Do you want to dominate your industry or niche digitally for the coming year and into the 2020s? If you do wish to do so then read on.
1.Optimize Your Email Strategy
Email is 50 years old but it seems that it isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. According to HubSpot, about 80 percent of marketers have increased their email engagement over the past 12 months. One of the major benefits of using emails in your marketing is the fact that email marketing has the highest return on investment for small businesses. However, to enjoy the benefits of email marketing, you have to ensure that your email is well-crafted with concise copy and an engaging message.
One of the things that makes email marketing effective is the fact that you can make your email strategy match your target audience. For instance, marketers regularly use the holiday season to offer their customers incentives like discount codes to a customer who visited their website and left with an item in the shopping cart.
2.Use the AIDA Formula
It is good to use the AIDA formula which stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action. The description from Lucidchart below will show you how you can use the AIDA formula for digital marketing.
AIDA has been around for many years. In fact, it has been around since 1898 but it is still effective. The AIDA formula can be used with almost all marketing channels to grab the attention of those reading, create a sense of want, stir their emotions and offer them a solution to the problem they are experiencing. It is good to use this formula when marketing a small business as it is very effective.
3.Use Video Marketing
Video marketing works. This is what has made video a driving force for digital marketing and it looks like this trend is not going away anytime soon. Research shows that by 2021, 82% of consumer internet traffic will be videos. Live and branded video are among the most popular trends in video marketing and people are finding new and interesting ways to grab the attention of their audience with videos.
Videos need to be central to your marketing campaign efforts. If you are not using video marketing, you are likely falling behind. Video production is more cost-effective as you can shoot high-quality videos with your smartphone.
The good thing about live video is that it is interactive and enables the audience to be part of the conversation as they can call in or leave a comment that can be answered during the live video session. Live video draws longer streams and higher engagement rates as viewers spend more time watching live videos than video-on-demand.
As such, live video is one of the best ways to engage your audience. Estimates show that by 2021, 13% of all video traffic will be live video. This makes live video a good strategy for those businesses that often think outside the box.
There are very many lead generation tools and strategies that you can use to market your business including cold outreach, live chat, social media, and pop-up forms.
Creating a product description, how-to or an explainer video is not as expensive as it may look like. All you have to do to create such videos is to look for a good camera and microphone or use your smartphone. And the good thing is that there are powerful editing apps that can help you create videos that look professional.
So, there is no need to spend a lot of money on expensive editing tools. Keep in mind that spending less when it comes to marketing is very important as spending less will help you get a positive ROI which will increase your profits.
A video that is well-thought, informative, and offers a solution to a problem a customer is experiencing is likely to generate more search traffic for a website. If you would like to increase the viewership of a video you upload on YouTube, optimize with relevant keyboards.
The title of your video should sound unique and engaging. For instance, “Learn how to tie the perfect bow tie” is a better title than “Learn how to tie a bow tie”. Even if there are many YouTube videos on a similar subject matter, making the content unique is very important. Being unique is what will make people want to watch your video as it uniqueness will make it stand out.
4.Use Novel Content
The content of your video will act as currency for your marketing strategies. Creating articles and blogs can help you generate traffic but just writing informative content will not suffice. Businesses have known the importance of engaging their target audience alongside educational content.
Novel content has become increasingly popular. This type of content is being put along with the conventional content of articles, blogs, videos, and eBooks. Just like videos, creating engaging content is also possible through quizzes, polls, and contests, where the target audience vote or share their opinions on a certain subject. However, you should ensure that the content is relevant to your business.
Expiring content, which may have been inspired by the Snapchat model continues to become more and more popular among young people. Expiring content remains on your social media or website for a certain amount of time before it is removed. Such content creates a sense of urgency in readers and makes them take action. If you want to entice your audience using expiring content, consider including a discount code to your content that is displayed for a limited amount of time before it is removed.
5.You Need to Know About the Difference Between Marketing and Branding
If you want to invest in online marketing, you need to know the difference between marketing and branding. Sometimes, these two terms are used interchangeably but have different meanings. Your brand isn’t going to be the product or service you offer but the website design, logo, and message across all platforms that you send to your customers. In other words, branding is how your potential customers will perceive your business.
Digital marketing on the other hand use tactics that are meant to reinforce your branding efforts. This means that your marketing efforts need to enhance your brand’s message and not have the opposite effect. A good brand message inspires, persuades, motivates, and makes your target audience want to buy a certain product.
However, small businesses make the mistake of using marketing campaigns that focus more on the product or service they offer instead of crafting a brand message that resonates and building a community on social media platforms.
Apart from earning a sale, your brand messaging should earn a loyal, lifelong customer. Marketing your product or service on social media won’t enable you to create a community of loyal followers. It may also negatively affect your brand’s overall appeal to your audience.
