The Beginner’s Guide to Digital Marketing for Small Businesses!

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INTRODUCTION

The world of digital marketing is flourishing at a very rapid pace. It has emerged as a paradigm changer in the marketing. Most of the business owners probably have heard about the term digital marketing and many of them are even utilizing it to unleash the full business potential. No matter what type of business your run, digital marketing has the sheer power to elevate your business online presence and plays a huge role in the success.

Digital marketing is actually fun and a way better medium than TV or newspaper ads for your business marketing. Not only it is extremely cost-effective, but also it is the quickest way to communicate with the vast number of users and uplift the value of your business.

WHY DIGITAL MARKETING?

Digital Marketing for Small Businesses
Digital Marketing for Small Businesses
Digital Marketing for Small Businesses

With every passing day, more and more individuals from around the world are marking their presence on the internet. Moreover, according to a survey by the prestigious consulting firm, more than 80% of the internet users prefer the online mode of shopping. This colossal number of an untapped user base in no less than a gold mine for the small business owners to expand their business beyond the specific geographical conditions and generate the jaw-dropping amount of revenues.

In the current scenario, it is quite cumbersome for the small business owners to target the audiences with traditional and blunt marketing methods. Digital marketing is that super-sonic missile that can fulfill your business objectives expeditiously and make a substantial impact on the business growth.

STEP 1 – Understanding Various Digital Marketing Channels

Digital Marketing Channels
The first and perhaps the foremost step when you step into the realm of digital marketing is to get familiar with the distinct marketing channels. Garnering the noteworthy amount of knowledge of various digital channels will help you to devise the perfect marketing strategy that takes your business to the zenith. Let’ discuss the various marketing channels along with pros and cons respectively.

1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)-

Search Engine OptimizationPresumably, the most celebrated as well the most used term in the digital marketing fraternity. SEO or better-called search engine optimization is a highly effectual marketing strategy to enhance your business online visibility on the major search engines without much of a hitch. It is a method to generate the organic traffic.

How It Works –

SEO elementsVarious SEO elements like are utilized to make your website search engine friendly and boost traffic and visibility. In a nutshell, it’s all about providing maximum exposure to your online business and pull the users to buy your product and services.

Pros –

  • 1. Search engines are also known as the gateway to customer devices.
  • 2. Making your website visible on search engines means allowing the millions of people to interact with your business and ensure the monumental growth.
  • 3. SEO done meticulously brings flabbergasting and stable results.

Cons –

  • 1. SEO is surely not a recommended marketing strategy to the small business owners who are looking for towering growth within a short span of time.
  • 2. SEO requires a substantial amount of time, planning, and investment to keep up the pace.
  • 3. If you don’t have much time to invest, SEO is not for you.

2. Social Media Marketing –

Social Media MarketingIn a layman language, social media marketing is all about marketing your business online at the key social networking platforms. In today’s word, a huge chunk of people are on the social media platforms but barely handful of the individuals knows how to market their business on the social media. Digital marketing services harness social media platforms to market your products, deeply engross with the users, and encourage them to become loyal customers.

How It Works

– You can easily pull the users by creating the comprehensive brand-centric contents and publishing them on all the major social platforms. With SMM services you can extensively promote your business. The best part about social media marketing is you don’t need to spend a penny to promote your business, just create the account and start promoting your business.
Small business owners can also go for paid social media campaigns and target much larger audience seamlessly. There is no limit for the campaign budget but, as soon as you run out of it, you will stop getting the benefits.

Social Media Marketing

Pros –

As there is no dearth of users on social media followers, SMM is an excellent strategy for massive promotion without spending a dime. Moreover, SMM is an efficacious way to strengthen your business roots at the local level.

Cons –

Social media accounts are more prone to security breaches and also it is daunting to measure the return on investment in social media marketing.

3. Pay Per Click Marketing (PPC) –

Consider by many as one of the best and quickest ways to promote your business online effortlessly. Just like the SEO and SMO, PPC has its own share of pros and cons. Unlike the other marketing channels, Business owners leverage the PPC marketing by placing their ads on relevant websites to target the particular segment of the audience.

Pay Per Click Marketing
Pay Per Click Marketing

How It Works –

The whole process revolves around bidding system. Advertisers bid on the terms also known as ‘Keywords’ to display their ads for the goods and services to the users who are searching the relevant queries in the search engines. Search engines determine the relevancy of the advertisements and place it accordingly on the SERPs.

Pros –

Undoubtedly, PPC provides the super quick results and it is quite easy to track the conversions and ROI with the help of tracking code which is one of the most fascinating features of the PPC marketing. Moreover, it exposes your business enormously on both local and global level.

Cons –

Ads disappear as soon as your PPC marketing campaign ends. Also, there is no surety about conversions even though you place ads at the relevant websites. If you are tight on the budget, you can’t afford to have PPC marketing.

Step 2 – Analysis

Once you get conversant with all the digital marketing channels and pick up the one among them, next crucial step is to identify your customers. A crystal clear understanding of the target audience will help you to set up the realistic and achievable marketing goals & also make it easier to allocate the budget. Here are some pivotal factors to identify the ideal customer base.

Pay Per Click Marketing Analysis
Pay Per Click Marketing Analysis

Age –

Ask yourself a question that the product and services you are offering designed for any particular age group? If the answer is yes then you need to start accumulating data of that age group for the business.

Location –

So many business owners ask the question that how the location is relevant to the online mode of business? If you are running an online business, you can use various tools to check from which location your majority of the traffic is coming. You can request the customers for their valuable feedback and also provide lucrative discount offers to pull them.

Price Slab –

What you are selling is equally important as at what price you are selling. Are your goal to sell luxurious products at a high cost that only a particular segment can afford or are you want to pull the huge chunk of customers by offering low-cost products. You should have a clear idea of margin and how much profit you want to extract.

The crystal clear understanding of your customer base will help you to pick up the right digital marketing channel and reach the targeted customer base.

STEP 3 – Action

Now it’s high time to run the marathon. To invigorate your business, you need to utilize various internet marketing methods to strengthen its online presence. The first and the foremost step is to devise the gripping and user-friendly website. It is through the medium of website, users will engross with your business and get to know what your business is offering them.

Set up social media accounts at key platforms and harness their USPs to gloat about your business. Use social media accounts to educate users about your business product and services and how buying them will impact their lives. Create a brand logo and put it up all the platforms and frequently add new and compelling contents to make the customers aware of everything related to your brand.

Perform SEO on the website to enhance the digital footfalls manifold times. The combination of SEO and SMO strategies can quickly bring the target keywords at the top in search engine result page and push the users to click through.

If you keep promoting your business consistently through the means of various marketing channels and implement effectual strategies on the timely basis then within a short amount of time your online business will deliver you the unimaginable results.

Start Your Digital Journey Today!