Digital marketing is as much a part of marketing as any traditional method in this day and age. If you aren’t utilising the benefits of digital marketing, then you’re seriously missing out on huge advantages for you and your business.
But why is it so good, and why should your business be carrying it out? Find out all about digital marketing and the benefits it can have for your brand.
The Definition of Digital Marketing
Similarly, Marketo believe ‘digital marketing refers to advertising delivered through digital channels such as search engines, websites, social media, email, and mobile apps.’ Unlike the elusive definition of social media, which the type of marketing takes place on, this digital method has a solid meaning.
What Does Digital Marketing Consist Of?
Digital marketing is the tip of the subject’s iceberg. Below the term comes lots of different branches that all make up the digital marketing tree. For example, content marketing, social media marketing and email marketing are all part of digital marketing. They are all helping to market and advertise a business online. As well as these Hubspot also identify ‘Pay Per Click (PPC), Affiliate Marketing, Native Advertising, Marketing Automation, Online PR, Inbound Marketing and search engine optimisation (SEO)’ all as forms of digital marketing too.
Social Media Marketing
In our Social Media Marketing: The Giraffe Guide article, we discuss the different meanings of social media and social media marketing. We decided that Buffer best describes social media marketing as ‘the use of social media platforms to connect with your audience to build your brand, increase sales, and drive website traffic. This involves publishing great content on your social media profiles, listening to and engaging your followers, analyzing your results, and running social media advertisements.’
Content Marketing
Content marketing is vital to digital marketing. The content you write offers value to your audience as it must be interesting and informative. It should be helpful to customers or businesses in your industry, so they can share the information to their audience on social media.
Email Marketing
Email marketing is a great way to get offers and discounts out to customers, which means it’s best to recover an old part of your audience. You can encourage people back to your website and remind them of something they’ve left in their digital basket. Newsletters are also a powerful part of email marketing that can provide your audience with valuable information and reinterest them every month.
What are the Benefits of Digital Marketing?
Digital marketing helps businesses get their brand’s message out there. The best part is that essentially, it’s free. All you need is an internet or data connection.
As DigitalMarketer states, ‘your customers are online: hanging out in social media, staying updated on news sites and blogs, and searching online when they have a need.’ Digital marketing then allows you to be on the same platforms, so you can reach new and potential clients. It lets your audience learn more about your business, your team and any new products or services you’re offering.
Digital marketing can help boost sales, generate leads and get people clicking through to your website. It’s a powerful tool that more and more businesses are taking advantage of. Whether you’re a local florist, a bar in London or a sweet shop with stores all over the world, you must have an online presence in this modern world to get anywhere in it. Potential customers are likely to check a company’s social media before buying anything from them. In 2015, it was revealed that three out of four customers consult social media before buying. Digital Marketing Magazine found that ‘74% of consumers rely on social media to guide purchasing decisions. Before they’ll add a product to their baskets, they check peer reviews and comments.’ It’s like checking out a film trailer before going to see the movie.
Digital marketing also works in the reverse. For instance, it allows you to find out more about your audience and industry and what consumers want. Social media is a great way to receive feedback on your products and services through community management and reviews. You can then evolve and improve your business for the future.
How Should I Use Digital Marketing?
There are certain things you can do for digital marketing success:
- Make sure you keep on top of interactions and engagement to build good customer rapport.
- Keep an eye on insights and data you collect as you go on.
- Take advantage of all the free and paid tools available to you.
- Stay on top of new social media and digital marketing features.
- Identify what’s working and cut out what’s not.
Use digital marketing for good and don’t spam your audience with salesy posts or useless content. Think about how many people are scrolling through endless feeds – you need something that will stand out against the rest.
Should I Outsource My Digital Marketing?
Digital marketing takes time, patience and expertise. Each platform requires different efforts and alternative strategies. That’s why digital marketing should not be rushed or overlooked, making it a good part of your business to outsource.
Content marketers will take time on your blog articles, making sure each one has a good SEO and relevant keywords. Social media marketers will work on campaigns, find useful hashtags, create lengthy strategies and utilise high quality content to share on the different platforms.
At Giraffe, we specialise in digital marketing, from everything from content marketing, to social media management, to influencer marketing. We’ve got digital marketing down, so you don’t have to worry about it. As social media specialists, we help businesses all around the world reach their digital marketing objectives. If your business needs help with social media marketing on any social platform mentioned in this article or not, please get in touch today.
