8 types of digital marketing and how they work
Are you confused about the types of digital marketing? Here’s our easy guide to the 8 main types of digital marketing – and how they work. Use a mixture of these to achieve a huge boost for your business.
Pay-Per-Click Advertising
Pay-per-click advertising covers a broad range of digital marketing tools, from Google AdWords to Facebook Ads. They are all forms of paid advertising where you pay every time someone clicks on your ad. They include:
Search advertising. These paid ads appear at the top of lists of search engine results. They are a good way to target people who are searching for your products or services.
Display advertising. This shows your ad on Google Partner websites all over the internet. You can pick the types of people that get shown your ads, to ensure they are seen by those who are most likely to want what you are selling.
Social media advertising. This shows your ad in the newsfeed of your target audience when they’re using social media platforms such as Facebook or Twitter. It’s a good way to build awareness of your product or business.
Remarketing. This serves people who’ve visited your site with ads for your business or products when they’re on other sites, ensuring you stay fresh in their mind and coaxing them to visit again.
Google shopping. This advertises your products in a carousel above the main Google search results and can be an effective way to bring people straight to your site.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Search engine optimisation (SEO) is the art of creating a website and web content that will rank highly in organic searches – in other words, it achieves high visibility without you having to pay for ads. SEO includes everything from using the right keywords in the copy on your site, to tagging images correctly. To find out more, read this article for information on using keywords and this article for information on using images.
Social Media Marketing
This is another free, organic way to market your business online. It involves building a strong presence on social media platforms such as Facebook or Twitter. The trick is to be present on the platforms your target customers use the most, interacting with them as well as posting great content.
Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO)
This is the art of enhancing the user experience of your website in order to get more conversions from your existing web traffic. Conversions aren’t just sales – they can be chats, leads or calls, for example. By examining user data about your site – for example, to see at which point users lose interest and leave – you can tweak their experience to them more likely to stick around, engage and buy.
Content Marketing
This covers the use of content such as blog posts, infographics, eBooks and videos to build awareness of your brand, bring people to your site and boost the conversion rate. It can include elements such as having a downloadable e-book available from your site or sharing articles and blog posts on social media.
Native Advertising
This is a form of content marketing that uses material such as advertorials, videos or articles to attract interest in your brand. This type of content can be hard to distinguish from the regular content on a site – for example, you might pay for a news site to run a story promoting your brand alongside their regular articles.
Email Marketing
This tried and tested form of digital marketing involves sending emails to people on your mailing list. It’s a highly effective way to get conversions.
Affiliate Marketing
This is when you pay a person or business to promote your products and services on their website – for example, you might pay an instagrammer to photograph themselves wearing your brand of clothing. It can be very effective because people already trust and like the person or business promoting your products.
