Digital marketing is one of the first things that new ecommerce business owners pay close attention to. Most online businesses invest a lot of time, effort, and resources to create a good marketing strategy and launch their campaigns. However, marketing on online and digital platforms is not as easy as one may think.
For one, ecommerce is a highly fierce and highly competitive industry. While it’s relatively easy to set up an ecommerce website to sell digital products, goods, and services, it’s harder to get people’s attention and pique their interest online. The internet is a world itself that has so much to offer. Only through your digital marketing efforts can your online retail and business start climbing and rising above the competition. Taking this into consideration, here’s a quick guide and some tips on how to start your digital marketing campaign for your ecommerce store.
What is Digital Marketing and Why Invest In It?
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In general, digital marketing refers to every marketing activity and effort conducted online. Businesses typically use a variety of marketing tools and channels in order to boost their online presence, increase brand awareness, and draw traffic to their ecommerce website. However, starting a digital marketing campaign may be overwhelming for some. Given the vast scope of the internet and other online platforms, it can be hard to decide what marketing tactics to use in order to achieve your goals.
There is a ton of reasons why digital marketing is an effective business solution for those struggling to get customers and increase their online sale. One of the most notable benefits of digital marketing revolves around reaching and targeting the right people on proper platforms and at the right time.
Online marketing efforts allow businesses to reach a larger audience. It also offers them an opportunity to campaign on different ecommerce platforms and channels like social media, search engines, email marketing, and the like. Aside from that, marketers also have the ability to send out marketing paraphernalia to potential customers at a time in their buyer’s journey when they are more likely to buy and complete a sale.
Another advantage of digital marketing is that it allows businesses to accurately gauge their campaign’s effectiveness and results in real-time. There is a variety of customer relationship management software and analytics tools that provide marketers with up-to-date data regarding website traffic, ad performance, and more.
Owned vs Earned vs Paid Digital Marketing Assets
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Oftentimes, marketing is all about getting your name or your brand’s name out in public. In general, some tactics are more effective than others. However, it typically comes with a hefty price or investment. Luckily, digital marketing provides both free and paid avenues for marketers to start promoting products or brands on the web. To give you a better idea, let’s dive deeper into what owned, earned, and paid marketing tools are and the pros and cons of each type.
Owned digital marketing assets
Owned digital marketing assets are those that you yourself produced and created. This means that everything that goes on and out of this channel is the responsibility of the brand, company, or business owner. Some examples of owned digital marketing assets include your brand’s social media accounts or profiles, ecommerce website, brand name, brand logo, as well as other digital content such as ebooks, white papers, or blogs.
This type of digital marketing asset is beneficial specifically for ecommerce startups as it is relatively low-cost compared to others. Aside from that, utilizing owned digital marketing channels and assets allow online businesses to take full control of the marketing campaign starting from how it looks, it’s message and delivery, and even to where it is published or posted. When done right, using owned digital marketing assets and channels can bring the right people directly to online stores or ecommerce websites.
However, owned digital marketing assets such as blogs, ebooks, and white papers can be time-consuming to create. This is especially true for startups or small businesses with limited time and resources to outsource these tasks.
Earned digital marketing assets
This type of digital marketing asset comes from the coverage of a third-party company, individual, business, or organization. Often referred to as the word-of-mouth type of marketing in the digital sphere, this form of marketing typically comes in the form of customer reviews, news sources, media attention, and the like.
One potential risk of using earned marketing assets as part of your marketing strategy is that the content is out of your control. If a customer says you have great customer service then that is good for your business. However, if another customer mentions something that is more on the negative side, you can’t do anything about their opinion.
While this is considered risky, earned marketing assets are particularly valuable as it comes from impartial audiences. Those who say that your brand is good have nothing to gain but they provide your business with a reputable source and testimony to the quality of your service. It can also be used as an effective way to boost your brand visibility and increase awareness to a larger audience. In hindsight, it usually takes some time to accumulate a number of valuable reviews. And since you have no control over it, there’s is little that you can do if you garner negative feedback or attention from your target market.
Paid digital marketing assets
Paid digital marketing assets are widely considered to be the most effective in drawing attention, boosting brand visibility, and increasing website traffic. However, this is more like a service that an online business pays for in order to streamline their marketing campaign and reach their target audience as fast as possible. Paid marketing media typically come in the food of digital advertising banners and displays, native advertising, boosted social media posts, and pay-per-click content.
One sure advantage of paid digital marketing campaigns is that online visibility is guaranteed. Since ads about your product, service, or website appear in front of your audience quickly, it’s an effective way to promote your brand as well as increase your website’s traffic. However, paid digital marketing channels can be pretty expensive in the long run. Aside from that, paid media typically broadcasts to large-scale audiences. This means that it can reach anyone, even those not necessarily interested in what you have to offer.
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