Before 2020 happened, traditional marketing and face-to-face sales meeting made the core part of a business's sales revenue.
But now, it has changed.
ALL businesses need digital marketing, irrespective of whichever industry you are in.
The question is how can digital marketing actually replace your current channels as effectively as it should.
This playbook lists the importance of effective digital marketing and how it can be a game-changer.
What is the role of Digital Marketing to a company?
The possibilities with Digital Marketing are endless. Compared to conventional marketing tools, digital garners stronger client attention and engagement.
Digital content and marketing is so common that consumers now expect and rely on it as the only way to learn about brands.
Another advantage of digital marketing is its capability to be monitored and analyzed with the dedicated dashboards.
Digital Marketing powered with relevant content and supported technology will set your business to a path of continuous and automated growth in sales.
With several user friendly Martech Tools, one can easily control each and every aspect of marketing campaigns.
The power to analyse your decisions also sets you up for increased performance in the future. Such testing capabilities cannot be harnessed using conventional marketing.
Types of Digital Marketing Channels
Some of the most effective and commonly used digital marketing channels are:
- Content Marketing
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Social Media Marketing
- Paid Social: Ads on Social Media Platforms
- Display Advertising: Banners ads on high DA websites
- Cold Email Outreach Marketing
- Influencer Marketing & PR
- Inbound Marketing
- Content Marketing
Content Marketing refers to creating and promoting content with an aim to enhance brand awareness, gain more traffic, and increase customers.
This stratagem includes:
- Creating blogs, ebooks, whitepapers, infographics, and lead magnets.
- Answering Questions on Quora.
- Writing guest posts.
Your basic intent with this channel should be to try to solve problems that customers face.
Search engine optimization (SEO)
As per the WebFX Marketing Stats Report, 41% of all clicks go to the top three organic search results. Therefore, it's imperative to have a strategy to rank ahead in searches.
That’s where SEO enters the picture.
It is the process of optimizing your website to rank higher on the search engine result pages. When used properly, it is among the most effective tools to get organic traffic to your business page.
There are a sub-categories within search result optimization and the most prominent ones are:
On-Page SEO: This includes all aspects like keywords, content, infographics on your website that influence your search engine rankings.
Off-Page SEO: This involves creating inbound links, backlinks, generating external attention to direct traffic at your website as more-accessed web pages automatically rank higher.
Technical Concerns: In this type of SEO, the back end of a website is tweaked for higher ranking. Factors like page coding, image compression, CSS File optimization, structured data etc influence webpage loading speed, which in turn influences Google Search Rankings.
Social Media Marketing
As per Lyfe Marketing Report 2019, almost every internet user has at least 7 social media accounts.
Moreover, the average person spends 2 hours a day on social media and the number is even higher for teenagers (9 hours).
That’s not all. People spend 37% of the time on social media interacting with their favorite brand’s content. See the opportunity here?
These statistics conclude that nothing can beat Social Media Marketing for brand awareness and lead generation.
So, if you want to make conversions using this channel, start building a presence on social networks like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and Linkedin.
Paid Social: Ads on Social Media Platforms
Engaging with your audience organically is a great social media marketing strategy.
But, paid social ads take this a step further.
They give you the power to display targeted ads to your ideal customer.
Currently, the social media ad platforms that are most effective are:
- Facebook: It’s a great ad platform for lead generation. If you play your cards right, you can end up paying merely $1 per lead (or even less).
- LinkedIn: More than half of LinkedIn’s user-base are aged around 30-60 years old. Most of them also make a decent living. This means that LinkedIn gives you access to customers who have the means to buy your product (and probably will) if you give them a reason to.
- Instagram: With 500 million active users, Instagram is a goldmine for paid social advertising. Devote most of your budget to this platform if your audience is on the younger side.
- Twitter: For SMBs, paid ads on Twitter can do wonders. A report states that 60% of Twitterites buy the products and services of small and medium businesses.
- Pinterest: Pinterest has a strong female presence. In fact, 81% of users on the platform are women. Think of it as a highly targeted version of Instagram. For ecommerce retailers, that’s a huge plus.
Display Advertising: Banners ads on high DA websites
Display advertising has changed a lot with time. They’re still visual ads that appear on websites.
But, they’ve become more visually appealing and have a much wider audience than before.
In the US alone, a user typically sees 63 display ads a day.
For the average user, that can be too much to bear. No wonder why Ad Blockers are so popular these days.
But, this roadblock can be overcome if you run banner ads on high DA websites.
Cold Email Outreach Marketing
There’s no other channel that delivers a 3800% return on your investment.
So, you’d be a fool not to make hay while the sun shines.
But, if you don’t plan your cold emails right or send them to the wrong leads, there’s plenty of time and energy that you stand to lose.
To make sure that never happens, try to send personalised emails to leads that are already warmed up.
If that’s not possible, make sure that at least you prospect the right leads beforehand and create appropriate audience segments.
Influencer Marketing & PR
In 2020, influencer marketing should be an integral part of your PR strategy.
Wonder why?
That’s because consumers don’t warm up easily to paid ads anymore.
This mindset shift makes influencer marketing a great way to generate leads in a marketing environment that isn’t oversaturated or difficult to navigate.
Moreover, data proves that influencer marketing has a great ROI.
A report states that 70% of brands that tried influencer marketing ended up making $2+ on every $1 they spent.
Social media analytics also make sure that you can make informed future decisions based on your collaborations with various influencers.
Inbound Marketing
Rather than outwardly pushing your brand, product, or service to your prospects, you can adopt the inbound methodology.
Typically, it involves activities like marketing automation and funnel optimization.
The former is all about using specialized software for tasks like scheduling social media posts, creating lead nurturing workflows, campaign monitoring and tracking, and sending emails.
The latter, on the other hand, is concerned with crafting customer journeys that engage, attract and delight leads using blogs, SEO, and social media.
The Takeaway
Digital Marketing and its benefits to drive your business growth are that it levels the field for SMBs and large enterprises, enabling even the former to reach prospects where they are.
Simply put, the ROI with digital is beyond impressive.
But, to harness that ROI, you may need a veteran digital marketer’s guidance.
So, if you’re ready to unleash your growth on the digital marketing channels we’ve discussed today, feel free to book a Book A Free Strategy Session here.