Digital Marketing is a prominent part of marketing today, and as time goes on, it is evolving. Businesses that are able to keep up with even the most subtle changes are the ones who are up for the long haul. However, with how rapidly the industry is evolving, coping up with it can prove to be difficult. What are the major components of digital marketing? To understand what is digital marketing consists of and the functions of digital marketing, we introduce:
SWEPS: Components of Digital Marketing
Having a strong digital marketing strategy is extremely crucial. And all the basics can be covered with the six main components of digital marketing (SWEPS + CM):
- Social Media Marketing
- Website Design
- Email Marketing
- Pay Per Click Marketing
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
+ - CM:Content Marketing
1. Social Media Marketing (SMM)
At this point in time, digital marketing is not complete without social media marketing. While there are countless social media platforms these days, there are six main ones that need your focus the most: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, and LinkedIn.
For generating brand awareness, Facebook is the best platform out of the bunch. You can generate leads, create and engage with your audience, and drive them back to your sales page. On the same route, your Instagram should feature photos and videos, along with stories that showcase your brand and its value the best. In addition to using hashtags, you can also make use of ads and partner up with influencers to gain a larger audience.
People misunderstand the benefits of video marketing, hence YouTube’s role in digital marketing is often overlooked. If you know what type of content works for your business, post them online, ensuring proper optimization has been done. Your videos are bound to generate a positive result.
LinkedIn offers you the same features as Facebook but targets the B2B market. Snapchat, on the other hand, allows you to create a strong relationship with your audience through organic content. Lastly, Twitter is the platform to use in order to have live conversations with your customers.
2. Website Design and Marketing
Contrary to what most people think, a properly designed and functioning website is a must for any business. Poor website design will not help your cause when it comes to digital marketing or while trying to create a strong online presence.
People are very visual, and without a proper website, you will lose all potential customers to your competitors. The colors, fonts, and design elements that you choose must be true to your brand’s aesthetic. Poor website design will also hamper your SEO rankings.
3. Email Marketing
One of the vital components of digital marketing is and always will be email marketing. Email marketing existed long before social media marketing, and while it isn’t as fancy as social media marketing, it is still as effective. Powerful automation software and tools like Constant Contact and Active Campaign have made email marketing cost and time effective, and profitable.
The main focus of email marketing is list building. This is basically the act of adding new customers to your preferred automation program. There are multiple ways you can do this, starting from PPC and Facebook campaigns to landing pages. The list will then be segmented into groups of customers with similar behavior. For example, customers who have added your products to their cart but haven’t bought them yet.
There are three categories of automated emails, such as welcome messages, newsletters, and follow up emails. If done right, you can use these emails to upsell your products.
4. Pay Per Click (PPC) Marketing
Just as the name suggests, this is where you pay for every click that your sponsored link gets. PPC campaigns allow you to promote your products and services and reach out to potential clients in a cost-effective manner. Hence, online businesses are given the opportunity to experience growth sooner.
During a PPC campaign, there are three things to keep in mind, the placement of the ads, targeting your customers, and your keyword strategy. The placement refers to the platform and where on the website your ads will show up. You can target your customers by setting the demographics and do your keyword research to know what searches are made by your customers.
5. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Understanding SEO is crucial to your success in digital marketing. While a part of it is based on Google’s algorithm, it also depends on your content. The better your content’s quality and consistency, the better your SEO ranking will be.
Your website should contain relevant keywords, properly indexed, and function properly. Google’s algorithm will examine your website’s loading speed, quality of images and relevancy of your posts, before ranking you in their index.
6. Content Marketing (CM)
Content Marketing is defined as “…a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.”
In short, it is the creation of content for your audience and customers to consume. Example of content marketing are blog posts, photos, videos, infographics, etc. Through content marketing you position yourself (or company) as the go-to source for that specific subject. With great content comes inbound leads which will drive your sales funnel.
So why digital marketing? Because it can help connect you with potential clients that are searching for your services and products online but they’re unsure who to turn to. Through digital marketing you’ll be found by new clients and have a competitive edge over others in your industry. A successful digital marketing strategy should contain all of the components of digital marketing (SWEPS) to function properly. A certain group of SF Bay Area based marketing experts (aka Cyrusson Inc) will walk you through all of the steps in detail and curate a proper digital marketing strategy best suited for your business. Book a call with us today!