What Are The Best 12 Types Of Digital Marketing For A Business?
Digital marketing is the surest marketing strategy for business owners looking to achieve meaningful results online. In other words, digital marketing is any form of marketing performed on the internet. So what are the best types of digital marketing?
When your goal is to boost traffic, attract the right audience or client, develop brand awareness, and promote team engagement, understanding the types of digital marketing is the key to scale.
We created this post to help you learn about the different digital marketing types, their goals and benefits, and how to put them into effective use.
Best 12 Types Of Digital Marketing
1. Content Marketing
Consumers are always looking for information that will solve their problems or fulfill their needs.
If you put the information they’re looking for right in front of them, they’ll gain more confidence in your brand and what you have to offer.
The right information will put your business in a position of authority and your brand will be the first option that comes into their mind when they want to make a decision. This is what content marketing is all about.
It’s all about providing valuable answers to your audience’s queries with high-quality content.
The contents can be in the form of emails, blogs, social media content, and more.
Some mobile devices also have specific formats like push notifications and apps. Each channel may require a specific format.
You can achieve the objectives through content types like ebooks, blog posts, videos, datasheets, infographics, and more. You can also create a Funnel for your content marketing strategy.
For instance, the top of the funnel should contain general info like an in-depth guide.
The bottom should have more specific content like testimonials.
Because of these parameters – type, format, channel – it’s up to you to choose the type of content to put in front of your potential customers.
Content marketing can serve various purposes. But they’re more useful for converting visitors into leads.
2. SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
When you publish content on your site, organic searchers must be able to find it easily.
That’s where SEO comes in.
Known as Search Engine Optimization, SEO determines whether your content will rank on the first page of a search engine for a particular keyword.
SEO application starts with the keyword(s) that your potential audience is typing in the search box when searching for a particular subject or query.
Then you can create your content around these search terms. A search Engine Journal research found that websites listed on the first page of Google take up to 91.5% of the internet traffic. More than half of web traffic comes from organic searches.
You can conquer organic traffic by pumping out high-quality SEO-friendly content based on search queries.
3. SMM (Social Media Marketing)
SMM, also called Social Media Marketing, is one of the types of digital marketing that involves the promotion of a product, service, brand, or content through social media platforms. Like Search Engine Marketing, SMM can be performed organically, with paid ads, or implemented with both strategies.
You can promote your content or ads organically, promote on social media and set up a paid ad that reaches your desired audience.
Regardless of the strategy, the key is to go for the best social network that’ll reflect your brand, persona, and content.
One of the biggest advantages of social media marketing is that it allows you to put your content/offer directly in front of your audience while promoting easy interaction with them. SSM allows you to easily gain audience validation through the content you share.
Furthermore, social media platforms allow you to communicate directly with your audience.
Hence, you need to regularly keep them updated with the latest info and monitor their behaviors.
4. Paid Advertising
There are multiple ways to pay for advertising. It totally comes down to your desired advertising media. For instance, you can set up paid ads for social media or on search engines like Bing and Google.
Businesses who set up paid ads appear on top of the search engine result page which is usually above the organic results. They’re easily recognizable with the “Ad” favicon.
Payment models differ, depending on the type of digital marketing. However, the most common of them include:
- Cost-per-Mile (CPM): CPM is also another commonly used model. It’s a preferable option for marketers targeting a short-tail keyword.
- Pay per click (PPC): Pay per click is the most common payment model used for ads and it usually cuts across all types of digital marketing. Ideally, the PPC model is about paying for what you use.
You buy a certain amount of clicks for your ads.
5. Email marketing
People send a lot of email messages every day (even with that, some still think email marketing doesn’t work).
Email marketing is one of the most effective types of digital marketing models that can provide your desired result if used strategically.
And you can achieve that by keeping your subscriber updated with not just the latest but also valuable information.
You can promote your product and service via email messages as long as you don’t break the privacy rules and don’t spam.
Email is a critical part of the inbound marketing strategy’s success. Automating this process allows you to walk your audience through the marketing funnel for success.
In addition, email marketing allows you to directly communicate with your list.
6. Instant Message Marketing
Many people are beginning to embrace the use of digital marketing tools like instant messaging apps.
Apart from WhatsApp, virtually all social media platforms have their instant messaging version which is a huge plus for business marketing.
Your clients can easily reach out to you for questions, inquiries, and support, which creates a positive impression of your customer care service. It also helps facilitate a stronger bond between your business and its customers.
A recent Statistia research found that more than 1.6 billion people use WhatsApp which indicates the strength of this platform. So you don’t want to ignore the underlying benefits of this powerful digital marketing.
If your business requires regular availability to customers, do not underestimate the power of instant messengers.
7. Affiliate Marketing
In affiliate marketing, affiliates receive a commission for every conversion/sales they get from advertising a product or a service. They’re like a part of a business sales team. They create relevant content based on your product/service and direct people to buy your product or use your service by clicking on a unique affiliate link that directs them to your page.
If they click and make a purchase through the link, they’ll receive an agreed fraction of the payment (affiliate commission). The biggest perk of affiliate marketing is that it doesn’t necessarily require a large audience.
As with social media marketing, what’s important is choosing the right audience that fits into the promoted product and service.
8. Influence Marketing
Influence marketing is performed by digital influencers.
Let’s explain who digital influencers are. These are experts in a particular subject with a large audience of people interested in the subject.
Digital influencers can create content for your brand and share it with their audience as long as it is within their audience reach. They can publicly test your product and show the result they get from using your product.
This means they can either make or mar your brand. Many brands are utilizing the underlying benefits of influencing marketing and getting the right result.
However, they come with certain risks – the influencer’s process may negatively affect your image. On the good side, their follower’s loyalty may rake in new clients for your brand.
9. Mobile Marketing
In today’s marketing world, mobile marketing is super important if your goal is to reach out to customers. According to Google research, 27% of people across the world use the mobile voice search feature.
In addition, the research also states that apart from loyalty, immediacy is also important. And immediacy is measured by the ability to solve a problem from the comfort of a smartphone.
Mobile marketing is more than just digital marketing trends.
It is a strategy every digital marketer must implement when dealing with customers. You can invest in mobile marketing by:
- Creating an app; spreading push notifications to connect with the audience.
- Implementing instant messenger marketing; direct communication to the public
- Offering products and services based on geolocalization, and flow with your customers.
- Utilizing SMS marketing; updating the audience with interesting content.
10. Video Marketing
Think with Google, a popular blog found that, every month, more than 2 billion people look up to YouTube for information.
News, comedy, entertainment, how-to guide, and more are great ways to reach out to attract new customers.
Video marketing is a result-driven digital marketing strategy that can be implemented in all facets of the marketing funnel, including emails and blog posts.
People look up videos for many reasons like accessing credible reviews of a particular product or service.
80% of potential buyers look up the search engine and videos to learn more about a product/service and past users’ experiences.
About 55% of potential customers do this prior to purchasing.
This is a highly beneficial way of making sales.
11. Audio Marketing
In this mobile marketing age, it’s not surprising why marketers are switching to audio marketing. Although they don’t have the prowess of video, podcasts, for example, have gained huge traction.
Podcasts are becoming a modern replacement of the traditional radio, especially for people who engage in regular transit or those who work out. Understand the interest of your target audience and create a podcast that relates to your audience’s activities.
Then you can introduce your product or service that may eventually turn into a big sale.
12. Virtual Reality Marketing
Abbreviated as VR, Virtual reality has already come to stay and implemented by digital marketers to grow the audience.
It allows the public to have an immersive experience of your product and service. Virtual Reality marketing creates an unforgettable experience for people while building a unique impression of your brand.
This technology involves the creation of a fake (but realistic) environment. VR can be multi-sensory or visual, which depends on the device.
Types of Digital Marketing FAQ
What are the benefits of digital marketing?
There are several benefits of implementing different types of digital marketing for businesses.
One of them is global reach. With a small investment, a website can allow you to operate globally and discover new markets for your business.
A well-planned digital marketing campaign can target the ideal audience at a minimal investment.
Web analytics through digital marketing allows you to track your results. That way you can measure the effectiveness of your campaign.
Which Type of Digital Marketing Is Best For Your Business?
Content marketing is the best type of digital marketing for businesses.
And that’s because the content is the foundation of every other type of digital marketing campaign. Email, blog posts, ads, and sales copy all require huge quality content to thrive.
Summary
Phew! So here are 12 of the best types of digital marketing that can be implemented on your website. Of course, you don’t want to do everything at once. Else, you may risk burning out.
Consider your goal, your audience and where they hang out….then implement one of these digital marketing strategies to reach out to them.
