8 Types of Digital Marketing in 2023 – The all-digital era now makes entrepreneurs have to keep up with the times in managing their business so they don’t lose to competitors.
One way? Promote marketing with digital marketing as an effective marketing strategy. Actually, what is the difference between conventional marketing and digital marketing? What are the types of digital marketing? Here’s the review.
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Difference between Digital Marketing and Conventional Marketing
In terms of media, conventional marketing uses billboards and print advertisements (anything that is not computer-based). While digital marketing uses digital technology, the internet and electronic devices as an effort to reach consumers.
In the current era, digital marketing is considered more effective. According to Jessica Rogers who is a marketing lecturer at Southern New Hampshire University, the difference between digital and conventional marketing lies in its reach.
How not, almost everyone now considers cellphones and laptops as primary needs for work, career, study, to seek information and entertainment.
For conventional marketing, the reach of consumers is broad. Roughly speaking, it is reaching as many people as possible without being too concerned about age, occupation, economic conditions, hobbies, and social scope.
Whereas in digital marketing, the main goal is to target very specific people so that the possibility of conversion (shopping) is much higher. The hope is that business people who practice digital marketing can be much more efficient and cost-effective in marketing.
Just imagine, that the largest digital marketing platform provider (google, Instagram) can create a very specific target audience.
You can even target people who are married or not, down to specific hobbies that are sometimes weird. It’s a bit scary to think about, but this is the power of technology and the internet.
Types of Digital Marketing
Digital marketing has very diverse types, and there is no limit to the number of strategies you can apply in managing your business. With a note, you are able to carry out all of these strategies well, otherwise you waste money because it is not efficient, both in terms of targeting creative matters.
Here are some types of digital marketing that you should at least know.
1. Content Marketing
The first effective strategy to increase turnover is content marketing. This strategy focuses on creating and distributing content aimed at a specific target market. The content must be relevant to the target market, so that it generates an emotion that is ultimately useful for your business.
For example, if you sell basketball shoes, then the content you might create is a video showing how your product can help athletes succeed in that sport.
There are many content marketing media, including:
- Photo
- Digital videos
- Story
- Audio
- Article
- Blog
- Podcasts
- Infographics
- ebook
2. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
The next strategy that can be applied to develop an online business is to utilize SEO (Search Engine Optimization). SEO activity is needed for the website to be in the first position on the Google search page.
By optimizing the website, there is a great opportunity for the audience to find the website on Google, until finally entering and purchasing the products you offer.
An easy example, if you sell a laptop, of course, you are after searches such as “best gaming laptop” or “acer laptop price” which has great potential to bring in sales.
SEO takes longer to optimize than other digital marketing channels, because your website must have a good reputation, fast loading speed, classy UI/UX, and many other technical matters that we cannot describe in one article.
One determining factor that is often a dealbreaker for SEO is the quality of the hosting alias server. A little explanation, so all websites must be stored on a computer, this computer is called the host or server.
Since buying and managing your own server is nearly impossible (expensive & difficult), the best option is to hire a hosting service from a world-renowned provider. If your business is in Indonesia, you should use local hosting because it will be much faster than abroad.
For reference, one of the reputable local hosting providers is Hostinger. You can use Hostinger for your website needs at a much more reasonable price than renting a server abroad.
3. Social Media Marketing
The third type of digital marketing is promoting a product or service using social media.
Glancing back 10 years ago, the practice of social media for digital marketing was not that big, but now almost everyone scrolls through their IG, Story, and Tiktok feeds for hours every day. As a business person, it is impossible for this social media platform to be ignored.
This is natural because every social media has active users who continue to grow. What you need to watch out for here is that, even though social media can attract hundreds of millions of users.
You have to be smart in choosing a quality audience, because not a few digital marketing actors have been rewarded for not optimizing their campaigns on social media.
4. Email Marketing
Although sometimes considered outdated, the data actually proves that email marketing is one of the digital marketing channels with the best ROI!
Promotions sent via email seem more personal because they go straight to the inbox of consumers, both potential customers and loyal consumers.
If it turns out to be unsubscribed, it means that the audience is not your potential customer. You can use an email verification service to ensure that your email list is legitimate.
These services will check to make sure that the email address you are using is actually registered with the service and not just somebody’s abandoned account.
The goals of email marketing include:
- Providing product offerings to new and loyal consumers.
- Provide information on the latest product updates to loyal and new consumers.
- Maintain good relationship with loyal customers.
The thing to note is, email marketing can be annoying if it’s too insistent, if it seems too pushy , or if the recipient is not given the unsubscribe option. Make sure to always provide the unsubscribe option to save the audience’s time, and also save the marketing budget of people who are not potential.
5. Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
Many equate SEO with SEM. In terms of definition, actually SEO is part of SEM, but in general SEM is considered as paid advertising on Google (search results with small “ads” text next to it), and also banners that you often encounter when browsing websites.
When it comes to SEM, for now, Google is the biggest (and very effective) one. You can target the audience from the search words he typed on Google, from age, income range, gender, location, hobbies, to type of work.
Just like social media marketing, you have to really understand your own audience so you don’t waste money on the wrong people.
6. Affiliate Marketing
You may often hear the term affiliate marketing, but do not understand the mechanism. In short, affiliate marketers are people who help sell a product, and will get a commission (percentage) from the product sold.
An easy example is youtuber. They always provide a shopping link in the video description column. When someone purchases from that link (eg a cellphone for 3 million), the youtuber will get a commission, let’s say 1% which means 30 thousand rupiah.
For business people, this strategy can increase sales turnover by cooperating with other parties through affiliate programs. The picture is, you as the owner of the company create an affiliate program to recruit affiliates. Later, each affiliate will be given a referral link that will be embedded in each promotion.
Read Also: 15 Best Chrome Extensions For Web Marketing
This affiliate marketing program benefits both parties. Usually there are various payment systems, some based on sales or website visits.
7. Influencer Marketing
This is a more subtle way of selling than others. In an Influencer Marketing strategy, you will pay an artist or famous person, and he will use your product, and he will flaunt it on social media or through other circles of friends.
That’s why the presence of influencers in the business world has a big impact. This is because most audiences are more interested in buying items used or offered by influencers .
Influencer marketing can be hard selling (inviting people to buy) or soft selling (showing off the function of a product) where later the audience will be interested in buying.
8. Call To Action Marketing (CTA)
The next marketing strategy is to use Call to Action or known as CTA. This is a strategy that uses a specific statement to get an immediate response from the audience, it could be getting clicks, or the audience scanning a QR code.
Some statements or imperative words that contain elements of CTA include:
- “Watch this video.”
- “Get the information right now!”
- “Don’t miss it, click on the link below!”
Benefits of Digital Marketing
By implementing digital marketing, there are several benefits that you can achieve, including:
- Reach more potential consumers with targeted digital marketing, because on the internet there are no market limits.
- Maximize sales figures .
- Consumers are more free to make considerations before deciding to make a purchase transaction.
- Marketing costs are much cheaper than doing conventional marketing.
- The business will look more professional and have high credibility in the eyes of the audience.
- It is easier to connect with consumers because everything can be done only through the internet.
- Stores can be online 24 hours non-stop every day without having to wait for customers to come.
- Help track consumer behavior if you implement the right strategy.
That’s information related to digital marketing that can be used by you as a business person. Digital marketing that is not optimal and not targeted can drain the budget.
But with careful optimization, detailed market research, and getting to know the potential audience well, digital marketing can be a very powerful weapon.