Fundamentals of Digital Marketing
As more and more customers are spending their time on their mobile devices and online, eCommerce and retail businesses are compelled to invest in digital marketing efforts. This guide on the fundamentals of digital marketing will help you understand the concepts behind digital marketing and the digital marketing landscape.
What is digital marketing?
Digital marketing is marketing to your audience online. Digital marketing encompasses a whole range of techniques including SEO, content marketing, social media marketing, digital ads, email marketing, etc. Most of the digital marketing techniques cost only a fraction of traditional marketing techniques such as print, telephone marketing, physical marketing, etc. If you are a business just starting out, you need to develop an online presence and build your online reputation, as your audience expects to learn more about you online. Customers expect to learn about your products, pricing and product features through your website.
What are the types of digital marketing?
Let’s look at the different digital marketing tactics you can use to create brand awareness and be competitive.
1. Search Engine Optimization
Search Engine Optimization is the technique to make your content rank on popular search engines such as Google, Bing, etc. Again, the ranking factors depend on the search engine algorithms. A number of factors are considered for your content to rank on SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages), such as
- Length and quality of content
- Number quality of links to your domain
- Keywords in your content
- Mobile optimization
The way you approach SEO can fall into on-page SEO or off-page SEO or technical SEO categories. When you focus on your web page, on your content creation and keyword optimization, you are doing on-page SEO. When you focus on building backlinks to your website, you are doing off-page SEO. When you focus on making your website load faster using image compression, you are doing technical SEO.
2. Email marketing
When you sign up for an account on a website, the business usually collects your email address and automatically subscribes you to their marketing communications. You might then receive a welcome letter in your email and communication from the company about new products, offers and discounts, events and other important communication. You can then monitor the email marketing metrics and tweak your email marketing strategy as required. This type of marketing for businesses is called email marketing, which is one of the strongest forms of digital marketing. The types of communications that are included can be
- Welcome emails
- Email newsletters
- New product launch information
- Information about offers and discounts
- Re-engagement emails
3. Content marketing
Content marketing is the method of creating content to create brand awareness, drive traffic and generate leads and eventually convert them to customers. If you notice, many of the product websites have blogs, where digital marketers create content to demonstrate their product and industry expertise and answer questions that customers are looking for. Content marketing can be done in the form of blog posts, white papers, infographics, etc.
4. Affiliate marketing
You might have seen disclaimers on websites or YouTube channels, indicating that the promoters may receive a commission at no cost to buyers, when a purchase is made. Affiliate marketing is a type of marketing where companies or individuals promote products for a commission.
5. Social media marketing
When you promote your brand on social media channels to increase brand exposure, drive traffic, generate leads and ultimately convert them to customers it is called social media marketing. Social media channels can include
- Snapchat
5. Native Advertising
If you’ve scrolled through Facebook, you might come across advertisements that look like Facebook posts, but are actually sponsored ads. If you’re reading content on a website, the website might recommended content that may be sponsored. If you’re searching on Google, Ads that look like search results appear above your actual search results. This type of advertising is called native advertising, where the sponsored content is designed to look similar to the platform you’re on. Native advertising is increasingly being used because of its higher engagement levels among users and because it doesn’t break the user’s flow.
6. Online PR
Online PR is another type of digital marketing, where you get online coverage for your business or products. This can be done through press releases by contacting journalists or it can be done by getting product reviews from publications or blogs and generating buzz around your product.
