One cannot deny the influence of digital media in our way of life. The way we entertain, educate, and interact daily has shifted. What was once a world of pen and paper note taking, and expression has been replaced with communicating through digital devices. Text on screens, keyboards on our phones, and even standard images are all used to relay our emotions.
From a business perspective, this shift has pushed our world from an industrial age into the information age. If your business is not only surviving but thriving, chances are you’ve adjusted your marketing strategy to find your audience and consumer through a digital platform. We are here to tell you that the future of your brand depends on your willingness and commitment to meeting your target audience. Therefore, the online audience should be your main priority. Now is the time to dedicate your attention to building a solid digital marketing strategy for the future of your brand.
Everything You Need to Know About Digital Marketing
Digital marketing is the commercial, billboard, or newspaper ad of 2022. It’s how you get your advertising message in front of your target audience. Given that the majority of consumers regularly use the internet, it only makes sense to display your message on a screen. That’s why it is important to create a digital form of advertising communication.
Therefore, any marketing strategy that uses electronic devices such as computers, tablets, phones, or other devices online is digital marketing. This means that anything created, distributed, and viewed via digital media uses digital marketing. Focusing your efforts on improving your digital marketing strategy is the most logical solution for your company. The digital world has landed its spot and is part of our everyday routine.
The Importance of Digital Marketing
Even if you have the best product or service, nobody will know about it if you can’t get your message in front of the right people at the right time. A business owner’s main focus should be creating a digital marketing strategy that is effective to reach and engage a target audience. Reaching the right audience through a digital approach is the most significant component that will drive conversion rates and increase sales.
Discover different concepts on how digital marketing impacts an audience.
- Reach a larger audience (brand awareness): Your message is online with the touch of a button.
- Reach targeted audience: Segment your contacts and control who receives your messages.
- Cost-effective: High ROI (Return on Investment).
- Easily measurable, easily adaptable: If it’s not working, adjust and change.
- Can compete with more prominent brands: Easy internet access provides a level playing field for businesses of all sizes.
- Personalization: Send personalized messages easily.
- Connection with customers: Communication is instantaneous, allowing for a fast-forward approach to a business-customer relationship.
- Increased traffic, more leads, more conversions, more revenue
The Value of a Digital Presence
Traditional magazine advertising, television commercials, and billboards are no longer the most effective form of marketing. Companies that use a digital marketing platform are guaranteed to reach a larger audience with the right digital marketing strategy. The truth is, you may think you’re reaching a large audience during rush hour. However, most of that audience is thumbing through their phone while sitting in traffic. Your marketing strategy determines your ability to get your message on that screen.
“EVERYONE is on the internet.” It sounds like an exaggeration, right? However, that’s reality! New studies show that even with close to 5 billion internet users worldwide, the number is still increasing, up by almost 200 million from April 2021 to April 2022. That’s a significant increase that has had researchers pivot their question from, “How many internet users are there?” to “How many hours are users active every day?”
The numbers are remarkable. In America alone, 85% of people say they go online daily. Another 48% say they are online multiple times a day. Then there’s 31% of users who report that they are constantly connected to the internet. Constantly, as in every waking moment! So, “constant” internet usage continues to grow. If your audience is online, you should be, too. Your digital presence is critical in establishing your brand and converting leads.
Establish an Effective Digital Marketing Strategy
You might know what you want to accomplish but don’t know how to make it happen. Sending an email now and then or optimizing your company’s website isn’t going to drive the sales that you’re looking for. This is an example of a digital marketing campaign failing to drive results.
The most successful way to proceed is to develop a digital marketing strategy. Without an effective digital marketing strategy, your business doesn’t have a map for achieving its goals. This specific marketing strategy lays out where you are, where you want to be, and a targeted approach to get there. The most successful businesses clearly understand how digital marketing campaigns support their overarching goals.
Types of Digital Marketing
Digital marketing is a way of online marketing that uses a digital channel to reach your audience. This could be through social media, a blog, a video, or a website. Using these channels helps you meet your audience online.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
This is the process of using keywords and phrases related to your business to improve your chances of ranking higher in search engines. The idea is to increase free (organic) traffic to your website.
Content Marketing
This online digital marketing strategy creates targeted content, like blogs or videos, to drive traffic to your website. For content marketing to be effective, you must deliver consistent, high-quality content to your audience.
- Blog Posts
- E-books
- Infographics
- Audio content
- Videos
Social Media Marketing
The popularity of social media makes it an excellent marketing strategy. With almost everyone across all demographics, having a social media presence, social media marketing is an easy choice for many businesses. Social media marketing is simple to use, inexpensive, and effective.
- Snapchat
- TikTok
Pay Per Click (PPC) Advertising
This marketing strategy allows you to pay for your spot at the top of search engine results. That becomes possible even if that’s not where you would rank organically. As the name suggests, you only pay when a user clicks on your ad.
- Facebook Ads
- Twitter Ads
- Sponsored Messages on LinkedIn
- Google Ads
- Bing Ads
Affiliate Marketing
This marketing tactic allows someone to make money by promoting another person’s business. This revenue-sharing model works the same way whether you are the promoter or the company that works with the promoter. The affiliate gets a commission every time one purchases the promoted item. Therefore, the merchant pays the affiliate for every sale they help you make.
- Hosting video ads through YouTube Partner Program
- Posting affiliate links from social media
Marketing Automation
This marketing strategy improves the efficiency and relevance of advertising by using software for digital power campaigns. By automatically gathering and analyzing consumer data, marketing automation allows a company to maintain a personal relationship. This relationship is very important for both present and potential clients.
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- Email newsletters
- Social Media post scheduling
- Lead nurturing
- Campaign tracking and reporting
Email Marketing
This is a personal marketing strategy used for communicating with customers because it allows brands to deliver relevant content in a non-invasive way. You can send targeted emails to targeted groups with the touch of a button. Email marketing is a good option for businesses with large or small budgets because the costs are minimal and the same for all.
- Blog subscription newsletters
- Follow-up emails
- Welcome emails
- Holiday promotions
- Tips or similar series of emails
Online Personal Relations
Online Personal Relations uses marketing strategies to attract an audience and interact with them. By using this method, you are allowing customer feedback to be made public and seen by everyone. This shows your trust and commitment to the reputation of your brand.
- Reporter outreach via social media
- Engaging online reviews of your company
- Inviting comments on personal website or blog
Voice SEO
This is a new internet marketing strategy that is gaining momentum. With more and more users relying on mobile devices to find restaurants, stores, and specialty shops, voice search optimization is essential. People use assistants such as Siri and Alexa to search the world around them. So, voice search is an innovative digital marketing strategy for companies to adopt.
Video Marketing
Like content marketing, this marketing strategy focuses on creating informational and valuable videos for your target audience. This allows your company to increase its reach, grow revenue, and expand operations.
- Instructional
- Announcement
- Behind the scenes
- Events
Digital Marketing is Effective for All Businesses
All businesses, in any industry, can benefit from a strategic digital marketing strategy, including business-to-business (B2B) or business-to-consumer (B2C). What remains constant is that an effective marketing strategy involves building buyer personas to identify audience needs and creating valuable content to convert your audience.
However, implementing this digital marketing strategy will look different for the different types of business structures. For example, a B2B company will focus more on lead generation and channels that tap into a specific demographic. A B2C company, on the other hand, will use marketing strategies that build an accelerated buyer’s journey, specifically with stronger calls to action.
How to Create a Digital Marketing Strategy
The process of developing a comprehensive digital marketing strategy will begin with basic brand definition and end with tracking results. This indicates how effectively your digital marketing is working. With a specific strategy in place, you are sure to improve conversion rates and drive positive gains.
Define your brand: How do you want your brand to come across through your online campaign? Consider your brand voice and what you have to offer your customer. This will determine the focus of your digital strategy.
Define your goals: It’s essential to start by identifying and defining your business goals. Use SMART goals to guide your strategy, both short and long-term.
- Specific
- Measurable
- Achievable
- Realistic
- Timely
Identify target audience (buyer personas): Buyer personas are created profiles that represent the customer. They can vary from channel to channel or your goals for a particular product or campaign. Buyer personas are particularly helpful in creating profiles of ideal customers based on demographics, firmographics, psychological, and behavioral data. This segmentation helps organizations individually customize their messaging, products, and services.
Establish a budget for each channel: All digital marketing tactics depend on an adequate cash flow. Businesses must be realistic about their budget to determine which marketing tactics are achievable and affordable.
Choose your digital marketing strategies: Focus on the best marketing strategy that offers the most value for your business and industry. It’s a good idea to balance paid and free marketing channels.
Create engaging content: Now is the time to focus on content marketing and write that blog, social media post, create that PPC ad, and email marketing newsletter. Content marketing aims to build brand awareness and improve lead generation, so your content must be engaging and exciting.
Optimize digital assets for mobile: Since a large part of your audience use mobile devices, it’s critical to think about how your digital marketing message will translate from a desktop site to a mobile device. You want to create a digital experience that works for your audience.
Conduct keyword research: The best way to offer personalized content to your audience is to optimize your website and content for SEO. Using targeted keywords and phrases helps people find your business through search engines.
Track results based on analytics: Measure and monitor the performance of your digital marketing channels by tracking their performance. Use analytic tools to closely manage the effectiveness of your strategies and their return on investment. Knowing how to pivot your approach to allow for continuous growth is critical.
Optimize your Digital Marketing Strategy with C1M
Whether you’re looking to increase sales, build brand awareness, or increase customer loyalty, establishing an effective digital marketing strategy is the way. There are so many avenues
to advertise and market your business that it can be confusing and overwhelming to know where to start. At C1M, we can establish an effective digital marketing strategy for your business needs. Together, we will create a comprehensive plan so you can make your stand in the digital marketing world. With an effective digital marketing campaign, we guarantee that you will reach your company goals.
Partnering with an experienced digital marketing agency such as C1M is a strategic business move. Success depends on development and execution, so our mission is to stay on top of marketing tactics, trends, and changes. Our team of experts are constantly studying the industry. So, we’re ready to pass on those ideas that will help your business grow.
Let’s build a personalized digital marketing strategy that will work for you.
