DIGITAL MARKETING

Digital Marketing: The Future of Business Growth in a Digital World.

In a constantly changing digital world, it’s obvious from recent studies that traditional marketing on its own is not getting this message out to your customers. It does not matter the size of the company (either small startup or large global brand); they are using digital marketing to connect with customers, build brand awareness and drive revenue. If you are an aspiring marketer or entrepreneur then it is not merely essential to understand digital marketing – it’s indispensable!

What is Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing is marketing using digital or electronic media and devices as communication channels. Digital marketing provides an organization and its products/services with the potential to target specific audiences, the ability to report results and engagement interventions in real-time or immediate, something that is hard to do with traditional marketing methods. Digital marketing is relevant, because it is data driven, incorporates many opportunities to target audiences, and can be communicated and presented in a variety of formats, channels, and platforms.

Digital marketing can be done in many different formats. Not all strategies needed for an organization will utilize the same format but all help contribute to the entire brand. For example, digital marketing will create web traffic and attract potential new customers searching for an organization on search engines and we can engage with our customers through our emails – which are extremely successful if they are engaged in a good digital marketing strategy – which can assist in developing a key engagement with leads. Digital marketing also offers opportunities to engage with our customers (audience) almost anywhere in the buying journey.

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
SEO is the assessment of a website to improve the visibility in search engine results. Better rankings lead to more organic traffic and increased credibility of a business. SEO consists of on-page strategies, like keyword optimization of tag names and page titles, and action-based strategies like backlinking and social sharing.
When initiated as part of a tactical marketing strategy, a proper SEO strategy can attract relevant visitors, enable reduced marketing costs, and provide a competitive advantage in your industry.

2. Social Media Marketing (SMM)

Imagine a campaign in-mind where we are dreaming human behavior from places where people connect with social media- facebook, instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, Tik Tok, etc. SMM is broad in that it can be content, paid sales, and engagement.
With SMM customer loyalty, engagement, and actual sales can occur. Social Media allows companies to have relationships with their customers, engage with them in a two-way conversation through their audience. Companies can listen to their people, they can hear their feedback in real time. Social media allows companies to be efficient in the way they carry out engagement with customers, and their clients.

3. Content Marketing

Content marketing involves the creation of extremely valuable content that will attract and retain members of a target audience or target market. This type of material includes blogs, videos, infographics, podcasts, e-books, etc. Content marketing informs and educates a target audience while establishing authority and credibility in an industry.

A good example would be a blog post titled “Top Digital Marketing Strategies for Small Business”. This type of blog can attract many entrepreneurs looking for something to read, and the ultimate goal is to turn page readers into customers.

4. PPC Advertising

Pay-Per-Click advertising (PPC) occurs when the advertiser pays for each click to their advertisement or listing. Examples for online advertisements that can be considered PPC include Google Ads, Facebook Ads or basically any form of online listing. PPC platforms provide the ability for their advertising to be labelled to demographic targets such as age, gender, etc or geographic (town, county etc) and/or behavioral targets (interest, action online etc).

Using organic (i.e. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)), can take time for use and achieve targeted traffic. PPC and achieve instant visibility, and ROI can be measured through return on investment (ROI) methodologies. This can be a solid sales mechanism for companies that would like to attain traffic and/or conversions to their website quickly. If executed well, PPC can achieve a good ROI.

5. Email Marketing

With all the momentum in Social Media, you may be thinking that perhaps email marketing had gone the way of the dinosaur! Email marketing is still one of the best ways to maintain a lead nurturing plan and to maintain relationships with customers. By sending out personalized emails, you can share promotions, updates or learning pieces to engage your audience over time.

Email campaigns are cheap, measurable, incredibly targeted and if you do them well you will satiate customers with an effective nurture strategy whereby the business remains in viable long-term relationships with customers, and ultimately increases repeat sales over time.

6. Analytics and Reporting
Data is the foundation of digital marketing, and with the many tools available, such as Google Analytics, SEMrush, and social insights, you are able to measure performance, account engagements, and improve campaigns. Analytics will show you exactly what is working and what is not, allowing to use your resources on things that are going to provide greater value.

When you make decisions based on data you will ultimately see increased return on investment (ROI), overall better campaign performance, and better marketing decisions will be made.

Definition of Digital Marketing

1. The quantified global reach of digital marketing allows businesses to communicate with users from any location in the world, seemingly without limits, while traditional marketing relies on word of mouth to reach a very restricted segmented userbase.

2. The costs of traditional marketing are significant, with print and television advertisements costing businesses substantial amounts for ad placement. Digital advertising campaigns tend to have better focused campaigns with less waste, and show to be more cost-effective.

3. Each click, each impression, and conversions can be tracked and measured in all types of digital channels and media. Proven ROI can be shown easily as an accountable framework.

4. In a world of digital channels and media, which allow for multiple platforms to interact with customers through engagement, it is crucial for business to leverage communication that is direct, informative, and a true representation of honest and truthful interaction with both new and returning customers to foster better relationships and loyalty.

5. The flexibility and ease to change a digital marketing campaign, not only speaks to the success in digital marketing, it can often take very little amount of time to make changes based on results and the feedback and interaction you receive in real time.

Flourishing digital marketing

It is true that digital marketing is continuously evolving as technology is always evolving, this means that the pace and intricacies of digital marketing has changed markedly, being particularly impacted by advancing capabilities with artificial intelligence (AI), automation, voice searching, and video content. Companies that can either pivot quickly your digital marketing to these changes or find a creative way to market your business will significantly outperform their competition.

As an example, AI tools can take tedious marketing tasks, run your email campaigns for you, the holistic view of where ads are being delivered to the right audience, and aggregating, analyzing, and providing intelligence to marketers on customer data. These streamlined processes take marketers away from the operational piece and allow them to think through some operational and creative strategy.

How to Launch a Career in Digital Marketing

As you begin the opportunity to explore your future career in digital marketing, you want to ensure you do it well. That means many aspiring digital marketers will need to begin at the very beginning (or ground floor). To begin, you will need to look into:

Online Courses – There are a plethora of online courses with comprehensive instruction across the areas of SEO, PPC, content marketing, social media, and analytics.

Practical Experience – Whether it is live projects, an internship, or a freelance assignment, you will be will able to move your theory from school (or courses) into real life practical applications.
Networking – Using platforms like LinkedIn or webinars to network with industry professionals gives you access to a ton of knowledge and a breadth of experience with case studies, industry topics, tips, professionals, tools, etc.

Learn More – The digital landscape is fast moving, and you want to ensure that you are not only catching up but staying up to date with all the developments, trends, tools, and case studies.

Conclusion.

Digital marketing has changed from being just an optional skill to being a major part of a 21st century organization’s success, as it gives you the ability to reach customers across the globe, analyze results, and interact with customers in substantive ways.

To organizations, it is a great vehicle for driving business growth, enhancing their brand, and creating long-term sustainability. To prospective marketers, it is an exciting and satisfying career that has unlimited opportunities. Digital marketing is a system of moving parts, however, by learning about its core areas, anyone can take advantage of the digital world and make a real difference.