When talking about digital marketing, it seems that there are so many platforms and channels available these days. However, while it’s easy to get excited about broadcasting your message through every channel and on as many platforms as possible, you must remember the fundamentals of marketing.
Today, we want to go over those foundational elements so that you can plan and execute your outreach to greatest result. It’s no good to spread your advertising across dozens of channels if you don’t know how to work through each one. Before branching out, familiarize yourself with these marketing details.
Online Traffic
For the most part, building your audience means drawing people to your website. Ideally, the various platforms you utilize will act as a funnel to increase your site traffic. However, not all traffic is the same. While it’s great to boost your numbers from 100 per day to 1000, for example, you have to pay closer attention to a few elements:
● Where Did the Traffic Originate? – Typically, search engine optimization (SEO) will be your best friend here. However, other sources can include social media and email landing pages. Pay attention to the sources of traffic and how those visitors behave in terms of time on site, page views, purchases to see if you can identify and translate best practices from one platform to another.
● What’s Your Click-Through Rate (CTR)? – Getting more visitors is only worth something if they stick around. If a lot of visitors “bounce” back to their search or close the window it may mean that your pages are not enticing enough, are too slow, or that you are optimizing keywords that aren’t connecting with the right audience. Pay attention to your CTR, and see how you can improve it.
● Which Elements Capture the Most Attention? – You should be able to generate a “heatmap” of your site to see where visitors are spending the most time. If your calls to action are getting a lot of clicks, for example, you’re doing well. Let the heat map guide your layout decisions as well.
Web Presence and Optimization
These days, more and more people are using smartphones to go online. In fact, 2019 was the first year that more shoppers bought goods on mobile devices than a computer. This means that your website has to be optimized for smaller screens. If not, then you’re leaving a huge chunk of business on the table.
For 2020 and beyond, there is no excuse for businesses to avoid mobile optimization. Either you’ll get with the times, or you’ll get left behind. Overall, you should take a mobile-first approach to your site layout – this mentality will help you identify any problem areas and correct them.
Social Media Feed
Some of the most valuable marketing channels are social media apps and sites. Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram can capture massive audiences, so you need to be utilizing them as much as possible. However, if you’re not getting as much traffic as you’d like, now is the perfect time to assess the situation. Here are a few tips for boosting your social presence.
● High-Quality Content – consumers have little time to pay attention to any one thing. You need to create captivating material that will encourage clicks and shares.
● Consistency – one post every few weeks won’t build an audience. You need to be posting three to ten times per week, depending on platform and your target audience’s approach to content, to keep up the momentum.
● Engagement – you want to get more likes, shares, and comments on your posts, right? Well, you need to give as good as you get. Businesses that don’t engage with users are less likely to build a loyal following.
Social Media Traffic = Paid Ads
One of the best reasons to start incorporating social sites into your marketing strategy is that you get access to tons of user data. These platforms can provide valuable insight into your customer base, which you can use to your advantage.
However, gone are the days of organic audience growth over night. You can still focus on organic growth with high quality content, but it will take months or years to build a broad follower base. Following on the heels of quality content, utilizing paid ads or boosted posts targeting people likely to follow based on your content can jumpstart your audience development. Fortunately, each site allows you to customize your ads and your budget to suit your marketing needs. We highly recommend running multiple campaigns to cast a wider net.
As you build audience, pay attention to engagement rates, page views, page previews and reach to see how your message is getting in front of people.
Customer Loyalty and Engagement
It’s not enough to bring people to your website – you have to keep them coming back for more. No matter which way you slice it, retaining existing customers is always more profitable than finding new ones. Here are a few ways to engage with your clientele more effectively.
● Subscriber Lists – categorize your customers according to how their behavior matches your marketing objectives. Identify them by interests, purchase history, demographics – whatever you need to craft unique messages that will stick.
● Drip Campaigns – email marketing is still excellent at retaining customers because it allows you to follow up regularly. Even though someone may not be interested in your business now, that can change in the future. Consistent marketing helps increase the chances the prospective customer thinks of you when the time comes.
Site Engagement
Overall, you want your customers remain engaged with your brand as much as possible, not just when they are buying something. One of the best ways to drive repeat traffic to your website is content marketing. A few examples include:
● Business Blog – craft articles about both your business and the industry at large. Become a reliable resource for your customers, and they’ll come to you more often.
● Video Content – video clips capture an audience’s attention more than text or images. Create various videos that you can share on different platforms, including social media.
● Linking – you don’t always have to create the content yourself. Share valuable pieces from news sites, quality journals and magazines that add real interest and value, and your audience will pay attention.
Marketing Customization
As we mentioned above, categorizing your customers into different subscriber lists can help you engage them better. Custom offers are more likely to draw attention, and part of that is remaining attuned to your audience’s wants and needs as they evolve over time. In addition to email marketing, use feedback surveys and follow-ups to gauge how well your brand is retained, perceived, described by others and acted upon by people. These details can help shape future marketing messages.
Let Green Vine Marketing Help
Broadcasting your business across multiple channels can do wonders for a business when there’s thought, structure and follow through on each campaign. At Green Vine Marketing, we cover the fundamentals and go beyond to help you craft a more compelling message and follow up as needed. Let’s start a conversation today!
