What is digital marketing?

Similar to traditional marketing, digital marketing uses social media, search engines, websites, and other components of the internet to connect with an audience through advertising. Digital marketing is much more effective than traditional marketing because you’re able to reach a higher number of people. Digital marketing is also much more targeted than traditional marketing.

Traditional marketing has always been geared towards the entire population in general, or at least those who had access to television, newspapers, magazines, etc. Digital marketing allows you to reach the people who are most likely to buy your product, allowing you to be more successful in sales.

How to Find Your Target Market

Different types of businesses will have different audiences, and there can be a mixture of different audiences within one business’s target market. There are tools to help you find your target audience, such as checking your analytics.

Social Media Analytics

As a business, you should also have social media business accounts across a number of different platforms, which will help you to determine who your target market is. For example, Facebook is the biggest social media platform, but its users tend to be older, which is great if that’s the audience you’re wanting to target. On the other hand, you could also be seeing a lot of engagement on sites such as Instagram and Twitter, which tend to have younger users. This means that you’ll have a larger demographic within your target market, of course, if a younger audience is your target.

The type of content you post on social media matters too. When you need to post long-form content, Facebook is the best platform to do so, while Instagram is better for posting high-quality photos. Facebook is also the best place to post videos.

Google Analytics

Google analytics does the same thing as your social media analytics, except it provides insight for your website. Google analytics breaks down your demographic reach, allowing you to see who visits your website the most.

Types of Digital Marketing

There are several types of digital marketing strategies, and there are more types that have been created in recent years.

Affiliate Marketing

This is a relatively new, but a highly effective and popular, method of digital marketing. A lot of bloggers use affiliate marketing to earn money. This is done by promoting a product from another company, and if sales are made through the affiliate link on their blog, they earn a commission off of those sales. This is also effective for companies because your product is able to reach a wider market.

Pay Per Click (PPC)

This is another new and effective way of marketing. With PPC, you have your ads placed on blogs and other websites. Every time your ad is clicked, you pay the owner of the blog or website, but you’re also getting potential customers to view your website.

Sponsored Content

This is probably the most notable form of digital marketing, especially among the younger generations. As a company, you pay an individual, group, etc. to promote your brand or a specific product, on one or many social media platforms. This is also called influencer marketing and is most notably done on YouTube.

Do traditional types of marketing still work?

Even though you reach many more people and a much more targeted audience through digital marketing, traditional types of marketing are still effective. It really depends on what type of business you’re running. For example, a local business would benefit from both digital and traditional styles of marketing. Companies that use trucks for hauling materials or for making deliveries benefit from having their logo displayed on the vehicle. This catches the attention of the local community wherever that vehicle goes.

Digital marketing is especially helpful for small businesses because it helps to narrow down their target market. There are also several different types of strategies that can be implemented, further increasing the chances of success.