What is Digital Marketing & Why do we need it
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Today, we discuss: What is Digital Marketing and Why Go Digital? Why Digital Marketing is the Best Thing. So, let’s go for it! Don’t forget to order a coffee because this article is long. If you want to learn digital marketing, you have to read it to the end.
Did you Google something today or check your Facebook? Maybe you saw that funny video that went viral yesterday, or you read the tweet by that famous cricketer. If you did, then you are a part of the digital world, along with 3 billion other people, which is 40% of the world’s population. Wow, that’s a large number! Wherever there is a huge number of people, there is a huge marketing opportunity.
Understanding Digital Marketing
- Identify the need to go digital.
- Digital Marketing Objectives and Best Practices.
What is digital marketing? Its scope, channels, and the need to go digital. Why do companies have to include digital marketing as part of their overall marketing strategy? And of course, the basic objectives of digital marketing.
What is Digital Marketing?
As I mentioned before, there are 3 billion people online today, which is close to 40% of the world’s population. Who are these people? What are they doing? How are they doing it?
- 43% of these people are browsing the internet through their computers or desktops.
- 52%, which is a huge number, are scrolling through their mobile phones. The smartphone revolution has made this possible.
- 4% do so through tablets.
You will be surprised to know that of the total time spent on media, whether electronic or otherwise, 54% of the time is spent on online media. 28% is on social media, primarily Facebook, 13% is on microblogging, primarily Twitter, and the rest is a mix of updating blogs, reading news, watching TV or online, and other activities.
What does it mean when people are spending so much time on media? There is a huge opportunity for you to reach out to them during that time.
Advertising and Budget Trends
This is a result you will see on this graph: budgets for paid search advertising and display advertising, both of which are fundamentals of digital marketing, have been increasing over the years. This year, it is estimated that there will be a spend of 225 billion dollars. The increase in digital spend is almost three times the increase in total ad expenditure. For marketing, when we spoke about search advertising, where is this money being spent? This again is related to where the time is being spent.
This graph shows that the Google search engine has the largest chunk, followed by Baidu, Yahoo, and Bing. When people invest in search advertising, they put up ads on the Search Network. I’ll show you what I’m talking about. This is a Google search engine results page for a query like “office box for women” or “online shopping in Bangladesh.” You will notice that apart from the organic results that you see on the page, which are way down the page, the ads dominate. These are sponsored results, and you will see a slight yellowish-orange tag indicating that they are ads.
What happens if I have found a website that I want to go to, and then I leave the search engine page? This is what happens in this case. I was looking for sites about “Breaking News of Bangladesh” and came to this website, but there’s an opportunity for me to see ads here on Priyo.com as well. So there you go. How’s this for intention? 28% of your time is spent on social media. Facebook has space for ads too.
Email Marketing
Email marketing is another important branch. Have you ever received emails about discounts from Priyo.com or online shopping on Daraz? If you have, you know what I’m talking about. Why are 3 billion people online?
Why Digital Marketing is the Best Thing & Why Go Digital?
What is it about digital media that is attracting everyone? Let’s see that in detail.
Multiple Channels and Devices
- Wide range of sites, social media.
- Cross-device integration.
Digital media offers multiple channels and devices to do what they want. They have a wide range of sites and social media to connect with and maintain relationships. This cross-device integration means you can start on a desktop, continue on a mobile device, and end on your tablet.
Better Decision Making
- Lots of choices.
- Deep discounts and offers.
Better decision-making is another advantage. There are a huge number of choices. If you want to buy a bag, there are ten sites that’ll offer you one, with five sites probably offering better discounts than what you can get at the store.
Easy to Buy and Return
- Quick purchase.
- Multiple payment options.
- Door delivery and easy returns.
It’s easy to buy and return items online. They are delivered to your home, and if you want to return them, in most cases, they will pick them up as well. With various payment gateways, buying online is easier than ever before.
Advantages for Marketers
There are lots of reasons why digital marketing is advantageous for marketers.
Relevance
I will compare this to traditional advertising. If you are driving down a road and see a hoarding about, let’s say, jewelry, you may or may not want to buy jewelry at that point. You may not have the money for it or may not be in the mood for it. But if you are looking online and want to buy rings or jewelry, and you see relevant ads, that has an extremely high degree of relevance compared to the hoarding you see on the road.
Personalization
Google, Facebook, and other sites collect a lot of information about you, which is legal. They can use this information to create a better advertising experience for you. You might see emails where your name is highlighted, or ads based on your previous browsing history. For example, if you have been shopping for diapers for your kid, you might see ads suggesting new diapers.
Cost-effectiveness
Cost-effectiveness is a big driver for digital marketing. Traditional media has become super expensive over time. Placing an ad in the newspaper or buying a hoarding for a month requires a large outlay of money. Digital marketing can probably be started with one-tenth of that investment.
High Measurability
Digital media is an extremely measurable medium. Unlike the example of the road hoarding, where you don’t know how many people saw the ad, visited your store, or bought the item, digital media allows you to track everything to the very last click. You will know how many people came to your site, where they came from, what they saw, what they bought, and if they will come back again.
Scalability
Digital campaigns are extremely scalable. If I create a campaign for Bangladesh today, I can easily replicate it for India tomorrow. There are no permissions involved, no time involved. It’s all done within a few clicks.
Scope for Higher Engagement
How engaged can you be with a hoarding on the road? Can you talk about it and change it? You can’t, but you can be super engaged with an interactive ad that you see on a website. You can make characters in the ads do different things by clicking a mouse around. That is engagement.
Level Playing Field
Digital marketing levels the playing field. If I were a small business, I wouldn’t have the money to compete with a large national player. But in digital marketing, you can decide where your ads will show, how many people they will reach, and if your ads are of high quality, you might end up paying less than the bigger players in your market.
Ability to Go Viral
Digital marketing has the ability to go viral. How many of your friends ever passed down a paper cutting to you and said, “Wow, look at this ad?” Not likely, but a lot of them must have shared a wonderful ad on their Facebook profiles. That multiplies and is free advertising.
Digital Marketing Objectives and Best Practices
According to Neil Patel, when identifying specific marketing objectives or digital marketing objectives to support your long-term marketing plan, it is common practice to apply the widely used SMART model. But today, I am going to share something new that I learned from my career and experience with brands like Bata and VisitVikings. Let’s look at the objectives of digital marketing.
Awareness (Increase Brand Awareness)
If you’re a small brand or have a huge plan that nobody knows about, or you are introducing a new product or a new addition to your product line, and you want to increase brand awareness, digital marketing is the answer. Increasing brand awareness is one of the key objectives of digital marketing.
Acquisition
For businesses that are not really selling a product and don’t need sales or leads, or are not advertising a product but just want people to come to their site, digital marketing can drive traffic. This could be a news site, a blog about digital marketing in Bangladesh, or business news. Basically, you’re driving people to your site.
Conversion
This is direct response marketing where your campaigns get people to buy something from your website. In some cases, they may not want to buy something but probably convert to a lead, where they sign up for news or a subscription.
Best Practices of Digital Marketing and User Behavior
User behavior is an important factor in digital advertising. There is a difference between how it is treated in traditional media and digital media. Let’s look at a few factors that matter in digital marketing.
List of Best Practices and User Behavior for Digital Marketing
- First Page of the Results There’s a digital marketing quote that I read the other day: the best place to bury someone is on the second page of results because they’re never going to be found. If you are not on the first page in search engine results, nobody is ever going to click in and see your ads. So it’s important to be in the midst of action, which is on the first page.
- First Fold of Website The first fold is the part of the website that you see without scrolling down. Most people are not involved enough to scroll down, so if you want your message to be heard, it’s important to be in the first fold.
- The Right Mix of Text and Images We need the right mix of text and images. Too much text will make it look like a newspaper, too bookish, and too many images will look like clutter. In fact, there’s a term called “banner blindness” where the brain is attuned to tuning out stuff that looks like too many ads. So you need to have the right mix of text and images.
- Clarity of Content Someone who comes to your website needs to understand what your website is all about. They shouldn’t have to click through five or six links to get the gist of what your site is about. It needs to be upfront, clear, and easy to understand.
- Clear Call to Action A call to action is a signal to the user about what they should do. Do you want them to buy something? Sign up somewhere? Provide their email ID? Unless you tell them clearly, they won’t be able to understand. So, please use a clear call-to-action button.
- Quick and Easy Navigation Quick and easy navigation is very important. Have you ever been to websites where you try hitting the back button but end up exiting the site? A user needs to understand how to move from one page to another on the site. Home button, back button, all this will help.
- Security Security is a major concern because there are lots of commercial transactions happening on the web where you provide your credit card details. You don’t want to be hacked or end up spending a lot of money unintentionally. Security is important in creating a secure atmosphere for your users.
- Responsiveness In this world of social media, people expect you to talk back to them. Brands have a very important responsibility to respond to users. If someone posts on a brand’s page that they didn’t receive a product or it was bad, it’s important for the brand to respond and say, “We’re sorry” or “We will look into it.” If you don’t respond, it leaves a bitter taste in the user’s mouth. So watch out for responsiveness.
Conclusion
Online user behavior and their expectations must be incorporated into digital marketing. So guys, don’t forget to share this on social media. Oops, please comment below on what you want to learn next in digital marketing.
