Did you know that 3 percent of Americans are online every day? Not only that, 43% of people travel more than once a day and 26% are “almost constantly” online.
These figures are even higher among mobile internet users. 89% of Americans are online at least every day and 31% are almost constantly online. As a marketer, it is important to influence the digital world with the presence of online advertising by building a brand, providing a great customer experience that brings more potential customers and more with a digital strategy.
Table of Contents
Digital Marketing Guide 2022 - A Guide to Marketing in Today’s Digital World
This guide to digital marketing 2022 will not only acknowledge you with the ifs and buts of Digital Marketing but also provide you with the latest advancement in the digital world heading to 2022. So, stay connected till the end.
What is Digital Marketing?
Digital marketing involves all marketing efforts that use electronic devices or the Internet. Businesses take advantage of digital channels such as search engines, social media, email, and other websites to connect with current and potential customers.
Digital marketing, also known as online marketing, promotes brands that use the Internet and other forms of digital communication to connect with potential customers. It includes not only email, social media, and web-based advertising, but also text and multimedia messages as a marketing channel.
Types of Digital Marketing
Digital marketing has as much expertise as there are ways to interact with each other using digital media. Here are some key examples.
Search engine optimization
Search engine optimization, or SEO, is technically a marketing tool, not a form of marketing. Balance defines it as “the art and science of making web pages attractive to search engines”.
The “art and science” part of SEO is very important. SEO is a science because you need to research and weigh the various contributing factors to get the highest ranking possible. Today, important factors to consider when optimizing a web page are:
Content quality
- User engagement level
- Mobile friendly
- Number and quality of inbound links
The strategic use of these factors makes SEO a science, but the unpredictability in it makes it an art.
In SEO, there is no quantitative rubric or consistent rule for high ranking. Google changes its algorithm almost constantly, so it is impossible to make accurate predictions. You can closely monitor your page performance and make adjustments accordingly.
Content marketing
SEO is a major component of content marketing, a strategy based on delivering relevant and valuable content to a target audience.
As with any marketing strategy, the goal of content marketing is to attract leads, which eventually turn into customers. But it does so in a very different way than traditional advertising. Instead of attracting opportunities with the potential value from a product or service, it provides value for free in the form of written material.
Content marketing is important and there are tons of statistics to prove it:
84% of consumers expect companies to provide entertaining and useful content experiences
62% of companies with at least 5,000 employees produce daily content
92% of marketers consider their company content to be an important asset
The more effective the content marketing, the harder it will be. Content marketing writers must be able to rank high in search engine results, as well as engage people who read content, share and interact more with the brand. When content is relevant, it forms strong connections across the pipeline.
Social media marketing
Social media marketing is about raising traffic and brand awareness by engaging people in online discussions. The most popular platforms for social media marketing are Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, not far behind LinkedIn and YouTube.
Since social media involves active audience participation in marketing, it has become a popular way to attract attention. It is the most popular content medium for B2C marketers at 96% and is also making an impression on the B2B sector. According to the Content Marketing Institute, 61% of B2B content marketers have increased their social media usage this year.
Social media marketing offers built-in engagement metrics that can be very useful in understanding how well you reach your audience. The number of shares, comments or total clicks on your website means that you need to decide what kind of interaction is most important to you.
Direct purchase may not be the goal of your social media marketing strategy. Many brands use social media marketing to start a conversation with an audience without immediately encouraging them to spend money. It’s very common among brands that offer products and services that target an older audience or are suddenly unsuitable for shopping. It all depends on your company goals.
Pay-per-click marketing
Pay-per-click, or PPC, is posting an ad on the platform and paying for it every time someone clicks on it.
How and when people see your ad can be a little complicated. Also known as SERP, when a position is available on a search engine results page, the engine must fill that space with an instant auction. An algorithm prioritizes each available statement based on a number of factors, including:
- Ad quality
- Keyword relevance
- Landing page quality
- Bid amount
Each PPC campaign consists of 1 or more target actions, which the audience must complete after clicking on the ad. These actions are called exchanges and may or may not be transactions. Purchasing is an exchange, but sign up for a newsletter or call your home office.
Whatever you choose as your target conversions, you can track them through the platform you choose to see how your campaign works.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing allows someone to make money by promoting another person’s business. You can be a promoter or a business working with a promoter, but in both cases, the process is the same.
It works using the revenue sharing model. If you are a subsidiary, you will receive a commission each time someone purchases the item you are promoting. If you are a merchant, you pay for every sale that the subsidiary helps you with.
Some affiliate marketers probably choose to review only 1 company product on a blog or other third-party site. Others have relationships with multiple merchants.
Whether you want to be an ally or find someone, the first step is to establish a relationship with the other party. You can use a platform designed to connect affiliates to retailers or you can launch or join a single-retailer program.
If you are a retailer and choose to work directly with affiliates, you can do many things to make your program attractive to potential promoters. You need to provide those teammates with the tools they need to succeed. This includes incentives for great results as well as marketing support and pre-made content.
Marketing Automation
Marketing automation uses software to empower digital marketing campaigns, improving advertising efficiency and relevance. here marketing automation that is the use of AI is one of the most important, updated, and evolving concepts of 2022 and coming years.
According to statistics:
90% of US consumers consider personalization to be “very” or “somewhat” attractive
81% of consumers want to better understand brands
77% of companies believe in the value of real-time personalization, yet 60% struggle with it
Marketing automation allows companies to pursue personalization expectations. It allows brands:
- Collect and analyze user information
- Create targeted marketing campaigns
- Send and post-marketing messages to the right audience at the right time
- Many marketing automation tools use it to determine when and how to approach a potential message after a potential engagement (or lack thereof).
This level of real-time optimization means you can effectively create a personalized marketing strategy for each customer without investing extra time.
Email Marketing
The concept of email marketing is very simple - you send out a promotional message and hopefully, your opportunity will click on it. However, the implementation can be very complicated. First, you need to make sure that your emails are as desired. This means a to-do list:
Personalizes content on both body and subject line
Specifies what type of emails the customer will receive
Provides a clear Unsubscribe option
Integrates both transactional and promotional emails
You want your customers to see your campaign not just as a promotional tool but as an important service.
Email marketing is a proven, effective technology: 89% of surveyed professionals call it their most effective lead generator.
It’s even better if you incorporate other technologies like marketing automation that allow you to sort and schedule your emails so that they can meet your customers’ needs more efficiently.
How does digital marketing work?
You know the definition of digital marketing, but how does digital marketing work? Online marketing works by developing a coordinated, omnichannel strategy that supports the unique buying journey of your target audience. This means that your business will use multiple channels such as social, email, and search to support a comprehensive strategy such as brand awareness, leads, or sales. Digital marketing cycle graphic
For perspective, think about this digital marketing example:
Goal: Earn leads
Channel: Search, Email
Strategy:
- Write a blog post that targets the Mid-Funnel (MOFU) requirement.
- Optimize blog posts for search engines and users.
- Include a downloadable resource that users need to share their email addresses with.
- Create drip campaigns to convert those email subscribers into customers.
Digital marketing is a prime example of targeting graphics, but it also gives an overview of how companies can use digital marketing to achieve global goals such as attracting leads. Although you can use online marketing channels yourself, they work best when used together, which is one of the biggest challenges for digital marketers.
The Mind-blowing benefits of Digital Marketing
Digital marketing has become popular because it reaches a large audience, but it also offers many other mind-blowing benefits. These are some of the benefits.
Wide geographical range
When you post an ad online, people can see it wherever they are (unless you limit your ad geographically). This will make it easier for you to expand the market share of your business.
1. Cost-effective
Digital marketing is more cost-effective than traditional marketing, reaching more audiences. Overhead costs are high for newspaper ads, television spots, and other traditional marketing opportunities. They also give you less control over whether or not your target audience sees those messages in the first place.
With digital marketing, you can only create 1 piece of content that will attract visitors as long as your blog is active. You can create an email marketing campaign that delivers messages to target customer lists in the schedule and it is easy to change that schedule or content if you need to.
When you combine it all, digital marketing gives you more flexibility and customer interaction with the cost of your advertising.
2. Quantitative result
To find out if your marketing strategy works, you need to know how many customers it will attract and ultimately how much revenue it will generate. But how do you do this with a non-digital marketing strategy?
Ask each customer “How did you find us?” Asking that is the traditional choice.
Unfortunately, this does not work in all industries. Most companies are unable to interact face to face with their customers and surveys do not always give complete results.
With digital marketing, monitoring results is easy. Digital marketing software and platforms automatically track the number of conversions you want to achieve, such as email open rates, visits to your homepage, or direct purchases.
3. Easy personalization
Digital marketing allows you to collect customer data in a way that offline marketing cannot. Data collected digitally is more accurate and precise.
Imagine that you are providing financial services and want to send special offers to people who view your products. You know that you will get better results if you target the offer keeping in view the interest of the person, so you decided to create 2 campaigns. One is for young families who have considered your life insurance products and the other is for the millennial entrepreneurs who are considering your retirement plans.
How do you collect all that data without automatic tracking?
How many phone records do you have to go through?
How many customer profiles?
And how do you know who owns or has not read the brochure you sent?
With digital marketing, all of this information is already in your hands.
4. Target the right audience
Dividing audiences is easier now than ever before as many digital marketing platforms allow you to target specific audiences. We have access to online tools that track a person’s online activities and demographics. Digital marketers can use this data to provide specific products or services that are of interest to consumers.
For example, after a visitor clicks on a display ad for a brand, they can target that visitor on social media or through a search engine, with brand follow-up and related ads. If the content that visitors receive is based on their interests and online behaviors, it will create positive reinforcement and make shopping easier and more satisfying.
You can target your audience with content and offers based on what stage you are on the journey of purchasing. For example, email marketing can be used to increase leads until they are ready to buy. They may have subscribed to your blog and keep your blog update emails constantly open. After many months, they will visit you’re About Me and Service web pages. At this point, you know they need to send targeted emails with a special offer. They clicked on the offer and submitted a request for a quotation.
Advanced digital marketing tools make this possible. Let me tell you how it works: When a user fills out an online form, he or she provides personal information. Most web pages contain cookies that track user behavior on the page. This data is what companies or digital marketers analyze and design the right strategy for a diverse audience.
5. Build a stable lead pipeline
Creating your “sales funnel” is ultimately the main goal of marketing. The sales funnel is basically a system that constantly generates leads and sales from traffic. In other words, turning traffic into brand enthusiasts. The task of the sales funnel is to distinguish “window shoppers” from the actual buyers. It also helps in improving the customer
The Online Sales Funnel is specifically designed to generate consistent leads. Here is an example: Before creating an online sales funnel, a betting company relied on its billboards and location to generate walk-in leads for its products and services. Now, the company is using digital submission to create more sustainable pipeline leads. When someone makes their first deposit or stake, they are given a coupon to play for free. The promo is only available on the company’s website and customers must register to take advantage of the offer. With this approach, the betting company generates leads in a more systematic and predictable manner. As an added bonus, the business stays in touch with the customer through email marketing, as customers have to submit their email to receive the free offer.
6. Optimize and get better conversion rates
Unlike traditional marketing with expensive TV, radio, or print ads, online advertising platforms are very affordable. You can improve your ad conversion rate more easily than traditional ads. With print ads, it is very difficult to keep track of exchange rates as everything is done offline. How would you know if someone saw your ad in a magazine and went to the store? If you can not track your ad performance, how can you optimize it?
Digital advertising makes this easier because every interaction is tracked. You will immediately know how many people are viewing your ad and what action they are taking.
Most online advertising platforms have some level of reporting that you can use to enhance, copy and design your advertising objective.
How Digital Marketing will evolve in 2022?
It can be argued that there is still time for surprises, 2021 is at least more stable and less unpredictable than 2020. But a consumer base (and still a challenging marketing environment) saturated with messages dictate what 2022 will bring Strategic changes in Digital Marketing. However, with the Google Key decision, there are some trends that we expect to anticipate next year.
The growth of AI will accelerate
This year, Google announced its decision to end cookie tracking in 2022. That change may now be delayed, with its ultimate death in 2023 further complicating the effective advertising goal. Digital marketing strategists need to start planning how they are going to tweak their model in 2022 and face it when changes come.
As a result, AI growth in digital marketing will only accelerate next year. Marketing that does not affect AI is already missing out on benefits such as automated reporting on web traffic, keyword recommendations for better organic search, and potential future purchases from customers. It also has a noticeable effect on the bottom line; 76% of companies that automate marketing generate ROI within a year. If you want your business to be more visible in search results or to target your audience without tracking them, you need AI.
Consumer’s Voice is heard
AI provided many custom tools for everything from market intelligence to conversations, and now chatbots have become ubiquitous in B2C interactions. And often, even though they do not need to talk to humans, users use their voices for web searches or even to make purchases.
Already, 27% of the world’s online population uses voice search on their mobiles. That’s about 18% of the total cost - about $ 40 billion. In fact, it is even more important to listen to the voices of consumers.
Storytelling as a means of marketing
It is not enough to describe your product, especially in B2B marketing where the customer base essentially focuses on the results. Storytelling in soft selling techniques is another growth area and continues to grow in place of case studies advertising on successful product implementation.
Brands let the world know if their solutions increase customer sales by 20%, save them money and streamline their processes. But instead of selling, they are going to tell a story and do this.
Gamification
Games are already completely dominating the download market. By 2020, 36% of all app downloads - almost 80 billion - are games. It is estimated that $120 billion will be spent on game downloads this year, with 80% of mobile phone owners using them for that purpose. This number will increase in 2022; Games add up quickly and can be addictive and their use is not recognized in customer engagement. Games are often found on interactive ads, websites, and wherever brands want to engage their customer base.
CSR Of ongoing growth
The importance of the brand’s ethics to consumers is already clear, with messages recently shifted into campaigns, especially from some multinational companies. According to a study in the US, 40% of consumers boycott a company for corruption or fraud, while 44% boycott animal abuse brands - the main reason.
Brands continue to deliver the message that they are authentic, connect with the communities they operate in, and care about the environment, giving consumers another reason to choose them.
Improved multi-channel marketing strategies
Your target market members do not limit their activity to one channel. You can’t either. With so many social media channels, especially the deep market and a large number of users, effective marketing strategies require presence in all major channels. A coherent message across a wide range of media is largely standard.
Increased personalization
You may have heard of this before, but by 2022 this is neither true nor significant. Inbound marketing - that is, search engine marketing, blogs and content, and social media - requires people to talk to each other to avoid the fog. Message. CRM and CMS‘s effective integration criteria for consistent, targeted brand messages in digital marketing.
Conclusion:
Digital marketing is a broad concept in itself that covers other topics such as SEO, Social media, Email marketing, Paid ads, and much more. Our latest guide for 2022 acknowledges the beginners and even advance with the evolving digital marketing concept and as said before AI & Automation are the most important concept to be focused on in order to take full advantage of Your digital marketing campaign. Hope You find this guide interesting and useful.
don’t forget to share your thoughts in the comment section and share this valuable content with others too. Thank You
1 Comment