About 59.5% of the world’s population use the internet. As a business owner, this means you cannot do without digital marketing.
To do this, you must understand what marketing channels are. Then, establish which would be a good fit for your business.
In this article, you will find some of the best digital marketing channels you can use. Keep reading!
Firstly, what is digital marketing?
Digital Marketing is a very broad term that encompasses many different forms of online advertising, such as social media advertising, banner ads, and video ads.
The primary objective of digital marketing is to grab customers attention and to bring in potential prospects who are searching for the advertised brands on search engines and social media platforms.
Wikipedia describes marketing as “Marketing is currently defined by the American Marketing Association (AMA) as “the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large”. However, the definition of marketing has evolved over the years.”
What Are Marketing Channels?
These are the platforms or tools businesses use to reach their target audience. The goal is to sell their goods and services.
As the years go by, trends evolve, and more channels emerge. So, you need to keep an eye out for what is relevant in 2021 and apply them.
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Top 10 Digital Marketing Channels
As marketers, we must always stay updated on the latest digital marketing channels and use them to promote our brands and products. Below are some of the best digital marketing channels to work with:
#1. SEO
Short for Search Engine Optimisation. It is a very popular digital marketing channel. The major reason is that most internet sessions begin with a search engine.
SEO helps your website to rank for relevant keywords. This will then drive traffic from your target audience to your site.
It will boost your business’s visibility, as it helps internet searchers to find your site. The algorithm ensures that only interested persons visit your site.
#2. Podcasts
In 2019, there were an estimated 88 million podcast listeners in the US. Experts predict that this figure will surpass 160 million in 2023.
This means that there is a considerable demand for audio content. So, as an intelligent business owner, you must take advantage of it.
Podcasts are an excellent opportunity to interact with potential customers. This is because people listen on the go, and you can reach them anytime.
#3. Email Marketing
About 4.03 billion people in the world use their emails. There are expectations that this figure will grow to 4.48 billion by 2024.
This only goes to prove what we already know – email marketing is not dead. Get your viewers to subscribe to your mailing list to get real-time updates.
You can send personalised messages to your target audience. It is also a means to inform them of sales and product launches.
#4. PPC
This stands for Pay-Per-Click, and it is a form of marketing. Here, advertisers pay a sum every time an internet user clicks their ads.
You can target your ads to reach a specific class of users. They should be the demographic with particular interests in what you do.
Due to its precise targeting, PPC has a higher conversion rate. This is unlike organic search results, which are free.
#5. Blogs
Blog posts are just as good as podcasts possible, even better as you can make blogs into podcasts; blogs also help with SEO if you are using the right keywords and SEO tools to push it in the right direction.
Blogs also give you the opportunity to educate your customers on questions they had on your product or service, possibly even saving your customer support team some stress.
Blogs will mainly help small businesses as every rank up with SEO can help them be easier to find and get new customers.
#6. Content marketing
Marketing is more than just selling products. It is an investment in the relationship with your customers, communities, partners, and suppliers.
Content marketing relies on creating and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract customers’ attention, build trust, and persuade them to buy products or services.
However, some content marketing techniques are more popular than others. Here are some of the most popular places for content marketing:
- Youtube
- Tiktok
- Medium
- Quora
#7. Digital PR
Digital PR is the practice of developing and executing a public relations strategy for digital media channels and brand awareness. This often includes publicising information about your organisation on websites, social networking sites, blogs, video sharing sites, etc.
#8. Affiliate marketing
Affiliate marketing is an increasingly popular strategy for earning money online. It is based on the principle of earning money by referring customers to any business online. The affiliate earns a commission for each sale they generate.
Affiliate marketing has been around for a long time, but it has seen increased usage among online marketers over the past few years. It is one of the most cost-effective ways to grow your business because it doesn’t require any upfront payment or investment.
It could also help you grow relationships with other businesses, which could, for example, get you a discount on supplies.
#9. Influencer marketing
Influencer marketing has become one of the best ways to market your products or services in the modern world. It is a form of marketing where you partner with people who have large social media followings, usually celebrities, bloggers, YouTubers, to endorse or promote your products. It’s a lot cheaper than traditional types of advertising and can be much more effective, too.
In this digital age, influencer outreach is a fantastic way to reach your target audience. Influencers can be individual influencers like bloggers, vloggers, Instagrammers, or organisations like companies, universities, and hospitals. The great thing about these channels is that you can find many influencers that fit your niche and audience.
#10. Viral marketing
Viral marketing is a type of marketing where people share the content with their friends and family, and it spreads like a virus.
It is most commonly seen as an online phenomenon, but it has also been used in the offline world with great success. The idea behind viral marketing is that everyone can help market your product or service by sharing it with friends, family, work colleagues or anyone they know.
One of the first instances of a viral marketing campaigns was in the mid to late 90s when Hotmail sent out an email to all of its users recommending that they promote the service by forwarding this message to at least ten other people. This caused them to grow from 4 million to 8 million users over the course of one year.
What is the difference between digital marketing and traditional marketing?
Traditional marketing is about getting out there and making sure that your product or service is visible to as many people as possible.
Digital marketing is all about leveraging the power of digital tools and platforms such as social media, websites, blogs, and email campaigns to get in front of the people looking for your product or service and create brand awareness.
Choosing The Right Digital Marketing Channel
At first, you may feel overwhelmed by the number of options out there. Yet, with proper understanding and guidance, you can find the right fit for you.
Take this article as a guide to help you. You can choose from any of the listed options or combine channels to meet your goals.
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