Digital Markets and Digital Goods

Web marketing, digital marketing, internet marketing or online marketing; all of these words are synonymously used for E-Marketing. What it means is the marketing of products or services by using the internet. E-mails and wireless marketing also fall into the category of e-marketing.

We can say that it uses different technologies and media to connect customers and businesses. Especially in this era of technology, e-marketing has become a very important part of the marketing strategy of different companies.

Features of E-Marketing

Big or small, many businesses are using e-marketing because of various features and multiple advantages. Some of the important features are as follows;

1. E-marketing is Cheaper than Traditional Marketing

If you compare its cost with traditional marketing media such as newspaper ads and billboards, then it’s much cheaper and efficient. You can reach a wide range of audience with very limited resources.

2. Tangible ROI

Small business owners can now check the turnover rate or ‘‘action taken’’ with the help of Infusionsoft. It analyzes multiple things like views of videos, number of emails opened, and per click on the link. Most importantly, it tells us how much sales the business has been made as a result of e-marketing.

3. 24/7/365 Approach

It works 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and 365 days of the year. It doesn’t matter whether you’re homesick, sleeping, or attending a casual meetings; but e-marketing is always hard at work.

4. Eliminate Follow-up Failure

Elimination of follow-up-failure is the main secrete behind the success of small business. It is done by entering your business figures into the Infusionsoft, and then its automated marketing system will provide you the custom-tailored information about your business, which areas to improve and what product to discontinue. 

Advantages of E-Marketing

Some of the important advantages of e-marketing are given below;

1. Instant Response

The response rate of internet marketing is instantaneous; for instance, you upload something and it goes viral. Then it’d reach millions of people overnight.

2. Cost-Efficient

Compared to the other media of advertising, it’s much cheaper. If you’re using the unpaid methods, then there’s almost zero cost.

3. Less Risky

When your cost is zero and the instant rate is high; then what one has to loos. No risk at all.

4. Greater Data Collection

In this way, you have a great ability to collect a wide range of data about your customers. This customer data can be used later.

5. Interactive

One of the important aspects of digital marketing is that it’s very interactive. People can leave their comments, and you’ll get feedback from your target market.

6. Way to Personalized Marketing

Online marketing opens the door to personalized marketing with the right planning and marketing strategy, customers can be made to feel that this ad is directly talking to him/her.

7. Greater Exposure of your Product

Going viral with one post can deliver greater exposure to your product or service.

8. Accessibility

The beauty of the online world and e-marketing is that it’s accessible from everywhere across the globe.

Disadvantages of E-Marketing

E-Marketing is not without disadvantages, some of them are as follows;

1. Technology Dependent

E-Marketing is completely dependent on technology and the internet; a slight disconnection can jeopardize your whole business.

2. Worldwide Competition

When you launch your product online, then you face a global competition because it’s accessible from everywhere.

3. Privacy & Security Issues

Privacy and security issues are very high because your data is accessible to everyone; therefore, one has to be very cautious about what goes online.

4. Higher Transparency & Price Competition

When privacy and security issues are high, then you have to spend a lot to be transparent. Price competition also increases with higher transparency.

5. Maintenance Cost

With the fast-changing technological environment, you have to be consistently evolved with the pace of technology and the maintenance cost is very high.

Types of E-Marketing

When we talk about digital and email marketing, then there are different type and methods of e-marketing which are as follows;

1. Email Marketing

Email marketing is considered very efficient and effective because you already have a database of your targeting customer. Now, sending emails about your product or service to your exact targeted market is not only cheap but also very effective.

2. Social Media Marketing

Social media is a great source of directly communicating with your customers to increase your product awareness. It could be done by any or all of the social media channels such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Google, and YouTube. Some of the important advantages of social media are as follows;

• Increase product awareness and reputation means more sales.
• Directly communicating with your customers can increase brand loyalty.
• You can increase the number of visits to your website and rank it up in the search engine.
• Targeting the exact audience will help you to know more about your customers’ needs.

3. Video Marketing

It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words, and a video is worth thousands of pictures. You can catch the attention and emotions of your target market by showing them a video clip about your product or service. Video marketing is very effective if it conveys the right message to the right audience. 

4. Article Marketing

Engaging quality content by providing valuable information to your targeted market, what people are looking for over the internet to solve a certain problem? It is a consistent and ongoing process of delivering quality content to your readers. It is not always about selling; you’re educating your audience and helping them by adding some value in their lives.

5. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is the process of promoting some products of certain brands and earning your commission out of every sale. It works for everyone; win, win situation.

6. Wrapping Up E-Marketing

It doesn’t matter whatever type of marketing methods you’re using; it has to be well focused and researched about your target market. Customer’s needs and demands should also be kept in mind; there should be consistency and coherency between the market and your product. Anything out of ordinary will make your customers suspicious. It has to be realistic.

Digital Marketing Strategy

Many years ago, developing effective marketing strategies was a much simpler task than it is today. With only a small number of television channels, radio stations, newspapers, and relevant magazines pertaining to a given market, advertisers could develop fairly targeted marketing strategies to generate sales. In the emerging digital environment, marketing strategies have become a far more complex task. There are now vast arrays of different marketing channels, tools, and tactics that must be unique in strategy while seamless and integrated in application. Companies also need to connect and engage with customers, and create memorable, lasting experiences.

To develop a successful marketing campaign in today’s digital environment, companies must focus on three strategic components. Marketers must establish clear, strategic, and targeted objectives and ensure that they are tactical in the rollout and implementation of new campaigns. Companies should also focus on the development of a separate team to identify and analyze emerging marketing opportunities. Companies that are able to clearly identify the strengths and weaknesses of each digital medium will likely be more successful in their campaigns.

• Marketing:

Yes, it is a “thing” although you probably won’t find this word in Webster’s Dictionary. It means that you integrate sales and marketing to optimize performance of marketing efforts.

Gone are the days when a consumer peruses an ad in print media then purchases that product later during the appointed shopping day of the week. Digital ads are portals to online sales. Marketing and sales all happen in the same place with the tap of a finger or click of a mouse.

If a potential customer has a question about a product, that, too, happens in the same place in cyber-world through chat window features. If your company is not marketing, it is losing significant sales potential.

• Experience

Have you walked in the shoes of your customers? Have you surfed the web to map the path of discovery to your product’s online ad? Did you click and see where your landed in cyberspace? What about the purchasing process? Was it a secure experience?

If you have not walked a mile in your customer’s shoes, how can you know if the process is efficient? That’s one of the best ways to fine tune your online presence.

Learning a new language requires complete immersion. Otherwise you’ll need an interpreter and in the case of digital marketing, that mean a savvy digital marketing agency.

Playing Field Dynamics: Not every digital marketing challenge is solved by throwing more money at it.

In the olden days the playing field belonged to the company that could afford the biggest print ad or a prime-time television/radio slot for a commercial.

Digital advertising has seriously leveled the playing field. Just look at what happens when a YouTube video goes viral. A company doesn’t always have to outspend a competitor to solve a marketing problem.

• Engagement:

So you have a company blog and a profile with every social media platform under the Sun. Yet you haven’t seen a significant impact on sales. What is going on?

Creating a digital presence is only the first step. Now you have to engage, engage, engage. That means creating content that inspires a reaction. Calls to action, surveys, asking viewers to name the new company cat rescued from the alley are all great ideas to create intrigue and stimulate engagement.

You’ve got to do something with your digital presence: connect with people. offer value and get them communicating with you.

• Decision-making

If data is not behind every decision, then your company is flying blind. The greatest thing about digital marketing is that every single action can be measured.

Did switching background colors result in more traffic? Good decision. But, even if it had been a bad decision, analytics reflecting a noted drop in traffic, or less time spent by visitors on your site, would have alerted you to the need to re-adjust accordingly. Data must captain the ship.

• Value: You must offer education & value.

There is more to value than getting a great product at a great price. Content is the most valuable commodity in the digital age. The information you share needs to have value to viewers.

Cultivate an online reputation for being the premier authority on your particular industry. It’s easy to Google an answer to a question. But believing in the integrity of a source is the value that will bring readers back time and again to your site for reliable information

• Personalized Automation

As of 2014, nearly 70% of businesses were using a marketing automation platform.

Analytics identifies so many unique characteristics of customers and viewers that marketing automation can take on amazing personalization aspects. You can send birthday greetings or religious holiday observances according to each individual. An anniversary of a loyal customer’s first purchase can be noted.

A customer’s purchasing history can generate a suggestions list of other products of interest. Marketing automation can definitely create that personal experience that online customers still crave.

• Get More

In the time of yester-year, sales executives had to get out and mingle in order to bring in more customers. It’s the same in the digital age. Your content needs to get out more.

This is often called a multi-channel digital marketing strategy which means ads are delivered to other online targets. For example, when Google recognizes the potential of a Facebook user to find your brand interesting, it places your ad before their eyes as suggested content. Voila. You just mingled online.

• Digital Agility is a must.

There are all sorts of technical lingo to explain concepts like “agile sales”. All you really need to know is that things can change.

You’ve heard us say before: “your website is not an office building, so don’t treat it like one!” In the ever-changing digital world, you must be ready to change with it and that includes your website.

So that website you built? Is it turning out to be lousy? Don’t despair! Be agile! Change it!  When you build something to be accessed by others through the worldwide web, it’s not set in stone like a brick and mortar store.

If they turn out to be a bomb, tweak it. The digital age means everyone gets do-overs until you get it right.

• Chatter Matters

That old saying, “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” does not apply to what your company or brand is doing online. Reviews matter. Feedback matters. Social media chatter matters.

If you get a bad review, be responsive and get things resolved. Stay focused on good customers service because all of your digital footsteps are out there for the entire world to see.

Digital Marketing Process

1. Developing Mission Statement:

That is the Organizational Mission Statement to be matched up with Marketing

2. Situational Analysis

• Identify the Problems and work on getting solutions.
• In order to achieve business goals, let me just brief you about the above chart.
• Identify the problem and Research

The marketer can identify the problem and research by asking people?s opinion about what they actually need.

Here surveys come into the picture where you take suggestions from the people and delivered the solutions(product/Services).

3. Marketing Strategy and Marketing Mix

Developing the Alternatives plan, After going through the surveys and analyzing the needs of the customers and then one can develop the alternatives plans. Once you Developed the alternatives plans, The next step is to carefully analyze every alternative and select the best possible alternative plan among them.

Marketing Mix which includes product Development, Pricing, Promotion, Place and Distribution Analyze and selects the Best alternative Plan.

4. Implementation and Control

• Implement the plan: Once you select the best plan you can start implementing the plan.
• Review/Measure: Once you have implemented the plan and now you can start measuring the success/failure.

Likewise, in Digital Marketing Strategy you can add similar methodology, gain some momentum and turn your visitors to the customer.

Steps

1. Research

• In the research stage, all the necessary information related either to the product(s)/service(s) or the target audience/market is collected, and the information collected during the research stage is used for making decisions. This information is very helpful in strategizing the marketing campaign. Following information are collected during this stage:
• About the brand/business/organization.
• About the target audience/target market.
• About the product/service being promoted.
• About the market, a competition to promote product/services and to stand out among the existing brands.

2. Create

• In this stage, the information collected in the research stage is analyzed and strategized to create the marketing campaign. The campaign is created as per the goals and objectives of the organization and the as per the vision of the stakeholders, how they want their product to be advertised on different platforms.
• This step covers the branding strategy, content strategy, etc. The goal is to reach maximum customers and to generate maximum revenue at the same time.

3. Promote

Once the marketing campaign is created and strategized, the marketing team starts working on promoting the product(s)/service(s). There are various digital platforms for promoting a brand, product(s)/service(s) like:

• Search Engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, Etc.)
• Display Networks
• Social Media
• E-Mail and Affiliate Marketing
• E-Commerce Websites and Other Marketing Portals

4. Analyze

• Now comes the analyzing stage in which the results and outcomes of the marketing campaign are analyzed. The results or the outcome from various promotion channels are collected and analyzed for generating the business reports in terms of sales and revenue. This analysis helps to identify the grey areas and helps the marketing team to improve those areas and to prepare for future marketing. Google Analytics is one of the most popular analytics tools used for the analysis and basically it helps to identify the target audience response, behavior of the consumers and the data collected helps to convert the potential leads into business.
• Digital marketing is thus a very effective marketing channel used by both consumers and marketers to deliver and to purchase the product(s) and service(s). Digital marketing works in integration with the business strategy and it is very important to draft the marketing campaign as per market standards and the requirement of the target audience. The digital marketing processes have been very efficient in bridging the gap between the customers and the companies and promotes bidirectional communication between them.
• The customer can give their opinion and feedback to the marketing companies and the business teams which consequently helps the companies to provide better services to the customers/consumers/buyers. Digital marketing has almost captured half of the available market and there is no way to stop. IT has emerged as one of the promising careers and it is still evolving. The future is digital and digital marketing is going to be the backbone of the digital infrastructure in the coming future.