The Ultimate Digital Marketing Guide
Marketing has changed drastically in recent times, here’s your guide on how to make the most
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The Ultimate Digital Marketing Guide
Marketing has changed drastically in recent times, here's your guide on how to make the most of it.
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The Ultimate Digital Marketing Guide
Marketing has changed drastically in recent times, here's your guide on how to make the most of it.
Marketing is a fundamental part of any business, it shows the world what you’re about and what you can offer them as customers. It’s the most simple and effective way of both attracting new customers and keeping hold of the ones you’ve already got. A perfectly executed marketing campaign can see your profits skyrocket and leave your competition in the dust.
While marketing is a proven method of brand building, the nature of it has changed drastically in recent times. Gone are the days of Don Draper’s billboards; modern businesses focus their efforts on digital marketing. Social media, search engines, and emails are all major channels with billions of daily users, and if you’re not using at least one digital platform, it needs to change.
Don’t know where to start? Don’t worry about it; you’re about to learn everything that you need to know about digital marketing!
What Is Digital Marketing?
Digital marketing, sometimes called online marketing, is no different from traditional marketing, it’s just spruced up for the modern age. Instead of billboards and ads in the local paper, it’s now online or ‘digitally’, if you like.
You know when you saw the ad for 2-for-1 cocktails at that trendy new bar on Facebook? That’s digital marketing.
When you Googled “running shoes” because this is finally the year you do that half marathon and clicked on one of the top search results. Digital marketing.
Even the email a charity sends to you asking you to donate to them is digital marketing.
Once you notice it, you’ll see it everywhere. And if it’s everywhere, it has to work. And if it works, why aren’t you doing it?
Why Should I Use Digital Marketing?
For better or worse, the introduction of smartphones has changed how we consume media. In 2007, 20% of people read or downloaded their news or magazines online. By 2020, it was 70%. Chances are, you’re probably reading this very article on your mobile right now.
Every major publisher now has a large online presence, with some even discontinuing print versions altogether.
This shift saw a knock-on effect in the advertising world, with many businesses focusing their marketing efforts to take advantage of this exciting new online world. Below are eight reasons why you too need to take advantage of digital marketing.
Expand Your Audience
Did you know that 5.52 billion people (or 63.8% of the world’s population) use the internet? Of those, 5.22 billion use social media. While Google alone processes 8.5 billion searches each day.
Okay, if you’re a plumber in Birmingham, these stats don’t mean too much to you. A Facebook user in Botswana won’t be calling you anytime soon. But it does show just how many people are online and, if done right, how this is a whole new revenue stream for your business.
People also use social media to stay up to date with their favourite brands. Below are the percentage of users that use specific platforms to research brands and follow products:
- Instagram: 62.7%
- Facebook: 54.3%
- TikTok: 44.9%
- Pinterest: 35.7%
- X (Formerly Twitter): 35.7%
Whether you’re using social media, search engines, or something as simple as email, these methods can help expand your client base and boost your profits.
What would you like to do?
Please select the PRIMARY REASON for requiring digital marketing services.
- It only takes a minute.
Increase Profits
Speaking of profits, digital marketing can help grow yours. Currently, 2.77 billion people shop online, and 26.1% of social media users actively use these platforms to look for products to purchase.
Google is the biggest player when it comes to online shopping, though, with 51% of people using Google to research a product before making a purchase. Think about it: When was the last time Google wasn’t the starting point for you to make an online purchase?
Emails might not be the coolest advertising method, but they’re surprisingly effective. For every £1 spent on an effective email marketing campaign, they generate £42 in revenue—an impressive profit margin by any standard.
Give yourself more ways to sell, reach customers, and watch the money roll in.
Improve Efficiency
Digital marketing isn’t pressing a button and starting to make sales. Trust us, we know that better than anyone here at Commercial Experts. It’s a technical trade with a lot of trial and error, frustrating results, and too much coffee.
Do you really have the time for all of this? Of course you don’t! Even something as simple as updating your Facebook page takes time away from what actually matters: running your business!
Get a reliable digital marketing agency to do it all for you instead while you focus your efforts elsewhere.
Gather Priceless Data
We won’t bore you too much with this because, unlike our team here, you’re probably not data nerds. However, the information you can get from a single digital marketing campaign is staggering and unrivalled by any type of traditional marketing.
Using online platforms, you can learn everything about your customers. Who they are, what their shopping habits are, what makes them tick, and so much more.
Specific Targeting
So, what do you do with all of that information you’ve gathered? You use it to tailor all future marketing campaigns to target the people most likely to buy.
A luxury men’s fashion brand advertising on a billboard could be seen by its intended audience. But how many people who have zero interest in custom pinstripe suits and cashmere ties are going to see it? Far too many.
With social media marketing, the campaigns can be incredibly specific with whom they target. Age, gender, location, interests, and even something like someone’s job title can all be filtered to make sure that your target audience, and only your target audience, see your ads.
You can also pick and choose which platforms you want to use based on where your audience spends most of their time. Selling Caribbean cruises to pensioners? Probably don’t waste your time on TikTok.
Easy Entry for Small Businesses
Getting started with digital marketing doesn’t require huge upfront costs, making it an easy way to get involved, no matter what stage you’re at.
An independent tattoo artist may find advertising in specialist magazines too much, and there’s no guarantee anyone in their area will see it. A £100 Instagram campaign targeting their perfect audience within a 10-mile radius of their shop is quick and affordable to set up.
Cost-Effectiveness
It’s not just the relatively low cost of starting but also the return on investment (ROI) you get by using digital platforms. Just look at the average return per spend:
| Platform | Spend | ROI |
|---|---|---|
| Email Marketing | £1 | £42 |
| SEO | £1 | £7.48 |
| PPC Advertising | £1 | £4 |
| YouTube | £1 | £2.5 |
| £1 | £2.19 | |
| £1 | £2.19 | |
| TikTok | £1 | £1.55 |
What would you like to do?
Please select the PRIMARY REASON for requiring digital marketing services.
- It only takes a minute.
Measurable Results
Again, we won’t bore you too much with the nitty-gritty, but key metrics can easily be measured to determine your marketing campaigns’ success. You can see spending, clicks, click cost, traffic, sales, cost-per-sale, whatever you want.
This data can help you make on-the-spot decisions and learn how to maximise your campaigns’ impact.
What Types of Digital Marketing are Available?
Like traditional marketing, digital marketing has many different avenues you can go down. Below, we’ve outlined some of the most popular ones.
Social Media
Not just for uploading pictures of your breakfast or reading conspiracy theories in the comments section of news articles. Social media is a highly effective way to market your business to a huge audience, with 5.22 billion people globally using some form of social media.
Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, TikTok, or whatever the next big thing is in the social media world, advertising on these platforms is a great way of improving your success.
These typically charge you per impression or cost-per-mile (CPM), if you want to use the fancy jargon. Regardless of how the customer reacts to your ad, you’ll be charged if you appear on someone’s screen.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC)
Pay-per-click (PPC) is another type of popular digital marketing. Any guesses on how you’re charged for these ads? That’s right- each time someone clicks (or taps for mobile devices) on your ad. You’ll typically find these at the top of search engines like Google or Bing, and they will often be accompanied by a tag telling you they’re sponsored posts.
These work by entering a bidding war against your competitors for keywords and phrases. This will determine where you rank on the Search Engine Results Page (SERP). Ad position one has an average click-through rate (CTR) of 2.1%, while the 4th is only 1.2%.
This might not seem like a lot, but think about how many Google searches Google processes daily. If there are 1000 searches each day, the 1st position will receive 21 clicks, while the 4th would get just 12. That’s nine more customers coming to you and not a direct competitor.
On average, for every £1 spent on Google, you’ll get £4 back. That’s an average return on investment of 400%. This is mainly because you are advertising to people actively searching for your product/service, which increases the likelihood of a purchase being completed.
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
Search Engine Optimisation or SEO, like PPC, is a method of trying to place your website at the top of a SERP. Unlike PPC, however, this is done without paying for clicks, or “organically,” as us nerds in digital marketing call it.
SEO is a massive topic that involves many levers being pulled, but one of the ways to do this is by integrating keywords into your content. These will be the words that are most commonly associated with your product/service. The more effective and natural these keywords are, the higher your website will chart.
When was the last time you actually visited the second page? Well, if you have done so recently, you’re one of just 0.44% of users.
The higher you are, the more likely you are to get a click. Position 1 gets more than double the clicks of position 2, and it continues to drop after that.
Content Marketing
Content marketing goes hand in hand with SEO, as quality, relevant, and consistent content is at the heart of both approaches. So, again, this article that you’re reading right now is also part of our content marketing strategy. Unlike SEO, however, content marketing focuses solely on content rather than all the technical elements of optimising a website for search engines.
Content marketing is not there to sell directly; it’s more about informing the customer and providing information to them. This could be a guide to digital marketing, blog posts about news in your industry, or a press release about your latest product.
With a strong and consistent content marketing strategy, you position yourself as an authority in your particular niche. Then, when people are ready to buy, they’re only going to one place: you!
By consistently delivering valuable content, you can increase brand awareness, build customer loyalty, and make sales. Content marketing is an essential component of modern digital marketing strategies, and its versatility means that the options are limitless.
Email Marketing
Ah, the good old-fashioned email. It’s been around longer than the newer and more fashionable platforms and will probably be here long after them.
In 1997, only 10 million people used emails worldwide; it’s now at 4.48 billion. With so many people using this very simple form of communication, you can’t afford to not take advantage of email marketing.
It’s low-cost to get involved, and for every £1 spent, on average, you can expect a £42 return.
This can be a great way of organically distributing content and even messaging those who have abandoned their online shopping carts to encourage them to complete the transaction.
Influencer Marketing
One of the newer forms of online marketing with the rise of the influencer. It may feel a bit tacky, but influencer marketing is an extremely effective way of getting your brand out there. So much so that each month, 49% of people purchase based on an influencer’s post.
If you own a restaurant, paying an influencer or throwing a free meal and a mid-priced bottle of wine in their direction can go a long way. We’re not saying you need Kim Kardashian to come in for some steak tartar, but a local influencer can expose you to a large audience of people who didn’t even know you existed yesterday.
Want to read more about the best digital marketing agencies?
If you’re ready to read more about how to get the best digital marketing strategy for your business, you’re already pretty close. With one click, you can head over to our page that breaks down the top five digital marketing agencies.
Essential Digital Marketing Tools
There are a range of different digital marketing tools out there. Some will be more suited to you than others, depending on what avenue you take. Below, we’ve named a few of our favourite tools and explained how they can help you with your campaigns.
Social Media Management Tools
Hootsuite
What It Does: Manages multiple social media accounts from a single dashboard, schedules posts, and tracks engagement.
Why It’s Important: Saves your time and provides consistent posting across multiple platforms. This increases your brand’s visibility and engagement.
Sprout Social
What It Does: Offers advanced analytics and reporting features to measure your paid social media campaigns’ performance.
Why It’s Important: Provides insights into audience behaviour to help you refine your approach and achieve better results.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tools
SEMrush
What It Does: Tracks website performance, analyses competitors, provides backlink analysis, and identifies keyword opportunities.
Why It’s Important: It helps you to develop effective SEO strategies to improve your website’s search engine ranking.
Screaming Frog
What It Does: Crawls your website to identify technical SEO issues such as broken links, duplicate content, and missing metadata.
Why It’s Important: Gives you an insight into your site’s overall SEO health, allowing you to address these issues and boost your search engine ranking.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Tools
Google Ads
What It Does: Manages PPC campaigns on Google Search and Display Networks.
Why It’s Important: Make sure your business appears in front of users actively searching for your products or services.
Microsoft Advertising
What It Does: Similar to Google Ads, it focuses on Bing and Yahoo users instead.
Why It’s Important: Provides additional reach to a different audience segment, maximising visibility.
Analytics and Performance Tracking Tools
Google Analytics
What It Does: Tracks your website traffic, user behaviour, and campaign performance.
Why It’s Important: Offers actionable data to improve your website performance and adapt your strategy.
Adobe Analytics
What It Does: Provides in-depth insights into customer journeys across multiple channels.
Why It’s Important: Give you an in-depth understanding of user interactions to enhance your campaign effectiveness.
What would you like to do?
Please select the PRIMARY REASON for requiring digital marketing services.
- It only takes a minute.
Content Creation and Management Tools
Canva
What It Does: Simplifies graphic design for creating social media posts, ads, and other creatives.
Why It’s Important: Ensures your business’s visuals are professional and on-brand without requiring extensive design expertise.
WordPress
What It Does: An easy-to-use content management system, allowing for seamless updates and blog publishing.
Why It’s Important: Helps maintain a professional online presence while enabling SEO-friendly content creation.
Email Marketing Tools
Mailchimp
What It Does: Manages your email campaigns, automates workflows, and provides open and click-through rate analytics.
Why It’s Important: Provides effective communication with your audience and nurtures leads through the sales funnel.
Constant Contact
What It Does: Simplifies email marketing with templates and automation features.
Why It’s Important: Delivers a user-friendly way to stay connected with your customers.
Display Advertising and Retargeting Tools
Google Display Network (GDN)
What It Does: Places banner ads on relevant websites within Google’s vast network.
Why It’s Important: Increases visibility and reinforces brand messaging to interested audiences.
Criteo
What It Does: Specialises in retargeting users who have visited your site but didn’t convert.
Why It’s Important: Helps recapture potential customers and improve conversion rates.
What to Look For in a Digital Marketing Agency
When choosing the right digital marketing agency, you can’t just dive into the first one you see. There are loads of different factors you need to consider when choosing the right partner for you.
Transparent Reporting
You may not understand what a lot of terminology and success metrics look like at the start, but a good agency should educate you along the way. They should also provide regular updates on these metrics and explain where your money is going and what you’re getting in return. These reports should be easy to understand and not packed with jargon that doesn’t mean anything to you.
Ideally, you’ll get a visual representation of your performance as well. Graphs that chart things like website traffic, clicks, sales, etc. If they’re unwilling to provide this for you, it’s time to look elsewhere.
Clear KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)
What are you looking to get out of hiring an agency? Sales, brand awareness, building out an online presence? Whatever it is you want, make sure they’re able to provide it.
There should be a period at the start where you discuss your aims and they clearly outline how they will do it. Again, just like in the last point, they should also be willing to keep you updated on progress at regular intervals.
Experience in Your Niche
So this isn’t always a deal breaker, but it’s something to consider, especially if you work in a niche sector. If they have a proven track record of delivering results for businesses in your niche, they probably know what they’re talking about. Dedicated agencies have a deeper understanding of your audience, competition and unique challenges that more general firms won’t.
If they have case studies in your industry that they can show you, you could be on to a winner.
Using the Correct Channels for Your Customers
Building on that last point, if they know your industry, they’ll know the best channel to use. Are you selling novelty socks, and they’re telling you how you could benefit from ‘”a killer LinkedIn strategy?” Or are they focusing more on platforms like TikTok and Instagram, where people are actually going to buy your hilarious cat socks?
Unlike having experience in your niche, this is non-negotiable. If you’re advertising on a platform where your audience doesn’t hang out, you might as well just set your money on fire.
Qualifications and Testimonials
Things like Google Partner status, Facebook Marketing Partner, or certifications in platforms like HubSpot or SEMrush can indicate a great agency. Also, if they proudly advertise testimonials from their previous partners, this is a big thumbs up.
Checking reviews on sites like Trustpilot is also a great way of gauging their reliability. There will always be one or two bad reviews because people love to whinge. But if you notice the same problems mentioned multiple times, turn and run.
How Much Does Digital Marketing Cost?
It’s impossible to give a definitive off-the-cuff answer, as agencies will charge based on your specific requirements. If you’re looking for a small, localised social media strategy that will cost far less than someone wanting to use all the channels and advertise internationally.
How Can I Take Advantage of Digital Marketing?
Hopefully, that’s cleared up some questions that you may have about how digital marketing can help your business. The last question you most likely have is, “How can I take advantage of digital marketing?” Luckily, the process couldn’t be more straightforward; all you have to do is tap the button below to compare prices from a range of agencies in minutes.
This is a free service, and there’s no obligation to commit. If you don’t like what you see, no worries; just walk away at no expense. To get started, just answer the question below, follow the prompts, and you’ll soon be comparing quotes.
What would you like to do?
Please select the PRIMARY REASON for requiring digital marketing services.
- It only takes a minute.
FAQs
What is the difference between digital marketing and traditional marketing?
Digital marketing uses online channels such as social media, search engines, and email to reach audiences. These offer precise targeting and measurable results. Traditional marketing employs offline methods like TV, radio, and print ads, often with a broader reach but less specific targeting.
What are the different types of digital marketing channels?
Digital marketing channels include search engines for SEO and PPC campaigns, social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn for targeted advertising, email for direct communication, and content marketing via blogs and videos. Each channel caters to specific audience needs and business goals.
What are the key metrics I should track in digital marketing? marketing channels?
Important metrics to monitor include website traffic, conversion rates, click-through rates (CTR), cost-per-click (CPC), customer acquisition cost (CAC), and return on investment (ROI). These metrics help evaluate the effectiveness of your campaigns and inform necessary adjustments.
How does SEO benefit my business?
SEO increases your website’s visibility on search engines, increasing organic traffic. This boost in visibility can result in higher brand awareness, more traffic to your site, and increased sales, all achieved without relying solely on paid advertising.
How can I get digital marketing services for my business?
Simply tap on one of the links on this page to access a range of UK-based agencies tailored to your needs. It’s free, with no obligation, and it takes just minutes to find the perfect fit for your business.
