Growth through effective online marketing requires businesses to cast their net wide, reaching new customers and entering new markets. Here are some top tips to make sure your marketing strategy has it covered.
- Define Your Goals
Your online marketing strategy should be tailored to your overall business objectives, and the main goal should be to attract consumers and get more sales. Good online marketing should generate a positive return on investment (ROI).
To make sure your strategy is as effective as possible, clearly define your business goals. Are you looking for brand recognition or new customers? Which markets do you want to tap into? What does success look like for you?
- Categorize Your Target Audience
To make sure your marketing efforts will get you the desired results, start by researching your target audience and categorizing them into different audiences.
Include characteristics such as age, gender, location, interests, job title, and even spending habits.
For example, if you’re marketing a new pair of running shoes, your target audience should include adults aged 18-35 who are interested in running, living in certain cities/regions, and at least any one of the following job titles – professional runners, gym enthusiasts, or athletes.
- Develop an Engaging Visual Style
Developing a visual style for your marketing campaigns is an important task and will affect every aspect of your online marketing efforts.
Your visual style is your brand identity and values, and you should use it consistently across all channels -social media, website, and email.
Design an eye-catching logo and include it in all your marketing materials. Use quality images, videos and graphics to create the visual style that conveys your brand identity and resonates with potential customers.
In addition to brand consistency, using the same visual style across channels shows that you have a thoughtfully designed and planned out marketing strategy, rather than just sporadic posts here and there.
- Incorporate Search Engine Optimization
Good search engine optimization (SEO) will help you bring qualified organic search engine traffic to your website.
Make sure your website is optimized for keyword terms that are relevant to your industry and brand, so that when people search for terms that are related to your business, your website will appear at the top of the search engine results.
Start by focusing on short-tail keywords that are specific to your industry – these will be harder to rank for, but the payoff will be worth it. Also, add longer-tail keywords that are more in-depth and related to very specific topics – these will be easier to rank for, but won’t bring as much traffic and won’t be qualified leads.
Make sure you update your website with fresh and relevant content on a regular basis.
Also, add metadata, image Alt tags, title tags, descriptions and header tags that are keyword-rich, so that search engine spiders can easily crawl your website and index it accordingly.
- Use Paid Search Advertising
Paid search is an effective way to drive qualified customers to your website.
When done right, it can help you get your website to the top of the search engine results quickly, and it’s a highly targeted form of advertising.
Start by researching relevant keywords, as this will help you target potential customers more accurately.
- Try Social Media Advertising
Social media platforms can be used as powerful marketing tools to reach new customers and enter new markets.
Using Facebook and Instagram, you can target users based on their demographics and interests, making sure your ads are only seen by people who are likely to be interested.
You can test different ad variations and see which one performs best. Try out different images, video, and copy to see which ones have a great click-through-rate.
- Leverage Influencers
Influencer marketing can be an effective way to reach new customers and enter new markets.
Reaching out to relevant and well-known influencers can help you tap into their engaged following, which will help you get exposure to targeted audience you’re trying to reach.
For example, if you’re selling running shoes, you can reach out to professional athletes and fitness influencers with a relevant and engaging message to promote your product or website.
Make sure you’re clear about what you’re offering in exchange for their help – it could be a free product, or even a commission for each sale that comes from their promotion.
- Invest in Content Marketing
Content marketing is the process of creating and distributing content to a target audience online, in order to engage with potential customers and build meaningful relationships.
Start by creating a content strategy and plan out the content you will create and share. Do you want to use video, podcasts, webinars, social media posts, blogs, or a combination of all of these mediums?
Make sure your content is top-notch. Your content should be original, informative, and entertaining.
Also, you should include visuals, such as images and video, to capture reader attention and keep them engaged.
- Re-engage Existing Customers
Re-engaging existing customers is a great way to boost sales, as these customers already know about your brand and are more likely to buy from you.
Think about why these customers bought from you in the past, and cater to these same needs with new offers.
Engage with your customers on social media, and make sure to respond to comments and messages.
You can also use email marketing to send targeted offers to these customers.
- Analyze Your Results
Analyzing and measuring your marketing results is key to understanding what’s working and what’s not.
This way, you can make informed decisions and optimize your marketing strategy to achieve better results in the future.
Analyzing website analytics (such as visits, page views and conversion rates) is essential to determine what kind of content your target audience is engaging with and to figure out which channels are working best.
Testing and measuring different campaigns is a great way to see what works and what doesn’t.
Reaching new customers and entering new markets requires an effective online marketing strategy.
Incorporating SEO, paid search advertising, social media advertising, content marketing, and influencer marketing are all great ways to boost your presence online and reach new customers.
Make sure you measure and analyze your results so that you can learn from them and make informed decisions about your marketing efforts.
