One of the most frustrating aspects of modern digital marketing is that it changes constantly. Just when small business owners think they have a handle on SEO, PPC, and social-media advertising, the entire paradigm shifts and what was once a best practice is now a horrible blunder.
Still, digital marketing is a critical part of long-term success in business, and it behooves all entrepreneurs to understand how to implement a modern marketing strategy. On that note, here are five things to always keep in mind in regard to digital marketing:
Your Customers are On the Move
More and more purchase decisions occur while customers are on a mobile device. That means local SEO and mobile web design are crucial in garnering (and retaining) traffic on your site. What’s more, developing ads and pages that are designed specifically for a mobile audience can give you a big advantage over your competitors.
It’s unwise to think about your website as a place that merely exists on a desktop, because mobility is the way of the future.
Tricks and Cheats Don’t Work
In the past, crafty marketers may have successfully “gamed the system,” by finding loopholes in search-engine algorithms. However, it’s now next to impossible to partake in shady marketing tactics like keyword-stuffing or sharing duplicate content without incurring a harsh penalty from Google or the like.
Rather than looking for ways to cut corners, it makes much more sense for business owners to look for long-term solutions.
Content is Still King
Speaking of long-term solutions, there are few more reliable marketing methods than writing compelling blogs and website content. At the end of the day, sound content will always attract interested leads. Yes, it’s a smart play to update or expand your content strategy, but you should never think that you’ve written enough on a subject, or that you’ve covered every possible angle.
Just as consumers are constantly looking for new solutions to old problems, so too should businesses look to address them with dynamic content.
Unified Networks
Many businesses employ a diverse marketing strategy online. They write blogs, post on social media, pay for digital ads on search engines –– and more. However, simply creating marketing and advertising material and throwing it out into the ether isn’t enough anymore. Rather, the most progressive marketers also work to link their content and create unified networks across multiple channels.
Consumers very rarely observe a linear path toward a purchase, and businesses that position their content strategically stand a much better chance at nurturing leads toward sales than those that don’t.
Educate & Instruct
No matter how badly someone actually needs a given product or service, no one wants to hear a sales pitch. Instead of creating marketing content that focuses solely on the virtues of your business or product, look instead to educate your customer base.
Consider for example, STD testing centers. Rather than describing the high quality of service centers, a better marketing tactic is to explain the nature of STDs, which are often misunderstood or misrepresented. In the same way, all businesses should look for opportunities to educate their consumer base so that they can make informed decisions themselves.
Control the source of information, and you control the nature of the customer journey.
The Bottom Line
Though marketing trends will come and go, the DNA of exceptional business plans will remain the same. Fortunately, any of these five precepts will likely serve your company well. Try them out today and see the proof for yourself!