably about 1pm by now and time for lunch. A poached egg on toast, a two egg omelette, a sandwich perhaps another coffee or glass of water, and a walk in the fields, weather permitting
After that I may turn to content creation, writing a blog post or an email or finding topics for my clients to write about that i can then provide an SEO “polish” to for optimum search engine responses.
I’ll look at the Google Ads, and other PPC accounts that I’m managing on behalf of clients. Making sure that the Ads are performing, that the key words are relevant and that the campaign is as well optimised as possible.
If I’ve written a marketing email I’ll get it approved by the client, upload it to MailChimp (my email platform of choice), make sure the address lists are up to date, create an email and send a draft to my client for approval.
Once signed off, I’ll schedule the sending, Early afternoon, middle of the week, for business clients and early evening, possible on a weekend, for retail clients. Timings determined by the optimum open rates.
The hunt for content continues
Time for an afternoon coffee and a swing back through various news sites, this time tech platforms such as
For tech related articles and Search Engine Watch and Search Engine Land again, just to see if anything new has been posted
Back to the Search Engine Optimisation
As we enter the middle part of the afternoon I’ll look another client website and look to repeat the SEO activities for them.
If I’ve received any enquiries for quotations or new proposals I’ll look to pull my thoughts together and send my proposal for consideration.
As the working day draws to a close I’ll take a 3rd look at my emails and respond to anything that can’t wait until the following morning.
I might email clients with ideas to improve their websites, carry out some more SEO on a site, perhaps register a client website with some web based directories and see whether there’s anything I can do to my own website to improve performance
Finally, I’ll update my To-Do list in preparation for the coming day, shut down my PC and have a quick tidy-round.
If you want any help with your digital marketing please don’t hesitate to get in touch for an informal chat by email (andy@enterprise-oms.co.uk) by phone (01793 238020) or ask me on Social Media – Linkedin or Twitter and I’ll be only too happy to talk.Thanks for reading and I hope you stay well