Digital Marketing for small businesses has been evolving at a rapid pace for over a decade, and the last few years have seen an exponential explosion of tools, systems, platforms, tactics, ‘gurus’, and more. All of this to try and win the war on online dominance and prominence over one’s competition, in order to capture an audience that wants what you have to sell. On top of all of this, we have had privacy issues, data breaches to manage, and governments slapping us with rules and regulations on the management of our customer data. So, what’s an effective way of doing digital marketing?
So all of this means it’s crucial to do things with a plan and purpose, and not ad hoc or with a whimsical approach that leads to failure and disheartenment.
The key is to build trust (the same thing people have been trying to do since long before the digital age came about), and connect with customers in an ethical, honorable and authentic way. This has become increasingly difficult in our digital fast-paced world, so here we are focussing on just 3 things that are most often sought out and used by businesses to market their business online – digital marketing, and that we think are relevant for many reasons.
As always, we start with knowing thy ideal customer and knowing them really well. Once you do that, then the rest becomes so much easier!
Here are 3 widely used tactics that we want to highlight as being important and show how you can use these to connect as a modern business today:
1. Video Marketing
Did you know that over 75% of video is being watched on mobile devices, and by 2022 it is estimated that online video will make up over 80% of internet traffic?
Luckily there are many tools out there currently to help you create these video assets so you don’t need a professional arm of your business to produce high-end content (unless you really want to!).
Tools such as Biteable and Powtoon allow people to create videos easily and affordably.
Furthermore, you can use editing tools such as Camtasia or Final Cut Pro to add images, audio, graphics, and motion clips plus more.
Here are a few of the different types of videos you can create on your own or with help from a digital marketing agency:
– Event overview videos
– Webinars
– Live Q&As
– Introductions
– Behind the scenes videos
– Customer testimonials
– Product demos
– How-to videos
PLUS the ever-growing popular LIVE streaming. If the year of 2020 has shown us anything it’s that we can all still connect and communicate with the help of some LIVE streaming tools!
By using these tools you can communicate what’s happening from anywhere at any time.
You can bring thought leadership straight from your location through the camera to your audience, thereby offering them insight into you, your genius, your company culture and the opportunities are endless.
There really is nothing stopping anybody from using LIVE video in their marketing mix today to communicate and connect with their audience and customers
2. Is Display Advertising worthwhile?
The short answer to this is YES.
They are worthwhile when used in conjunction with a broader and more considered approach to the entire marketing activities. You’ve got to know WHY you are using it, and at what stage of your Business Growth cycle you are at.
So let’s say it is part of your Digital Marketing Strategy and you need to create some awareness in the marketplace of your products. First it’s important to ensure you understand your Ideal Customer in great detail so that you don’t mess around or waste money targeting the wrong people.
So get that right first, and then you’ll be able to ensure your Display Advertisements are working for you with the best ROI.
There are many different combinations of ad formats with different styles, sizes and formats.
You can use Static Ads that require you to design each individual ad – great for a specific thing that you need to control the content, location and graphics on – and there are Dynamic Ads that are smart ads that automatically adapt based on where they appear, such as your desktop website, a mobile website, app, etc.
Remember that display ad are often ignored by users and the CTR (Click Through Rates) can be as low as 1 percent! What’s more, a growing number of people are using ad blockers to browse the web and hence they never see ads on websites they visit.
So if you know your Ideal Client in detail it could give you a clue about whether they are one of these people or not!
So be sure to do the work to understand your Ideal Client first, and then bring the Display Ads into the mix when your Digital Marketing Strategy requires it.
3. Get the Testimonials Flowing
The number one way that people come to any business faster, easier and more prominently is via a testimonial.
Think about how many times a testimonial helped you purchase something you were considering buying?
If you are in a service-based business then a testimonial is even more critical, because people want a human-to-human reference and want to feel that they are making a decision based on another person’s 1st hand personal experience.
However these testimonials won’t just come to you magically, you will have to ask for them often!
Sometimes you’ll find that there are people who want to give you a testimonial because they’ve had such a good experience, and these are the people you need to say YES to quickly, and even consider creating a video testimonial to further compound the validity and power of their testimonial.
Be proactive and ask for one shortly after delivery of your product or service.
You can also do this after they’ve paid, or even after a longer period – but you need to capture the emotion of their experience at the time that they’re living it!
Consider adding quotes into your website and email signature, so it’s always on display and people will see those powerful 1-liners from your satisfied customers.
You can also build in an automatic email to ask people to leave you a Google, Facebook or LinkedIn review.
Some people do all 3, and use the same message in each of them.
Remember that the more reviews you have in these social platforms, the more that the platform algorithm sees you as an expert and will show you to more people in their searches.
There are many steps and facets to boosting one’s marketing, these are just a few popular and widely used tactics and elements.
We recommend you start by focussing on understanding who your customer is in a very deep and detailed way, that way everything you do will link back to them and not be wasteful or unwanted.
If you need more information, please feel free to contact us!
