Back in the days, businesses spread awareness of their brand by TV and radio commercials, newspaper ads, and flyers. But gone are those days, or maybe some still practice this.
The advancement in technology has brought many changes to the marketing industry. Now we see ads online.
Digital marketing is a new way for marketing professionals and businesses to reach out to their customers. It’s an era where all things are possible with the power of the internet.
Nowadays, many small businesses are investing in digital marketing. They see the benefits of it. However, despite having 35% of small businesses engaging in online marketing, there are still others who won’t give digital marketing a try.
If you are one of those start-up brands or small businesses who haven’t deep their toes on online marketing, this article will tell you why you have to do so.
But before knowing the positive effects of digital marketing on your business, here are the different types of digital marketing.
- SEO: This is known as Search Engine Optimization. SEO is a marketing strategy that businesses use to drive organic traffic to their website. It helps with the ranking of a page on Google’s SERP. There are many factors to consider if you want your SEO strategy to work and be on top of Google.
- Social Media Marketing: Social media is the most common form of marketing. Many businesses engage in social media marketing because it is easy to understand and the most affordable way to market a brand.
- Content Marketing: All marketing strategy includes content marketing. Everything you post in your campaign, whether it is on social media, on your website, or email, involves content marketing. When creating great content, remember to deliver what your audience wants and the relevant information that they need. Avoid creating content that sounds like your selling something.
- Influencer Marketing: Influencers are people popular online, particularly on social media. They contribute to the decisions of buyers. Marketing professionals invest in this marketing method as it brings in more potential customers to their business.
- Email Marketing: You can reach out to your previous buyers or find new ones by sending out emails. Email marketing has the highest ROI amongst all other digital marketing techniques.
- SEM: Search Engine Marketing or SEM is a method used to drive paid traffic to your website. Businesses pay the publisher of the ad once it gets clicked.
Now you have an idea what are the different types of digital marketing you can choose which one you can use to promote your brand.
 WHY YOU NEED DIGITAL MARKETING TO PROMOTE YOUR SMALL BUSINESS?
IT IS AFFORDABLE
Traditional marketing costs more than digital marketing. It requires more manpower to create and deliver the ads. But in digital marketing, you spend less.
Aside from spending less with digital marketing, it also has an increase in ROI. With as little as a dollar that you spend, it can give you a return of $42.
Since it’s affordable, you can invest a little budget for you to promote your small business.
TRACK YOUR CAMPAIGN
The advantage of going digital is that you will be able to track if your campaign works. You can see which of your ads are working and which one needs to be eliminated or be refined.
The ability to track if a campaign is effective will also help businesses and marketing professionals end the guessing game. Once they know which campaign works, they can allocate their budget on that campaign, instead of spending money on ads that don’t increase their profit.
There are tools online that will help digital marketing experts to track the performance of their campaign.
YOUR COMPETITORS ARE DOING IT
Are you wondering why your competitors are getting ahead of you? It’s because they have integrated digital marketing as part of their business plan.
Many small businesses engage in digital marketing, particularly SEM. It’s a great way to drive traffic to their site and turn them to customers.
If you want to increase your profit this year and get more customers for your business, you must invest in digital marketing.
It is also good to know that there are tools available in the market that you can use to monitor your competitors. Many marketing experts use this to determine how their competitors are doing online.
If you get your hands on digital marketing, you can use these tools to help your brand.
BUILD RELATIONSHIPS WITH CUSTOMERS
Your customers are the most crucial part of your business. Their presence is the sole reason why your business thrives. Therefore, building a relationship with them by accommodating their concerns or appreciating their presence will increase your business sales.
But how can you reach out to your customers?
Most customers, nowadays, are found online. If you want to grow your business or reach out to your customers, digital marketing can help you with that.
The best digital marketing strategy you can use for customer service is through social media. You can allow your customers to engage with your content, and in return, you can respond to them using these platforms.
Engaging with your customers will help your business get to know them well, and you can provide what they want. It will also increase the referral of your brand.
INCREASES EXPOSURE
One of the advantages of using digital marketing as part of your business is that it will increase your exposure.
You need exposure for you to gain customers and produce sales.
You can do this by creating content that might go viral, or if not, content that people will resonate with.
You can use images, podcasts, and videos to create valuable content for your readers.
Digital marketing has better exposure as compared to traditional marketing. You can reach customers even outside of your city or country.
YOU GET UPDATES
When using digital marketing, you’ll be able to get along with the trends in real-time. These current trends are what people are engaging in at the moment.
Getting your hands on what’s happening can increase your business’s exposure. You can get more audience to notice your brand and turn them into customers.
It’s easy to create content with these new trends as compared to traditional marketing. In digital marketing, all you need to do is to produce engaging content.
INCREASES REVENUE AND CONVERSION
Digital marketing is effective in promoting a business. It doesn’t require a business to invest a lot of money to gain more. In fact, digital marketing has a higher return rate as compared to traditional or other forms of marketing.
Your website’s traffic or visitors can be easily turned to paying customers. An increased conversion rate means an increase in your company’s profit.
CONCLUSION
Digital marketing’s benefits surpassed traditional or other forms of marketing. With only a small budget, you can grow your small business in many ways. You can reach out to customers and build awareness for your brand.
Now is the time to bring digital marketing into your company. Grow your business with this strategy.
AUTHOR’S BIO
John Ocampos
John Ocampos is an Opera Singer by profession and a member of the Philippine Tenors. Ever since, Digital Marketing has always been his forte. He is the Founder of SEO-Guru, and the Managing Director of Tech Hacker. John is also the Strategic SEO and Influencer Marketing Manager of Softvire Australia – the leading software eCommerce company in Australia and Softvire New Zealand.
