Digital marketing: what is it and how to start?

Digital marketing, or “online marketing”, is a form of advertising that uses the Internet and digital technologies to connect with customers. Digital marketing seeks to accomplish the same thing as traditional marketing, except using computers, smartphones and other digital devices instead of traditional media such as print media, radio or television.

Keep reading to learn more about digital marketing, its methodologies and what a career in digital marketing requires.
What is digital marketing?

Digital marketing is a form of marketing that uses the Internet and digital technologies such as computers and smartphones to connect with customers. As with other forms of marketing, its purpose is to increase brand awareness, drive sales and promote goods and services.

5 types of digital marketing (with examples)

Digital marketers connect with potential customers through many different channels. The following digital marketing tactics, used by businesses large and small, remain among the most popular and impactful used today.

Optimization for search engines (SEO)
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a technique aimed at improving the ranking of online material in search engines such as Google or Bing. If you’ve ever searched for anything on Google, you’ve probably realized that even the simplest search can return millions of results. However, you probably rarely make it past the first few suggestions, let alone the next page.

In such a crowded space, digital marketers use SEO to ensure that potential customers actually find their products or services online. Some common ways to do SEO include:

Creating quality content that meets searcher intent

Use keywords to help search engines identify relevant material

Using long-tail keywords (specific phrases searchers use) to help content reach its target audience

Ensuring content loads quickly and is mobile-friendly

Content marketing is an approach that connects with a target audience through the creation of original content. Rather than being concerned with making sales, content marketing is generally looking to increase brand awareness through materials that appeal to a specific audience.

Content marketing can be done through digital or traditional media, but it is most used today as a form of online marketing. Often this online content is used for inbound marketing purposes, effectively engaging the audience with engaging content that piques their interest and increases overall brand awareness.

Content marketing can take many forms across a variety of digital media channels, including:

Informative articles and blogs

original videos

podcasts

email marketing
As the name suggests, email marketing uses email to reach customers. To do this, marketers send timely emails to large groups of people who have signed up to their contact list to announce sales, discounts, and new products or services.

The impact of email marketing is clear. One study found that email marketing had a return on investment (ROI) of 4,200 percent for every dollar invested [4]. Another study found that 59 percent of surveyed marketers rated email as having the highest ROI of all their marketing efforts [5].

Some common examples of email marketing include:

Scheduled emails that increase brand awareness during the holiday season

Blow up emails that inform recipients of upcoming sales events

Targeted emails that send personalized offers and messages to specific groups on a mailing list

Pay Per Click Advertising (PPC)
Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is a digital marketing model that involves an advertiser paying a publisher whenever their ads are clicked. Typically, the publisher is a website owner, search engine operator, or social media platforms such as Facebook or Instagram.

Typical examples of PPC advertising include:

Banner ads flanking web content on the sides or top of the page

Social media ads appearing in audience feeds

Ads that appear when a specific keyword is searched on a search engine such as Google.

social media marketing
Social media marketing is a form of digital marketing that uses social networks such as Twitter, Instagram and Facebook to reach customers. An essential feature of modern digital marketing, social media marketing leverages the reach of social media platforms with data-driven efforts to reach targeted consumers.

The active user size of social media platforms makes them particularly attractive to marketers. A study published in January 2022 quantified the number of active social media users in the billions [6]:

Facebook: 2.895 billion active users

YouTube: 2.291 billion active users

Instagram: 1.393 billion active users

Whether through computers, mobile devices or mobile apps, social media offers the opportunity to reach a broad and targeted audience of potential consumers.

Examples of social media marketing include:

Videos posted to social media as part of a larger campaign, like this ‘80s-themed music video produced by peanut company Planters for the holiday season

Photos posted on Instagram that reflect a brand’s identity.

LIKED? SHARE THIS POST.