Digital Marketing Explained: A Complete Guide

In digital marketing, there are a number of different aspects to consider. From digital marketing strategies to digital marketing analytics, digital marketers have a lot on their plate. In this blog post, we will discuss all the basics of digital marketing – from what it is and how it works to why you need digital marketers in your business. This is the complete guide to digital marketing explained.

What is Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing is the process of using digital channels to promote your business. This includes ads on Facebook, Instagram, Google Ads and YouTube; digital PR (public relations) via Twitter or LinkedIn; social media like blogging and content marketing; email campaigns with MailChimp or ActiveCampaign; digital videos on Vimeo or Youtube etc. All these techniques are used in digital marketing.

It is all about digital.

Step One: Understand Your Digital Marketing Goal

The digital marketing process starts with understanding your goal. Whether you want more customers, sell a product or raise brand awareness – digital channels are the right place to start. For example, if you own an online store and run Google ads, this will put your website in front of people searching for products similar to what you offer on e-commerce.

Step Two: Do Market Research

Next, you must do digital marketing research. This is how you will learn what digital tactics are worth your time and money – whether it’s SnapChat influencers or Facebook ads targeting Millennials for example. You can use Google Analytics to see which digital channels bring in more traffic or sales so this step requires some digging into the data before deciding on digital channels to use.

Step Three: Determine Your Marketing Budget

Now you know what digital marketing tactics will help achieve your goal and the digital channels that work best for your business, it is time to determine your budget. Digital advertising is usually more affordable than other forms of traditional media like TV ads or billboard space but it doesn’t come cheap. You will need to invest time and money into digital marketing research and digital marketers before you can see a return on your investment (ROI).

Step Four: Understand Your Customer Journey

Most digital marketers use the customer journey to plan digital marketing campaigns. Your customers have a specific path they follow when researching and purchasing your product or service – what you want is for them to get in touch with you before, during or after their purchase so that you can get more business from them down the road. To achieve this, digital channels are used to attract new business and keep existing customers coming back for more.

Step Five: Map Your Digital Marketing Plan

Now that you have digital marketing research on hand, it is time to create your digital marketing plan. This includes the digital channels you are going to use and how much investment each channel requires. Some digital marketers opt for a hybrid approach where multiple digital channels are combined with traditional ones like TV ads or billboards – this works best when there isn’t enough money to go digital-only.

The digital marketing plan is how you will achieve your digital goals so think through everything carefully before moving forward with any digital channels.

Step Six: Start Testing Your Plan (and Funnel)

Before digital marketing can go live, you must test your digital strategies. This is how digital marketers make sure everything works as expected and fine-tune the plan before it goes public to attract new customers or engage existing ones. Some digital channels like Google Ads are easier to test than others – for example, if search volume on keywords related to your digital campaign is low, this means you won’t bring in many customers and the digital strategy needs to be tweaked.

Step Seven: Launch Your Digital Marketing Campaigns

Once your digital marketing plan has been tested and fine-tuned, it’s time to launch everything! Some digital channels like Google Ads can go live straight away while others may require more time to set up. A digital marketing campaign usually begins with an email blast – this is how digital marketers start engaging existing customers or attracting new ones.

Step Eight: Optimize Your Digital Marketing Campaigns

After the initial launch, it’s time for digital marketing optimization! This includes measuring ROI on your digital campaigns and making digital changes if needed. Some digital marketers make digital tweaks on a weekly basis while others only need to optimize their digital strategies once every three months.

Step Nine: Maintain Your Digital Marketing Campaigns

Now that your digital marketing campaigns are up and running, it is time for maintenance! If you want to keep bringing in new customers or engaging existing ones, digital marketers must keep their digital marketing campaigns up to date. This includes updating contact information so customers can reach you more easily and adding new digital content like blog posts or press releases that are relevant to your business goals.

Step Ten: Analyze Your Results

The final step in digital marketing is analyzing the results of each campaign! Digital marketers usually start with digital marketing research and digital analytics to determine their campaign’s ROI. They then use this information to improve future campaigns by making digital changes, optimizing digital strategies or even tweaking digital channels!

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