Deciding where and how to spend your money on marketing can be a tricky proposition: Social media platforms are constantly evolving, and there are websites, blogs and email newsletters to consider. At first glance, encompassing all of these channels in your marketing strategy may seem daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. By executing a multichannel marketing campaign, and by implementing search engine optimization techniques, you can create a digital marketing presence for your product, service or brand that maximizes your return on investment.
Start With Google Search
If you want to rank higher in search results, then consider using SEO. Perhaps you’ve built your website or blog, or you have an exciting new product you want to showcase. SEO best practices, such as the strategic placement of keywords in specific areas of your site, providing a good user experience and publishing content regularly, will help determine where your site ranks on search engine results pages (SERPs). These practices are designed to increase your website’s credibility, and therefore its ranking on Google.
Now consider how much competition you have in your space. If there’s a lot, you may want to try search engine marketing (SEM). With SEM, you are paying for your website to appear at the top of the first search engine results page when you are matched to a searcher’s query through keywords. Many companies rely on SEM to generate traffic to their websites.
Send E-Newsletters
Sending email newsletters to your customers and prospects is another important digital marketing strategy. This presents a singular opportunity: These subscribers have already told you they want to know more about your products and services, and they have provided you with their email addresses so you can tell them more. Now when you have something noteworthy to share, such as a sale or new product or service, you can reach out directly to them with personalized messages that include a call to action (CTA). This is the specific action you want the consumer to take, such as clicking on a button to learn more about something or to buy your product. Include a CTA in every e-newsletter; otherwise, you are likely wasting your marketing efforts.
There are some caveats with e-newsletters: Make sure you email your target audience at the right time: when they are most likely to read your message. You can determine the ideal day/time by varying when you send emails and then checking and comparing the open and click-through rates (CTRs).
Also be careful about how often you send an e-newsletter. Have you ever unsubscribed to a business’s emails because you were receiving them all the time? Exactly. After a while, you come to believe that the business’s messages are no longer important; in fact, receiving them becomes bothersome. So be strategic in how often you send one out, and make sure that when you do, each email contains relevant and important information for your customers. This will make them feel special when receiving them. It also can make them more likely to click through to your site or buy from you.
Use Facebook And LinkedIn
Now consider which social media channels you want to use to help execute your campaign. There are many to choose from today, but Facebook is still regarded as No. 1 by most people for a reason: The channel has access to an unprecedented amount of personal information on its 2.45 billion active monthly users. You can target your ads based on gender, age, location, demographics, interest and behavior — all information that people have supplied willingly to be part of Facebook.
Facebook Ads Manager is quite easy to use when it comes to designing and executing ads, and you can also save an audience group and target it again later with another ad.
If you’re business-to-business (B2B) (like I am), then consider LinkedIn. It is the world’s largest professional networking site, with 675 million members.
LinkedIn allows you to position yourself as a thought leader in an industry through your posts. As you publish more and more, people will likely remember you for your thought-provoking content. You can become trusted as an expert in your field, leading to business opportunities as people seek you out to help with their business challenges.
Look at each person who connects with you as an opportunity for new business. Plan a series of meaningful messages to send to them through LinkedIn, and share a piece of valuable content or relevant information that will generate more interest in your product or service.
You can also advertise on LinkedIn. Like Facebook, you can build your ads through the network’s campaign manager and choose from a variety of ad formats such as video or carousel ads.
Publish Videos On YouTube
YouTube is ideal for video marketing. With more than 2 billion monthly users worldwide, YouTube gives you the opportunity for your videos to be seen by a spectacularly large audience. However, since YouTube has so many content creators, ensure that your videos stand out so you can build an audience.
As with your other marketing channels, pay attention to the analytics. Find out which of your videos is getting the most views (and the least). What are the ages and genders of most of your viewers? Do they align with your target audience? Is your subscriber base growing? Check the number of likes, dislikes and comments. Adjust your content strategy accordingly.
Final Considerations
No matter which marketing channels you choose to use, constantly monitor your results. Don’t be afraid to A/B test — try different ads and messages to see which ones resonate with your audience.
Consider a content marketing approach with everything you do. This means you are more concerned with supplying relevant information that potential customers are already looking for than with promoting your brand. Don’t panic. If you build a strong digital marketing presence, you will get noticed.