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What is Digital Marketing?
Digital marketing is a very common term among business owners and entrepreneurs. With the world becoming digital quickly, digital marketing scope in Pakistan is growing rapidly and it is now the go-to strategy of small and large-scale businesses.
Digital Marketing Definition
Digital marketing can be defined as the use of online mediums to promote your business. It involves different marketing strategies, tools, and online channels to inform the audience about a product or service.
In simple words, digital marketing means the use of the Internet by businesses to connect with a certain audience.
Different types of digital marketing content and techniques are used to advertise products and convince audiences to buy them.
How Digital Marketing Works?
Digital marketing is a modern way of marketing and has changed the advertising game for businesses in today’s digital era.
Nowadays, when a problem arises, the first thought that comes to mind is to search online for the solution.
Almost every person starts by scrolling different websites when he needs anything. This can be as small as a notebook or as big as a car.
The Internet has got all the answers to your needs. That is the reason why having a strong and visible online presence is important for every business.
Digital marketing works by showing your business page or advertisement on platforms that already have a diverse range of audience. Your digital marketing strategy can help you connect with consumers in a variety of ways.
Digital marketing experts use different techniques and methods that enable you to engage with your audience and build your brand.
Creating content is one of the digital marketing methods. This content can be optimized by using specific keywords, can be shared on social media, and can be used as paid advertisements to drive traffic to your website.
Digital marketing has many types and ways, and each type works to serve a specific goal of a full-fledged strategy. For example, digital marketing consultants use email marketing to send personalized emails to clients to inform them about a new product launch or regular updates on industry trends.
You can think of digital marketing tactics as pieces of a puzzle. When you fit them all correctly, your entire digital marketing strategy comes together, and your business ultimately grows.
Channels of Digital Marketing
There is no single way to execute your digital marketing strategy. It relies on multiple channels and means to function fully and give the desired outcome.
Different digital marketing channels are discussed below:
| Marketing Channel | Description |
| Website Marketing | Website marketing is advertising your website using the internet. Digital marketers create strategies to bring more traffic to your business’s official website. A website has all the details of what the brand is about, its products, and services. The website reflects the entire brand, its mission, and values so businesses should focus on making the website user-friendly, fast, and optimized for mobile. |
| Social Media Marketing | As the name implies, social media marketing means using social media platforms to reach the target audience. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, Twitter, etc are used to promote products and increase brand awareness. If you use these platforms to regularly post content like infographics, short videos, or images, it will boost the website traffic and increase sales. You first need to identify which social media platform will best suit your goals. Social media marketing also involves running paid advertisements by selecting a particular audience. |
| Search Engine Marketing | Search engine marketing means businesses use paid advertising to promote a website. One type of search engine marketing is Pay-Per-Click advertising. Search engine marketing is slightly different from other forms of marketing. The marketers choose a specific keyword and place a bid on that word. When a person searches for a product using that particular word, the ad with the highest bid will show up. Search engine marketing is cost-effective because the marketer only pays when someone clicks on the ad. However, you need to have a well-planned strategy for it. It also gives faster results than SEO. |
| Email Marketing | Email marketing is used by businesses to send personalized emails to their subscribers. Email marketing has the capacity to generate a high ROI. This can be done by nurturing leads and customers who show interest in your products. |
| Video Marketing | Video marketing is one of the most popular marketing tactics. It has proved to be the most effective form of marketing. People often skip blog posts or any written content, but they are most likely to watch the full video if it is entertaining and engaging. Your videos have to resonate with people’s interests as well as the latest digital marketing trends in your niche to grab the audience’s attention. |
| Affiliate Marketing | In affiliate marketing, businesses use affiliates as a third party to promote and sell their products. Each affiliate is given a specific referral link for advertising the product. The affiliates are paid for each purchase made through their link. Affiliate marketing is a great way to boost website traffic and win customer’s trust. It focuses on reaching a much wider audience. |
| Mobile Marketing | Through mobile marketing, businesses can reach potential customers on their mobile devices. Everyone has smartphones these days. So there is a higher chance that your marketing message will reach everyone in your target audience. You can use mobile marketing to tell customers about special discounts or deals offered by your business. This can increase the turnout of people visiting your website. |
Key Elements of Digital Marketing
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Search Engine Optimization(SEO) is the most important element of digital marketing. Without SEO, most of your digital marketing efforts are useless. SEO means optimizing your content to improve its ranking and visibility on search engines.
SEO has multiple purposes like improving user experience and increasing organic traffic.
A few SEO practices include creating great quality content, including specific keywords, increasing page speed, and observing analytics.
Content Marketing
Content marketing is also one of the key elements of digital marketing. Content marketing focuses on creating informative and original content to educate consumers about a product or service.
The content can be of any form such as videos, blog posts, tutorials, etc. Digital marketers optimize this content so that it shows up when customers are searching for a particular product.
Content marketing is an efficient and budget-friendly way to reach a huge audience.
Social Media Optimization
Social media optimization means using social media platforms to increase the visibility of a brand and strengthen its online presence. Businesses use these platforms and optimize their pages to connect with customers and increase brand awareness.
Social media optimization includes creating and sharing entertaining and engaging content with customers on social media platforms.
The process involves creating an effective social media strategy, connecting with influencers, optimizing social media pages and profiles, and joining relevant social media sites.
Paid Advertising (PPC)
Paid advertising or PPC means running paid ads on social media platforms and search engines. PPC increases your brand’s exposure and gives you quicker results because of precise targeting. Paid advertisements are run on different platforms to generate leads and boost sales.
Paid advertisements help you reach those consumers who are unable to find your website organically.
If you are a small business or run a startup, investing in paid advertising will help you in the long run.
Data Analytics and Metrics
Last but not least, data analytics and metrics are also fundamental elements of digital marketing.
You cannot change or improve your marketing strategies unless you know the performance of your previous campaigns and consumer behavior.
There is a wide range of metrics that need to be observed in your digital marketing journey. These are website traffic, page views, likes, shares, click-through rate, conversion rate, etc.
Best Practices for Digital Marketing
You need to have a well-researched and planned digital marketing strategy to grow your business. For that, you need to identify what are the best practices that will help your business succeed.
There are a few steps or practices that will definitely boost your marketing campaigns.
- Set Clear Goals and Objectives: The first step is setting clear objectives for your marketing efforts. Identify what you are trying to achieve, and what are your goals you want to fulfill through your marketing efforts.
Once you have clear goals in mind, you will be able to develop the right strategy for achieving those goals.
- Know Your Target Audience: Knowing your target audience is equally important as setting your goals. When you know your target audience, you can direct all your efforts towards that specific audience without wasting your time and money.
You can specify your audience based on your preferences. You can categorize the vast pool of audiences based on gender, age, demographics, interests, etc. This precision will make your campaigns more effective as your ads will only be shown to the ideal customers who are most likely to buy your products.
- Create High-quality Content: Now that you have identified your target audience, it is time to come up with something that will engage that target audience with your brand.
Your content should be creative, friendly, and up-to-date and must be resonating with the
needs of the target audience.
People tend to have short attention spans these days and it is difficult to grab their attention these days. It becomes more challenging because they come across thousands of ads every time they scroll through their mobile screens. Therefore, your content needs to be high-quality and entertaining.
- Use a Variety of Channels: You need to use a variety of channels to find out what works best for your marketing campaigns.
If you do not take risks and try advertising your brand only through one channel, all your efforts will go to waste if that channel does not work out.
It does not necessarily mean running full-fledged campaigns on all the channels at the same time. You need to develop small and hyper-focused campaigns running across different channels and analyze the performance of each campaign.
Once you are sure that a particular channel gives you more positive results than others, next time you can invest more money and time only on that specific channel.
- Optimize for Mobile Devices: Not everyone carries laptops or iPads all the time with them because of different reasons. But almost everyone has mobile phones with them all the time.
Also, people spend their free time on smartphones. So, it is important to optimize your website or business pages for mobile screens.
- Track Your Results and Make Adjustments: Tracking and monitoring the performance of your campaigns and marketing efforts is necessary. You need to constantly observe the results because they give you valuable insights.
They reflect which marketing platform is giving more boost to your advertisements, or which strategy works best for your business.
You can also identify any issues or errors in your campaigns. You can modify your marketing strategies accordingly.
Popular Digital Marketing Tools to Have
The arrival of technology and innovations every day has made life easier for everyone. New things keep getting introduced to offer convenience in every field.
The digital marketing industry relies on several tools that can help in taking businesses to new heights. Some of these tools are free so anyone can take advantage and some are paid and offer some premium features.
Some of the must-have digital marketing tools and their purpose are:
| Category | Tools |
| Website and social media graphics | Canva, Unsplash |
| Image editing | Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator |
| Social media management | Buffer, Hootsuite |
| Email marketing | MailChimp, ActiveCampaign |
| Lead management and CRM | HubSpot, Zoho CRM Plus |
| Monitoring and Analytics | Google Analytics, |
| Keyword research | Google Keyword Planner, Moz |
| Search engine optimization | SEMrush, Google Search Console, |
| Websites and plugins | WordPress, Yoast |
Conclusion
Digital marketing has become an essential part of the success of every business. Digital marketing helps businesses to stand out and stay relevant in a highly competitive market. It won’t be an understatement if we conclude that a business does not exist if it doesn’t have an online presence.
The endless convenience and numerous digital marketing benefits have made businesses abandon traditional marketing methods.
If businesses want to thrive in the market, they must adopt the latest digital marketing trends and techniques.
FAQ’s
What is digital marketing, explain with examples.
Digital marketing is the use of the internet, websites, social media platforms, and other online resources to promote a business.
Digital marketing has many different types. It also uses different tools to make the journey easier. Digital marketing is a faster, cost-effective, and convenient marketing method.
What are the 7 C’s of digital marketing?
The 7 C’s of digital marketing are content, context, community, connection, customization, communication, and conversion.
What are the 4 types of digital marketing?
The 4 types of digital marketing are Search Engine Optimization (SEO), content marketing, social media marketing, and paid advertisement.
What are the digital marketing basics?
Digital marketing basics include understanding and engaging target audience by creating engaging content, optimizing for search engines, using social media and email marketing, and analyzing performance to make data-driven decisions.
