3 Reasons Why Weekly Digital Strategy Meetings Are a Good Idea

In today’s fast-moving, always-online world, the digital landscape is constantly changing, and so are your organization’s needs and priorities. As multiple interconnected systems and services are used by different departments, the digital ecosystem is in constant flux. How can you stay on top of your strategy without scrambling to adjust to the latest developments?

At WSOL, we work with a number of clients who are executing on multiple initiatives, such as website design and development projects, inbound marketing campaigns, and ongoing support. For these clients, we often find that digital priorities can shift from one week to the next. This can cause issues with execution on these priorities, since it takes time to communicate changes to all concerned parties (the development team, marketing agency, digital partners, etc.), and it may even slow the time to market on important initiatives. In addition, these changes may affect the scheduling of existing implementations that are already in progress.

As you can imagine, rapidly shifting priorities present a challenge for any organization's digital strategy, which is why we often find that it makes sense to have weekly strategic planning meetings to make sure everyone stays on track with their digital initiatives. Here are 3 benefits that these weekly meetings can bring:

1. Build Understanding

During a website redesign project, what may seem like small changes made to the project’s goals or requirements can often have a tangible effect on the go to market plan. Design or development builds may already be in the process of testing or deployment, blocking the deployment of features that may be needed to execute on any new or updated initiative. As we factor in other initiatives and activities, we see how it can be difficult to keep track of how each change affects the organization as a whole.

Weekly strategy meetings not only provide regular updates to a project’s progress, but they help build understanding of how different initiatives affect an organization's entire digital strategy. We find this essential for helping clients understand how changes to a project or updates to other initiatives will impact existing tasks and strategies. These meetings also provide a chance to get approval for any changes that will affect deployment of existing builds, reducing the possibility of delays that will affect the time to market.

2. Set Appropriate Expectations

It’s important for everyone involved in a client's digital strategy to have a good understanding of the amount of time and money needed to execute on new or updated initiatives. Weekly strategy meetings provide an opportunity to make sure the client’s senior management has appropriate expectations for final delivery. Making sure these conversations happen regularly will eliminate surprises related to costs and/or timing.

3. Explore Alternative Options

When working with our clients, we always make sure that they understand all of their available options when executing on their new or updated initiatives. Weekly strategy meetings give us a chance to present them with these options and let them know what has proven to work for other clients or organizations. Maintaining this level of communication can help clarify requirements and lead to lower costs and solutions that can be executed more quickly.

At WSOL, we believe partnership is key to a successful relationship with our clients. We work with our partners to continually improve their digital strategy, but this requires continual planning, adjustment of expectations, and exploration of options in order to execute on new initiatives. Clients who make use of a development retainer are able to reap the benefits of this relationship and maintain an up-to-date digital strategy that addresses the ever-changing online landscape.

Do you have any questions about how to maintain communication with your digital partner and execute on digital priorities? Do you want to know more about development retainers with WSOL? Please contact us to speak with a Solutions Engineer, and we’ll work with you to create the ideal digital strategy for your organization.

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