In an increasingly digital world, companies, advertisers, and marketers are working to maintain relevancy and to capture consumer attention. One of the most relevant ways to maintain attention for a product is by using digital marketing. Digital marketing, also known as online marketing, is a form of marketing that uses the internet and a combination of online technology in order to market, advertise, and promote products for clients. Everything concerning the marketing process is conducted over the internet. There are four main methods of digital marketing that are used by a large portion of companies today, including social media marketing, search engine optimization, pay-per-click, and email marketing. This article will address each of these methods and explain how each can be used within your business.
Social Media Marketing
As you may imagine, social media has quickly become one of the easiest, cheapest, and most effective tools for digital marketing strategists. With over 80% of companies marketing through some form of social media, it is one of the most popular ways to reach a large audience while keeping marketing costs low. Depending on the target audience, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, or TikTok can each be used to drive awareness and sales while fostering a relationship with potential customers.
Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization, or SEO, is a strategy that has been used since the creation of the search engine. With this method, keywords and phrases are used tactfully within websites and media in order to maintain a high rank within a specific search topic. SEO is used by both large and small companies. The average person uses Google to search for an item or for an answer to a problem about four times per day. SEO ensures that when a consumer searches for a topic similar to what is being marketed, the marketed search result ranks higher than others, driving more clicks and more interaction to your site, which in turn can be converted to higher purchase rates and profit.
Pay-Per-Click
Have you ever previously researched an item that you are interested in purchasing, and then suddenly started to see advertisements for that exact product on web pages afterward? This is one example of pay-per-click marketing, or PPC. PPC is when a marketer creates and pays for ads that are specifically tailored to target a certain niche of consumers. Typically, these types of ads can be created using an engine like Google Ads. Just as the name suggests, the marketer only pays the ad company if a consumer clicks on the ad, meaning that the marketer can track the effectiveness of the ad and compare the cost to the profit gained by using the ad. Again, PPC is a fantastic method to direct traffic to your site or product, but it is most effective when you know your target customer well.
Email Marketing
Nowadays, a functioning email account is necessary for pretty much any technology-based action, from opening a bank account to purchasing anything online. Because of this, 90% of the U.S. population aged over 15 owns at least one email account. Knowing this and considering a large portion of the U.S. has their email directly linked to their cell phones, it is easier than ever to create high visibility for a product by feeding the ad to the consumer directly through their email. Over 80% of marketers use daily, weekly, or monthly email subscription services as primary forms of advertisement. This method allows the marketer to maintain total control over the marketing content and distribution process—unlike social media marketing or SEO.
It is safe to say that magazine, television, and newspaper ads are on their way to becoming obsolete, while digital ways to market a product or service are becoming more and more necessary in this digitally-dependent world. Whether you are a small business or a large company, it is critical that you find a digital marketing strategy that will work for your product.
