Digital Marketing BOON or BANE?

Today in the modern era, technologies are getting updated day by day. As technologies change
practically at the speed of light, it’s vital for companies to innovate new idea for being in the
race. The creative ideas will help the business to stand long in the challenging world. A well
business work on various aspect like Digital Marketing, therefore, it is one of the important
pillars of the company.

Digital marketing can boost the company which will certainly help the company to reach its
destination early. Social media users are increasing day by day. People are getting involves
directly or indirectly in the digital word. As a result, Social media user has covered almost
53.33% of the current population and it is increasing every second. Digital marketing can be run
through such social media, which target the people on various accept. Social media like
Facebook provides user to promote their ads on a worldwide level. Facebook avail to promote
the user’s ads at the minimum cost of Rs.40 per day. This ads reaches to the unique
customer of that localities.

 
 

Earning-
Marketing through the internet gives a chance to earn surplus to some user. The user needs to
promote ads of a certain company on their pages, website, etc. Earing can depend on the per
view or the number of traffic reaching on a certain page.

Boon and Bane-

Advantage can be related to the number of users present on the Internet. First of
all, places which are most diverse are lacking behind to take advantage of digital marketing.
Because there is a lack of Internet services. It can be one of the disadvantages. It can’t be
considered a total disadvantage they can get the information through other physical sources.

Similarly, Places with proper services can enjoy digital shopping.  Online marketing is by far the
most important segment of digital marketing. As traditional channels like TV and radio become
less and less valuable, online marketing continues to take up bigger and bigger segments of
companies’ marketing budgets, with millions of businesses marketing exclusively via the
Internet.

Digital Marketing Can Help You Grow Your

Business
The following 12 reasons will show you why the use of digital marketing is not only
investment-wise decision but also an effective marketing channel that can help you
grow your business.

The Infographic:

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Why-Digital-Marketing-Can-Help-You-Grow-Your-Business.jpg

1. Because Digital Marketing Levels the Online Playing Field

Gone are the days when business owners still welcome the notion that Digital
Marketing is only for the likes of multinationals and large corporations that have the
sufficient resources required to mount an online marketing campaign. Digital
Marketing actually levels the playing field, providing small and medium enterprises
the chance to compete against the big boys and attract their share of targeted traffic.

With digital marketing, small companies now have the resources to perform sales and
marketing processes that were previously available only to large corporations.
Without a call center, small businesses can engage effectively with multiple
customers, even to customers from any parts of the world even if they don’t have
physical stores or branches in these locations.

2. Because Digital Marketing Is More Cost-Effective than Traditional Marketing

Small businesses have very little resources and even capitalization. This is why
Digital Marketing provides them with a better and much more cost-effective
marketing channel that delivers results. Gartner’s Digital Marketing Spend
Report highlighted that up to 40% of respondents claimed getting considerable
savings by using digital marketing methods of promotion for their products and
services.
That is why according to the Gartner survey, 28% of business owners surveyed will
shift marketing budget allocations from traditional media channels and invest them
into digital online marketing tools and techniques. HubSpot confirms this as shown in
the chart below that confirms how digital marketers get better Cost-Per-Lead (CPL)
compared to other marketing channels.
  

3. Because Digital Marketing Delivers Conversion

Businesses marketing products and services online measure success by the percentage
rate of incoming traffic gets converted into leads, subscribers or sales, depending on
the intended purposes of your website. Without conversion, all your traffic would
mean nothing and all your marketing efforts will simply go to waste. That is why
business owners are streamlining their digital marketing campaigns
towards conversion optimization, making it a top priority above everything else.

 
  

 There are several tools and techniques that you can use for your digital marketing
campaign such as Search Engine Optimization, social media marketing and email
marketing. As seen from the chart below from HubSpot’s 2013 State of Inbound
Marketing Report, these three that generate quick and effective communication and
interaction with targeted audiences will deliver better-than-average results in terms of
higher conversion rates.

4. Because Digital Marketing Helps Generate Better Revenues

Higher conversion rates generated by effective digital marketing techniques will
deliver loads of profitable benefits for you and your business in terms of better and
higher revenues. Google confirms this in a study with IPSOS Hong Kong, claiming
2.8 times better revenue growth expectancy for companies using digital marketing
strategies to those who do not.

With better revenue growth expectancy, small and medium enterprises using digital
marketing techniques will have 3.3 times better chances of expanding their workforce
and business – opening their doors to better, larger and farther reaching markets both
locally and abroad. Google’s Asia-Pacific Head of SME Kevin O’Kane describes the
Internet as rocket fuel for growth for small and medium enterprises.

5. Because Digital Marketing Facilitates Interaction with Targeted Audiences

One of the reasons why digital marketing is taking over traditional marketing channels
is the ability of Internet marketing tools to interact with targeted audiences in real
time. Engagement in any form is what your customers expect to receive when
interacting with your brand or business. How your business handles such engagements
and interactions will spell the difference between business success and failure – just
like what eMarketer’s report Key Digital Trends for 2014 is saying as shown below.
  

Interacting and providing your customers with proper engagement points can give you
an insight of what your targeted audiences want. This vital information will steer you
towards making the right set of next moves, provide your customers with an even
better experience, develop good relationships with them – gaining their loyalty and
trust that you will need when your business begins to grow.

6. Because Digital Marketing Caters to the Mobile Consumer

Undoubtedly, mobile internet will be the next wave of information dissemination and
communication channel, brought about by the rapid proliferation of smartphones,
tablets and other internet-enabled devices. These mobile devices have become a
central part of American life that 91% of adults in the United States always have their
devices within reaching distance.
Now would be the best time to have digital marketing campaigns intended towards
mobile consumers, paving the way for them towards achieving better growth and
faster expansion. Mobile gadgets have evolved from being mere alternatives for
laptops and personal computers, into something that is influencing their purchasing
decisions as confirmed by another report from eMarketer.
7. Because Digital Marketing Builds Brand Reputation

The power of digital marketing lies in its ability for attracting targeted traffic. These
types of audiences for your content are most likely already ready to know more about
your brand, products or services and may be interested enough to purchase what you
have to offer. Delivering on what you promised will help you develop a better
relationship with your targeted audiences, help them transition into paying customers
that will go back and interact with your site some more – on a regular and continuous
basis.

This will prove beneficial for your brand reputation, as satisfied customers will most
likely tell other people about their experience with your brand, product or service.
Your brand reputation will go viral as expected, further opening new doors of
opportunities for reaching bigger markets and attain business growth.

8. Because Digital Marketing Provides better ROI for Your Marketing

Investments

With better revenues and better branding, Digital Marketing can provide a better
Return of Investments (ROI) than traditional media and marketing channels. With
traditional media, the cost is too exorbitant for small and medium enterprises to
leverage on, and the results received are somewhat vague and difficult to measure.

Digital Marketing on the other hand can easily be tracked and monitored, with results
immediately realized and measured as soon as targeted audiences provide contact
information, subscribe to a newsletter or training program, or make a purchase. The
key to success in Digital marketing however, is to generate a steady flow of targeted
traffic that converts into sales and leads. The more your business generates this kind
of traffic, the faster you can realize your ROI.

9. Because Digital Marketing Earns People’s Trust

Digital Marketing rides on the current online trend that focus more on social media
signals resulting from direct and more personalized interaction between a brand or
business and their targeted audiences. In the Nielsen Global Online Consumer
Survey that involved 25 thousand consumers coming from at least 50 countries, 90
percent of respondents claimed they would trust information about a particular brand,
product or service if the data comes from people they know.

Digital Marketing leverages on social media signals, social proof and testimonials
from actual consumers who have previously purchased, joined, or availed of a product
or service marketed by a particular brand or business. The more reliable these social
signals are, the higher the trust rate it can generate from targeted audiences – most of
which can be potential customers.

10. Because Digital Marketing Entices People to Take Favorable Action

While social signals and testimonials help earn trust from targeted audiences, Digital
Marketing makes use of effective strategies that will entice people to take a favorable
action your brand or business intends them to take. Conversion to leads or sales is still
initiated and under full control by the website visitor. They are not compelled to do so
but digital marketers can make use of clever and innovative ways to entice conversion
using Calls-To-Action.

Calls-To-Action specifies what your web visitors should do next – either to sign up,
like, download something, call or buy – specific steps that will entice them to perform
a favorable action. Innovative forms, buttons and texts are optimized according to
copy, color scheme, graphics and even positioning on the page to generate the best
results in terms of generating favorable action.

11. Because Digital Marketing Makes You Ready for the Internet of Things

The “Internet of Things” is a global ecosystem of interconnected devices – tablets,

smartphones, gadgets, appliances and more – that can interact with each other through
the Internet. Sounds like something from a Sci-Fi thriller, but this is what the
projected 24 billion gadgets by the year 2020 will actually head to. Digital Marketing
will prepare your business towards this eventuality, an interconnected ecosystem that
will permeate through every aspect of people’s lives. Survival for your business in the
era of the “Internet of Things” means inclusion in this interconnected grid – giving
you an access window to reach out to targeted audiences belonging to this online grid.

12. Because Digital Marketing Ensures Business Survival Online

It is a normal occurrence for brick-and-mortar business establishments to encounter

visitors entering their store, skimming through and inspecting products, then leave
without buying anything. Many kinds of people like these come and go, but a targeted
few will actually make a purchase and if satisfied, will come back for more on a later
date. If you get less of the later and more of the few, sooner or later your brick-and-
mortar business will cease to exist.

SWOT Analysis in Digital Marketing: What, Why and

How!
Digital Marketing is an ever-changing field. The speed at which technology is
transforming calls for a disciplined approach to tackling business challenges.

In order to get your business started and then stay ahead of the competition, conducting
a SWOT analysis is absolutely necessary.
It is a method of structured planning that can be applied to a business, a product,
industry, place or even an individual for that matter.

In the field of Digital Marketing, applying SWOT analysis while starting your business or
assessing a product could help you understand where you stand and how to capitalize
on the vast amount of opportunities within your industry.

SWOT analysis needs to be done even before you consider spending any money on a
marketing campaign.

What is SWOT Analysis

SWOT analysis stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. It is the
strategic planning of your company, product, business, or industry by listing down these
four characteristics.
These 4 characteristics are divided into two factors – Internal and External.

Internal Factors
Internal factors are the strengths and weaknesses of your business, product or service. It
could be the quality of your product, its unique selling proposition, the strength of your
team, your marketing strategy and so on.
You need to list down the strengths and weaknesses in those specific columns. It is up
to you to decide as to what you consider strengths and weaknesses during your
analysis.
The internal factors are something that we have direct control over. These are things
that can be improved or changed as it applies internally to us.

External Factors
Opportunities and threats come under the external category of the SWOT analysis.
These are things that you may not have direct control over however by understanding
the opportunities and threats in your market, you could indirectly affect your business by
making the necessary changes in your approach.
Opportunities and threats could be the amount of competition that you have in the
industry or the need for services that no one is currently providing that you possess.

How to Conduct SWOT Analysis

While conducting a SWOT Analysis, it is very important that you be honest with
yourself and ask the right questions.
In order to ask the right questions, you need to pick the right people in your team. Your
team should comprise of people who posses diverse expertise in their field in order to
get a complete picture of your objectives.

Don’t just pick a team of people who agree all the time. People with different opinions
will reveal insights that would otherwise go unnoticed.

Strengths
What is the USP of my business?

In which areas are we better than our competitors?

What have our success stories been so far that has made us stand out from the crowd?

Weaknesses
What are we lacking compared to our competition?

What resources do we require?

What sort of skills do we need to work on?

Opportunities
Is there something that our target audience is looking for that we can provide?

Are there any potential market areas that we haven’t reached yet?

Threats
What are our competitors doing that we are not?

Are there any government regulations that could hamper our business?

Do we have all the technologies in place to keep up with the ever-changing market?
Put them together and Prioritize

Once you have answered all of these questions with the help of your team, you need to
put them together and start working on your goals based on their priority. Some aspects
of your SWOT analysis may require more immediate attention compared to others.

For example, if you find out that you need to get certain government regulations in place
for your agency, you might want to start working on that first and then systematically
move on to the next objective that needs your attention.

Once you have completed your SWOT analysis, it is important to start working on them
with the implementation of SMART Goals. 
SMART stands for goals that are specific, measurable, assignable,
realistic and time-bound.
In the digital marketing spectrum, let us say after conducting a SWOT analysis, you find
out that your website is lacking in ‘How To‘ articles and you wish to create quality
content in order to get more traffic to your site.
You might assign your content writing team with a specific target in mind by creating
SMART Goals for the team.

This would also give them a clear framework to work with. If you don’t have a team, you
could create SMART goals at an individual level too.
For example, you could create a plan wherein you are required to write 4 articles a
month, that is 1 article every week, on specific topics such as

i)  How to promote your event on Social Media for Free

ii) How to Increase your Facebook Page Likes without Spending Any Money on Advertising
iii) How to start Affiliate Marketing with Amazon in 4 Minutes
iv) How to Think of Content Ideas for your Blog at Lightning Speed

I have given myself a realistic time-frame of 1 week for each article based on my skillet
and other factors. In this manner, I have an action plan with a goal in mind that is
achievable.

Similarly, you can conduct SWOT analysis for your Social Media pages by asking
yourself similar questions and then assigning SMART goals to achieve your target. I
have created a checklist of questions that you can ask while conducting SWOT Analysis
for Free. You can download it here.

Conclusion
A SWOT Analysis is extremely important if you want to achieve your goals in a
structured systematic manner.

Conducting a SWOT Analysis will give you insight on what works well for you and what
you need to focus on to achieve your marketing goals.

Use SMART Goals after you have finished preparing your SWOT Analysis.

It is advisable to conduct an Analysis even before you create a marketing plan, in fact, a
thorough SWOT Analysis.

What is the difference between

Inbound and Outbound
Marketing?
What Is Outbound Marketing?
Outbound marketing is what used to just be known as “marketing.” It’s
interruptive and it pushes itself at an audience, whether the audience wants it
or not. TV and radio ads, telemarketing, banner and display ads, billboards,
newspaper and magazine ads, cold calling, pop-ups and pop-unders, and
contextual ads are all examples of outbound marketing. Outbound marketing
has fallen out of favor in the last 10 years. Oversaturation — especially on
the internet — caused people to start ignoring display advertising.

Since the advent of the ad blocker, it’s only gotten worse. Clickthrough

rates for display ads are now at a dismal 0.05%, and according to Hubspot’s
State of Inbound 2017, marketers consider paid advertising like print,
outdoor, and broadcast to be the most overrated marketing tactic.
 

This eyeball heat map from Michael Daehn illustrates the problem of
“banner blindness.”

What Is Inbound Marketing?

Inbound marketing is a relatively new marketing concept where marketers
attempt to “pull” in potential customers with interesting content. Also
called content marketing, inbound marketing involves creating blog posts,
social media, infographics, white papers, email newsletters, and other content
that people actually want to read. Search engine optimization paid discovery,
and paid search help people find marketers’ content. If it’s engaging enough,
they interact with it, reading and sharing, and come away with a positive
impression of the brand that influences later purchasing decisions.

Inbound marketing is very hands-off and indirect: there’s never a noticeable

sales pitch. Inbound marketing nudges customers down the sales funnel
by increasing their engagement with the brand. Here’s an illustration of how
it works.

How the inbound process works, from Hubspot.

What Is the Difference Between Inbound
and Outbound Marketing?
To review, here’s the difference between inbound and outbound tactics.
Inbound Outbound

Pulls in interested readers Pushes at everybody, regardless of interest

Written for the consumer’s needs Written for the product’s needs

Interactive and fluid Inert, one-way

Draws in customers Seeks out customers

Is part of content consumption Disrupts content consumption

Natural habitat: blogs, social media, opt-in emails, Natural habitat: display ads, billboards,
search, influencer marketing telemarketer scripts, magazines, TV ads

What’s More Effective, Inbound or

Outbound Marketing?
Inbound marketing is far and away the more fashionable marketing choice
right now. According to Hubspot’s State of Inbound 2017, 71% of companies
globally reported that they’re primarily focused on inbound. Certainly
inbound provides a better ROI: inbound marketing efforts are 62% less
expensive than outbound.

On the other hand, inbound’s effectiveness can be hard to measure. Since the
inbound strategy relies on raising brand awareness, providing value, and not
giving the hard sell, it’s difficult to quantify exactly how well your strategy is
working. The biggest criticisms of outbound marketing traditionally have
been that it’s expensive, it’s not responsive, and it isn’t targeted. You spend
hundreds of thousands of dollars on a TV ad, send it out into the world, and
hope for the best. And while most companies aren’t going to increase
spending on those kinds of outbound advertising — let’s be real,
telemarketing isn’t ever going to make sense for most brands — recent
upgrades in audience targeting are breathing new life into display advertising.

Things like retargeting pixels, contextual ads, and Lookalike Audiences allow
Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Google display ads to be directed
specifically to users based on what they are interested in. This is a kind of
outbound marketing that shows untapped potential and gets around ad
blockers. Unlike outbound marketing of the past, it incorporates inbound’s
strategy of showing users things they specifically will find helpful or
interesting.

In today’s marketing landscape, many companies employ a combination of a

brilliant inbound strategy and retargeting outbound display
ads. Remarketing can work solely with inbound, too. Here’s a case study of
how Brooklinen used Outbrain’s Lookalike Audiences and retargeting to get
a 50% lower CPA, all within Outbrain’s ecosystem. Of course, like anything
in marketing, you’ll have to find a mix that works for your potential
customers.

What Is Inbound Methodology?

A good inbound strategy involves creating content that appeals to your
desired reader, then helping them find it through search, social, and
discovery. To get started, you’ll need to create buyer personas: Who are the
people you want to draw to this content? What are they looking for? What
kinds of things do they like? After that, craft a solid SEO strategy. How will
this audience find you? Will you optimize your content for Google keyword
searches? Will you promote your content on discovery networks
like Outbrain Amplify? Will you push it to your social? How often will you
post? A lot of this is stuff you’ll figure out as you experiment. After that, it’s
time to create your content and put it out into the world.

Make sure you build in a way to assess the success of your efforts. Before
you do anything, figure out a concrete idea of what success would look like
for your content, and have a way of measuring that. Metrics will drive what
you do going forward. Any successful marketing strategy is dynamic and
changes based on the data you collect about how effective your content is. If
that sounds too impersonal, think of this way: figure out what your people
want, and give it to them.

Finding the Right Marketing Strategy for

You
Ultimately, the best marketing strategy for your business will be the one that
works. Always try new things while you continue to do the old things that are
working. Analyze your data frequently, and be on top of any changes you
see. Remember, audiences change, too. What worked last year might not
work this year. People get tired of seeing the same thing, and marketers can
run certain methods into the ground, robbing them of their usefulness. Your
mix of inbound and outbound marketing will almost certainly change with
time and as technology adds new features and ways of connecting with
people. That said, the most important strategy will always be: experiment,
measure, repeat.