INTRODUCTION TO DIGITAL MARKETING

INTRODUCTION TO DIGITAL MARKETING

Conventional marketing is referred to as the activities we perform to promote the sales of products and services. In Digital Marketing we do all those activities online. We use a variety of channels available online e.g., social media, websites, email and search engines. This also includes online videos and paid advertising on internet. In the past, before the internet, these activities of awareness and promotion were done through radio, TV, newspapers etc. 

The internet is used by all of us in our daily lives. People usually search the internet before buying something. It makes internet the right place to send these prospective buyers, the right message at the right time. 

Digital Marketing is an evolving process, and we often experiment a lot to find the right customer at the right time. This feature gives Digital Marketing an edge over conventional marketing. We will cover this aspect of Digital marketing in the upcoming articles a lot. 

Here is a simple example to clarify the difference between conventional and digital marketing. Suppose you are selling carpets and you advertise your shop in a leading newspaper. What will happen is that thousands of people who are NOT interested in buying carpets will also see your advertisement. This means that your advertisement will go wasted. Whereas in digital marketing you will pay for advertisements specifically for people who really are looking to buy carpets. 

Let’s have some idea of benefits of digital marketing over conventional marketing: –

You can target your audience. 

You can target your audience by demographics, geographics, pscychographics, technographics and behavior attributes in digital marketing. There is also a needs-based audience. In conventional mediums like newspapers and TV, you don’t have such options. 

You get engaged with your audience at a higher rate.

You segment (segmentation explained in the articles ahead) your audience and target your audience in digital marketing, so your engagement is high. Whereas in conventional marketing mediums like newspapers or TV many thousands of attempts of engagement go wasted because you reach out to an audience who has no interest in your product. 

Conversion of the prospects is fast.

High rate of conversion naturally happens due to targeted market engagement. You are sending your messages directly to those prospects who really have interest in buying your product or service. 

Returns on Investment are easy to measure

ROIs is a great feature of digital marketing which does not exist in conventional marketing. You can keep an eye on the investment you are making on every medium and can easily measure the return 

Your reach is global

You can always target a global market in digital marketing whereas in convention marketing you have geographical constraints. Even if you own a small business, you have the power to reach the opposite side of the globe.

You can have diverse strategies for different businesses

Digital marketing gives you the advantage to launch different strategies for different types of businesses. You can target the global market with one strategy for an international business and a whole different strategy for a local business. You always have the option to tweak your strategy when you see the results.