This short article on Digital Marketing will help you learn – What is Digital Marketing in just 5 minutes. A quick and effective guide to online marketing by ABS Digital Agency In Bangalore.
What is Digital Marketing?
Digital Marketing or online marketing is the art and science of promoting your business or brand on the internet. It is a strategic way of attracting, informing, and engaging prospects and customers on the web. Digital Marketing helps business websites get more traffic, calls, leads, and sales mainly by means of digital channels and platforms like social media, search engines, emails & PPC ads. The internet plays a huge role in a businesses’ growth and success nowadays. From reaching out to new prospects to closing a deal to receiving that payment online everything could be done on the web. Even if you have a traditional offline brick-and-mortar business, you can reach out to your potential clients online via digital marketing channels like search engines & social media. The long-term survival of any business in the age of the internet is almost impossible if the business doesn’t make use of online marketing.
- Inform prospects about your business and brand
- Bring online visitors to your website
- Encourage website visitors to call you or make a purchase on the website
- Build brand reputation and trust by growing your business’s social media presence and online reviews
- Make your website or business easily accessible to people looking for your products or services online
- Through content marketing, you can inform and educate your prospects about your products and services.
- Through social media marketing, you can promote your offline business within a 5 kilometers radius of your store and also increase followers on your brand’s social media page.
- Through email marketing, you can send a series of emails to your subscribers and customers to increase awareness and trust to drive more sales for your business.
Why is Digital Marketing Important?
In today’s digital world, businesses need to have a strong online presence in order to succeed. A strong online presence can be achieved through digital marketing. By using digital marketing, businesses can reach a larger audience more easily and effectively than they could with traditional marketing methods. Additionally, digital marketing allows businesses to track results and analyze data more easily than with traditional methods, making it easier to see what is working and what needs improvement.
Digital marketing allows businesses to reach customers in ways that were previously impossible or too expensive. In addition, it makes it possible for customers to share information about products and services with each other via social media and other platforms, further extending reach and effectiveness.
Digital marketing makes it possible for businesses to track performance and analyze results. This leads to faster, more effective adjustments that can improve a business’s bottom line. Digital marketing also offers many different options with regard to customer interactions and engagement. It allows businesses to find new customers, interact with existing ones and build brand loyalty among all customers.
Digital marketing allows businesses to quickly and easily reach customers on a global scale. If you’re selling a product or service, digital marketing can be used to connect with consumers across borders. This is important because consumers may otherwise be difficult or impossible to reach in other ways. Digital media also makes it possible for businesses of all sizes, even small ones, to get their products or services in front of large audiences at a low cost.
Most Effective Digital Marketing Strategies & Channels For A New Business Website
Grow your business online using the 7 most effective online marketing channels proven to get more traffic, calls, leads, and sales for your business. Let’s get started.
- Search Engine Optimization
- Search Engine Marketing
- Social Media Marketing
- Email Marketing
- Content Marketing
- PPC Advertising
- Affiliate Marketing
- Inbound Marketing
Below is a detailed explanation and guide to effectively using each of these online marketing channels for your business. This information will also help you decide which channel is best suited for your business.
1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
SEO is the process of making your website rank higher in a search result on a search engine like Google or Bing. Higher ranks on the search pages result in an influx of free (organic) high-quality traffic (visitors) to your website.
When you search for something on a search engine, the results that come up are based on complex algorithms that determine the relevance and usefulness of each website. SEO aims to improve a website’s ranking by optimizing various elements such as keywords, content, and backlinks.
The goal of SEO is to attract more organic traffic (free traffic) to a website from search engines, which can lead to more leads, sales, or engagement. It involves both on-page optimization (such as optimizing content and meta tags) and off-page optimization (such as building high-quality backlinks from other websites).
SEO can be a complex and ongoing process, but it is essential for any website that wants to be visible and accessible to its target audience.
Benefits of SEO:
- High-quality traffic to your website.
- Very high Return on investment (ROI).
- Increased brand awareness.
- Massive boost to brand value and credibility.
- Consistent long-term traffic influx.
Businesses that need SEO the most:
- Small businesses and startups.
- SaaS and service-based companies
- Niche stores and websites
- Local business for maps search results
- Medical, Legal and other professionals
- Maintainance professional & handyman companies
- Restaurants, bars, and cafes
Want to learn more about SEO? Check out our blogs on SEO.
2. Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
Search engine marketing is basically paid search marketing. This is the primary difference between SEO and SEM, SEO is about getting free search engine results and SEM is about buying search ads to display your website in top search results.
Unlike SEO, which is focused on optimizing a website’s organic search results, SEM uses paid search ads to increase a website’s visibility and traffic. These ads appear at the top of the search results page and are marked as sponsored or ads.
SEM involves creating and running ad campaigns on platforms such as Google Ads, Bing Ads, or Yahoo Gemini. Advertisers bid on relevant keywords and pay when someone clicks on their ads, which is known as pay-per-click (PPC) advertising.
Like SEO, the goal of SEM is also to attract targeted traffic to a website, generate leads or sales, and achieve a positive return on investment (ROI) for the advertising spend. SEM campaigns can be highly effective but require careful planning, monitoring, and optimization to ensure they are targeting the right audience and delivering the desired results.
Benefits of SEM:
- Get top rank on search pages instantly
- Very helpful for new websites to get traffic until SEO kicks in
- In the long run, SEM helps improve the SEO of a website
- A/B testing is possible with SEM but not with SEO
- Helps in building a brand image
Businesses that need SEM the most:
All businesses that need SEO could get started with SEM until their SEO starts getting significant traffic. SEM is particularly useful for startups and new businesses to get as much market share as possible before their competition enters the market.
Get started with SEM – Google Ads.
3. Social Media Marketing (SMM)
Social media marketing refers to marketing activities like brand awareness campaigns, and building a brand’s fan pages, etc on social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc. Social media marketing helps build trust with prospects by building a social community around your business. SMM helps tremendously in growing trust, sales, brand awareness, and social proof.
Social media platforms offer a vast audience and the ability to reach and engage with potential customers in a more direct and personalized way. SMM involves creating and sharing content on social media platforms to attract and engage followers, build brand awareness, and drive website traffic.
SMM can include a range of tactics such as creating and sharing posts, running social media ads, and engaging with followers through comments, direct messages, or live events.
The goal of SMM is to build a strong social media presence, increase brand visibility, and engage with a targeted audience in a way that creates a positive impression of the brand. SMM requires a consistent and strategic approach to content creation and audience engagement to be effective.
Benefits of SMM
- Building trust
- Building a loyal fan base
- Getting social proof and approval
- Driving sales via social ads
- Social proof helps improve SEO
Businesses that need SMM the most:
All businesses require social media presence. Social media marketing is the best way to increase that presence. Though SMM is particularly very helpful for the following businesses:
- Niche business
- Businesses that need constant & quick feedback from customers
- Business with a low marketing budget
- New businesses that need to build trust in the market
- Businesses that cater to a young generation
4. Email Marketing
Email marketing is one of the earliest forms of digital marketing. It’s also one of the most reliable and cost-efficient means of marketing on the web. Email marketing involves direct communication with your audience. You can use email marketing to promote products, discounts, events, etc. It can also be a means of directing your audience to your website.
Email marketing can be used to send newsletters, promotional offers, event invitations, or other types of content to subscribers who have opted-in to receive emails. It can also be used to nurture leads and customers through a sales funnel, providing them with valuable information and incentives to encourage them to make a purchase.
Email marketing typically involves using an email marketing platform to manage email lists, create and send emails, and track email performance metrics such as open rates and click-through rates.
The goal of email marketing is to build relationships with subscribers, drive traffic to a website, and generate leads and sales. It is an effective and low-cost way to reach a targeted audience and can be highly personalized and automated to save time and increase efficiency.
Benefits of Email Marketing:
- Personalized notification service
- Follow-up communication with customers
- Sales promotions and loyalty programs
- 40% more effective than SMM (Mckinsey)
- Long-term marketing campaigns on a limited budget
Businesses that need Email Marketing
- Businesses that need marketing with a personal touch
- Businesses that sell high-cost products and services which involve lengthy communication stages with prospects.
- Local businesses
- New businesses that need to build trust
- eCommerce businesses
5. Content Marketing
Content marketing involves the creation and promotion of informative content for your audience. This informative content promotion will serve the purpose of brand awareness, traffic generation, lead generation, and customer acquisition.
The content can take many forms, including blog posts, videos, social media posts, infographics, white papers, or podcasts. The content should provide value to the audience by addressing their needs, interests, or pain points and establishing the business as a trusted source of information or solutions.
Content marketing aims to build brand awareness, establish a relationship with the audience, and ultimately drive profitable customer action. It can also help businesses position themselves as thought leaders in their industry and build a loyal customer base.
Content marketing requires a well-planned and executed strategy, including identifying the target audience, defining the content goals, and developing a content calendar. It also requires measuring and analyzing the performance of the content to ensure it is achieving the desired results.
Benefits of content marketing:
- Increased brand visibility
- Creates loyalty and trust
- Helps to build authority and credibility
- Provides value to prospects for free
- Helps generate new leads
Businesses that need Content Marketing:
- SaaS businesses
- Consultants
- Offline service-based businesses
- Online service-based businesses
- Big brands use it to improve market share
Learn more about content marketing.
6. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing refers to marketing carried out by your customers or marketing partners (affiliate partners or affiliates) on your behalf. Once the deal is closed, the affiliate partner usually gets a percentage of the sale as a commission.
Affiliates earn a commission for each sale they refer through a unique tracking link provided by the business. This link is used to track the traffic and sales generated by the affiliate and determine the commission amount.
Affiliate marketing can be a cost-effective way for businesses to reach a wider audience and drive sales. It allows them to leverage the networks and influence of affiliates to promote their products or services, without the upfront costs of traditional advertising.
Affiliate marketing typically involves finding and recruiting affiliates, providing them with marketing materials, and tracking and paying commissions. It can be managed in-house or through an affiliate network, which connects businesses with a network of affiliates.
The goal of affiliate marketing is to generate sales and revenue for the business by leveraging the reach and influence of affiliates. It can be an effective way to expand a business’s reach and tap into new markets while providing affiliates with an opportunity to earn income by promoting products or services they believe in.
Benefits of Affiliate Marketing
- Trust building
- Social proof
- Word-of-mouth marketing
- Zero expense until the sale is completed
- Highly efficient. Amazon relies heavily on affiliate marketing.
Businesses that need Affiliate marketing:
- eCommerce businesses
- Construction & architectural firms
- Service firms
- It could be effectively used in almost all businesses
7. Pay Per Click (PPC) Marketing
PPC marketing is a type of online marketing where you pay the publisher only when your ad is clicked. PPC has been gaining traction in the digital world for many years and now is one of the most widely used marketing methods. The most common PPC platforms are Google Adwords and Facebook Ads.
Benefits of PPC Marketing:
- Fast results
- Measurable results
- Precise targeting of the audience
- Cost-effective
- Highly versatile
Businesses that need PPC marketing
- Startups and new businesses
- Local businesses for Google business search
- Service-based businesses
- Doctors, Lawyers, and other professionals
8. Inbound Marketing
Inbound marketing refers to a specialized content marketing technique where you attract your prospects to your website through high-value free content. Once they arrive at your website or blog, you continue to communicate with them via emails or chat and provide more valued information to the prospect.
Inbound marketing helps you attract potential customers to your business without using disruptive advertising to get your client’s attention. This results in the generation of very high-quality leads and helps the ideal customer find your business. Inbound marketing also helps tremendously in building credibility and trust for your business
How to do Digital Marketing?
The digital marketing landscape is always changing, so it’s important to keep up-to-date on the latest trends and best practices. Here are ten ways you can get started with digital marketing:
- Use social media platforms to connect with potential customers and create a strong social media presence.
- Use search engine optimization (SEO) techniques to ensure that your website appears as the top result for relevant keywords.
- Create engaging content that people will want to share on their social media feeds or bookmark on their browser tabs.
- Partner with influencers in your industry to promote your products and services online by collaborating on content creation, product reviews, and more.
- Research popular websites in your niche for common design elements like call-to-action buttons or templates so that you can make sure yours is competitive.
- Build a business website to provide potential customers with information about your company and its offerings.
- Consider investing in paid advertising channels such as Google AdWords, Facebook Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Twitter Ads, Instagram Ads, etc., if you’re looking to boost traffic and conversions on your site.
- Keep an eye out for emerging tech trends such as voice search that could potentially give you an edge over competitors who aren’t paying attention to them yet!
- If you have an existing brick-and-mortar location, make sure to have a listing of your business available on Google Maps and other similar directories.
- Local business directories and review sites are another way to get your company listed on the internet. These sites might require some payment in order to be listed, but they offer exposure that goes beyond just one platform.
Remember that there is no one size fits all approach when it comes to digital marketing-it’s all about experimenting until you find what works for your audience and budget!
Digital Marketing Assets
A digital marketing strategy starts with your website. Your website is the foundation of your digital marketing efforts and should be optimized for search engine ranking and user experience. Once your website is built, you can start adding other digital marketing assets such as blog posts, eBooks, infographics, and white papers to attract more visitors and leads. You can also use social media, email marketing, and pay-per-click advertising to drive traffic to your website.
Examples of Digital Marketing assets:
- Social media business pages
- A responsive website
- A blog
- Emails – Welcome, Newsletter, sales sequences
- PDF Brochures & eBooks
- Videos
- Images & Infographics
- Data
- Reviews & testimonials
- Influencer Partnerships
Examples of successful digital marketing campaigns
- Share A Coke – A successful digital marketing campaign by Coca-Cola encouraged people to take selfies with the hashtag #ShareACoke. This campaign resulted in increased brand awareness and sales.
- Beauty unites Us – Sephora’s Beauty Unites Us campaign was created in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The campaign encouraged people to share how they were staying connected with loved ones while staying safe at home. This resulted in increased brand loyalty and engagement.
- Because you are worth it – L’Oréal’s #BecauseWe’reWorthIt campaign has been running since 1973 and is one of the most successful and longest-running digital marketing campaigns ever. The campaign celebrates women’s beauty and empowerment, resulting in increased brand awareness and sales.
- We Believe – Lego’s #WeBelieve campaign was created in response to media backlash against its hiring practices. The campaign involved an open letter from Jørgen Vig Knudstorp, CEO of Lego. This response gained global media attention and increased brand awareness for Lego.
- The #LikeAGirl campaign is a viral video ad produced by Always, an American feminine hygiene and maxi pad company. The campaign aimed to empower women and challenge social stigmas about being like a girl. This resulted in increased brand awareness and sales.
- The #OscarsSoWhite campaign was created in response to criticisms of the lack of diversity at Oscar Award ceremonies. This campaign urged viewers not to watch certain films and actors that had received nominations in order to send a message about racial inequality in Hollywood. This resulted in increased brand awareness and public opinion change surrounding diversity issues within Hollywood.
- Freecupsize coffeehouse chain launched #MightyCupsOfLove as a way to give back after the devastating earthquake in Haiti. It donated proceeds from every cup of coffee sold to help those affected by the earthquake recover. The campaign resulted in increased community engagement and heightened visibility for Freecupsize coffeehouses.
- One more example of a great digital marketing campaign is Dos Equis‘s Most Interesting Man In The World series. These commercials feature actor Jonathan Goldsmith portraying a man living life adventurously and engaging in heroic exploits, while always having a Dos Equis beer close at hand. These commercials are wildly popular on YouTube (2.5 million views) and have led to high levels of engagement with consumers online.
- The #NoMakeupSelfie campaign is a social media campaign launched by Cancer Research UK in 2014. It encouraged women around the world to post pictures of themselves with no makeup on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram in support of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. This resulted in increased brand awareness and donations for Cancer Research UK.
- The #PlasticFreeJuly campaign was launched by Surfers Against Sewage in 2015 and encourages people to avoid single-use plastic items during July. People who signed up were encouraged to track their plastic consumption and share their experience online. This resulted in increased brand awareness and engagement with customers.
Best Digital Marketing Tools
If you’re new to digital marketing, you might be wondering what tools are available to help you get started. Here are some of the best tools available:
- Social Media Marketing Tools – Hootsuite, Buffer, CoSchedule, HubSpot, and Sprout Social. Key features of each. Why you should use them.
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tools – Moz, Google Webmaster Tools, SEMrush, ahrefs, and Majestic SEO.
- Email Marketing Tools – MailChimp, Aweber, ActiveCampaign, and ConvertKit. These are all great tools with similar pricing plans starting at $20 per month with MailChimp being the cheapest option out there.
- Conversion Optimization Tools – Optimizely, CrazyEgg, ClickTale and Mixpanel. We take a look at what these tools can do for your business and how they work. Two more free services that you can use – LanderApp and Unbounce, they offer some great templates to help get your landing pages off the ground quickly.
- Graphic Creation Tools – Canva, Pablo, Visual.ly and Venngage.
- Content Writing Tools – Grammarly, Zyro.io, Quillbot
- User Experience & Research Tools – SurveyMonkey, Hotjar, UserTesting, and Qualaroo. User experience is an important part of any digital marketing campaign.
- Competitor Analysis Tools – SimilarWeb, Adbeat, SpyFu, and Trakken.
- Customer Service Tools – Zendesk, GrooveHQ, and Deskpro.
Some of our favorite Digital Marketing tools:
- Google Analytics – This tool will help you track your website traffic and understand where your visitors are coming from.
- AdWords – AdWords is a tool that allows you to create and manage online advertising campaigns. It’s important to have an AdWords account if you want to do paid search advertising or run ads on YouTube or other Google-owned sites.
- Hootsuite – A social media management platform that helps you connect with people who have similar interests on multiple networks including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and more.
- Ubersuggest – An excellent tool for finding long-tail keywords (i.e., phrases rather than single words) to target when doing content marketing.
- CoSchedule – This allows you to schedule all of your blog posts, social media messages, and any other types of content in one place; this way, you don’t have to worry about forgetting something because it’s all right there on your calendar!
- Anyword – Great content writing tool that automatically drafts content you for.
- Buzzsumo – Helps you discover popular articles and share them with your followers.
- Canva – Free design tool that makes graphic design quick and easy.
- MailChimp – Gives you the ability to easily send out newsletters to grow your email list or promote an upcoming event without having to know how to code or set up email lists manually.
So which online marketing channel is best suited for your business?
You’ve launched a new website, now how do you market it?
Here’s is a quick guide on how to market your newly launched website based on two important questions:
1. How much money can you spend on marketing?
2. How quickly do you need results from your marketing efforts?
Case 1: Low Budget & Less Time – Word Of Mouth among friends & family.
Case 2: High Budget & Less Time – Online Ads & PPC Marketing
Case 3: Low Budget & More Time – SEO & Organic Social Media Marketing
Case 4: High budget & More time – PPC + SEO + Social Media
The best channel of digital marketing for your business depends on various factors like the type of your business, the stage at which your business is, and also the stage at which your prospect is in the sales funnel. Unfortunately, there is no “one size fits all” solution for online marketing. But, any business will have to use all channels of digital marketing at some point or another in its businesses’ journey.
You can narrow down the best online marketing channel by considering the following:
- your business type (online or offline)
- your business location – do you cater to local, national or global audiences.
- your product or service – is it a physical product or a digital product.
- your ideal customer – businesses or consumers
- the best way to reach your ideal customer – social, search, content, etc
- your business model – subscription-based or …
- and many more factors…
Still confused? Get a Free Digital Marketing Consultation from an ABS Expert today.
Digital Marketing in Post Pandemic India
The pandemic has significantly accelerated the growth of digital marketing in India, with businesses recognizing the importance of having an online presence. According to a report by the Digital Marketing Association (DMA), digital marketing spending in India is expected to reach $10 billion by 2021, representing a growth of 25% compared to pre-pandemic levels. This trend is expected to continue in the coming years, with experts projecting a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 27.4% between 2021 and 2026.
One area of digital marketing that has seen tremendous growth post-pandemic is social media. With people spending more time at home, social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter have seen a surge in user engagement. A study by Kantar revealed that social media usage in India increased by 87% during the pandemic. This has presented businesses with an opportunity to engage with their customers through social media advertising. According to a report by Statista, social media advertising spending in India is expected to reach $2.7 billion by 2023, up from $1.3 billion in 2019.
In addition to social media, other digital marketing channels such as search engine optimization (SEO), email marketing, and video advertising have also seen increased adoption post-pandemic. With more businesses shifting their operations online, the demand for digital marketing services has grown exponentially in India. As a result, digital marketing agencies and professionals are in high demand, with the industry expected to create over 20 lakh jobs by 2025, according to a report by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI). Overall, the pandemic has accelerated the growth of digital marketing in India, and businesses that invest in digital marketing are likely to reap the benefits in the coming years.
Conclusion
So there you have it! A quick overview of digital marketing, why it’s important, and how to get started. Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to all things digital marketing, but it’s a great starting point. If you’re feeling ready to take your digital marketing efforts to the next level, consider working with a digital marketing agency. With their help, you can create a comprehensive plan that includes all of the strategies and tactics we’ve discussed in this post (and more!).
Wanna dig deeper? Here are the best blogs to learn more about Online Marketing:
Whether you’re looking to increase brand visibility, generate leads, or boost sales, a good digital marketing company will take the time to understand your objectives.