According to Pew Research Center, internet usage has increased by 5% among adults in the past 3 years. Businesses are progressively exploring untapped prospects offered by the digital world. In other words, digital marketing is playing a very strong role in the shopping decisions that they make.
Regardless of the type of digital marketing tactic that your business employs, its overall objective is to help you outreaching and connect to the mass target audience through the right channel, at the right time. And, what place could be better than the ‘internet’ in the modern digital world.
In this blog post, we will be discussing the foremost benefits of digital marketing that every business must know, to make the best out of it. But before plunging into it directly, let’s have a brief overview of what digital marketing is?
What is Digital Marketing?
Digital marketing is referred to making marketing, advertising, and promotional efforts through the internet and electronic mediums such as websites, the internet, social media, and mobile devices. Nowadays, there are hundreds and thousands of businesses that are engaged in digital marketing, because digital marketing is easier, effective, and cost-efficient for reaching out mass audience in a shorter time, and with a greater impact.
People these days spend more time online and hence businesses need to optimize their digital marketing efforts to reach their target audience and potential buyers. There is a wide range of digital marketing tactics available nowadays; some of which include the following;
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
- Social Media Marketing.
- Content Marketing.
- Affiliate Marketing.
- Influencer Marketing.
- Paid Search.
- Display Advertising.
- Email Marketing.
Here are some of the best benefits of digital marketing has to offer you, no matter what size is your business.
1. Increase Your Customer Loyalty With Persistent Communications
Attracting and converting new customers to a successful buyers is not an easy job and it takes both your effort and money. Establishing customer loyalty is difficult, but once it is done, it is worth all your efforts. Convincing customers to purchase is easy, but it is even better if you can retain them after the sale. Because a retained customer will not only make more purchases in the future, but they can also recommend your brand to others, which eventually results in greater sales.
To retain customers, you need to make persistent communication with your customers, and digital marketing makes this easier for you. Some of the proven digital marketing tactics to maintain frequent communication with your customer include Personalized Email Offers, Social Media Engagement, Push Notifications, and Digital Advertising. Frequent interaction and communication with customers make them feel valued and heard.
2. Engage The Customer At Every Buying Stage
We didn’t see many people talking about customers’ buying journeys before digital marketing, mainly because it was very difficult to analyze and understand. Conventionally, customers go to a physical store to buy something as soon as they see the ad in the newspaper or on TV. However, since we have digital marketing around the corner, tracking every single step made by the customer can be tracked and notified and a product can be offered to them when they are triggered to find a product and solution.
Nowadays, it is very common to come across any online ad, search for an alternative, compare processes, check out different websites, and then finally go to the online store or physical store to purchase the product. The mobile application provides customers with promotional coupons, special offers, comparison modeling tools, customer support, which improves the customer buying process. Digital marketing helps marketers follow the entire buying journey of their customers.
No matter, what channel customers use to discover your business; whether it is Facebook ads, Google Search, Instagram Post, or Display Ad, you can engage your customer more easily now. This enables you to help to resolve all the objections and questions; while also influencing their purchasing decision.
3. Target The Right Audience
It’s now easier than ever to segment audiences since many digital marketing platforms allow you to target a specific audience. We have access to online tools that keep track of an individual’s online activities and demographic information. Digital marketers can use this data to offer users specific products or services that they may be interested in. For instance, once a visitor clicks on a brand’s display ad, whether on social media or through a search engine, the brand can target that visitor with subsequent and related ads. If the content a visitor receives is based on their interests and online behaviors, it creates positive reinforcement and makes shopping easier and more satisfying.
You can also target your audience with content and offers based on what stage they’re at within the buying journey. For example, email marketing can be used to nurture a lead until they’re ready to make a purchase. Perhaps they subscribed to your blog and consistently opened your blog update emails. After several months, they visit you are about me and service web pages. At this point, you know to send them a targeted email with an exclusive offer. They click on the offer and submit a request for a quote.
Sophisticated digital marketing tools make this possible. Let me tell you how it works: when a user fills out a form online, he or she provides personal information. Most web pages have cookies that track the user’s behavior on the page. It’s this data that companies or digital marketers analyze and devise the right strategies for different types of audiences.
4. Generate A Steady Lead Flow
Creating a ‘Sales Funnel’ is the primary purpose of marketing; because this is what helps generate consistent sales and leads traffic. The job of a sales funnel is to distinguish real buyers from window shoppers. It can also help improve customer purchasing journeys. An online sales funnel in digital marketing is designed specifically to generate consistent leads. For instance, a company fully relied upon billboard advertising and physical location for walk-in to generate leads for its products. After digital marketing efforts, the company now has more consistent leads in its pipeline. When a customer purchases something, he is offered some promotional code or a free coupon for the next purchase. Now, the promo that is applicable on the website requires the user to reach there and then register to avail of the offer. The company will now be generating a steady flow of leads more predictably and systematically.
5. Obtain & Optimize Better Conversion Rates
Unlike conventional marketing which involves the expensive broadcast time of TV or radio ads; digital platforms are relatively affordable. Also, you can improve your ad conversion rate easily as compared to traditional marketing. With electronic and print advertisements, it is usually very difficult to track conversion rates because everything is happening offline. And if you can’t track the performance of your marketing campaign, then how will you optimize it?
Digital advertising makes interaction and tracking much easier. You instantly know how many people are viewing your ads and what they do in response. Mostly, digital advertising platforms include some kind of tracking and reporting, which can be used to refine your ad design, targeting, etc.
Author Bio
Sam Khan is a digital marketer at Code Creators Inc, a SharePoint development company in the USA and Canada which is dealing with software development, Power BI, SharePoint Online, Microsoft Teams, mobile app, IT services, and more. Connect with him on Facebook, Twitter, and Codecreatorsinc.com