What is Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing is an umbrella term for the marketing of products or services using digital technologies, mainly on the Internet, but also including mobile phones, display advertising, and any other digital medium. They include but are not limited to the following six digital marketing tactics and tools that small businesses can use.

1. Website Development & Design

Choose platform like WordPress. These types of content management systems are great to hold content in a backend database. Which makes your website easy to update and add features. There are tons of ready-made plugins for social sharing, calendars, and more. If you have not updated your site within the last two years, its time for a refresh.

2. Search & Content Optimization

• Good copywriting equals good content. Be sure to take the time to plan out an editorial calendar around your keywords and goals. Create marketing copy with that mind. Including blogs, social media posts, and imagery.
• Search engine optimization is critical to being found on the internet. Think of this is the directory for the yellow pages. By making sure your site is indexed for the keywords you want to be known for then you will be found by folks searching for you.
• In all of your digital marketing efforts, you should also consider the mobile marketing and the user experience on this medium. More and more people are using their phones and tablets to surf the internet and find information. Don’t be left out of this critical buying option.

3. Social Media Marketing

Research where your target market hangs out on social media. Choose one or two tools to start. Don’t sign up for so many tools that you don’t do any of them well. Keeping focused on great content and interaction will encourage engagement and relationship building. Spreading yourself too thin will do the opposite and ultimately, end up being a complete waste of time.

4. Email Marketing & Newsletters

Using services like Mail Chimp are great to push your digital marketing message. Once you create content, you can build it but will they come? You will need a way to spread your messages directly to your customers and potential clients. Email marketing and regular newsletters are helpful in sharing your marketing messages.

5. Pay Per Click & Social Media Advertising

Pay per click and social media advertising can be one of the most expensive aspects of digital marketing. However, this type of advertising can work the best for your business because it can be hyper-targeted to match your potential customer base.  Here are a few options you can utilize for your digital advertising needs:

• Google PPC is great for reaching anyone who uses the internet.
• Facebook advertising is perfect for those customers who are more social media savvy and have social media accounts.
• Pinterest is an interesting advertising platform since it is based on future purchases – all those dream boards.
• LinkedIn is the place for business to business advertising.
• More and more tools are becoming available and adding a way to advertise. This monetization of the platform is critical to their business model but has also completely changed the social media landscape. Organic followers are not enough as most platforms only serve about 4% organically, depending on your budget you can serve your messages with a much wider net.

6. Measurement and Analytics

The best part of all this digital marketing is that you can track who is clicking your advertisements, who is commenting, liking and sharing your social media. And ultimately what kind of engagement your business is getting. There are several tools you can use to measure your success:

• Google analytics can be installed within your website and can give you very detailed information on demographics and behavior.
• Email stats show you how many people opened your email and how many clicked on those links you inserted to drive traffic to your site etc.
• Social Media Stats are available to reveal who is liking what, who is commenting on your posts and what types of content are being shared. These are critical for understanding what your customers like and when they want your information to be served to them.
• Sales are the ultimate marketing measurement as it shows you who and what your customers are buying. Look at trends and see growth on the items you are featuring in your digital marketing efforts to determine future efforts.

Small businesses need to look at digital marketing now more than ever. We only shared six important ways to use digital marketing to increase sales. But there are more. We can help you create a strategy so that all your marketing is integrated and working cohesively towards your business goals.