The business landscape is rapidly evolving every day. Businesses need to stay up to date and keep an eye on quickly developing trends within the business atmosphere. In such a rapidly evolving world, it can be difficult to know where to start and how and why to invest in different digital technologies. It can be easy to get caught up in the jargon and technical aspects of complicated digital marketing processes, but these strategies are easier than they first appear. Here’s a list of eight different digital marketing strategies your company should deeply consider investing in to drive traffic and increase profits.
SEM
SEM stands for Search Engine Marketing. It’s considered to cover PPC and SEO work, which means it’s great at bringing in traffic to your website. Using search engines to attract new customers is a difficult process, but SEO and PPC work together to accomplish this goal through both paid and free methods.
Keywords are a highly important part of search engine marketing because they demonstrate a proficiency in what questions consumers are asking at any given point. The general population is always searching for questions on search engines like Google and Bing, and savvy companies research these questions to place their business websites on the first page of search results. One of the best tools for using keywords is Google Keyword Planner.
SEO
Let’s begin with SEO, which stands for search engine optimization. SEO is a tool to make your website optimized, or more valuable, for search engines. This method is all about gaining customers by moving up search result rankings; people usually don’t look past the first few search results, so if you can maneuver your company page into the top four or five links on the first page of Google, your company will flourish and attract new customers like never before.
SEO is a tough and determined process which takes a few months to truly work. It also takes a strong know-how and a significant amount of time and effort, but SEO is one of the most important digital marketing strategies in the world today.
PPC
PPC stands for pay-per-click and is a tool to advertise on search engines. This method is a way of moving to the top of search results by paying the companies who are in charge of moving and shaking on these pages. In this method, you’ll create an ad account which is charged every time one of your ads is clicked by a user. The cost of this clicking – cost per click – is determined by the quality score of your website and the keywords you and your competition have chosen to attract potential customers.
PPC strategies can be used both in the short and long term and are a great and effective way to boost revenue when done right. The advertising space on Google is limited – about four spots – but choosing careful and specific keywords will put you on the path to making PPC campaigns work for you.
Social Media Marketing
One of the most straightforward and simple strategies on this list, social media marketing consists of marketing through social media platforms such as Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook. These platforms are highly popular among different demographics and are rapidly growing in userbase numbers. This means that by utilizing one or all of these options, your company will be reaching a large swath of the population in a general but focused way.
You can pick or choose which platform you want to work with or use all of them. The key for this type of marketing is to make sure your social platforms synchronize in a way which enhances your synergy and presents a holistic image to your customers. Different platforms are used most effectively in different ways, but your brand messaging and aesthetic should always be unified across all platforms.
Content Marketing
Rather than focusing on the platform your marketing will be placed on, you can start thinking about the content of your marketing and gaining customers through a slow process of trust and relatability. With content marketing, you won’t be selling your products or services directly and bluntly to consumers; instead, you’ll create smart and enriching content through various means which will act as a valuable tool to your current and potential customers.
Content can be created through several avenues, but the most popular content on the web right now are blogs and articles. These usually inform and entertain visitors to your site while forwarding your brand and building up relationships with your customers. Each and every piece of content you write should serve a distinct purpose, and easily be modified to forward your SEO and attract customers to your company from all corners of the internet.
E-Mail Marketing
This is another simple but highly effective form of digital marketing in the current day and age. Through e-mail marketing, you can send information, offers, questions and requests to interested parties. E-mails are highly likely to be read and are one of the best methods for getting people to respond to your inquiries, which is why it’s so popular among big shot marketers and small businesses alike. Effective and efficient e-mails should be eye catching and stand out from the other hundreds of e-mails being sent out by other businesses.
Always use a professional but warm tone in the e-mails you send out and be sure not to beat around the bush in the bodies of your e-mails. One of the most important steps in e-mail marketing is gathering an e-mail list with customers who have already shown interest in your company in one way or another. A great way to create these is to use lead generation techniques, which get customers to your website and ask them to provide their e-mail and other information in exchange for a small token from your company.
Influencer Marketing
Many companies who are just dipping their toes in the digital marketing atmosphere are usually skeptical about using influencers to forward their brand. This skepticism is healthy but unneeded, as influencers are a great way to speak to your customer base and help consumers see your company in a positive light. This method involves contacting an “influencer” to reach out to the general population through their popularity or expertise.
Influencers are usually celebrities or other popular figures who are well known among a particular type of platform. For example, Michael Jordan and Steph Curry are two of the biggest influencers in the basketball industry today. Influencing marketing works because people look up to celebrities and other popular figures to gain life and product advice in their daily lives. Companies have become great at exploiting the status of many celebrities across many business fields and social media platforms.
Television Advertising
In the past, the only way to advertise on television was to pay for an overpriced ad slot. However, there are many companies advertising on television without this costly step, leading the way in a digital television revolution. There are also those who consider a thirty-second ad a vital part of marketing though, as the fragmentation of markets and digital shifts mean using any avenue necessary to reach a broad range of the population. Today’s television marketing combines personal data of consumers with new delivery methods like addressable ads.
Additionally, televised ads can now be targeted at specific regions and demographics, meaning your ads are always focused on precisely who they’re supposed to reach. Audience demographics are critical to consider in any marketing form, but they’re especially important in television, as audiences can tune in to one of any number of channels, both through traditional cable and the emerging digital market.
Digital Marketing can seem like a scary or intimidating concept for businesses which have never tried it. There’s nothing to worry about, however, as many companies are using digital marketing to branch out, increasing their ambition and scope through the internet. Digital marketing can bring more people to your website, help you gain followers and influence on social media platforms, or be used in a simpler manner, like e-mail communications. However you choose to use digital marketing, your company would heavily benefit by converting to a 21st century form of marketing and communication.
If you need help deciding what type of digital marketing campaigns would work best for you, please feel free to get in touch!
