What is Digital Marketing?
Digital Marketing refers to the marketing of products and services of a company or business through digital channels such as search engines, websites, email, social media, mobile apps, etc. It involves the use of electronic devices and the internet.
Digital marketing mainly comprises Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Social Media Optimization (SMO), and Search Engine Marketing (SMO), and Search Engine Marketing (SEM). We can say that it can be divided into three parts SEO, SMO, and SEM. However, Email Marketing and Affiliate Marketing have also become important components of digital marketing over the past few years. So, in digital marketing, we mainly deal with the following components:
* SEO
* SMO
* SEM
* Email Marketing
* Affiliate Marketing
Let us understand these components of digital marketing one by one:
1) Search Engine Optimization (SEO):
It is a process of improving the structure and content of your site and doing promotional activities to increase the traffic, and thus ranking on search engine result pages.
SEO is further divided into two parts: On-Page SEO and Off-Page SEO
On-Page SEO:
It refers to all the measures or methods used by website owners within their websites to increase the traffic and ranking of a website on search engine result pages. Within the website means you deal with such elements of SEO that are in your control, such as meta tags, technical tags, content quality, etc. So, there should not be any delay in resolving o page SEO issues to maintain and improve the ranking.
Off-Page SEO:
Although Off-page optimization has the same objective of increasing traffic, it is different from On-page optimization. In On-Page SEO, we deal with the factors that are in our control, within the website, but in Off-page SEO, the measures are taken outside the site, which is not in the control of a website owner such as blog submission, article submission, forum posting, etc.
2) Social Media Optimization (SMO):
In Social Media Optimization, we increase traffic, and thus ranking of sites through social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+. These sites offer an online platform to interact with other people and build a social network throughout the world. Each of the social media sites has different features and offers you lots of ways to drive traffic to your website and promote your business and services. Let us know about some of the popular social media sites:
i) Facebook:
Facebook is an online social media platform that offers you an online platform to invite and connect with other people, which can be your family members, friends, colleagues, etc. This social media platform was created by Mark Zuckerberg in 2004. Initially, it was open to the students of some colleges, but after a few years, anyone who was more than 13 years old was allowed to join it using an email address. Facebook kept developing over the years to offer users new features to interact and share.
Today, it is not only a platform to interact with others, but has become a powerful marketing tool.
What is Facebook Marketing:
Facebook marketing is a new form of marketing that allows you to promote your business, product, services, etc., on Facebook.
Facebook offers you plenty of ways to promote your business.
ii) Twitter:
Twitter is another online media platform. It is a micro-blogging tool that allows users to read, write, and share messages that are up to 140 characters long. These short messages are called tweets. Twitter was created by Jack Dorsey in 2006. Today, it has become a popular social media site with a huge user base.
What is Twitter Marketing:
Twitter marketing refers to using twitter to promote or advertise your business, product, services, and drive traffic to your website.
Some Twitter features that can be used for marketing are as follows:
Images and Videos:
You can add images or videos to your tweets to drive more traffic to your tweet. You can also tag users to improve the exposure of your tweets.
Hashtags:
You can use it to highlight specific keywords or phrases in your tweets. Up to 3 hashtags can be used per tweet.
Twitter Chat:
It allows you to host your chat or participate in an existing chat.
Twitter Alert:
It allows you to get notifications when someone tweets. It helps you understand your users and make them interested in your business.
Twitter Analytics:
You can use it to check how your tweets are performing, who is retweeting, linking your tweets, etc. You can track your followers' activity over time, including their demographics and interests.
Twitter Moments:
This feature was introduced in 2015. It is a list of curated stories or big events happening around the world. It allows you to create your own story to attract visitors to your site.
iii) LinkedIn Marketing:
LinkedIn is a professional networking site that allows you to interact with professionals and build a professional network. You can share industry news, your profession or job-related ideas, and requirements like job openings. Today, it is widely used to promote businesses, products, brands, which is called LinkedIn marketing.
iv) Pinterest:
Pinterest is a social media network that acts as a virtual online pinboard. It allows you to create your own virtual online boards, where you can pin images, videos, and share them with other users. The users interact through visuals, they can't share ideas, thoughts, etc., without using an image or video. When you post visuals like images or videos to your own or other boards (a collection of pins), it is called pinning on Pinterest.
Pinterest offers you plenty of ways to promote your business.
3) Search Engine Marketing (SEM):
SEM is a digital marketing strategy that is different form SEO and SMO, as here you have to pay the search engines like Google for the marketing of your products and services on Search Engine Result Pages. The more you pay, the more are the chances of your ads to appear on the top of the search engine listings. So, it is the practice of marketing a business through paid advertisements such as Pay per Click ads (PPC) that appear on search engine result pages above the organic results.
In SEO, you don't pay Google for traffic and clicks; rather, you get a free slot in the search results based on the quality and relevacy of your content for given keyword search.
SEM is also known by many names based on the Search Engine you are using for marketing. For example, Google ads.
What is Google Ads:
Google Ads, which was earlier known as Google Adwords, is a paid search engine marketing platform of Google. It is also known as PPC advertising or pay-per-click advertising. It offers PPC advertising, including banner, text, and rich media ads.
It allows advertisers to bid on certain keywords for their clickable ads to appear in Google's search results. Advertisers pay for these clicks, and this is how Google makes money. It is called PPC (Pay Per Click) ass you only pay once when someone clicks on your ad.
Google Ads comprises two networks Google Search Network and Google Display Network.
Google Search Network:
In this network, the ads appear on the search engine result pages. When users make queries using keywords related to product or service, your ad is displayed on the search engine result pages above the organic results.
Display Network:
In the display network, your ads are displayed on websites that have given space to Google to run advertisements. Here, the users don't search for your products or services. However, when they visit a website, they see a banner ad. If they like it, they click it and thus diverted to your site. For example, Text Ads on websites, Image Ads on websites, Video Ads on websites, and Ads on mobile websites.
4) Email Marketing:
Email marketing is also one of the most profitable means of marketing, like SMO, PPC, etc. It refers to sending a commercial message to a group of people, usually potential customers using mail. In simple words, it is the use of emails for promoting products or services as well as developing and maintaining relationships with the clients.
Common Goals of an Email Marketing:
。To increase new signups for your product and services
。To generate new leads for the sales department
。To reach to maximum attendees for your event, to attend the event
。To get donations for your cause
Benefits of Email Marketing:
。It helps increase Brand Awareness.
。It is a cost-efficient way of digital marketing.
。It allows you to create highly personalized messages or ads based on previous sales and purchases.
。It also provides you metrics to evaluate the performance of your Email Campaign.
。It has a larger reach.
Some Email Marketing Tools:
。Mail Chimp
。Litmus
。Reach Mail
。Active Compaign
。Compaign Monitor
。Get Response
。Infusion Soft
5) Affiliate Marketing:
Affiliate marketing is a type of digital marketing in which an affiliate earns a commission for marketing the products or services of a company or a seller, etc. The affiliate gets a part of the profit form each sale. So, the company compensates the third-party publishers, the affiliates, to generate traffic to company products and services.
It is a relationship between three parties: Advertiser, Publisher, and Consumer. Affiliate marketers join affiliate programs that relate to their websites or blogs and have reputable promotes to promote. The affiliate shares these products with their audiences and earns a commission when a product is purchased.
The basic step involved in an Affiliate Marketing / How Affiliate Marketing Works:
1. The affiliate joins the merchant's program and gets a unique ID and a specific URL for promoting the company's product.
2. The affiliate incorporates the link in their blog or post and via their marketing efforts attracts readers to visit their blog and click on the link if they link the product.
3. When a potential buyer clicks the link and lands on the affiliate's site, a cookie that identifies the affiliate is placed on his or her computer. The cookie makes sure that the publisher gets its commission even if the sale occurs after a few days or weeks. The affiliate gets the commission at the end of each payment period.
4. When the sale process is completed, the merchants check the sales process, and if they find a cookie with an affiliate ID, they credit the affiliate with the sale.
5. The merchant shares the repots with affiliates so that they can see their contribution to the sales and accordingly can get their share.