There are various digital marketing types with which you can lead your own business to the ultimate success or you can acquire those skills to work for your clients because digital marketing was once only a new and distinct approach to the market. It created a new type of media through which to sell products and services. However, in the last several years, the significance of digital marketing has shifted. It has become an essential component of what a company represents to its clients. It is no longer sufficient simply to have a website or to run an unfocused Ads campaign. Every company needs a well-defined digital marketing strategy.
Do you have a comprehensive digital marketing strategy in place for your company? As a result, time is working against you. As the Internet grows more integrated into our daily lives, the significance of digital marketing becomes evident.
Let’s have a look at the 7 main types of digital marketing that you can explore and help yourself and others to grow exponentially.
Digital Marketing Types
Online marketing and offline marketing are the two fundamental components of digital marketing. However, because I’ll discuss internet marketing in a separate book, I’ll just cover the main types of internet marketing here for thoroughness.
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Social Media Marketing (SMM)
- Search engine marketing (SEM)
- Email marketing
- Pay-per-click advertising (PPC)
- Content marketing
- Affiliate marketing
Let’s discuss them one by one in detail.
Read More: How to Become a Pro in Digital Marketing in 10 Minutes
1. Search engine optimization (SEO)
SEO is an abbreviation for search engine optimization. In layman’s words, it refers to the process of upgrading your website so that it appears more prominently when people search for items or services linked to your company on Google, Bing, and other search engines. The higher your pages appear in search results, the more likely you are to draw attention and attract new and existing clients to your business.
Because individuals make billions of searches each year, frequently for commercial purposes to obtain information about products and services, SEO is a critical component of digital marketing. Search is frequently the key source of internet traffic for businesses, and it works together with other marketing channels. Greater exposure and higher placement in search results than your competitors may have a significant influence on your bottom line.
However, search results have evolved in recent years to provide users with more direct answers and information that is more likely to retain people on the results page rather than pushing them to other websites.
Also, elements in the search results such as rich results and Knowledge Panels can boost visibility and give consumers with more information about your organization right in the results.
To summarise, SEO is the cornerstone of a whole marketing ecosystem. When you understand what your website visitors desire, you can use that information for your campaigns (paid and organic), website, social media properties, and more.
2. Social Media Marketing (SMM)
In comparison to conventional mediums like television, print, and even online display advertising, social media brings a whole new level of engagement and involvement. Instead of simply broadcasting messages to a large number of people, you can interact with them and listen to what they have to say. There are several platforms available, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, and Snapchat, with possibilities ranging from organic (such as Facebook groups, page updates, stories, and Messenger) to sponsored (such as Facebook advertisements). Almost every business should be present on at least a handful of these social networks.
People who enjoy, comment on, and share your material with their friends and contacts may multiply your efforts. Facebook advertisements, in particular, have gotten smarter, and you can target certain client categories with your content to ensure that your message reaches the intended audience.
3. Search engine marketing (SEM)
Search engine marketing (SEM) is a digital marketing approach that is used to boost a website’s presence on search engine results pages (SERPs). While the industry phrase used to apply to both organic and paid search operations such as search engine optimization (SEO), it now almost solely refers to paid search advertising. Search engine marketing is often known as sponsored search or pay-per-click (PPC).
Search engines employ complex algorithms to guarantee that the most relevant results, including location and other accessible information, are returned for each search. Sponsored adverts show at the top and on the sides of search engine results pages to obtain greater attention and prominence than organic results.
Assume you are a client searching for a product or service online. You enter your search phrases into a search engine (also known as keywords). You may see several corporate advertisements on your search results page whose keywords match the keywords in your search.
These advertisements display prominently on the page, among other search results that match your criteria. Because the sponsored listings are very relevant to your unique search, you are more likely to click on them.
Read More: Pinterest for Marketing: 10 Best Strategic Ways to Grow
4. Email marketing
In a world where everyone is instant messaging or Snapchatting, email marketing may appear antiquated, yet it is still one of the most successful digital marketing methods. Especially e-commerce sites and retail companies are seeing a significant amount of success with pushing seasonal promotions and discounts (think Black Friday deals or Mother’s Day), while you can also use email newsletters to nurture your prospects by providing a lot of value beyond just pushing your products and services.
If Mr. Zuckerberg decides to take down your Facebook group, having an email list allows you to keep in touch with your fans regardless of any changing algorithms. Staying in touch with your email list regularly can help you create relationships and keep you ‘top of mind’ when they’re ready to buy.
5. Pay-per-click advertising (PPC)
PPC is an abbreviation for pay-per-click, an online marketing technique in which advertisers pay a charge each time one of their adverts is clicked. It is essentially a method of purchasing visitors to your website rather than seeking to acquire those views naturally.
One of the most common types of PPC is search engine advertising. It enables marketers to bid for ad placement in a search engine’s sponsored links when a customer searches for a term related to their product or service. For example, if we bid on the term PPC software, our ad may appear towards the top of the Google results page.
6. Content marketing
Instead of just broadcasting an advertising message, content marketing entails developing and sharing material—text, images, and multimedia—that offers value to your audience. If you’re in B2C (business to consumer), ‘content’ can include social media postings, blog articles, and entertaining videos; if you’re in B2B (business to business), it could include white papers or reports, webinars, and informative films.
It’s free in the sense that it focuses on bringing people to you and your business rather than paying to spread your message to a cold audience. Content is very adaptable and can help you create your brand by educating, entertaining, and inspiring your audience; it is the gasoline that drives all other sorts of digital marketing, such as search engine optimization, social media, and email.
Read More: How To Go Viral On Pinterest for Business In 2022
7. Affiliate marketing
Affiliate marketing is a method of earning a commission by recommending a product or service manufactured by another store or advertiser. The affiliate partner is compensated for delivering a specified outcome to the store or advertiser.
Typically, the outcome is a sale. However, some programs may pay you for leads, free trial users, website hits, or app downloads.
You won’t have to worry about significant initial charges because affiliate networks are typically free to join. If done correctly, this performance-based opportunity may transition from side hustle to a viable online business concept by providing you with a steady income.