The ultimate aim of any marketing strategy, whether online or offline is to achieve sales. In order to do this, companies need to fully understand the positioning of their brand as well as which methods best reach their target audience in the most effective and cost-efficient manner.
What is Online or Digital Marketing?
By definition, online or digital marketing is “the marketing of products or a brand to reach consumers by providing the content that they seek through electronic means”. These electronic means may encompass the use of one or a combination of the following;
• Company Website
• Search Engine Optimised (SEO) Content
• Social Media (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc.)
• Corporate Blogs
• Online Videos
• Email Newsletters
• Internet Adverts (banners or pay-per-click ads)
• Mobile Marketing (SMS, MMS)
Companies today are quickly recognising the practical and versatile benefits of online marketing, especially towards the up and coming, tech-savvy generation X and Y adults. These progressive organisations understand that people will use brands that they trust and with whom they have built up a personal relationship.
By establishing and building a relationship with each client, companies can tailor their offerings to an individual’s unique requirements through the use of social media. Specialised applications are able to recognise client demographics and show advertising specific to each user. In other words, users are only shown content which is relevant to them, thus driving brand recognition and ultimately potential sales.
Online Communication is a Two-Way Street
In order for companies to maximise their online marketing strategy, regular two-way communication, in a large part consisting of content marketing, needs to be regularly maintained between the company and its clients.
Importance of Keyword-Rich Content Marketing
It is imperative to monitor and respond to online comments relating to the brand so the client feels connected to the brand. Keyword-rich content marketing is another major marketing tactic which companies need to utilise. This involves publishing high quality and relevant information which clients or potential clients may be seeking. This content needs to be Search Engine Optimised and contain the right ratio of keywords in order to ensure that content can be found and indexed by search engines such as Google in order to rank higher on the search engine results pages (SERP).
Types of Online Content
Content varies greatly and may be in the format of an article, a white paper, a video or photos which may be published on one channel and linked to a number of other online channels in order to gain maximum exposure.
Online marketing is the perfect platform to demonstrate your or your company’s expertise, whilst establishing and fostering the personalised business relationships required to build trust, create brand awareness, increase your client base and increase sales.
The additional advantage of online marketing is that companies are able to easily monitor the results of their marketing activities and to optimise them in order to provide better results in the future. Furthermore online marketing is a powerful lead-generating tool which companies cannot afford to be without.