Digital marketing is all about using digital platforms for marketing purposes. It concocts the use of the internet, mobile devices, social media, search engines, and other channels to reach consumers. Some marketing experts consider digital marketing as a new endeavor that requires a new way of approaching customers and unique methods of understanding how customers behave compared to traditional marketing. A mobile phone has become a primary need for everyone. The future of digital marketing in India along with the scope of digital marketing in the future is going to get brighter in the coming years.
There are various types of digital marketing practices, which include:
- Search Engine Optimization
- Social Media Marketing
- Pay-Per-Click Advertising
- Content marketing
- Affiliate marketing
- Viral Marketing
- Influencer Marketing
- Email Marketing
- Mobile Marketing
Now that we know about the different methods or ways to digitally market your business, let me walk you through their basic meaning and the benefits that they can potentially provide to your business. The most common of these is Search Engine Optimization or SEO.
SEO is the art of optimizing your web content in a manner to reach the first page of search engines, in the organic listing.
The benefits of SEO are-
- It’s proven that SEO works for B2B Marketing.
- It is easily incorporated and is effective.
- Effective SEO adds credibility to a business.
- Inbound Marketing practices result in more leads than Outbound Marketing practices.
Next is Social Media Marketing. It involves using social media platforms to reach the audience and boost sales. Marketing through social media is one of the modern, versatile and cost-effective strategies that small businesses and start-ups can use to reach their target audience and boost sales over time.
Some of the benefits of marketing via social media are-
- It increases inbound traffic
- It helps to increase brand recognition
- Consumers are more receptive to messages
- It is cost-effective
- It allows us to target and retarget ideal consumers
Pay-Per-Click marketing is a way of online advertisement in which advertisers accrue costs when users click their ads. Advertisers bid on the perceived value of a click depending upon the keywords, platforms, and audience type in which it originates.
Through target settings and account structure, advertisers can run successful Pay-Per-Click campaigns as long the relevance survives.
Content Marketing is a technique that involves creating unique and relevant content that the customers will find useful and valuable. It is the art of communicating with your potential customers without adopting the sales person methodology; that is, without directly selling to them. Instead of bluntly selling your services and products, you give information to your prospective customers that can teach them something.
Different types of content marketing include:
- Social media posts
- Blog posts
- E-mail newsletters
Affiliate marketing is a form of digital marketing where you recommend someone to any online product and when that person buys the product based on your reference, you receive a commission of any kind. It is a type of performance-based marketing in which the commission depends on the number of sales you make.
The ways in which affiliate marketing benefits businesses are-
- It’s cost-effective
- Increased brand visibility
- Fast customer acquisition
- The returns on investment are clear
- It helps to attract and retain traffic
- It helps in saving a lot of time and energy
Viral marketing is any kind of marketing practice that leverages network effects and word-of-mouth promotion. It is basically a method of marketing where customers are encouraged to share information about a company’s goods or services via the Internet.
Some benefits of a successful Viral Marketing campaign include-
- Increases brand awareness
- Creates a spike in website traffic
- Generate more leads and sales
- Viral content is WAY cheaper than advertisements
- Increases connection with existing customers
Influencer Marketing is the kind of marketing that focuses on targeting key industry leaders to drive awareness and brand message to a specific market of consumers.
Working with the right influencers affect the business in many ways such as-
- Improved SEO ranking
- Increased product sale
- Improved brand awareness
- Increased online engagement
Email Marketing is a direct line of contact between a business owner and an email subscriber; who is a potential audience and customer. It is a very effective way to build a business and increase conversions.
So, Email Marketing is a type of Digital Advertising that is made up of two main components-
- A list of email that consumers sign up for
- The emails that various businesses send out to this list.
Two of the most basic reasons that make Email Marketing important are this that, it’s highly adaptable and inexpensive.
Mobile marketing is a multi-channel, digital marketing strategy aimed at reaching a target audience on their smart-phones, tablets, or other mobile devices, via websites, email, SMS and MMS, social media, and apps. Effective mobile advertising stands for understanding your mobile audience, designing content with mobile platforms in mind, and making strategic use of SMS/MMS marketing and mobile apps.
The reasons for the success of mobile advertisements include-
- The relative amount of time spent on mobile phones is increasing tremendously.
- It’s giving advertisers and marketers the chance to be more specific by personalizing advertisements based on individual preferences, buyer behavior and location, and therefore offering more relevant content to the users.
- They are conversion-oriented and cost-effective.
Digital marketing is continuow evolving, and mobile marketing plays a key role in that strategy. The shift toward mobile devices is in trend and it will continue to progress, and businesses need to ensure they have a cohesive mobile marketing plan to connect with those digital consumers.
Digital marketing has the ability to transform the way companies reach and engage with their customers.
It is the most cost-effective way to market any business, and with affordable digital marketing tactics, small businesses can get more for their marketing expenditure.
It is the most measurable form of marketing. By measuring your digital marketing campaigns in real-time, you will be able to see which tactics are working and which are not. One can just adjust their campaigns for greater success.
It helps to target ideal buyers. Pay-per-click, display, and social media advertising enable one to target those who are most likely to be interested in their products or services based on demographic information and general characteristics.
