Digital Marketing is the marketing of products or services by using electronic display units and various digital channels such as search engines, social media, email, and other websites.
Let’s discuss how Digital Marketing works. Currently, it is the hottest topic in the marketing world, where it connects the manufacturers/service providers/ distributors/ marketers and the end-consumer.
Nowadays the accessibility to the Internet has become so easy that the number of people who use the Internet is still on the rise. There is constant change in the thought process of people, their shopping habits have changed a lot due to the presence of the Internet.
Let us say that Marketing is always about reaching the right audience in the right place at the right time. Today we know that where we can find our audience, as they spend so much time on the Internet.
At Sunraise Solutions, we always find the best ways in practice to engage/attract entrepreneurs with potential customers online. Though we use the best practices, people around the world pose a lot of questions about digital marketing. So we decided to answer some of them.
Why should we use digital marketing?
Because of the technical advancements year by year, the marketing approach by brands and businesses changed their ways. As the usage of digital platforms is increasing in everyday life, people started using digital devices instead of doing physical shopping. There are endless possibilities for brands to make their appearances through social media, video, email, and other websites.
In Digital Marketing, we can use various analytics tools through which we can monitor the ROI of your marketing campaigns. But when we go for traditional marketing like print ads, and billboards there is no means to find your ROI.
What are the types of Digital Marketing used to promote a business online?
Here are the types of digital marketing you should consider for your business online.
- Search Engine Optimization
- Content Marketing
- Social Media Marketing
- Search Engine Marketing
- Affiliate Marketing
- Email Marketing
- Online Public Relations (PR)
- Native Advertising
- Marketing Automation
Let’s discuss these topics in simple words
Search Engine Optimization:
Search Engine Optimisation is the process of optimizing a website for a particular keyword to rank higher in the SERP (search engine result pages). This will increase the chances of getting free traffic to the website/blog.
There have many approaches to this process, but we organized them into three types. They are:
- On-Page SEO: In this type, SEO is focused on the content on the website page. Here we have to do the research on what type of content the webpage needs to showcase the intent of the page. Also, we need to find out the keywords that were getting searched online and write the content accordingly. The main point is that the content should be written for humans only, cause content is king for SERP.
- Off-Page SEO: In this type, SEO is focused outside the page (off-the-page) activities. There are many ways to go about it like backlinks, and guest posting. Backlinks are also known as inbound links from different websites/blogs that have relevance and high authority. Guest posting also has a great effect on your website which has good chance to increase attention to your website by getting referral traffic and backlinks as well.
- Technical SEO: Here we focus on the backend of your website, and on how the pages were built. One of the main factors in increasing your ranking is Page loading speed. We can achieve this by implementing CSS file optimization, Image compression, Structured Data, and AMP(accelerated mobile pages).
Content Marketing:
This is the process of creating content for generating brand awareness, traffic growth, lead generation, and customers. We can make this by following a content marketing strategy.
- Blogs: We need to write and publish articles about your company that help to demonstrate your expertise in a particular field. Also writing effective blogs will generate organic traffic for your website. This will give you more chances to convert your website traffic into leads.
- Ebooks: Ebooks are similar to long-form content that will educate the website visitors about your company/business. It will create the chances of getting contact information, which helps to convert them into leads.
- Infographics: Customers sometimes face difficulty in understanding the concept, so infographics will help you to visualize the concept.
- Videos: Video content is the most important and engaging as almost 82% of internet traffic will be through videos in 2021. We have various platforms to showcase your content, like YouTube, Netflix, Prime Video, etc.
Social Media Marketing:
Social Media Marketing will help you to promote your business brand and content on various social media platforms like:
- YouTube
- Snapchat
- TikTok
Growing followers on these platforms will increase the chances of getting free word of mouth and referrals. For the successful growth of your business, you need to target a specific set of audiences that is relevant.
In all social media platforms, we have an analytics tool that can be used to understand which post has better engagement, and how many positive mentions you get, how many are using your business hashtag in their social media post.
If you have more funds to grow your SMM, you can consider using Social media advertising. Social media ads will give you more reach and attention to your business. Social media platforms are very powerful nowadays as you can target your specified audiences based on their demographics, interest, behavior, and so on.
Search Engine Marketing:
Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is a digital marketing strategy that is used to gain more visibility of your website in the search engines results page (SERP). It is also known as Pay Per Click PPC or Paid search advertising.
One of the most common types of PPC is Google ads which allows you to buy the top slots on the Google search engine results in pages.
In search engine marketing the advertisers will have to pay for the impression that will result in visitors, which is an efficient way of spending for a company. SEM reaches the customer at the right time when they are searching for information. Results are very fast with SEM and it is one of the best ways to drive traffic to a website.
Affiliate Marketing:
This is performance-based advertising where an affiliate earns a commission for marketing another’s product/business. Affiliate Marketing channels include hosting videos through the YouTube Partner Program, and posting affiliate links from your social media accounts.
Email Marketing:
Email Marketing is a way of sending business messages to a group of people using Email. It will help you to interact with your audience while promoting your brand and increasing sales. An email has a broader reach when it comes to connecting your prospects and customers. According to Statista, there were more than 3.8 billion email accounts in 2018 which may rise to 4.4 billion in 2023.
Online Public Relations (PR):
It is a practice of earning online coverage through digital publications, blogs, press releases, and other content-based websites. It influences cyber citizens and it aims to make desirable comments about an organization and its products, and services.
Native Advertising:
Native advertising is a type of advertising that matches the form and function of the platform upon which it appears. In many cases, it functions like an advertorial and manifests as a video, article, or editorial. We can often find Native ads in social media feeds or recommended content on a webpage. Native doesn’t look like ads. They look like part of the editorial flow of the page. The main key for native advertising is to be non-disruptive, as it exposes the reader to advertisement content. Facebook and Instagram advertising are examples of native advertising.
Marketing Automation:
It is a process that automates several repetitive tasks that will take part on a regular basis in a marketing campaign. Marketing Automation allows an individual to design, execute and automate a time-bound marketing workflow. With this, businesses can target customers with automated messages across email, web, social, and text to generate sales leads.
How much budget do I need for Digital Marketing?
It is completely dependent on the elements that you are looking to add to your strategy. If you are looking for marketing techniques like SEO, Social media, and content creation for an existing website, you don’t need much budget. The main focus should be on creating quality content for your website for the audience, the only investment you need is time unless you are planning to outsource the work.
If you are starting afresh, you need to create a website with the help of WordPress hosted on WP Engine and using a simple theme.
With techniques like online advertising and purchasing email lists, it will have some expenses. The expense is not much when compared to the visibility you could receive as a result.
If you want to implement PPC using Google Adwords, there will be bidding against other companies who want to stay on the top in SERP. The cost will depend on the competition for that particular keyword, this may be affordable or expensive. So you to have focus on building your organic reach as well.
How long will it take to see results?
When compared to offline marketing, digital marketing will get you faster results, because it is a fact that it’s easier to measure ROI. However, it is completely dependent on the effectiveness of your digital marketing strategy.
If you spend your time finding the needs of your audience and focus on creating quality content that will attract and convert them. Then it is very likely to see good results in the first six months.
If you use paid advertising as a part of your strategy, the results will be a lot quicker. But for long-term and sustainable success you should use SEO, quality content, and social media.