Myths Vs Reality of Digital Marketing

1. Build and it will come — We wish, but that’s not how it works now, you have to get the attention, distribute, market, measure

2. Digital marketing fast results — Effective and instant but to see results, it does take time just like any other activities

3. Digital marketing is easy — Easy, but being creative is touch and to get good at it you have to work your way up

4. Tools can automate and I don’t have to work — Not so soon.

5. Social media is free — Pages and accounts are free but to reach to the right audience you have to spend

6. I can start my own business — Yes, but just like any other business it takes time to build your business online too.

7. Can work from home — Sure, you have to hustle to get to where you want to be.

8. Can get rich fast — There is no such thing as getting rich fast. It was easier like 10–15 years ago not anymore.

How Digital marketing is done?

Who does Digital Marketing?

1. Outsource: There are specialized agencies whom you can outsource it to.

2. In house: Hire digital marketers to work for your company or clients.

3. Consulting: You can become a consultant if you are well versed in Digital Marketing.

Digital Marketing in 2021 and beyond

Digital marketing is dynamic and updated every day. The future of digital marketing has a lot to do with Artificial Intelligence, automation, and technical expertise. Should you be worried?

Yes, and No — digital marketing has evolved and changed quite a bit, however, all the big players including Google, Facebook, Instagram are good at simplifying these techniques for common users. A basic understanding of all the channels and keeping up by reading the latest updates through each of the platforms official blog can help

What is not digital marketing?

1. Multi-Level Marketing — Digital marketing is not multi-level marketing. It certainly provides a medium to build a brand reputation through social media but it is not a good practice to indulge in MLM.

2. Quick rich schemes — Most often people think they can quick money online with the help of affiliate marketing. However, the challenge is building traffic takes time & only happens with your creativity to provide valuable content.

3. Junk mail/Spam — Never indulge in purchasing data and more so never send junk email to hundreds of unknown database. That’s spamming and invasion of privacy. Eventually, you will lose business and reputation.

Who can do Digital Marketing? — You can! No matter what industry you belong to you can do digital marketing!

• If you are planning to start a business
• If you are an individual looking to share your hobby, your experience
• A start-up enterprise
• Students
• Consultant or freelancer
• Non-profit organization seeking to raise funds

Anyone and all of the above can learn and grow with digital marketing.

Content Marketing

Useful/Valuable information in various formats Video, Audio, Image, PDF’s, ebooks, PPT’s, Reports, Research downloads

Action — Do it now:

1. Create visual content using www.canva.com

2. Create an easy video using the free Quik app

7. Dynamic: Digital Marketing is dynamic and on-going. It keeps evolving day after day and as users & marketers, we need to keep adapting to changes. Every day there is a new app that’s launched or a new update by Google to its existing feature. Keep this in mind we must understand that digital marketing is not the only practice. So while you might be an expert in using Instagram, you also need to know about Twitter or Snapchat and make use of it to grow your business. Do not restrict your business to just one platform

8. Brand Building — It is a known fact that brand building or brand reputation is a long-term process. While digital marketing gives you a push to create brand awareness, you must acknowledge that brand building yield results with effort and continuation. So you might go viral in a day but how you sustain & use technology in the right way is the game-changer for success.

Social Media

Social media is the biggest aspect of Digital Marketing. Most of us have some footprint on social media platforms. It allows us to connect with like-minded individuals/groups, share ideas, and build a professional network.

On a business level websites like Facebook & Instagram help to engage with real-time customers, provide valuable information, and reach out to a huge audience at minimal costs.

The advantages of Social Media

1. Free Business page/channel — Creating a business page on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter is not only easy but it’s absolutely “FREE”!

2. Paid Ads — To reach out to target audience all social media channels requires paid ads

3. Social Media Advertisement — SEA is a straightforward and effortless way to target a wide audience, increase profitability & reach business goals.

4. Influencers Endorsement — Influencer marketing has gained a huge momentum due to digital channels. It has become a career path for many through endorsements and reviews.

5. Email — Email marketing plays a key role too. It’s a way to stay connected & updated about the latest buzz in the market, your favorite brands, closing transaction deals

6. Content Marketing: Unique content is what works on social media. If you want to stand out and make an impression in the digital realm, then your content has to be top-notch and versatile. Provide valuable information and educate the consumer through videos, images, text, audio, e-books, slide share

Disadvantages of Digital Marketing

 

1. Privacy/security — Privacy is one of the biggest concerns when it comes to digital channels. When you click on a product on an e-commerce website, you see the same product following you in most of the website/social media channels (remarketing/retargeting) This is done through cookies. As an Internet user, being aware of how this is targeted will help a user.

2. Ad blockers — Ad blocking or ad filtering is a type of software that can remove or alter advertising content from a webpage, website, or a mobile app.

The Advantages of Digital Marketing

It is no surprise that more and more people are devoting their time online to transact or research. According to a report by Forbes, about 82% of consumers research online. Marketers today are applying digital marketing tactics to reach to the consumers & here’s why you should use digital marketing for your business too:

1. Cost-Effective: Digital marketing is an economical and most effective way to promote your business as compared to traditional marketing. With a limited budget, you can create content & start your campaign. It is you who decides the budget which can even start from something as low as UGX 5000/- depending on your business.

2. Real-time results — The moment your ad is live, you can view the performance. Additionally, edits can be done in real-time. This way you can understand the situation and take necessary action

3. PPC– PPC stands for Pay Per Click. It is a model where the advertiser pays the publisher each time their ad is clicked. Google Ads is the best and easiest platform for PPC.

4. Targeting — In the case of traditional marketing, there is no way to determine the number and the type of people who saw your billboard. With digital marketing, it is not easy to target audiences based on their interests, location, behavior. You can create an audience based on your business model and push your ad to the right consumers.

5. Measurable results — Be rest assured about the analytics and reports through digital marketing. You will get the most accurate & realistic data that will help you in reaching your goals as well forecast your future sales

6. Conversion rates: It’s much simpler to get conversion online as the customer views the ad & takes action.

7. Easy Interface: Setting up ad accounts, building a website, managing social media have become straightforward and clear-cut with the easy user interface.

Other Tools

 

Voice Search

Information can now be looked at by the command of your voice. Siri, Google Voice, Cortana are some of the common digital voice assistants

Action — Do it now: Search your business using voice search, see what shows up.

Visual Search

Earlier we mentioned about optimizing images. This is because search engines do not understand imagery. Hence renaming an image, adding a description and alt text are pivotal. Search engine crawlers understand the text-based information given in the images and present it in a visual form to the searcher. Now you can search using images with Google lens, Google Pixel. Open your Google Assistant, point at a logo, and see if your company details are showing up

Maps: Maps have become a big deal! Listing your business on Google maps is essential as it cost-effective and helps in drawing local traffic to your website. Searching directions, review, phone numbers, images, etc have all become an integral part of everyday life as nobody today uses Yellow Pages. Google maps are one of the most dominant map services we have.

Answer Box: “Ask and you shall receive!” Yes, that’s right. When you ask a question by entering appropriate keywords, the SERP displays the answer on the page itself. There is no need to click and visit a website. Whether you know the weather or even get a calculator the answer box is right at your service to solve your queries!

Knowledge Graph: Have you ever observed the big block on the right-hand side of SERP while looking up for specific information pertaining to locations, celebrities, brands, etc. The format in which the information is displayed is called the knowledge graph. It’s a crisp way of displaying relevant information in the form of facts, images, social media.

Local Business Listings: Local business listings are nothing but your business directory. Traditionally we could list our business on Yellow Pages. But remember the pain of searching for pages to find the right contact. We now no longer have use of Yellow Pages as the digital platform allows you to easily list your business with Just dial, Sulekha or Yelp. With just a click, the searcher can locate your address, number, e-mail ID. In the long run, this helps in your ranking and online reputation.

Google Ads/ PPC/ Pay Per Click/Search Advertisement:

Traditionally, as a business, if you wanted to reach out to a wider audience you could place ads in newspapers, broadcast on TV/radio, use direct mailing or telemarketing. All these options required huge budgets as they are expensive. It was difficult for startups or small business owners to use most of these mediums. But advertising in the digital age world has changed rapidly & has become cost-efficient.

Online marketing consists of two main types of advertising:

1. Search Engine Advertising/Marketing: Search advertising aka PPC (pay per click) basically refers to text ads that are showcased on search engine pages. The results appear due to the keywords used by the searcher. Hence, it’s essential to use at least 12–15 important keywords in your ad. In order to advertise on a search engine, you will need an Adwords account which is a very easy tool provided by Google.

2. Display Advertising: This is one of the most common types of ads you might have come across while browsing. It could be in a video or image format and is largely based upon user behavior. For eg — You’re planning a holiday and want to book tickets on Make My Trip/ website. However, for some reason, you didn’t make the purchase and close the website. The next time you log in to any website such as Facebook/Youtube the exact same product/service will be flashed on your screen.

Tool #2

 

Search

A user uses the internet to look for various types of queries. The search result may vary as per the keywords used by the searcher. Search engines like Google have various ways and formats of showcasing results. As business owners, it is our responsibility to utilize the tools provided by search engines and present content to get the best possible outcome.

But how do these results appear? What happens at the back end? To understand this, we need to understand SEO — Search Engine Optimization

Digital Marketing Tools

 

Website

It is imperative in the digital age to own a website. If you are a business owner and don’t have a website you lose on the market opportunity. The information on a website helps in communicating with the customer about the product & overall business credibility. Think about it, any customer will do basic research before making a purchase, hence having a user-friendly and informative site is the first step in showcasing your authenticity.

Through digital marketing, you can learn how to design a cost-effective website, generate traffic, list your website on directories and search engines. The basic rule is to design a website that is user-friendly, mobile-friendly, and loads quickly. 

Apart from mobile-friendly or responsive design websites, AMP is becoming more important. Now you can build a website by just using AMP powered by Google just like building a WordPress site. Free of cost with some amazing templates.

All you need to do is install a plugin called AMP (this plugin allows your website to load faster on mobile.

How do beginners learn digital marketing

 

The Beginner's Guide

Digital marketing has become one of the most commonly used phrases these days. Although it’s easily used in a sentence, quite often it is not defined accurately. For some, it’s a synonym for “Internet Marketing” while others describe it as marketing using electronic devices.

Here’s how You can get started in Digital Marketing. Most common topics in Digital Marketing includes:

Fundamentals of Digital Marketing 

• Website – Mobile Friendly
• Blogs
• SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
• Google Ads (Pay per click)
• Social Media Marketing
• Content Marketing
• Email Marketing
• Creatives for Social Media
• Google Analytics
• AI
• Voice Search Optimization
• App Store Optimization

So let’s understand what exactly is Digital Marketing?

Just a decade ago, if a business wanted to reach out to target customers they would promote using traditional marketing mediums such as TV, radio, print. Simply because that’s where the potential customers’ used to spend their time. However, as humans evolved our technology advanced giving rise to a digital revolution. To simply state, people started spending more time on online platforms such as Google, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, etc to stay acquainted with news, entertainment, and commerce. Hence, today our lives run on a click.

Digital has become a part of our existence. From shopping apparel to groceries, furniture & getting laundry delivered everything is online. With this new shift, marketers did not waste anytime and quickly adapted to use social media & other digital tools to push & pull the consumer which gave birth to Digital marketing

But how to achieve your business or individual objectives using Digital/Internet channels?

No matter the size of your business, digital marketing is the most effective way to grow and achieve your goals which could vary from any of the following:

• Increase revenue
• Build brand awareness
• Market your product or service
• Decrease cost
• Improve efficiency
• Increase productivity
• High return on investment
• Identify loyal customers

Apart from these business objectives, digital channels can be used effectively for:

• Educating & engaging with potential users
• Increase website traffic
• Providing valuable information
• Building trust
• Customer reviews
• Grow online community

Instapreneur Secrets

 

Instapreneur Secrets

Dear entrepreneur,

If you want to build a massive following on Instagram and reach financial independence, or even if you just want to make money doing what you love on Instagram, then this is the most important letter you'll ever read!

Here's why...

Because in today's digital world, building a following or NOT can mean the difference between making money online or struggling to succeed as an entrepreneur!

Before I tell you more about it...

Yours Truthfully,

Douglas Bayo

200 Social Media Marketing Tactics

 200 Social Media Marketing Tactics. 

                        Inside this eBook, you will discover the topics about tips on choosing 

                        which social media site to use, tips on getting started with a social 

                        media site, tips on keeping subscribers glued to your account, tips on 

                        using multimedia content, tips on using language, tips on how to 

                        expand the reach of your social media account, tips on using 

                        Facebook, tips on using Twitter, tips for safety, tips on involvements 

                        you should avoid, tips on maintaining/improving the credibility of 

                        your social media account, tips on measuring and improving the 

                        effectiveness of your social media account, tips on coming up with a 

                        good content, tips on unique ways to deliver your message, tips on 

                        dealing with competition, tips on financing your social media account 

                        and tips on making your social media account user friendly.