Nowadays, we hear a lot about digital marketing from different quarters. Why?
Mainly because a lot of things change very quickly in this industry. Technology is evolving. Consumer behavior changes minute by minute. What is popular today may not be next month. All this represents a great challenge for online stores. How to keep up with all this?
At the same time, we constantly follow success stories and see that it is realistic that we can succeed with our online store more than we even dare to imagine. After all, if others can succeed, why can’t we?
Everything starts with a good foundation (brand, analysis of the situation, competition, and the right strategy). Effective digital marketing is a profitable investment in increasing sales and long-term brand building and connecting with target customers. It allows even the smallest to become big.
In the following, we would like to explain to you what digital marketing is and help you become familiar with the different digital marketing channels that you should focus on in your online strategy to increase online sales and simultaneously build quality and a recognizable brand.
What is digital marketing?
Digital marketing refers to advertising through digital channels such as search engines, websites, social media, email, and mobile applications. The power of digital marketing is tremendous. You can reach millions of users in a few hours and a few clicks.
Why is digital marketing so important for online stores?
Users are no longer only watching content while sitting at their desks. Now they do it on the go or while multitasking. They generally overlook a lot of things – they get distracted by notifications and even the phone battery has a hard time keeping up with their usage. All of this presents a huge challenge for online stores of all sizes around the world.
On average, users “scroll” as much as 190m per day on their mobile phones. Therefore, it is crucial that your ads are in the right place, carry the right message value, and, as a result, attract their attention.
How to capture attention?
- We don’t watch TV the same way we used to. Now it has been replaced by Youtube or Netflix.
- We don’t listen to the radio like we used to. It has now been replaced by podcasts or Spotify.
- We don’t read newspapers as much as we used to. It has now been replaced by social networks, email, apps, and websites.
- We don’t pay as much attention to giant billboards as we used to. Now they have been replaced by a small screen in our hand.
This is where digital marketing shines. The only way to comprehensively reach potential customers and market your products today is to use various digital marketing channels.
9 digital marketing channels for an online store
As we all know, without planning, there is no success. The same is true in digital marketing, which is why you need your own digital strategy first. It should foresee all planned activities, steps, campaigns, services, solutions, tactics, and tools for your success in the digital reality.
How do successful online stores manage to integrate all channels into their marketing strategy?
So that they don’t just focus on one channel and ignore the others. The combination of all working channels brings them success.
Please note that new channels will be introduced in the future, but you should make sure you are on top of the following:
1. Website optimization (SEO)
Why not be among the first on Google? This gives you free clicks, increased visibility, and new leads! According to PowerReviews, 35% of consumers start their shopping journey with a Google search.
It is crucial to ensure that your online store is optimized for search engines. When changing search algorithms, it is necessary to strive for good on-site and off-site SEO and constantly monitor the results and upgrade the level of optimization.
With long-term optimization, you can achieve excellent visibility of your website for relevant keywords and authority in your field.
2. Paid advertising on search engines (SEM / PPC)
If you’re looking for immediate results and just can’t wait to start showing up in search engines (it usually takes 3-6 months to see significant traffic from SEO), SEM or paid search (PPC) is a great choice.
Google Ads is a great way to target search queries and is among the leading paid search channels that you should focus on. In Google Ads, you can specify the exact search terms for which you want your ad to appear. Due to the PPC model, you only pay if the user also clicks on the ad, thus ensuring that you only pay for those ads that bring the user to your online store.
3. E-mail marketing
Email is still one of the most effective digital marketing channels, providing a positive return on investment. Research says that the average return on investment in e-mail marketing is as much as 1:39!
It plays a huge role in the customer’s shopping experience. Users can email questions about products or request general information about your company. You can also remind customers about their abandoned shopping carts and much more.
While automated emails can certainly help you increase sales, scheduled email campaigns can help you communicate brand value and current/upcoming promotions.
For more effective e-mail marketing, we recommend personalized mailings and following the rule – less is more. Each email should have one goal and one main call to action.
4. Content marketing
As an online store, you should not focus only on sales. You need to provide value without asking customers to make a purchase. This is where content marketing comes in.
One of the best ways to nurture and delight your customers is by creating valuable content that helps them solve their everyday challenges. Whether it’s a simple shopping guide or a short blog post, creating this type of content will help you build awareness, nurture leads and delight current customers.
5. Social networks
Social networks are here to stay and occupy most of the user’s attention. Posting regularly on Facebook or Instagram is only part of the solution. You should also include advertising in your strategy, as social networks make it difficult to reach an audience without paying.
One such general rule is that you should not mistake social media for a bulletin board. Therefore, create content that is interesting, creative, and informative. The 80/20 rule applies here – 80% interesting content and 20% pure marketing/sales content.
It is also important to know who is following you and who is your potential customer. The rule of thumb when it comes to text posts is less is more. That is, records should be short and concise.
Posts should appeal to users, i.e. offer them a solution to their problems. You should always tell users what you want them to do. If you want them to click on a specific link, you should write it: “click here”, “check more here”, etc. These are the so-called “call to action” elements. Without it, the results are significantly worse.
If a picture says 1000 words, how much does a video say? There is a study that says that somewhere around 8314 words. In our experience, customer-recorded videos work best, not professional edits in controlled environments. Such videos are closer to the user, because of which they trust them more and decide to take a step forward or make a purchase earlier.
The key to advertising on social networks:
The sales funnel is a display of what is happening with users or what stage of the buying process they are in. Most of the activities (60%) you carry out on social networks are aimed at new customers, i.e. customers who do not know you yet
The communications and campaigns required for the top of the funnel are very different from those for customers who have already made a purchase. Always keep this sales funnel in mind when planning your ads. That is, what you communicate to a specific target group. Top-of-the-funnel prospects need more benefits, more credibility, and opinions from other customers.
When you have a customer on your side, it means that they are moving down the funnel, and our job is to help them with that. let’s speed up this process. This way you get to the second part of the funnel, where there are customers who have already been to your website and are already in a purchasing decision. Namely, once a customer visits your website, you can track them with an integrated “pixel”. This helps you track your customer and show them ads based on the content they’ve viewed, which is called remarketing. The key to successful advertising (one of the keys) is to create specific target groups and not to target in general. You can set age, gender, interests, and behavior and choose which channel to show ads on.
At the last level of campaign creation, you choose the type of creative – photo/video, carousel (several photos alternate). We can test several different texts on one ad. We can create up to 5 different texts that will alternate with the photo/video.
6. Display advertising
Banner ads aren’t as effective as they used to be, but they can still have a positive impact if planned correctly. Internet users are developing a habit of ignoring banner ads on websites unless your ad has the right message.
Display advertising usually takes place via the Google Ads platform, which other networks of websites, or directly by agreement with certain portals that offer advertising space.
7. Remarketing - retargeting
Retargeting can be considered invasive, but if done correctly, it can really help online stores convert shoppers into actual customers. New technologies allow you to dynamically target website visitors with specific products or content they may be interested in or have already viewed on your website.
8. Mobile marketing
The internet browser is no longer the only software used to access the web. We use apps more than ever before. Users behave differently on smartphones and online stores need to be there at the right time with the right message.
9. Influencer marketing
Research shows that one-third of consumers don’t trust traditional advertising and will refuse to follow or engage with your brand online. Influencers allow you to reach your niche audience in a relaxed and relevant way. Indeed, influencers have built their own audience that trusts their thoughts and opinions.
We find that nano-influencers (2,000 to 5,000 followers) and micro-influencers (5,000-50,000 followers) can have a huge impact on driving brand awareness and sales and are worth investing in – as long as the engagement and reach levels are right.
Conclusion
Traditional marketing is not dead, but it no longer has the same impact it once had. Potential customers spend a large part of their time on their smartphones, where there is real competition for attention.
As digital marketing professionals, our goal is to find ways to capture this limited attention span by communicating stories that resonate with your target audience. We need to get them to the point where they act at the right time and buy your valuable product. We hope that we have given you some useful guidelines and tips so that you too can succeed in doing this for your online store.
Remember that new digital marketing channels will emerge in the future. But before you jump into these new channels, make sure you have a good foundation and the ones we mentioned above under control.
If you are looking for help with digital marketing for online stores, you can read more about our approach and cooperation options HERE.
