Digital Marketing- Who, What, Why, How of Digital Marketing

Introduction

As per a study of Statista, there were around 4.1 billion internet users in 2020 and 4.9 billion users in 2021. The number of global internet users rose to 5.3 billion in 2022. As per this, it is witnessing a jump of around 400 million each year.

Along with the rise in global internet users, the way people shop products, avail different required services, and access information has changed a lot.

It means only sticking to offline marketing or traditional marketing can’t help you reach your audiences and grow your business.

You need to market your business on the internet or platforms available on it. And such marketing is digital marketing. Here in this write-up, you will briefly learn all about it.

What is Digital Marketing?

Digital Marketing is also popularly known as online or internet marketing. It is a branch of marketing that involves the promotion of a company’s services/ products via different digital media channels.

This includes search engines, emails, social media platforms, paid advertisements, affiliates, print media, and more.

With the fast growth of the internet, smartphone, and computers in the past 2 decades, today digital marketing has become one of the hottest options in the industry. It allows businesses to easily connect with their targeted audience and further helps in growing their business sales.

After implementing the available different types of digital media techniques, companies can increase website traffic, online branding, awareness, user engagement, and further digital sales.

Types of Digital Marketing

Digital marketing includes the use of several online platforms, channels, and tactics to promote a business on the internet. Here in the below article, Poonjan have mentioned some of the most common tactics, channels, or types of digital marketing:-

1)Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO or search engine optimization is a set of practices that marketers use to make a business visible to people searching for relevant products or services on the internet. Apart from making a business available on the internet, it helps businesses increase organic traffic to their website and improve their website rankings on search engine result pages of Google, Bing, and allied others.

On-Page SEO:

It relates to optimization activities that marketers do on a business website to improve its visibility, ranking on search engines and drive huge traffic to it. On-Page SEO includes keyword research & uses, internal linking, content quality, and Meta Tags & titles. All these help in increasing user experience.

Off-Page SEO:

Off-Page SEO refers to marketing tactics that marketers do outside of a business website for increasing domain authority and visibility on the internet. It includes influencer marketing, link building, online reputation management, and social media optimization. With it, there is an increase in the credibility of a website all across the internet.

Technical SEO:

Technical SEO includes the activities that marketers execute to optimize the server and a business website for increasing its ranking and visibility on search engines such as Google. It focuses on several factors such as website structure, mobile-friendliness, indexing, speed, and crawlability. Optimizing these factors help search engines to comprehend your website content and improve user experience.

2)Content Marketing

Content marketing is another important branch of digital marketing that involves the creation and distribution of relevant, useful and informative information for the promotion of a company’s business. The key objective of this type of marketing is to attract and retain a targeted set of customers.

This finally leads to a highly profitable customer action (that is helpful for the company growth) in the long run. In content marketing, agencies provide helpful content that solve the customer problems instead of directly promoting their products unlike traditional other marketing channels.

It is a long term business strategy used by all types of companies to build a strong customer base by constantly delivering top quality content.

3)Pay Pay Click (PPC)

PPC also known as Pay Per Click is a type of digital marketing technique that businesses execute to drive instant results, i.e. website traffic and sales. In it, advertisers have to pay a certain amount each time for a click on their advertisements.

Advertisers choose relevant keywords to bid for target specific audiences. Users search for these keywords, ads appear before them, and advertisers have to pay when their ads have clicks on. PPC is highly effective in bringing instant results.

4)Email Marketing

Email marketing includes the creation & distribution of promotional emails to promote a company business for its respective products or services. It focuses on building brand awareness, drive sales, and increasing customer loyalty.

Here the content includes special offers, newsletters, product announcements, etc. An effective email marketing campaign needs careful segmentation of email lists, creation of valuable content, and catering to data privacy.

5)App Store Optimization (ASO)

App store optimization (ASO) is the process of optimizing a mobile app visibility and position in the popular mobile app stores, i.e. Google Play and Apple App Store. The key objective of ASO is to optimize all the necessary elements of an app that includes its name, description, reviews, keywords, and more.

The higher an app ranks; the more visible it becomes to the potential users. Further this will ensure an improved app listing in the app store and further help in increasing the app install.

6)Google Ads

As an online advertising channel/platform, Google Ads help businesses create effective ads and display the same on Google search result pages and associated websites. It works on a PPC or pay per click model. Advertisers have to pay a certain amount/fee when a user clicks on their ads. With targeted keywords and ads bids, businesses can reach their probable customers, market their products/services and drive traffic to their websites.

Google Analytics and allied tools help them know their campaign performances, adjust/improve marketing campaigns, and attain their goals like lead generation in digital marketing, sales increase, and brand visibility.

7)Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a type of digital marketing in which advertisers give a fee or specific amount to affiliates to bring sales or traffic via a referral link. The affiliates can be individuals or companies and earn a commission after the conversion of a lead into a customer or the purchase of a product/service.

As a cost-effective marketing type, affiliate marketing helps businesses expand their customer reach and the affiliates monetize their strong online presence.

8)Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing is a valuable and effective internet marketing channel. It relates to the practice in which marketers use social media sites for the promotion of a  business brand or product/service.

This marketing practice includes the creation of useful & relevant content, engagement with users, relationship building with the targeted customers, and business expansion.

Using social media marketing, businesses can take advantage of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn to improve brand visibility, reach customers in a large number, and bring traffic to websites.

To succeed in social media marketing, you need to have strategic planning, execute the made plan consistently, and understand the target market to attain expected goals.

9)Marketing Automation

Marketing automation relates to the utilization of technology and software/ tools to automate & optimize all the major marketing tasks that are repetitive in nature. The tasks are email marketing, customer segmentation, lead generation & nurturing, campaign management, and analysis.

Through marketing automation, business owners can save time, resources and increase the overall efficiency. They can offer customized and relevant marketing messages to their target audience at the right time.

Further, companies can easily nurture the generated leads, optimize marketing strategies, analyze customer behavior, and increase customer engagement & final conversions.

10)Native Advertising

Native advertising is a type of digital marketing form. In it, advertisement content is cohesive and natural and blends in the format, design, tone on the platform where it is shown. The platform can be a website, mobile app, or social media feed.

Native advertising aims to produce promotional messages non-disruptively and more user-friendly & engaging experience. Through mimicking the function and appearance of relevant original content, this type of marketing channel is effective in improving conversion and user interaction with your brand.

11)Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

As an online marketing channel/type, search engine marketing helps businesses have instant results in terms of visibility & ranking on search engines.

It includes the creation and optimisation of online advertisements that appear on search engines above, below, or alongside organic search results on Google, Yahoo, Bing, or allied others.

Marketers bid on the keywords that are relevant to products or services and advertisements appear when users make searches on search engines by using the similar keywords.

With this internet marketing channel, businesses can easily target particular customers, drive traffic to their websites, and enhance brand awareness.

12)Online PR (Press Release)

Online press release is another most effective online communication channel used in digital marketing.

Businesses use it to create relevant information about their company services on what is happening, what occurred, and what is going to happen in the near future to industry professionals, media houses, and the public.

It usually contains the creation & sharing of precise and informative announcements on online platforms. Press releases aim to draw the attention of the media and public, make publicity, and improve the visibility of a business brand.

They are an effective way to update industry professionals & public and share product launches, company updates, and allied things.

13)Inbound Marketing

As a part of digital marketing, inbound marketing focuses on the attraction and engagement of probable customers. In its process, there is the creation of informative, relevant, and valuable content. It doesn’t aim to interrupt prospective customers through captivating ads.

However, it aims to address customers’s interests & concerns and educate them on the respective products/services through useful content. Inbound marketing includes composing ebooks, blogs, articles, videos, social media posts, and audios and sharing the same. It aims to build trust, set credibility, bring high-quality leads and improve conversions.

14)Sponsored Paid Content

It is an effective way for businesses to advertise their products/services on several distinguished platforms. In this, businesses pay to companies or individuals to display their content for a certain audience.

For instance, you can take a social media post. Initially, it looks like a regular post, but it is an advertisement when you have a close look at it.

The individual or company who composes and shares such a paid post assures specific businesses having maximum reach. It helps businesses get their messages out and draw new customers.

15)YouTube Marketing

In digital marketing, YouTube is a powerful marketing strategy. In it, marketers make informative videos on respective products or services to advertise the same. They publish respective product or service videos and let people watch the same when they (customers) are watching YouTube.

These videos are free for perspectives while advertisers have to pay a certain amount to YouTube to advertise the respective products/services. This digital marketing channel assists businesses build brand awareness, obtain subscribers, and fetch traffic to their websites.

16)Influencer Marketing

As a popular digital marketing form, influencer marketing highly relies on the collaboration of businesses with well-known persons of any industry such as sports and entertainment. These people have a large number of followers on social media platforms. Fans of these famous people try to do what they suggest to their followers.

Businesses consult these celebrities and request them to promote their respective products or services on relevant platforms to their (celebrities) followers. Inbound marketing helps businesses to have reliable connections with perspectives and build trust through celebrities. And it brings an increase in brand awareness, engagement, and product/service sales.

17)Display Advertising

As a paid online marketing type/channel, it relates to the practice that uses visual advertisements for the promotion of particular products, services, or business brands on social media sites, mobile applications, and websites. It usually contains graphics, images, interactive elements, or videos. Display advertising aims to draw the attention of certain targeted audiences.

It is helpful in generating leads, enhancing brand visibility, and fetching traffic to landing pages or websites. Marketers get an insight of interests, demographics, and behaviors of specific audiences before using this internet marketing channel.

18)Video Marketing

Video marketing is a powerful internet marketing strategy. It includes the use of relevant videos to promote certain products, services, or business brands. Being engaging in nature, video content draws the attention of perspectives and produces captivating messages to them.

Marketers use social media platforms, YouTube, and websites to share the made relevant videos for promotion purposes. These videos aim to educate customers, showcase offerings, narrate stories, and entertain probable customers.

With relevant and engaging videos, video marketing helps enhance user engagement, increase brand awareness, fetch more traffic to business websites, and increase sales & conversions.

19)Facebook Marketing

As a type of internet marketing, Facebook marketing is the use of Facebook for promoting products, services, or business brands. It includes the creation of relevant advertisements, engagement with targeted perspectives and use of varied Facebook tools to have maximum reach and positive outputs.

Marketers give proper attention to the collected insights on customer interests, behaviors, demographics while making Facebook marketing plans for their clients or in-house projects. With the use of features like Facebook Groups, Pages, Ads Manager, and Messenger, marketers help businesses improve brand awareness, build relationships with customers, increase website traffic, boost conversions.

20)Google Ads Marketing

Google Ads being one the world’s most popular online advertising platform used by millions of businesses globally to quickly increase the companies leads and sales.

It further helps the marketers to showcase their ads all across Google in search, display, YouTube and other related partners sites. It is similar to the PPC (Pay Per Click) model in which businesses bid on specific keywords to make their ads visible on search result pages of Google and partner websites.

Google Ads Marketing helps marketers or businesses to quickly target the specific audiences based on customer search behaviors, interests, and demographics. It assists the ads reach the targeted audience at the right time. Marketers easily create captivating texts, video ads, & images, track campaign performance, and adjust their ads campaigns according to the performance report.

21)Google Search Console

It is a web service from Google. With it, website administrators or owners can track and optimize the presence of their websites in Google search results. Google Search Console offers information on the indexing and crawling of a website and helps owners/marketers know what is affecting visibility. Marketers use it to know search analytics, submit sitemaps, and receive alerts about important issues.

They can know and fix errors affecting the visibility of a business website by using this web service. In addition, Google Search Console helps users/marketers test the mobile-friendliness, analyze backlinks, and manage site URLs.

22)Google Analytics

As a powerful and effective web analytics tool from Google, it helps users/marketers track website traffic and analyze user behaviors. Google Analytics provides users/marketers insightful information on traffic sources, visitor demographics, conversion rates, and popular write-ups published on different digital platforms.

It helps users/marketers have data on bounce rates, page views, session durations, and allied others. This platform helps marketers/users generate customized reports in real time. It assists website owners to have a comprehensive understanding of their online presence, make wise and data-oriented decisions, adjust marketing strategies, and improve visitor experience.

Brief history of Digital Marketing

Digital marketing is closely related to the invention of the internet. Its history dates back to the 1990s. In the beginning, it meant only basic online advertising like email marketing, and banner ads. The rapid technology advancements paved the way for the expansion of online platforms and internet marketing strategies.

In the beginning of the 2000s, SEO or search engine optimization came into light and became a valuable channel of digital marketing. After that, there was a rise of PPC in which advertisers pay a certain amount for each ad click. In the late 2000s, social media platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn emerged and made a shift in online marketing. These platforms help businesses have direct engagements with their targeted audiences.

The rise in popularity of Smartphones and respective user’s numbers made mobile marketing an important aspect of digital marketing. With responsive websites and mobile applications, this marketing allows business brands to reach target audiences on-the-go.

Further, the invention of AI (artificial intelligence) and data analytics made significant evolution in digital marketing. Now, marketers can analyze huge data to customize and streamline their marketing campaigns for specific businesses.

In the contemporary world, digital marketing is an umbrella term for web design & development, video advertising, influencer marketing, content marketing, and more. It is on the path of evaluation with technical advancements.

How Digital Marketing Works?

Digital marketing is a method or process to promote products or services of a specific business on online platforms like search engines, app stores, social media, and the internet. It works on the utilization of several internet channels to reach and have engagements with probable customers.

In its first step, it focuses on the creation of a strong presence on all respective platforms on the internet. Further, marketers use SEO, SMO, SMM, SEM, PPC, and allied other strategies to optimize a business website and maximize customer reach to attain specific objectives and goals.

It comprises display advertising, content marketing, email marketing, and allied channels to make businesses go beyond their geographical boundaries. Also, it relies on data analysis and performance reports to make improvements in marketing strategies.

Advantages of Digital Marketing

Digital marketing is highly beneficial for almost every business. Here are some advantages of digital marketing just for your reference:-

1. Cost efficiency

In the contemporary world, there are many advertisement means such as ads on televisions, radio, newspapers, magazines, banners, and pamphlets that are conventional. Placing ads on one of them is costlier in comparison with digital marketing.

As more than 60% of people in the world are online, businesses can have maximum reach at a lower cost. They can choose the most ideal channel like SEO, PPC, or email to reach their targeted audiences in a cost effective manner.

2. Sharable Content

Shareable and useful content matters a lot in digital marketing. Marketers know the importance of such content and help businesses in the creation of relevant and engaging content. Such content pieces are viral videos on YouTube/TikTok or social media posts. These content pieces can assist businesses to expand their market reach and have people as mouth advertisers.

3. Measurable Results

Conventional marketing does not allow marketers or business owners to track campaign progress in real-time. On the other hand, marketers can easily measure the results of marketing campaigns on digital platforms.

For measuring the campaign success, they (online marketers or business owners) use varied analytics tools such as Google Analytics and SEMrush. Generating reports and going through the same regularly helps in making wise decisions.

4.Targeted Audience

There is no need for targeting audiences/perspectives in traditional marketing, However, in digital marketing, marketers identify probable customers with the use of several different online tools. They go through the collected data to know the locations, behaviors, demographics, etc. of potential customers. The targeting of perspectives helps marketers convert leads into real customers.

5. Increased Visibility

As per a study, approximately 60% of the world population is on the internet. Therefore, businesses need to be visible for such people. Digital marketing with its varied channels helps businesses in this regard. It assists businesses to break physical boundaries and go global.

Further, it makes a business available for perspectives 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. It helps businesses increase their brand awareness, get engaged with their customers, and drive traffic to their websites.

6. Improved Brand Loyalty

Each business requires loyal customers. It is possible when a business is in constant touch with its existing as well as probable customers. Digital marketing allows marketers or businesses to communicate and get engaged with customers due to their presence on all respective digital platforms.

Personalized interactions with improved customer support service help them build good relationships with their customers. This helps businesses generate loyalty among customers for specific products/services.

7. Accessible Data

With it, marketers have useful data for a business in real-time. This data helps them comprehend the trends, behaviors, interests, and preferences of potential customers. It is highly helpful in making adjustments in marketing strategies and offers better products/services that can cater to customer needs and concerns.

8. Greater Scope for Creativity

Digital marketing is dynamic. Due to this, marketers do not know what strategy will work and what will not work. They need to be creative in making adjustments in their marketing strategies and use varied mediums such as gamification, VR, and interactive content. With this, they make and executive innovative marketing campaigns to captivate users/audiences.

9. Enhanced User Experience

Businesses need to offer better experience to their perspectives while visiting websites or accessing product/service information through various mediums. Digital marketing is very helpful in this regard. Better user experience means easy interaction with a business brand, product/service purchase, and finding for relevant information.

10. Improved Engagement

Digital marketing is interactive in nature, apart from being dynamic. Its interactive elements such as quizzes, polls, and contests help businesses have better interaction and engagements with their customers. This facilitates businesses to have an increase in customer interests and participation.

11. Multi-Device Interaction

In today’s world, people have several different devices such as desktops, smartphones, tablets, and laptops to use the Internet. Businesses need to have websites that can easily be accessed on these devices and allow their users to have seamless interactions. Digital marketing helps here with responsive websites, mobile apps, and web applications.

12. Reputation Management

In the contemporary digital world, having good positive reviews is crucial for a business brand. It is, as customers go through several online review sites and contact real people to know what others are saying about certain products, services, or brands.

With digital marketing, businesses can receive feedback and see customer reviews & comments on online platforms. Further, they can take the required steps to maintain their brand reputation on the internet.

13. Increased Reach

Before the advent of the internet, a business had to be within its physical boundary. Digital marketing helps businesses go beyond its physical boundary and become global. With it, businesses of a certain location get into international markets and extend their customer base.

14. Connectivity

Digital marketing helps businesses in having an improved connectivity with their customers, advocates, and influencers. With the use of social media and respective online platforms, digital marketing assists businesses build a network that can help promote brand’s image by spreading relevant and useful messages.

15. Improved Competitive Edge

Being ahead of their counterparts is crucial for businesses. Digital marketing helps businesses here and let them adopt the latest trends, utilize new technologies, and respond to customer demands.

What Does a Digital Marketer Do?

A digital marketer is a professional who holds sound knowledge and skills to market a business brand on respective online platforms. These platforms or channels can be search engines, social media, forums, emails, mobile devices, PPC, and allied paid advertising means. All these mediums or channels help businesses have maximum reach and engagement with their target audience.

A digital marketer promotes businesses with their respective products or services with the use of varied channels available on the internet. The respective professional conducts an in-depth market research to comprehend the behaviors and preferences of customers.

Further, their research helps them to identify demographics, and plan result-oriented marketing campaigns. With SEO strategies, marketers help businesses improve their visibility and ranking on search engines and increase website traffic.

With PPC or pay per click and allied paid advertising means, a digital marketer helps a business have instant results in terms of website traffic, sales, and customer engagement. Social media marketing includes the creation, publication, and sharing of useful and relevant content. It helps in engaging brand awareness and customer engagement.

In addition, a digital marketer uses email to promote a business with its respective products or services. With email marketing, the marketer helps in generating and nurturing leads and driving conversions.

Digital Marketing Vs. Inbound Marketing

Digital marketing is an umbrella term used for all marketing efforts that use digital technologies and channels to reach targeted audiences.

It comprises several different tactics like SEO, PPC, email marketing, social media, and content marketing. And it aims to promote brands with their respective products or services on all different online platforms.

On the other hand, inbound marketing relates to a particular approach within digital marketing. It focuses on driving and engaging prospective customers via valuable informative content.

The respective content surrounds the requirements and interests of the targeted audiences. It aims to fetch customers organically towards a business brand, build trust, and nurture relationships for a long-term.

How to Do Digital Marketing?

As an umbrella term, digital marketing consists of several different techniques and strategies for the promotion of products or services all across digital channels. To do digital marketing, you should define your goals, know your targeted audiences, make a website with respective landing pages, optimize your business site for search engines & social media.

Further, you should have top content marketing tools & strategy and result-oriented email marketing plan. You can opt for pay per click or paid advertising for having instant results. And you should analyze and optimize your marketing campaigns by using respective tools like Google Analytics.

Different Types of Businesses That can Take Benefits from Digital Marketing

Digital marketing is highly helpful for businesses of different industries/sectors. With it, businesses can have robust online presence, loyal customer base, improved brand awareness, increased sales, and significant increase in website traffic. Here is the list of businesses that can get advantages of digital marketing:-

• E-commerce
• SMEs (small and medium enterprises)
• Start-ups
• Service based businesses like healthcare, consultation, and education
• Hospitality and tourism such as restaurants, hotels, and travel agencies
• Real estate
• IT companies
• Entertainment
• Consumer goods

What Types of Content Should a Business Need to Create to Succeed in Digital Marketing?

Content is the backbone of all marketing efforts on digital platforms. With relevant and engaging content pieces, you can easily reach your targeted audiences, educate them, and encourage them to make a wise decision before purchasing your products or services. To have success in digital marketing, you should create and share the following types of content:-

• Informative blogs
• Engaging social media posts
• Graphics and infographics with visual appeal
• Video content
• Email newsletters
• Ebooks
• Livestreams and webinars
• Whitepapers
• Podcast
• WebPages

How to Integrate Digital Marketing Into Your Growth Strategy?

In today’s world, integration of digital marketing into the growth strategy of a business is essential. For this, you should have clear business goals aligned with your objectives and know your target customers. You need to build buyer personas and a solid marketing plan that could include search engine optimisation, paid advertising, email marketing, and social media.

Further, you should include the use of data analytics for measuring campaign performance and making wise decisions to improve outputs. The optimisation of customer journey and having current digital marketing trends are the one you should have for the integration of digital marketing in your business growth.

Goals of Digital Marketing

In general, digital marketing goals are several different objectives that aim to promote business brands, products, or services.

At first, they are targeting & reaching specific audiences, improving the brand awareness, and increasing traffic to business websites. Further, the goals of digital marketing includes building long-term relationships with customers, improving loyalty, and engaging & interacting with the respective audiences.

Furthermore, they include lead generation using digital marketing, conversion of perspectives into customers, sales increase, and revenue increment. At last, online marketing goals include the analysis and optimisation of marketing campaigns by using several different collected data in real-time.

With the use of content marketing, SEO, social media, email campaigns and allied strategies, businesses stand straight in the competitive market and attain growth.

Popular Digital Marketing Tools

Digital marketing tools are the available online software applications that facilitate marketers in the execution of their marketing strategies for promoting specific products or services of a business. There are several types of digital marketing tools with their own specific purposes. Here are some of them:-

• Email marketing tools help in creating and sharing valuable information to targeted audiences. To make their marketing campaign successful, businesses can use MailChimp, Constant Contact, and Aweber.
• Social marketing tools like Sprout Social, Hootsuite, and Buffer help create, publish, and manage campaigns on social media platforms. These tools help businesses in improving their presence on social media websites like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
• SEO tools are very helpful in improving visibility and ranking on search engines. Marketers use Google Search Console, Ahrefs, Moz, and SEMrush to track and adjust SEO tactics.
• PPC or pay per click helps businesses have instant results in terms of sales increase and website traffic. Based on needs and choices, marketers use Google Ads, Facebook Ads, Twitter Ads, and Bing Ads to drive expected results.
• Content marketing tools help in the creation, publication, and management of varied content pieces. These tools are WordPress, HubSpot, and Canva for example.

Digital Marketing KPI (Key Performance Indicator)

KPI or key performance indicators are very helpful in digital marketing when it comes to tracking the progress and performance of a marketing campaign.

These metrics are CTR, CPL, ROI, the number of website visitors, conversion rate, and CLV. Online marketers use these metrics to evaluate the success of their marketing campaigns, provide useful insights to facilitate business decisions, and track goals & objectives.

Variations in KPIs highly rely on the primary objectives and goals of a business. These objectives and goals can be having enhanced customer retention, increased brand awareness, lead generation, and increased sales.

With these key performance indicators, marketers can easily identify faults in their campaigns and adjust or make improvements in their marketing strategies. Further, they can effectively use the available resources in the promotion of a business brand with its products/services. All these can make businesses have noteworthy improvements in their online presence, ranking, and reputation.

Latest Digital Marketing Trends

Digital marketing is dynamic in nature. So, there is no static strategy to marketing a business with its products/services digitally. Its strategies keep changing with time. Here are some of the latest digital marketing trends that you can include in your online marketing strategy for your own business or client:-

• Voice search optimisation 
• Personalized marketing
• Influencer marketing 
• Video marketing
• Integration of AI (artificial intelligence)
• Social commerce 
• UGC or user generated content 
• Virtual reality (VR)
• Augmented reality (AR)

These trends can change with time. Therefore, businesses or digital marketers need to keep themselves updated with what has gone and what is going on in online marketing. It will help you be ahead of your counterparts and reach your targeted audiences effectively.

Challenges Faced in Digital Marketing

With technical advancement, one can face several challenges in digital marketing. A few of these challenges are described below:-

• Ever-changing Platforms: Dynamic platforms in multi-channel marketing, prove challenging.
• Competing with Large Brands: Smaller companies face difficulty in competing with big brands. It is due to the extensive reach of the big businesses.
• Customer’s Unpredictable Buying Behavior: Online marketplaces lead to unpredictable consumer buying patterns with more options.
• Limited Budgets: Startups with limited budgets struggle to create content. They also find problems in allocating resources effectively.
• Creating User-friendly Content: Facing challenges in generating engaging content.
• Striving for Mobile-Friendly: Optimizing websites for mobile usage becomes vital. The reason is more users prefer to shop from smartphones and tablets.
• Data Privacy Issues: Balancing data collection for marketing while addressing security concerns.
• Content Strategy: Developing an effective content strategy for dynamic social media platforms.
• Fast-Changing Trends and Updates: Staying updated with digital marketing trends and changing algorithms.

What are the 7 P’s of Digital Marketing?

The 7Ps model forms a framework essential for making effective digital marketing strategies. In digital marketing, all kinds of marketing decisions are around this model.

Each “P” in the model together plays an important role in the success of digital marketing efforts. To understand this model better, check out the meaning of each “P”:-

• Product: A product is a good or service aligned with customer preferences. Understanding the product better helps businesses in developing an excellent marketing campaign.
• Price: Competitive and profitable pricing strategies are made to attract customers. It is necessary to consider the target audience and the competition level before determining the price.
• Place: These are referred to as distribution channels such as search engines, social media, etc. for accessible product availability.
• Promotion: Communication strategies to provide product awareness. This can be achieved by email marketing, advertising, and other online digital methods.
• People: Providing a positive experience for customers, or stakeholders.
• Process: A Process refers to a streamlining procedure required for efficient service delivery.
• Physical Evidence: Collaterals used for supporting the digital marketing effort.  It includes graphics, videos, reviews, etc.

All this shows the importance of the 7Ps model and its role in the digital marketing campaign.

Market Research in Digital Marketing

Market research in digital marketing is a process to collect, analyze, and interpret data about specific audiences based on their behaviors, preferences, and needs.

It includes the use of several distinguished techniques and tools to gather information like website analytics, surveys, competitor analysis, and social media monitoring. With this, businesses comprehend customer insights with market trends.

They make informed marketing decisions to improve their content strategies, make adjustments in their marketing campaigns, and enhance engagements with customers. Market research in digital marketing assists business owners to know opportunities and rectify their marketing strategies. It improves the efficacy of internet marketing campaigns.

Does digital marketing work for all types of businesses?

Digital marketing is effective for almost every business. However, its success lies on several different factors. It is a cost-effective way to reach audiences in large numbers, build brand awareness, and engage with customers.

Some businesses with no or little online presence might have to face more challenges while marketing themselves on digital platforms. In addition, tough market competitions and regulatory norms affect results. A personalized digital marketing strategy allied with goals and objectives can help businesses expand their reach and grow further.

Different Types of Digital Content That Works Successfully in the Digital Marketing Industry

Engaging, effective, user-friendly, and impressive content plays a very important role in digital marketing. It helps in driving more traffic to your website. Listed below are a few widely-acceptable digital content:-

• Article and Blogs: Informative content written as per SEO perspective.
• Infographics: Visual representation of the information in a simplified form.
• Social Media Posts: Short and crispy content written to engage audiences.
• Videos: Pictorial content created for testimonials, tutorials, or product demos.
• Podcasts: A kind of audio content that is used by storytellers.
• eBooks and Whitepapers: Provide a comprehensive description of a particular topic.

Additionally, there are several other kinds of digital content that help in meeting your marketing objectives.

What are Some Most Common Digital Marketing Mistakes One Needs to Avoid?

Digital marketing is a constant marketing practice that helps marketers to promote a business with its respective products or services on the internet.

In it, marketers need to be very careful in making and executing strategies. A single mistake can affect the whole marketing campaign and it will not help in getting desired results. Here are some most common digital marketing mistakes that you should avoid:-

• No clear business goals and objectives.
• No focus on the target audience or failing to comprehend the actual needs and concerns of prospective customers.
• Overseeing people/users on mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.
• No importance to analytics and reporting.
• Avoidance of SEO.
• No adjustments in marketing campaigns with time.
• Too much focus on sales and no attention to educating people on respective products/services.
• Inconsistency in marketing campaigns.
• Overuse of automation.

How to Measure the Success of Your Digital Marketing Campaigns?

It is crucial for you to measure the success of your marketing campaigns on digital platforms. The measurement helps you know the effectiveness of your current marketing campaigns and make improvements in future efforts to bring more positive results/outputs.

Here are some useful steps that you can take to measure your digital marketing campaigns:

• Make your business objectives and goals clear to you
• Regularly study your web analytics with the use of Google Analytics and allied tools 
• Comprehend bounce rates, traffic to your business website with respective sources, and conversion rates
• Analyze your social media campaigns with a focus on follower growth, likes, comments, and shares
• Value email metrics for tracking your email campaigns such as open rates, conversion rates, and click through rates
• Calculate your ROI based on the budget you invested in marketing your business digitally and the revenue you generated from it
• Evaluate your customer loyalty and engagements based on feedback, reviews and repeated purchases.

Digital Marketing Strategy

Digital marketing relates to a marketing plan or approach that a marketer takes to promote a business with its products/services on all respective online platforms. It includes the use of several different channels and platforms available on the internet to reach and engage with specific customers.

A digital marketing strategy includes the evaluation of earned, owned, and paid media. Earned and paid media comprise the use of external communication channels, but owned media refers to the use of internal communication channels.

A well-planned digital marketing is the key to have effective engagement with customers and attainment of business success. Constant monitoring and adjustments are the sureshot ways to ensure having an effective digital marketing strategy.

The data-oriented approach helps businesses/marketers to optimize their campaigns for attaining maximum results. A digital marketing campaign is successful when a relevant strategy has close association with business goals and objectives. It helps businesses stay ahead of their counterparts.

What is a Digital Marketing Agency?

Digital marketing agency is a type of business entity that helps businesses be online, bring traffic to their websites, improve their sales, enhance customer experience, and build a loyal customer base. To assist businesses to enhance their online presence, an online marketing company offers services like SEO, SMO & SMM, PPC, Content Marketing, and Email Marketing.

It offers customized marketing strategy/plan to facilitate businesses grow online. Some of the popular digital marketing agencies in Australia and other countries can helps modern days businesses to reach their targeted customer in a more effortless and cost effective manner. These agencies can helps in increasing the website traffic, better branding, user engagement, lead generation and finally growing the overall sales number.

What is a Digital Marketing Plan?

A digital marketing plan is a strategic documentation of methods and relates to the internet marketing objectives, specific tactics, particular channels, and target audiences of a business. It includes the use of several distinguished online platforms like search engine optimization, social media optimization & marketing, advertising, content marketing, and email marketing.

This plan discloses timelines, required budget, and KPIs to track effectiveness of marketing efforts going to be made for promoting a business with its respective products or services. It works as a roadmap for driving traffic to a business website, increasing conversions & sales, engaging with customers, and improving brand ranking & visibility.

Conclusion

This Digital Marketing Guide written by Poonjan takes a dig into ever changing internet marketing with its role in the success of businesses in today’s world. Digital marketing is of varied types or has several channels that are from SEO, social media, and content marketing to email marketing.

Emerged in the early 1990s, it has become essential for marketing needs of each business of every sector. Its key advantages include precise targeting, cost-effectiveness, and analytics in real-time. It plays a pivotal role in increasing customer satisfaction & retention, brand awareness, and allied others. It helps businesses to have sustainable growth and an edge over their counterparts.