The goal of every marketing strategy is to generate sales. Each advertising effort is dispatched with the sole reason for change which could be anything from clicking on a page to purchasing an item. A digital marketing funnel is the most common and proven way of attempting to change those individuals from the crowd into a customer and afterward persuade them to keep on buying items. The marketing funnel is an essential model that addresses the whole purchasing excursion of the personas, from the second they know your image until the time they become clients or customers. This idea is generally utilized among sales reps yet has likewise turned into a major asset for the accomplishment of promoting activities. Digital Marketing Funnel & AIDAA Model The marketing funnel and the AIDAA model both serve as frameworks for guiding potential customers through the buying process. While they share similarities, the marketing funnel, and AIDAA are not the same thing. To know more read marketing models & frameworks. The marketing funnel is a broad framework that describes the journey a potential customer goes through from the initial awareness of a product or service to the final purchase. The marketing funnel typically includes several stages such as awareness, interest, consideration, conversion, and retention. The AIDAA model, on the other hand, is an extension of the traditional AIDA model, which stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action, and it includes an additional stage, which is Advocacy. The AIDAA model is used to guide customers through the buying process and beyond. While both the marketing funnel and AIDAA serve as frameworks for guiding potential customers through the buying process, they are not mutually exclusive, and businesses can use both frameworks together to create a comprehensive marketing plan that addresses all stages of the buying process, from initial awareness to post-purchase advocacy. An effective marketing funnel must include stages right from attracting the suspects to converting them to leads and then nurturing them into customers, while it must also cater to retaining those customers. We are not diving into B2C or B2B approaches in detail, instead, we will stick to the marketing activities one needs to digitally take into account. The above AIDAA-based marketing funnel recognizes the intellectual stages an individual goes through during the purchasing cycle of an item or administration. It's a purchasing funnel where buyers go forward and backward at each stage, to help them in making the last buy. It's as of now, not a physical relationship absolutely between the purchaser and the brand as it used to be since online media has stretched out to accomplish the various objectives of the funnel through data added by different clients by means of informal communities and networks. Brands utilize the marketing funnel to decide the manner in which they should make and circulate promoting messages to their interest group at each phase of the purchaser's excursion. Now let us see what goes with each stage of the funnel: Awareness : This is the stage where businesses create awareness of their brand without being pushy and analyze the segment of the audience. This is the stage where a lot of creative content is marketed in order to attract customers or prospects. They are considered suspects at this stage. Content Marketing plays a key role at this stage along with the platform used to create awareness. Re-evaluation of both content and medium is necessary, use of appropriate KPIs like CTR is required to measure the success of this stage. For relevant metrics check our post on Marketing Metrics. A few ways in which businesses create awareness : Sponsored social media posts SEO Guest posting or guest podcasting eBooks and whitepapers Independent research Webinars Videos Infographics In-person events For instance, You want customers to find your website when they search for information relevant to your brand online. So it is worth putting time into executing SEO best practices so you show up in web search tool results pages. Counting the right data when your organization shows up on SERPs is critical. Interest : In this stage, it is known that the suspect has shown interest and turned into a lead who is attracted to the brand or its idea and wants to know more about it. However, they are still not prepared to make a purchase. It would be crucial for any business to build a relationship with the leads and understand their end goals. This can be done through content like feelers that foster the brand voice along with determining the lead's intent and end goals. Also keeping a close watch on what interests them in the content, and which links they click will help in building the relationship. Answering their queries and concerns will establish the brand as an expert in the field and assist in the smooth transition to the next stage. Following are a few ways in which this can be achieved : Email campaigns Blog posts Lead magnets Chatbots Social media accounts Free trials Retargeting campaigns For instance, blog posts flash intriguing items that grandstand the ability of the brand in a connecting way. A decent method to maintain and expand on their advantage is to get them to buy your pamphlet and later send them applicable items via email. Desire : At this stage of the funnel, the lead has intentions to make a purchase but is not 100% sure. This is when the lead turns into a prospect, as they think of the budget, impact of buying, and post-buying effects. This is when the business showcases the prospects, and the benefits of making the purchase by highlighting the positive outcomes of the buy compared to not buying. This is the stage when a Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) turns into a Sales Qualified Lead (SQL) depending on their interest. Following are some content types that can be used to escalate the desire: Testimonials Pricing pages Case studies Discount codes Customer reviews and product recommendations Live demos or tutorial webinars Consultations Product comparisons For instance, hearing directly from your existing customers can be incredibly persuasive when buyers are still considering whether you are right for them. Action : This is the stage where the lead actually makes a purchase. The business must make sure that the lead is provided with enough materials to fit into the customer category. It should not be only about closing a deal. If the business wants to make progress then at this stage it must provide enough support to the customer in understanding the usage of the product or service they have bought or any kind of post-buying assistance. At this stage, the sales team is in action and the processes henceforth fall under BOFU (Bottom of the Funnel). Following are a couple of tests : Insider or client achievement tips Uncommon offers Item execution or preparing online classes Packaged bundles Follow-up email crusades A Call to Action (CTA) that is well composed, outwardly engaging, and stands apart on your site page is the way to getting clients to at last change over. This could be through pursuing a free preliminary, booking a demo, or guaranteeing a markdown. Retention : Brand royalty goes in hand with customer loyalty. At this stage, content must add value to the customer beyond just sales. The focus must be on long-term relationships. Referrals and word-of-mouth are influenced at this stage. Following are a few ways : Referral programs Upsell campaigns Re-engagement email campaigns Product-specific webinars and tutorials Live demonstrations Types of Marketing Funnels There are several types of marketing funnels that marketers can use to guide consumers through the buying process. Here are some of the most common types of marketing funnels: Lead Generation Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to generate leads by capturing the contact information of potential customers. It typically involves offering a lead magnet, such as an eBook or a webinar, in exchange for a user's email address. Tripwire Funnel: This funnel aims to convert leads into paying customers by offering them a low-priced, high-value product, also known as a tripwire. The goal is to get the customer to make a small commitment, which makes them more likely to make a larger purchase later on. Sales Funnel: The sales funnel is designed to guide customers through the entire buying process, from awareness to conversion. It typically includes multiple steps, such as lead capture, lead nurturing, and a sales page, and aims to convert prospects into paying customers. Membership Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to turn customers into members by offering a subscription-based product or service. It typically includes a free trial or a low-priced offer, followed by a series of upsells and cross-sells. Launch Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to generate buzz and excitement around a new product or service launch. It typically includes a series of pre-launch content, such as webinars or social media teasers, followed by a launch event and a limited-time offer. Each type of funnel serves a specific purpose and is designed to meet the needs of different types of businesses and customers. By understanding the different types of marketing funnels, marketers can choose the right funnel for their business and create effective marketing campaigns that drive results. Types of Digital Marketing Funnels There are several types of digital marketing funnels that businesses can use to guide customers through the buying process online. Here are some of the most common types of digital marketing funnels: Email Marketing Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to build a relationship with prospects and customers through email marketing campaigns. It typically includes lead capture, lead nurturing, and sales conversion emails that are sent to subscribers over a period of time. Social Media Marketing Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to attract prospects and customers through social media platforms. It typically involves creating social media content, engaging with followers, and driving traffic to a landing page or sales page. Content Marketing Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to attract prospects and customers through valuable content, such as blog posts, videos, or podcasts. It typically includes lead capture and lead nurturing strategies, such as offering a lead magnet or email newsletter. Search Engine Marketing Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to attract prospects and customers through search engines, such as Google. It typically involves creating targeted ads, optimizing landing pages, and using retargeting campaigns to convert leads into customers. Affiliate Marketing Funnel: This type of funnel is designed to generate sales through partnerships with affiliates who promote a business's products or services. It typically includes offering commission-based incentives to affiliates and providing them with marketing materials to promote the product. Each type of digital marketing funnel is designed to meet the needs of different types of businesses and customers. By understanding the different types of digital marketing funnels, businesses can choose the right funnel for their digital marketing strategy and create effective campaigns that drive results. Anatomy of Digital Marketing Funnel Funnel concepts are so crucial in any Digital Marketing Strategy. Now based on funnel segment positions we can classify the users into TOFU, MOFU, and BOFU. TOFU: Top of the Funnel Users This stage is where problem/need recognition happens. Businesses can attract users if they have identified user needs and are able to provide a solution that can add value to the customer. At times users may not know the solution to the problem when businesses can tap into this area. MOFU: Middle of the Funnel Users This stage involves information search and careful evaluation. When a business approaches a user with various solutions, the user performs a lot of information searches to identify the right solution. Once the user has identified the solution for their problem/need, they will tend to evaluate these solutions with alternatives in the market. This is when businesses can create content appealing to the user in making a purchase decision. Usually, this journey begins with engagement to nurturing to turning strong prospects or Sales Qualified Leads (SQL). BOFU: Bottom of the Funnel Users This stage involves some action i.e. a purchase decision. After a lot of scrutiny, a user moves to the purchase decision stage. Businesses can provide additional content that will make the users feel confident in making the purchase. At this stage, negative reviews and comments from other customers can prove to be a setback for the purchase. Businesses have to take measures to improve on these comments and feedback so that they don’t lose loyal customers. Post-Purchase: The post-purchase stage represents the retention stage, where businesses focus on retaining customers and creating long-term relationships. Post-purchase tactics include email marketing, loyalty programs, and personalized content to keep customers engaged and encourage repeat purchases. Analytics and Optimization: Analyzing the results of each stage of the funnel and optimizing the strategy is an important part of the digital marketing funnel. Businesses use tools such as Google Analytics, A/B testing, and customer feedback to identify areas for improvement and adjust their strategy accordingly. If you have found this information valuable, don't forget to read other articles related to digital marketing.

Facebook marketing refers to the use of Facebook's advertising platform to promote a business, product, or service. Facebook provides a vast audience for businesses to reach potential customers through targeted advertising. As of 2022, Facebook has nearly 3 billion users which makes it the most popular social media platform in the world. Having said that, Facebook engages people over 30 years of age making it a more mature audience engagement. While the younger audience prefers alternatives like TikTok and Snapchat. Facebook marketing can be done through various ad formats, including image ads, video ads, carousel ads, and more. Advertisers can target their ads based on specific demographics, interests, behaviors, and geographic locations to ensure that their message reaches the right audience. Facebook also offers various tools and features to help businesses manage their social media presence and engage with their followers, such as Facebook Pages and Messenger. Facebook Pages allow businesses to create a public presence on Facebook, where they can share updates, interact with followers, and promote their products and services. Messenger allows businesses to communicate with customers directly through Facebook, providing a way to answer questions, resolve issues, and offer personalized customer service. Facebook Features Facebook Profile is a place where personal account holder updates their information. It is made available after creating an account. It is available for both Public/Private Profiles Though one may not be able to perform business activities along with advertising. A personal profile is limited to 5000 members and also does not allow integration with third-party apps. The user has the provision to message friends from a personal account. Facebook Posts are the content that is posted on Facebook which can be a photo, video, text, link, or poll. Facebook Stories are content that appears at top of the news feed for 24 hours after which they disappear from your friend's view. They can be photos, videos, or images posted as a story. If your profile audience type is Public then you can see stories from friends, followers, and people who chatted through messenger, but only your friends can reply. Facebook Reels are short-form videos. Users may opt to recommend Instagram reels on Facebook after which they may be viewed on Facebook. Facebook Live is for real-time broadcasting of user videos. A recording is made available later. While users viewing streamed content are allowed to engage. Facebook Newsfeed holds posts indefinitely until deleted while stories are held for 24 hours before they are removed automatically from your friend's view. The stories, posts, and actions are unique displays based on connections you have to people, pages, and groups while posts and actions are displayed on the newsfeed. Facebook Page is a place that has followers instead of Friends. The page can be used for running ads for promotion. It is always associated with a Facebook profile and is publicly visible. Events can be created using a page. A profile can also be converted to a page. To create a page you need to set up a business account. Users cannot send direct messages to followers on a page. Facebook Groups are created to build a community to share and discuss subjects of common interest. They are associated with a Facebook profile or page. They may or may not be associated with the brand. They can't be used for creating & running promotional ads. Groups may be public or private depending on the group admin. Groups help in business growth and are an exceptionally better way of networking. Facebook Marketplace is a place where users are allowed to shop. It behaves similarly to a retail online store. Facebook Account Types The Facebook page is like a personal website on the Facebook platform. Facebook has two account types personal and business. A general account is of a personal type and is also associated with a personal profile, whereas to set up a business page and launch advertising campaigns you will have to create a business account. A business page is created for an organization, brand, business, or public figure. You need a personal account to create a business page. Multiple personal accounts can be associated with one business page. While the Business Manager can handle business page creation and ad management, the Business Suite on the other hand manages all Facebook and Instagram accounts. Though Facebook provides a default Ad account during sign-up, for advertising through Ad Manager one needs to create a page and get associated with Business Manager or Business Suite depending on their requirement. Facebook Owned Apps & Platforms Messenger originally developed as Facebook chat is currently a dedicated service for sending messages and supporting video calling. Instagram can now be accessed directly from Facebook. We also can market through Instagram. WhatsApp which is a messaging app unlike Messenger which does not rely on phone numbers is now a part of Facebook. Oculus Quest is a virtual reality headset for playing games and running apps under an Android operating system. This is also used with Facebook's new platform the Metaverse. Giphy is a platform that uses animation deals not only in GIFs but also stickers, arcades, clips, and others. Facebook bought Giphy for a reported $400 million in 2020. Masquerade is a face-swapping app that creates playful filters for your selfies. Facebook bought MSQRD in 2016 which stood a competition with Snapchat Lenses. Facebook Metaverse is where your surrounding real world is recreated virtually which is called Horizon Home. Horizon Worlds is where you can create worlds and get into that. Metaverse holds a digital version of humans and you can perform your daily activities in the virtual world using Virtual Reality headsets. Seems like a game changer in the world of the internet for people who are remote and yet want to travel. How should you perform Facebook marketing? Now that you have seen the bandwidth of Facebook now called Meta and what it covers under its umbrella it will be easier to understand its reach through marketing. Due to its vast coverage through various apps and platforms, Facebook Algorithm can offer you a wide organic reach with a high-converting audience. By creating a business page you will get access to a variety of business tools that can help you promote your brand or service. Talking of Facebook features, a personal profile audience who are more of friends and family would be interested in you as a person while a business page audience is always interested in "what you do?". It would be tempting to spend on gaining followers, but with any changes to the Facebook algorithm the reach would decrease overnight wasting your time and money, instead, it's always encouraged to go for organic growth. A Facebook business account provides options to create a custom audience who has visited your page, which can be used to reach this audience with your future content or tap into a similar audience. This is also useful during competitor analysis. Facebook Insights can give a lot of information on your audience which can be used to your advantage. Reaching out to Sponsors and Influencers can also prove beneficial. Should you boost your post or not? The best time to post is usually when the maximum number of your followers is active online. The location and online time of the audience decide the engagement trends. According to SproutSocial Research data, the best day to post on Facebook is Wednesday. Instead of spending on boosting your post which will gradually lose engagement, it is advisable to gain an engaging audience over time. Posts that are promotional and are meant to reach your target audience for a specific period and purpose can be boosted. Should I use paid Ads? Facebook is an ad network whose audience is large enough and caters to mostly earning and settled customer segments. Facebook allows retargeting through pixels where the cookie follows users to another website to display the ads. Facebook caters to outbound ads that require the right targeting audience which may be created through the custom audience option. Along with targeted reach, you can also get organic reach with Facebook Ads. Interacting with your ad audience is also possible. A Call to Action can be set up while managing the audience to suit the AIDAA-based funnel. All these features and more make Facebook Ads beneficial. Facebook Marketing Analytics Facebook provides its own analytics tool called Facebook Ads Manager, which allows advertisers to track and analyze their ad campaigns. This tool provides detailed metrics on ad performance, such as impressions, clicks, cost per click (CPC), and cost per acquisition (CPA). Advertisers can use this data to adjust their targeting, bidding, and ad creative to optimize their campaigns. Facebook Ads Manager also provides insights into audience demographics and behavior, allowing advertisers to understand who their ads are reaching and how they are engaging with them. By analyzing this data, advertisers can create more effective targeting and messaging strategies to reach their desired audience. In addition to Facebook Ads Manager, there are various third-party analytics tools that can be used to analyze Facebook marketing campaigns, such as Google Analytics and Adobe Analytics. These tools can provide more in-depth insights into website traffic and user behavior, as well as help track the customer journey from Facebook ads to website conversions. Facebook Marketing Metrics Facebook Marketing Metrics refer to the various data points that are used to measure the performance of Facebook marketing campaigns. These metrics can help businesses evaluate the effectiveness of their ads, understand their audience, and make data-driven decisions to optimize their advertising strategies. Here are some common Facebook Marketing Metrics: Impressions: The number of times an ad was displayed on a user's screen. Reach: The number of unique users who saw an ad. Clicks: The number of clicks an ad received. Click-Through Rate (CTR): The percentage of people who clicked on an ad after seeing it. Cost per Click (CPC): The cost of each click on an ad. Cost per Thousand Impressions (CPM): The cost of displaying an ad one thousand times. Engagement: The number of actions taken on an ad, such as likes, comments, and shares. Conversion Rate: The percentage of people who completed a desired action, such as making a purchase or filling out a form, after clicking on an ad. Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): The amount of revenue generated for every dollar spent on advertising. Frequency: The average number of times a user saw an ad. By monitoring these metrics and adjusting their ad strategies accordingly, businesses can improve the performance of their Facebook marketing campaigns and maximize their return on investment. To succeed in Facebook marketing, businesses need to create compelling content and use effective targeting strategies to reach their desired audience. They also need to track and analyze their performance metrics to evaluate the effectiveness of their campaigns and make data-driven decisions to optimize their advertising strategies. For more on marketing check other articles on digital marketing.

Email marketing has been around for nearly two decades and is known to stay around. The ease of sending advertisements, promoting lead magnets to acquire customers, or sending special offers to improve sales or fundraising are a few uses of email marketing. It involves sending emails to a mass audience who are subscribers to bring awareness about a brand or product and to generate sales. It also involves cold emails to create a subscriber list. Email marketing has evolved over the years and grown in popularity. Types of marketing emails The emails can be broadly classified into four categories Newsletters, Promotional, Acquisition, and Retention emails depending on their purpose in the marketing lifecycle. The below figure shows the different emails that fall under these categories. Promotional Emails : As the name describes these types of emails are generally used to promote a product or a service. Common email promotions include discount coupons, promo codes with offers, access to exclusive content, or admission forms for events. Giveaways are also a way of promotion to gain leads. Email Newsletters : Newsletters are a means of reaching the audience with the latest updates or information related to the latest products and services of the company. Some forms of newsletters are weekly digests of content, quarterly organizational updates, and promotional content for products and services. Acquisition Emails : This type of email is mainly for acquiring a customer or pushing the process one step closer to acquiring a customer. The email usually includes exclusive information about what the business has to offer or curated content to attract a prospect. It is undoubtedly a great way to grow business faster and drive additional revenue by moving leads faster through the conversion funnel. Retention Emails : The emails sent to existing customers with the purpose of retaining them and pushing them toward making repetitive purchases are considered retention emails. Objectives of Email Marketing Every channel in digital marketing offers a way to generate sales. In order to make the strategy successful it is always advisable to follow the AIDAA-based funnel approach. The below figure shows an Email Marketing Funnel with different email types that can be used at different stages of the marketing journey. Now that you know which email type suits which phase in the funnel, the funnel itself is created with a budget which means there could be single or multiple campaigns with a specific purpose. The purpose could be generating leads, acquiring new customers, retaining old customers, promoting new product launches, and others that can be clubbed under the following objectives carried out with email marketing. Conversions : Conversion usually refers to an action required after reading the content, which in our case would be an email. It acts as a primary tool in measuring return on investment (ROI) for marketing efforts. Those companies with higher conversion rates are known to generate higher sales as a result of a good email strategy. The email marketing conversion rate is measured as the percentage of subscribers performing the goal action after reading the email. Brand awareness Building : Brand awareness is the most necessary and one of the biggest challenges for new businesses and start-ups. Email marketing is the most cost-effective way to build brand awareness cost-effectively. Emails provide a reliable path to build trust with customers by enabling personalized messages through segmentation. With email marketing, it is easier to anticipate the needs of consumers alongside creating a positive image of the brand. Customer loyalty : Customer loyalty programs have proven to be the most effective tool in customer retention and encouraging brand advocacy. Customer loyalty boosts company growth. It is observed that businesses that prioritize customer experience and provide excellent customer service have often been known to have increased revenue. Sharing exclusive offers, vouchers, coupons, and incentives with existing customers push these customers into the delight zone of the sales funnel. Frequent reminders on offers and coupons, birthday messages and offers, VIP deals, and special incentives are some of the techniques to make an existing customer feel special. Personalized emails while expressing gratitude for continuing their journey as customers can take the relationship to the next level. Businesses with a larger share of customers in the delight zone have been known to carry the brand image to higher levels. Email Service Provider vs Internet Service Provider The ISP (Internet Service Provider) is the company that gives you access to the Internet like Verizon, Vodafone, and others. The ESP (Email Service Provider) is a service used by marketers who send bulk emails to their subscribers like AWeber, MailChimp, Drip, Get Response, etc. Gmail and Yahoo Mail are free Email service providers. Businesses use an Email Service Provider (ESP) to send marketing emails. Sending bulk emails using free email service providers like Gmail and Yahoo Mail can lead to disabling the account for suspicious activity as it’s easily flagged by spam filters. Email Marketing Strategy A business's digital marketing strategy must include email marketing since email is the most convenient and cost-effective way to reach business goals, attain a higher conversion rate, and also create brand awareness. The following steps are to be taken to create a successful strategy. 1. Identify the business goals : Most common and relevant goals considered for email marketing - · Grow your subscriber list · Increase your open rates · Improve click-through rates · Retain customers and turn them into brand advocates 2. Create an Email Marketing roadmap : Create a specific plan and timeline for finishing your project or campaign. 3. Create an Email Marketing Campaign : Sending a series of email messages over a certain period of time to attain a specific goal following a given budget is called an email campaign. In email marketing, a funnel represents the journey of a user from being a prospective lead to becoming a customer through educational and promotional email campaigns, which can prove to be effective in making email campaigns successful. A detailed explanation of the email marketing campaign is given below. 4. Create email automation strategies : A few common automation strategies are : Welcome Emails Drip Campaigns which include a series of emails pushing the prospect towards acquisition. Nurture Campaigns include a series of emails that are more curated depending on the customer lifecycle targeting a conversion. Remarketing Emails Upsell Emails which include special offers for Customer Retention Reengagement Emails Goodbye Emails Email Blast This strategy involves sending bulk emails to an email list usually done during an announcement of a new product through newsletters, flash sales, and webinars. Emails can be sent up to twice or thrice a week if the subscriber is a nurtured lead. The latest email automation tools can personalize these bulk emails to some extent. Drip Campaigns Drip email campaigns are a series of automated emails as a response to a user's action. It could be an abandoned cart email or a successful order placement. It may be sent as an invitation for an event or a request for signing up for a website. There may be 2 to 5 or more automated emails as a response to the user's action. Remarketing Emails They work the same way as retargeted ads, where a line of code is placed in your email signature or in the HTML of your email, and the email subscriber who opens your email will be served with ads all over the web with an intent to remarket. The purpose of remarketing also known as retargeting could be to re-engage customers, continue with order placement, drive users into clicking ads related to the brand you are promoting, or bring in more sales. Upsell Emails These are emails sent to increase sales which are done by putting forth upgraded versions of products with offers during buyers' purchase action to make more sales. It could be through selling more quantities of products, including protection with the product, going for an extended service period, or buying an upgraded version. 5. ESP Vendor Evaluation : Since email marketing requires a lot of email transactions, businesses would require to use any ESP for the task. ESP Vendors have to be evaluated and scored based on the following key areas: The ESP business model (are they focused on email send volume or services?) Technological capabilities The total cost of ownership /operation (TCO) Service and Support Deliverability (Monitoring, resolution, and reputation services) Other services they offer 6. Identify the KPIs for measuring the campaign success : Important Metrics to determine the campaign success : Delivery rates Open rates Click through rates Bounce rate Conversion rate Unsubscribe Rate List Growth Rate ROI 7. Evaluate and Optimize the campaigns through : A/B Testing Send time optimization The subject line, CTA, and content optimization Personalization Behavior-based segmentation Marketing automation Email Marketing Plan Developing an effective email marketing plan requires a strategic approach to ensure that your emails are targeted, relevant, and engaging to your subscribers. Here are the steps to creating a successful email marketing plan: Define your email marketing goals: Before creating any marketing campaign, it's essential to determine what you hope to achieve from it. Examples of email marketing goals include driving sales, generating leads, increasing website traffic, and promoting brand awareness. Build your email list: Once you've defined your goals, it's time to start building your email list. You can collect email addresses from sign-up forms on your website, social media, and events. Segment your email list: Segmentation allows you to group your subscribers based on demographics, interests, and behaviors. This allows you to create personalized and targeted campaigns that are more likely to resonate with your subscribers. Choose an email marketing software: There are numerous email marketing software options available that can help you create, send, and track your emails. Examples include Mailchimp, Constant Contact, and HubSpot. Create your email content: Your email content should align with your marketing goals and be relevant and valuable to your subscribers. Types of email content include newsletters, promotional offers, event invitations, and surveys. Design your emails: Your email design should be visually appealing, easy to read, and reflect your brand identity. Most email marketing software includes pre-designed templates that you can customize to fit your brand. Test your emails: Before sending your emails, make sure to test them to ensure they display correctly on all devices and email clients. You can use an email testing tool like Litmus to do this. Analyze your results: After sending your emails, it's essential to analyze your results to determine the success of your campaign. Metrics to track include open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, and unsubscribe rates. Continuously improve: Use the data you've collected to continuously improve your email campaigns. Experiment with different types of content, subject lines, and sending frequencies to see what works best for your audience. By following these steps, you can create an effective email marketing plan that helps you achieve your marketing goals and build stronger relationships with your subscribers. Email Marketing Campaign Every business launches more than one campaign for its digital strategy. While strategy tends to achieve the mission of the brand, campaigns are a more tactical approach to meeting these targets. With a set budget, the brands have to chalk out goals and launch specific campaigns for each goal to get the desired outcome. The following steps have to be taken in order to launch a successful campaign. Identify your audience : One of the primary goals of email marketing is to initiate meaningful conversions. Emails that are sent to the wrong people create poor open rates with increased bounce rates that impact ROI. Conversions are created by focusing on the target audience and showing them what they wish to see. Identify the campaign goals : Defining your campaign goals can help you set the direction and measure the success of the campaign. Additionally, it prevents emails from being sent to the wrong audience. Decide on the Email Type that suits the campaign : Types of email campaigns depend on the type of Email being sent, so it is necessary to choose a style that will help achieve the campaign goal. The four types of emails have been discussed earlier, and depending on the stage the prospect is in the purchase lifecycle the campaign email type must be decided. Evaluate the technology and email service : Choose an ESP (email service provider) which have features like Templates, Tracking, Automation, and Mobility. Use creative content and lead magnets : The initial step in the email marketing campaign is to obtain the prospect's email address which can be done by offering them free value. Businesses require an effective lead generation to achieve their goals, and lead magnets can help them to accomplish that effectively. Evaluate the email marketing design, subject, and email copy : Marketing email must be carefully crafted in view to encourage the recipient to open, read and click through the email. Plan for emails and follow-ups: An email marketing tool can be used to create, send, test, optimize, and report on campaigns. In addition, there are many email marketing tools that provide free services as well, such as MailChimp and Campaign Monitor. Identify the testing strategy and optimize : Testing must be made a part of your day-to-day processes. To determine a clear winner it is ideal to run tests on groups that are small, but large enough. Identify the KPIs to measure the effectiveness : Choose KPIs that answer basic questions about the campaigns, such as: How many people open your emails? How many people click your links? Which link gets the most clicks? What time do people open your emails? How many average unsubscribes per email are sent? Building Email List Most Email Campaign goals involve building an email list for creating a prospect base that can then be targeted for higher campaign goals like brand awareness and sales. Embedded signup forms : An embedded form is a way to display your form as part of your own web page, without your form users needing to click a link to the parent site, and can be used to collect the email address of the signing-up user. pop-ups and overlays : Website elements that can be used to engage users, increase conversions, and prompt other website actions can also be used to collect the email address. Gamification : Add game mechanics to an email to increase participation and allow users to subscribe. Sign up for Notifications : When businesses want to inform their subscribers regarding the changes or updates to their website, product, or service, a Notification email is used. Interested users would subscribe to receive such notifications. This can be a way to collect email addresses by asking the user to opt for notification. Lead Magnets : Offer an incentive in order to receive a visitor's contact information. Lead magnets are typically long-form content pieces that offer the user a value usually free like e-books, white papers, templates, etc. Landing Pages : A standalone web page, created specifically for a marketing or advertising campaign can be used for collecting email addresses. Include opt-in fields at checkout : A specialized checkbox field that presents the user with a single checkbox and supporting message for them to subscribe during checkout. Email marketing is a proven online-marketing element that can reach a high percentage of conversions while improving customer experience. A prerequisite for this approach is the target audience which must be relevant to the structure of your message which must be well thought out and the content must be highly relevant to your target group.

Marketing is a primary component of business management and commerce. It is defined as the activities undertaken by a company to promote the sale of its products or services. It can also be understood as a catalyst in consumer decisions to buy a product or service. Broadly marketing can be grouped under online and offline channels. Online Marketing is mainly through SEM, social media, and email marketing, whereas Offline Marketing is carried out through traditional media like television, radio, print, and other offline channels like billboards, events, banners, etc. Marketing in general is carried out through a strategic process that involves identifying and understanding the needs and wants of potential customers, creating a product or service that meets those needs, promoting it to the target audience, and ultimately selling it. The marketing process typically involves the following steps: Market research: This involves conducting research to understand the target audience, the competition, and the market trends. Defining the target market: This involves identifying the specific group of people who are most likely to buy the product or service. Developing the marketing mix: This involves developing a product or service that meets the needs of the target market, setting a price that is attractive to them, creating a promotion strategy that reaches them, and making it available to them through the right channels. Implementing the marketing plan: This involves executing the marketing mix and monitoring its effectiveness. Evaluating and adjusting the marketing plan: This involves analyzing the results of the marketing efforts and making adjustments to the marketing mix as necessary. Marketing is an ongoing process that requires constant attention and adjustment to stay relevant and effective in a changing marketplace. A marketing plan is developed strategically using 3 stages Segmentation, Targeting, and Positioning (STP) of the product. Segmentation happens based on Demography, Geography, Psychology, Behavioral, and Benefits based. This is evaluated using the MAADS framework. MAADS framework Here is a brief overview of each component of this framework: Mission: This refers to the marketing objectives that the company hopes to achieve through its marketing efforts. The mission is the foundation of the marketing plan and provides a clear direction for all marketing activities. Analysis: This involves conducting research and analyzing market data to understand the target audience, their needs, and their behaviors. The analysis also includes an examination of the competition, market trends, and other external factors that may impact the marketing plan. Advertising: This refers to the creation and execution of advertising campaigns across various media channels to promote the brand, product, or service. Advertising can be used to build brand awareness, communicate product benefits, and drive customer engagement. Direct Marketing: This involves communicating directly with customers through channels such as email, direct mail, or telemarketing. Direct marketing can be personalized and targeted to specific customer segments to drive immediate response and conversion. Sales Promotion: This involves the use of short-term incentives to encourage customer purchases, such as discounts, coupons, or free samples. The MAADS framework provides a comprehensive approach to marketing planning and execution. It can be used to develop and implement marketing campaigns across various channels and touchpoints, with the ultimate goal of achieving the company's marketing objectives. Targeting is carried out using strategies like Mass Marketing, Segmented Marketing, and Niche Marketing. The positioning includes considering components like Product, Price, Place, and Promotion (4P's) channels. The evaluation of product positioning is done through perpetual maps. Perceptual maps: It is a marketing tool used to visually represent how consumers perceive different products or brands in the marketplace. They are also called "positioning maps" or "attribute maps". Perceptual maps display the relationship between different products or brands based on how consumers perceive them along two or more key attributes. The attributes may include factors such as price, quality, features, or style, depending on the product category. The goal of a perceptual map is to help businesses understand how their products or brands are positioned relative to their competitors in the eyes of consumers. By identifying gaps or opportunities in the marketplace, businesses can adjust their marketing strategies to better meet the needs and preferences of their target audience. The companies usually follow the above process of using the STP framework until they achieve stable sales targets. Every product lifecycle includes four stages initial, growth, stability, and decline. During the declining stage, the companies may take a call for discontinuing a product. Let's take a simple example, say you launched a school fair for students from class 1 to 10, and you have a budget of 50 bucks as an initial investment. You decided to prepare 3 different kinds of chocolate- candies, milk bars, and chocolate bars since you classified your audience based on demographic segmentation considering their age and psychology. Since you knew all children would not buy sweets you used segment-based targeting by creating 3 groups primary, secondary grade, and high school going while targeting more playful students as they will tend to burn out more. You placed your candy shop next to the school gate while keeping the price of candies lower than the price of milk and chocolate bars which were medium to high. You considered such a placement since high school kids get pocket money whereas primary-class students normally don't carry cash. You also used banners in the entryway and school bulletin board to promote your sweet shop. The total sales were 100 bucks which gave a profit of 50 bucks. With this example, you understood how marketing is carried out using the STP framework, and the 4Ps of positioning your product are carried out to generate high revenue. Marketing Frameworks Marketing frameworks provide businesses with a structured approach to developing and executing effective marketing strategies. They help businesses achieve their marketing goals more efficiently and gain a competitive advantage in their industry. There are many marketing frameworks, models, and concepts that marketers can use to analyze, plan, and execute marketing strategies. Here are some of the most popular and widely used marketing frameworks: STP framework: This framework stands for Segmentation, Targeting, and Positioning. It is a widely used approach for developing marketing strategies that are focused on meeting the needs of specific groups of customers. The STP framework involves breaking down the market into smaller segments, evaluating the attractiveness of each segment, and developing a unique positioning strategy that appeals to the needs and preferences of the target customers. By using the STP framework, companies can create more effective and targeted marketing strategies that are better aligned with their customers' needs and expectations. SWOT Analysis: This framework helps companies identify their Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats, which can inform their marketing strategy and decision-making. Porter's Five Forces: This framework helps companies assess the competitiveness of their industry and the bargaining power of suppliers, buyers, substitutes, and potential entrants, which can help inform their market positioning and pricing strategy. The Marketing Mix (4 Ps): This framework is a classic marketing concept that focuses on four key elements of marketing strategy: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion. The Customer Value Proposition: This framework helps companies articulate the unique value that their product or service provides to their target customers, which can guide their marketing messaging and positioning. The Customer Journey Map: This framework helps companies visualize and understand the customer's experience and interactions with their brand, which can help them identify opportunities for improvement and optimize their marketing channels and touchpoints. The MAADS framework: This refers to a marketing model developed by Don E. Schultz that provides a structured approach to developing a marketing strategy by focusing on five key elements: Mission, Analysis, Advertising, Direct Marketing, and Sales Promotion the details of which have been explained above. Different frameworks can be useful for different purposes and in different contexts, and it's important for marketers to choose the right tools for their specific needs and goals. Marketing Models There are various marketing models that businesses use to promote their products or services. Here are some of the most popular types of marketing models: The Five Cs: This model looks at five key factors that businesses need to consider when creating a marketing plan – customers, company, competitors, collaborators, and climate. The AIDA Model: This model outlines the stages of the customer journey – attention, interest, desire, and action – and how businesses can use these stages to create effective marketing campaigns. The latest version of this model is the AIDAA. The Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) Model: This model looks at the potential lifetime value of a customer and helps businesses determine how much they can invest in acquiring and retaining customers. The Ansoff Matrix: This model helps businesses determine their growth strategy by analyzing their current product offerings and potential new markets. The Marketing Funnel: This model outlines the stages of the customer journey from awareness to purchase and helps businesses create a marketing strategy that targets customers at each stage. The most effective marketing model for a business depends on various factors such as the industry, target market, and marketing goals. Types of Marketing There are several types of marketing, each with its own unique characteristics, strategies, and goals. Here are some of the most common types of marketing: Digital vs Offline Marketing: Digital marketing refers to any form of marketing that uses digital channels, such as the Internet, social media, email, mobile apps, search engines, and digital advertising. Offline marketing, also known as traditional marketing, refers to any form of marketing that uses non-digital channels, such as print media, TV, radio, direct mail, billboards, and events. Experiential vs Interactive Marketing: Experiential marketing involves creating immersive experiences for customers that allow them to interact with the brand in a unique and memorable way. This can include pop-up events, brand activations, and experiential installations. Interactive marketing involves using digital channels to engage with customers and create a two-way conversation. Interactive marketing methods include quizzes, games, polls, surveys, chatbots, and social media campaigns. Direct vs Indirect Marketing: Direct marketing involves communicating directly with customers through targeted, personalized messages that are designed to generate a response or action. Examples of direct marketing methods include direct mail, email marketing, telemarketing, SMS marketing, and targeted online advertising. Indirect marketing, also known as brand marketing, involves promoting a brand, product, or service through non-promotional content, such as blogs, social media, PR, and events. Indirect marketing methods include content marketing, social media marketing, influencer marketing, and event marketing. Inbound vs Outbound Marketing: Inbound marketing involves creating valuable content and experiences that attract customers to your brand naturally, rather than interrupting them with ads or promotions. Examples of inbound marketing methods include blogging, social media marketing, SEO, content marketing, and email marketing. Outbound marketing, also known as traditional marketing, involves pushing promotional messages out to a wider audience through interruptive channels such as TV ads, billboards, telemarketing, cold calling, and direct mail. Guerrilla vs Traditional Marketing: Guerrilla marketing is a creative and unconventional approach to marketing that relies on low-cost, high-impact tactics to create buzz and generate attention for a brand or product. Examples of guerrilla marketing tactics include viral marketing, experiential marketing, street marketing, ambush marketing, and unconventional PR. Traditional marketing, also known as outbound marketing, is a more established and mainstream approach to marketing that relies on paid advertising and promotional messages to reach a wider audience. Examples of traditional marketing methods include TV ads, radio ads, print advertising, billboards, direct mail, and telemarketing. The type of marketing that a company chooses will depend on its goals, target audience, budget, and resources. In this article, we have shed light on different aspects of marketing in the hope to help other amateur marketers in their journey toward successful marketing. It is always good to have a glossary of marketing terms, this article strives to provide the same.

Social media marketing is the process of promoting a product, service, or brand on various social media platforms. This can include creating and sharing content, running ads, and engaging with customers on social media. The goal of social media marketing is to increase brand awareness, drive website traffic, and ultimately generate sales. Some popular social media platforms for marketing include Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. One of the major goals of social media marketing is social media branding. What is social media branding? Social media branding refers to the use of social media platforms to establish and promote a brand's image and reputation. This involves building a community around the brand. Some strategies for social media branding include: Develop a consistent and recognizable visual identity: Use a consistent color palette, logo, and style across all social media platforms to establish a recognizable visual identity for your brand. Create and share valuable and engaging content: Share content that aligns with your brand and resonates with your target audience. Engage with customers and build a community: Respond to comments, messages, and reviews, and actively engage with your followers to build a community around your brand. Use influencer marketing: Partner with social media influencers who have a large following and significant influence in your industry to promote your brand. Monitor and protect brand reputation: Monitor social media for mentions of your brand and respond quickly to any negative comments to protect your brand's reputation. Use consistent branding across all platforms: Use the same branding and messaging across all your platforms and all the materials you create. Social media branding can help establish a strong, recognizable image and reputation for your brand, and increase the chances of your brand being seen by the right audience. It can also help to establish trust and credibility with your audience which can lead to more conversions, sales, and loyalty. One of the main channels of digital marketing is social media marketing. Social Media marketing allows businesses to reach a large and diverse audience, and allows for a high degree of targeting, measurement, and optimization, with lower costs than traditional marketing methods. It also allows a direct relationship with the customers and gets instant feedback which can be used to improve the product or service. Generally, brands don't contact their customers directly but choose to reach through third parties like influencers. What is Social media influencer marketing? Social media influencer marketing is a form of advertising that utilizes individuals who have a large following or significant influence on social media platforms, known as influencers, to promote a product, service, or brand. These influencers may have a large following on platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, or Twitter. They typically create sponsored content, such as sponsored posts, videos, or stories, that feature the product or service they are promoting. The goal of influencer marketing is to reach a large audience through the influencer's followers and increase brand awareness, website traffic, and ultimately generate sales. Social media influencer marketing can be an effective way to reach specific demographics and target audiences. Social Media Marketing for Beginners Social media marketing can be a challenging task, especially for beginners. However, with the right approach, it can be an effective way to reach a large audience and achieve specific business goals. Here are some tips for beginners: Set specific, measurable, and achievable goals: Identify what you want to achieve through social media marketing, such as increasing brand awareness or driving website traffic. Choose the right platforms: Not all social media platforms are created equal, so choose the ones that are most relevant to your audience and goals. Create valuable and engaging content: Develop a content calendar and create or curate content that is relevant, informative, and consistent with your brand. Focus on Engagement: Engage with your followers by responding to comments, messages, and reviews. Building a community of audiences with similar interests will help increase engagement and reach. Use analytics to measure success: Use the analytics provided by social media platforms to measure the success of your efforts and make adjustments as needed. Start with small and test: Start with a small budget, test different strategies, and expand as you see results. A/B testing is one of the methods marketers follow to measure the success of their content. Learn from others: Learn from other companies, influencers, and experts in the field, and stay up to date with the latest trends and best practices. Collaboration is the key. Remember that social media marketing takes time, patience, and consistent effort. Start small, be patient, and be willing to learn and adapt as you go along. Social Media Marketing Funnel The social media marketing funnel is a framework for using social media to guide potential customers through each stage of the buyer's journey, from awareness to conversion. The funnel typically consists of four stages: Awareness: This is the top of the funnel, where potential customers become aware of your brand or product through social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or LinkedIn. Social media posts, ads, and content marketing can be used to generate awareness. Interest: In this stage, potential customers have shown some interest in your brand or product, and may have engaged with your social media content or visited your website. Social media engagement and lead magnets can be used to nurture interest. Desire: At this stage, potential customers have developed a desire or need for your product or service, and are considering making a purchase. Social proof, customer reviews, retargeting ads, and targeted offers can be used to influence decision-making. Action: This is the bottom of the funnel, where potential customers convert into paying customers. Social media can be used to facilitate the conversion process through targeted calls-to-action, landing pages, and checkout pages. Retention: This is crucial for businesses to maintain and grow their customer base over the long term. By focusing on building relationships and providing value to existing customers, businesses can increase customer loyalty, drive repeat purchases, and ultimately, improve their bottom line. By using the social media marketing funnel, businesses can strategically guide potential customers through each stage of the buyer's journey and increase the likelihood of conversion. It's important to note that the funnel is not linear, and customers can move back and forth between stages, depending on their behavior and interaction with your brand. Social Media Marketing Benefits Social media networks are open to all, giving businesses a chance to follow their consumers' activities or potential buyers. This assists advertisers with being more informed with regard to their main interest group, their likes, dislikes, and interests so they can make a superior promoting strategy to draw in clients. It is seen that social media marketing has the following advantages : Improves Personal Branding : Social media spreads the news and creates brand awareness and also assists in promoting your product or service. Tunes new prospects For Your Business : Social media spreads the news and creates brand awareness and also assists in promoting your product or service. Builds Stronger Relationships With Customers : Social media allows you to gather and reinforce client connections since it gives a technique to draw in clients to connect with you. Generates More Leads & Conversions : Collecting leads via social media will assist you with discovering individuals intrigued by your organization. All the more significantly, these leads will assist you with staying in contact with the possible client regardless of whether it's to make a unique deal or offer news. Gives Scope to Stay Ahead of Competitors : Since social media lets users perform competitive analysis by reviewing, monitoring, and analyzing competitor activity it will allow you to gain better insight into your competition. Is Cost-Effective : While organizations can spend hundreds to thousands of dollars putting resources into one-off advertising materials that may just reach out to their neighborhood outreach, social media promotions permit organizations to expand their contribution past a customary physical setting. The results are more effective in evaluating a business's overall marketing strategy, also the data associated is more accessible and relevant to business goals. This makes the entire process cost-effective. The social media strategy is the place where everything begins, it's your social media establishment, you can't have a mission before you have a system. The data you get from exploring and making your technique is the thing that is to a great extent going to be utilized for your campaign goals or at large your business goals. Social Media Marketing Risks While social media marketing can offer many benefits, there are also some potential risks to be aware of: Damage to brand reputation : Regardless of whether it comes from programmers, disappointed clients, or is essentially a reaction against something you post, negative social media content can obliterate confidence in your image surprisingly fast. Inconsistency : Conflicting social media is more terrible for your business than no online media. In the event that your image exists on friendly stages, however, if you once in a while or never post, it gives the feeling that nobody is effectively occupied with your image, and potential clients might pass on giving you their business. Social media marketing relies on the continued popularity and functionality of third-party platforms. A change in user behavior or a platform's policies could negatively impact your social media marketing efforts. Overuse & Algorithm : Social media posts ought to engage and instruct clients, not ask for their consideration and commitment. Know what your clients need to see and restrict it to that. A decent spot to begin is by investigating how regularly pioneers in your industry post via social media. Social media platforms frequently update their algorithms, which can affect the visibility and reach of your content. This can make it difficult to predict the success of your campaigns and require constant adjustments. Account hacking : Unmonitored social records can be the goal of online hackers, who could start posting bogus messages under your name. When they acquire control, programmers can send anything. That could mean bogus data that is harming your business. On the other hand, infectious connections can cause major issues for adherents. Also, you will not notice this until your clients start complaining. Social media platforms collect a vast amount of data on users, and businesses should be aware of the potential risks to user privacy and data security when collecting and using this data. Legal Risks : There are many laws and regulations that apply to social media marketing, such as the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) guidelines for endorsements and testimonials. Businesses must ensure that they are in compliance with all relevant laws and regulations. Ad Frauds : Social media platforms are vulnerable to ad fraud, which can lead to wasted advertising dollars and a tarnished reputation. Businesses need to be vigilant in monitoring their social media campaigns for suspicious activity Types Of Social Media Platforms Social networks : Websites that allow individuals (such as friends, acquaintances, and co-workers) to connect by interpersonal relationships beyond the familiar circle of friends and family. Person-to-person communication exercises become financial freedoms, bringing new thoughts through shared data and startling open doors as a task, a loft, or even an accomplice. Casual people group outfit limitless opportunities to interface with others who have social, political, severe, and various interests like your own. Media sharing networks : Media-sharing destinations permit you to transfer your photographs, recordings, and audio to a site that can be accessed from any place on the planet. You would then be able to impart that media to the world or simply a select gathering of companions. Numerous media-sharing destinations additionally permit you to put media on different locales. Social blogging networks : Contributing to blog networks are agents among brands and bloggers. Brands consistently have explicit socioeconomics they need to focus on, for promoting and discussing their blogs and ideas. Discussion forums : Where individuals can gather to have conversations about a particular topic, where the interfaces connect individuals present on the spot, allow recordings about occasions or events, and create groups of individuals with similar interests. Review networks : Where clients share criticism about items or administrations for others to pursue. At the point when you have great audits, these stages can carry positive social evidence to your business and its cases. It's a phenomenal way for you to comprehend their viewpoint and work on their experience. Social Media Marketing Strategy A social media marketing strategy is a long-term plan that defines how a business will achieve its marketing goals. It includes an analysis of the target market, positioning, competitive advantage, value proposition, and overall marketing mix (product, price, promotion, and place). A marketing strategy is the foundation of a company's marketing efforts and provides direction for all marketing activities. It may include details of activities using social media platforms to achieve specific business goals that involve increasing brand awareness, driving website traffic, generating leads and sales, and engaging with customers. It is important to note that your social media marketing strategy may change over time as social media platforms and user behaviors evolve. Set Clear Goals And Metrics : The underlying secret of creating a successful strategy is to develop your objectives and targets. These goals must follow the SMART framework. You might need to follow various objectives for various organizations, or even various uses for each organization relying upon the business targets. Online media destinations should agree with your general advancing targets. Focusing on metrics like engagement, click-through, and conversion rates can give insight into the ROI. Identify Target Audience : Fostering a reasonable interpretation of your ideal social media interest group is the way to an effective promoting method. Creating content for the right audience is critical for turning social media followers into customers for your business. Defining a buyer persona helps create content to better target the ideal customer. Competitor Analysis : Identify your competitor's characteristics and deficiencies conversely, or in line with your own, and find an opening to keeping a watch. As per Study.com, there are 3 fundamental kinds of contenders : Direct Competitors are the ones targeting the same audience as you, selling the same products as you, in a similar distribution model as you. For example, Coca-Cola and Pepsi are direct competitors in the soft drink industry. Indirect Competitors are the ones who sell the same product or service but with different end goals. Substitute competitors are the ones that offer different products or services that can be used in place of your own. These products or services may not be identical to yours, but they can still satisfy the same customer needs or wants. For example, a company that sells energy drinks may have direct competitors in the energy drink industry, but it may also have substitute competitors in the coffee or tea industry. Analyzing your competitors is a basic, yet powerful marketing strategy to ensure you are keeping up and coordinating with the endeavors of others in the business. Identify Social Media Platforms : Figure out which platform your crowd utilizes by taking a look at the socioeconomic factors of the clients. You will likewise need to consider how dynamic your crowd is on that platform. For example, while young Facebook users may have profiles, they are more active on Instagram or TikTok. Create Engaging Content : The content that your business utilizes in promotions is the thing that makes your image stand apart from the group. Furthermore, to ensure that your crowd is associated with your image reliably, it is significant that you make your content interactive and interesting by adding value and color. Engaging content must be appealing to the eye of the audience, it must interest them and grasp their attention and make them want to know more about your brand after looking at the content. Advertise Social Media Posts : Posting via social media builds brand awareness and makes you more noticeable to possible clients. Regular posting ensures that customers remember your brand. Spamming your audience with too many posts a day is not recommended, instead advertising on social media can be a cost-effective way to reach a large audience, increase brand awareness, and drive website traffic and sales. It also allows businesses to target specific demographics, interests, and behaviors, which can increase the chances of the ads being seen by the right audience. What is social media advertising? Social media advertising is the process of creating and placing ads on social media platforms to reach a specific audience and achieve specific business goals. These ads can take many forms, such as sponsored posts, videos, stories, and carousel ads, and can be targeted to specific demographics and interests. Social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn offer a variety of ad formats, targeting options, and campaign objectives. Social media advertising is done through a self-serve platform, or through a representative of the social media platform, and can be managed and optimized through the use of analytics provided by the platform. The cost of social media advertising varies depending on the platform and the targeting options selected, but it allows businesses to reach a large audience at a relatively low cost. It also allows for testing and optimizing the performance of the ads. Analyze Results Frequently : Reviewing key performance indicators(KPIs) can uncover which parts of your social media marketing campaigns are working and give insights into the scope for enhancement. In order to stay ahead in the market it is advisable to keep a close check on the following areas of analysis : Observe Audience Behavior Track Impressions Monitor Engagement Review Clicks and Traffic Perform Sentiment Analysis Social Media Marketing Plan A social media marketing plan is a detailed, short-term action plan that outlines how a business will implement its marketing strategy. It includes specific marketing tactics, timelines, budgets, and metrics to measure success. A marketing plan is more tactical and focused on the implementation of the marketing strategy involving social media platforms. It serves as a roadmap for executing a social media marketing strategy. A social media marketing plan typically includes the following elements: Objectives: Clearly defined, measurable, and achievable goals that will be accomplished through social media marketing. Target audience: A detailed description of the target audience, including demographics, behaviors, and interests. Platforms: A list of the social media platforms that will be used, and a rationale for why they were chosen. Content and messaging: A content calendar that outlines the types of content that will be created and shared, and the messaging that will be used to support the brand's overall marketing strategy. Tactics and timing: A description of the specific tactics that will be used to execute the plan, such as paid advertising, influencer marketing, and community building, and the timing for when they will be executed. Budget and resources: An outline of the budget and resources that will be required to execute the plan, including staff, equipment, and tools. Measurement and evaluation: A description of how the success of the plan will be measured, including metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs), and how the plan will be evaluated and adjusted over time. Crisis management plan: A plan for how to handle any negative comments, reviews, or crises that may arise during the campaign. Having a detailed social media marketing plan in place can help ensure that a business stays on track and achieves its goals. It also allows for better coordination and communication within the team and with other departments, as well as better budget management. What is a Social Media Marketing Campaign? A social media campaign is a coordinated effort to achieve specific business goals using social media platforms. It is a set of activities and tactics that are planned and executed over a specific period of time to achieve a specific objective. A marketing campaign is a specific set of activities designed to achieve a specific goal within the broader marketing plan. Using social media marketing funnels while creating campaigns is a powerful way to bring visibility to every stage of connecting with your customers. One of the main advantages of a digital marketing funnel is its quantifiability. Funnels help to increase a campaign's conversion rate. 1. Set social media campaign goals : From brand attention to boosting income and then some, it's prudent that advertisers put out explicit social media objectives. Some common goals are : Getting feedback from users. Building email marketing lists Increasing website traffic Improving overall brand engagement Directly driving sales Collecting relevant data from users 2. Create buyer personas : Buyer personas assist organizations with comprehension and help understand their clients so they can serve them better. Buyer personas portray who your ideal clients are, what their days resemble, the difficulties they face, and how they pick. 3. Choose your social media platforms : Every social platform has an alternate segment and planned use. For the best profit from speculation, you'll need to guarantee that the platform's use coordinates with your content and your audience. 4. Have a social media calendar : Use rights tools for content and social media schedule : Save time by being coordinated Post reliably Make fewer grammatical errors, and furthermore decrease the danger of serious mix-ups Get more aspiring with your social procedures Try not to pass up important minutes Make better content Track what works, and further develop it 5. Research the right tools to boost productivity : Following are a few ways in which you can boost your productivity : Content creation : Creating shareable online content is essential to business growth. Your content ought to be important, enlightening, and appeal to the necessities of your interest group. This sort of content will drive communication, increase brand awareness, and underline the requirement for your administrations. Content curation : Curating content is tracking down the subject that your crowd will discover significantly and repositioning it such that the content serves both your followers and your reach. You can likewise utilize tools that permit you to rapidly and effectively administer content, and get important articles, recordings, and other items from anywhere on the web that goes with your content. Social media management : Analyzing social media audiences and fostering a system that is custom-fitted to them, creating and promoting content for social media profiles, checking on the web discussions, teaming up with powerhouses, giving neighborhood, and noticing, assessing, and covering online media execution and ROI. 6. Perform Social media analytics Gathering data from social media platforms and analyzing that data using social media analytics tools to make business decisions. The most well-known utilization of this analytics is to mine client opinions to help promote and support client exercises. 7. Carry out competitive analysis Identify who your competitors are on social media. Know which social platforms they're on. Know how they're using those platforms. 8. Track performance Use the right performance evaluation tools to measure the real impact of your digital campaigns with accurate, aggregated, cross-platform campaign metrics and robust campaign monitoring and analytics. After the campaign is over, it is important to analyze the results to identify what worked well and what didn't. A social media campaign allows businesses to reach a specific audience, achieve specific goals and measure the results of the campaign. It also allows businesses to be creative and think outside the box when it comes to social media marketing. Social media can be an incredible asset for any organization. It can expand your permeability, upgrade connections, set up two-way correspondence with clients, give a discussion to criticism, and work on the mindfulness and notoriety of the association. Luckily even two or three hours over seven days can have enormous results. The truth is HubSpot reports that 84% of publicists had the alternative to make extended traffic with only six hours of effort spent by means of social media every week. The importance of social media marketing is increasingly important for companies as they look to reach customers online and grow sales.

For anyone using Google, or those owning a website, or those, writing a piece of content, believe me, they all need SEO. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization which means optimizing your content so that it stands out amidst the competition on a search engine. Search engine crawlers use several algorithms most of them unknown to the common public in that case the only savior for our content to rank higher on SERP (Search Results Page) would be SEO tactics. The major steps involved in optimization would be: Keyword research and analysis Create good content Optimize On-Page SEO Generate Traffic Fetch Backlinks Strategize Off-Page SEO Here are some commonly used SEO tactics: Keyword research: Identifying relevant keywords and phrases that users are likely to search for when looking for information related to your website's content. On-page optimization: Optimizing various elements on your website's pages, including title tags, meta descriptions, headings, URL structure, and content, to make them more search engine-friendly and relevant to the targeted keywords. Technical SEO: Ensuring that your website is technically sound and accessible to search engine crawlers. This includes optimizing site speed, mobile responsiveness, crawlability, XML sitemaps, and fixing any technical issues that may hinder search engine indexing. Link building: Acquiring high-quality inbound links from other websites to improve your website's authority and credibility. This can be achieved through guest blogging, content promotion, influencer outreach, and creating valuable content that others naturally want to link to. Content creation: Producing high-quality, informative, and engaging content that aligns with user intent and addresses their needs. Content can include blog posts, articles, videos, infographics, and more. User experience (UX) optimization: Ensuring that your website offers a positive experience for users by improving page load times, navigation, mobile-friendliness, and overall usability. Positive user experiences can lead to increased engagement and improved search engine rankings. Social media promotion: Leveraging social media platforms to promote your content, engage with your audience, and attract more traffic to your website. Social signals, such as likes, shares, and comments, can indirectly influence your search engine rankings. Local SEO: If you have a local business, optimizing your website to target location-specific keywords and implementing strategies like Google My Business optimization, online reviews management, and local citations to improve your visibility in local search results. Monitoring and analytics: Continuously tracking your website's performance using tools like Google Analytics and Search Console. Monitoring keyword rankings, traffic sources, user behavior, and other metrics can help you identify areas for improvement and adjust your SEO tactics accordingly. There are different classifications of SEO : Black Hat vs White Hat On-Page vs Off-Page SEO can be broadly classified into three main categories based on the areas they primarily focus on: On-Page SEO: On-page SEO tactics involve optimizing the elements within your website's pages to improve their visibility and relevance to search engines. This includes optimizing meta tags (title tags, meta descriptions), headings, URL structure, internal linking, keyword usage, and overall content quality. On-page SEO ensures that your website is easily discoverable and provides a positive user experience. Off-Page SEO: Off-page SEO tactics primarily focus on improving your website's authority and credibility by acquiring external signals. The main aspect of off-page SEO is link building, which involves obtaining high-quality inbound links from other websites. These links act as votes of confidence for search engines, indicating that your website is reputable and valuable. Other off-page SEO tactics may include social media promotion, influencer outreach, and online reputation management. Technical SEO: Technical SEO tactics involve optimizing the technical aspects of your website to enhance its accessibility, crawlability, and indexability by search engine bots. This includes optimizing site speed, mobile responsiveness, XML sitemaps, robots.txt file, canonical tags, structured data markup, and ensuring proper website architecture. Technical SEO ensures that search engines can effectively crawl and understand your website's content. It's worth noting that these categories often overlap, and a comprehensive SEO strategy usually incorporates elements from each category. For example, creating high-quality content (on-page SEO) can naturally attract external links (off-page SEO), while ensuring proper website structure (technical SEO) can enhance the user experience (on-page SEO). A well-rounded SEO approach addresses all three categories to maximize visibility, relevance, and user satisfaction. Black hat SEO and white hat SEO are two contrasting approaches to search engine optimization. They differ in their methods, intentions, and adherence to search engine guidelines. Here's an overview of each: Black Hat SEO: Black hat SEO refers to aggressive and unethical tactics that aim to manipulate search engine rankings, often by exploiting vulnerabilities in search engine algorithms. These tactics prioritize short-term gains over long-term sustainability and user experience. Examples of black hat SEO techniques include keyword stuffing, hidden text and links, cloaking (presenting different content to search engines and users), paid link schemes, and content scraping. Black hat SEO can lead to immediate improvements in rankings but carries significant risks. Search engines continuously update their algorithms to detect and penalize such manipulative tactics. Websites employing black hat SEO may face severe consequences, including getting deindexed or receiving manual penalties that negatively impact their visibility and rankings. Engaging in black hat SEO is strongly discouraged as it can harm your online reputation and long-term success. White Hat SEO: White hat SEO, on the other hand, focuses on ethical and sustainable techniques that align with search engine guidelines and prioritize user experience. It aims to improve rankings through genuine optimization, valuable content creation, and positive user engagement. White hat SEO techniques include keyword research and optimization, creating high-quality and relevant content, improving website structure and navigation, acquiring natural and authoritative backlinks, and optimizing user experience. White hat SEO takes a long-term approach, emphasizing the value and relevance of content to attract organic traffic and build a loyal audience. It aims to establish a trustworthy and reputable online presence while complying with search engine guidelines. Although white hat SEO may take longer to yield results, it offers sustainable growth, improved user satisfaction, and reduced risks of penalties or search engine backlash. It's important to note that search engine algorithms are continually evolving to better detect and penalize black hat tactics. Search engines, such as Google, explicitly encourage webmasters to focus on providing valuable content and user-friendly experiences rather than attempting to manipulate rankings. Adopting white hat SEO practices is not only more ethical but also more likely to lead to long-term success in the ever-changing digital landscape. Black Hat SEO involves all the manipulated tactics of content optimization in order to show the crawlers that the page contains rich content for the searched keyword whereas White Hat SEO uses all organic optimization techniques. While On-Page SEO involves optimization related to the content and its markers whereas Off-Page SEO deals with brand authority of the site and site owner. Generally marketers use all or most of it to rank their content higher. Ace Digital Marketers give more importance to White Hat SEO as Black Hat SEO is considered doomed. Nevertheless Black Hat SEO still exists. Most marketers use a hybrid of both which they call Grey Hat SEO. On-Page SEO mainly includes attributes related to content : Look for keywords in Title, URL and meta description. Include the keyword in the content without over stuffing. Use of Schema and Subheads in the content. Site architecture plays a major role. Canonicalization is a technique to avoid duplicate content. Use of mobile-friendly sites. Use of HTTPS and SSL certificates. Off-Page SEO on the other hand mainly deals with outward attributes : Trust that audience has in your site which could be derived from - Domain Authority - popularity of the domain name. Page Authority - Popularity of page content. Bounce Rate - No of people viewing single page before leaving the site. Domain Age - age of the site, older the better. Identity - Brand or personal Identity. Backlinks - total number of links to your page from other sites and their quality including the anchor text with which they are linked with. Region - Country or City of origin and the target audience. Social Shares - presence on social media involves both number and quality of shares. I have covered most of SEO tactics and practices used across web. Hope this brings some relief to those who are new to Digital world and are looking for some insight on the basic idea of what actually happens behind a search and how SEO is used to get desired results from a search. For other content related to digital marketing you may visit https://www.digimarketeronline.org/blog/categories/digital-marketing #digitalmarketing #digitalmarketingbusiness #onlinebusiness #onlinemarketingbusiness #SEO #searchengineoptimization

Own a blog, want to increase traffic? Most new bloggers face the challenge of bringing in an audience for their content. I was also the one sailing in the same boat until I identified a few ways by which traffic can be driven to your website. The good part is all this is free traffic. How can one get traffic to their website or blog? Advertising As explained in my previous blog on monetization, advertising is a popular means, to get traffic to your website. Just like how advertisement can make the audience buy a product or service, a good visual or promotion can do the same for your blog or website as well. You may choose to promote your website for free or opt for paid advertising. Using ad networks or ad exchanges is a feasible way to build traffic in a short time. Programmatic advertising is provided by big players like Google, Bing, Facebook, Youtube, LinkedIn, and others. Social Media If you are aware of SEO, then you would know how social media plays an important role in brand building and search result ranking. With the right use of social media, one can generate traffic to their blog. This not only increases domain authority but also creates a brand awareness of your content. Aggregator sites like Quora and Reddit are fuel sources for traffic. Social Media also improves the off-page SEO of your site. Keyword Research Now if one is working towards search engine optimization, they will be very much aware of the use of the right keywords. This not only brings up your website content for a bunch of keywords associated with your niche or domain but also acts as a traffic generator. Long-tail keywords can play the trick in bringing more traffic than short keywords which face high competition. There are several keyword search tools, also one may make use of Google Adword planner for generating high traffic. Guest Blogging If you are a blogger then you know the importance of guest blogging. This could be a two-way process, one may ask someone else to guest blog for their site as well as one can write articles for someone else's blog. In both cases, they are targeting high-quality backlinks which will increase the website authority and in turn increase google search ranking. Fiverr and Freelancer sites have a ton of related jobs around guest blogging. There are several guest posting websites where one can submit their content. CoSchedule and ReadWrite are two such guest blogging sites. Referral Traffic Now referral process is generally a part of every industry, leave alone blogging. With reference, we intend to do good to two parties involved, the one who is promoting as well as the one who is a consumer. This policy holds true for bloggers as well. With subscription-based websites, one can ask their own users to refer their friends and acquaintances to join their site which will build the community and bring in free traffic. Now your referral can come from social media or other websites. These are a few ways to generate traffic to your website. Traffic is the key source for growth. Whatever your site may be doing, without traffic it will not grow. Hope this article can help you bring in traffic for your blog. For more content on digital marketing, you can check my blog.

You may have come across many digital marketing tools on different channels and blogs. In this post, I am going to discuss the types of digital marketing tools in general. When I started out fresh as a digital marketer, it took me a while to figure out which tools I need the most and which I can overlook for now. Digital marketing tools are software platforms, applications, and technologies that help businesses and individuals to promote and market their products or services online. These tools support various aspects of digital marketing, including search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, social media marketing, email marketing, content marketing, and more. Types of Digital Marketing Tools There are many types of digital marketing tools available to businesses today. Some of the most common ones include: Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tools: These tools help businesses optimize their website to rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs). Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising tools: These tools help businesses create and manage paid search and display advertising campaigns. Social media management tools: These tools help businesses manage and track their social media accounts. Email marketing tools: These tools help businesses create and manage email marketing campaigns. Content marketing tools: These tools help businesses create and distribute content, such as blog posts, infographics, and videos. Marketing automation tools: These tools help businesses automate repetitive marketing tasks and streamline their overall marketing efforts. Video marketing tools: These tools help businesses create engaging video content, distribute it across multiple channels, and track its performance to improve their overall marketing efforts. Conversion rate optimization (CRO) tools: These tools help businesses optimize their website and landing pages to improve conversion rates. Analytics and reporting tools: These tools help businesses track and measure the success of their digital marketing campaigns. Customer relationship management (CRM) tools: These tools help businesses manage customer interactions and relationships. Chatbots: These tools help businesses provide instant customer support, improve lead generation, and increase sales. Website & Hosting Servers: These tools help businesses create and maintain their online presence, improve their SEO, and streamline their overall marketing efforts. SEO tools SEO tools help businesses and marketers improve the visibility and ranking of their websites on search engines, which can drive more traffic and leads to their websites. The primary goal of SEO is to increase the visibility and ranking of a website in search engine results pages (SERPs), and SEO tools help achieve this goal by providing data, insights, and tools to improve various aspects of a website, such as keyword research, technical SEO, backlink analysis, content optimization, and more. Examples of SEO Tools are Google Analytics, Google Search Console, SEMrush, Ahrefs, Moz, etc. By using SEO tools, businesses and marketers can: Research and target keywords: SEO tools can help identify the keywords that potential customers are searching for and help optimize the website's content and metadata to rank for those keywords. Improve website technical SEO: SEO tools can help identify and fix technical issues on a website, such as broken links, crawl errors, and duplicate content, which can negatively impact search engine rankings. Monitor and improve backlinks: SEO tools can help monitor the backlink profile of a website and identify opportunities to build high-quality backlinks, which are critical to improving search engine rankings. Measure and track results: SEO tools can provide data on website traffic, user behavior, and search engine rankings, which can help businesses and marketers measure the impact of their SEO efforts and make informed decisions about future SEO strategies. PPC Advertising Tools Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising tools help businesses and marketers run and manage paid advertising campaigns on platforms such as Google Ads, Bing Ads, and Facebook Ads. The goal of PPC advertising is to drive targeted traffic to a website and generate leads and sales, and PPC advertising tools help achieve this goal by providing a suite of tools to create, launch, and manage PPC campaigns. Some of the key features of PPC advertising tools include: Campaign creation and management: PPC advertising tools allow businesses and marketers to create, launch, and manage advertising campaigns on multiple platforms, including Google Ads, Bing Ads, and Facebook Ads. Keyword research and targeting: PPC advertising tools can help businesses and marketers research and target the most relevant keywords for their advertising campaigns, and bid on those keywords to appear in search engine results pages or on social media platforms. Ad creation and optimization: PPC advertising tools provide tools and templates to create compelling and effective ad copy, images, and videos, and help optimize campaigns for improved performance. Performance tracking and reporting: PPC advertising tools provide real-time data and insights on the performance of advertising campaigns, including impressions, clicks, conversions, and ROI. Social Media Management Tools Social media has an important role to play in off-page SEO. Links posted on social media platforms can fetch high-quality backlinks which improve your DA and PA. With multiple social media platforms and accounts, one may find it difficult to manage these platforms for which you may find it suitable to use social media tools for creating and scheduling content. Tools like Canva can be used to create social media content for different platforms and tools like Buffer can be used to schedule and post content to these platforms. These tools provide free and paid versions. There is a lot that can be achieved with the free version, while some premium features are made available with the paid version. Some examples of social media management tools are Hootsuite, Buffer, Sprout Social, Agorapulse, etc. Social media management tools help businesses and organizations effectively manage their social media presence and engage with their target audience. With these tools, businesses can: Schedule and publish content: Social media management tools allow businesses to plan and schedule their content in advance, ensuring a consistent and well-timed presence on social media. Engage with followers: These tools provide a centralized inbox for businesses to manage and respond to messages and comments from their followers, helping to build relationships and increase engagement. Monitor social media conversations: Social media management tools provide real-time monitoring and tracking of social media conversations, allowing businesses to stay on top of what is being said about their brand and respond accordingly. Measure the impact of their social media activities: These tools provide robust analytics and reporting capabilities, helping businesses track and measure the success of their social media campaigns and make data-driven decisions. Email Marketing Tools Email marketing platforms allow businesses and organizations to create, send, and manage email campaigns and newsletters. They provide a range of features and tools that make it easy for businesses of all sizes to design, send, and track email campaigns. For example, Mailchimp, ConvertKit, Aweber, GetResponse, etc. are a few email marketing tools. Email marketing tools are used to create custom email templates, segment email lists based on specific criteria, and send targeted campaigns to specific segments of the audience. The platforms also provide analytics and reporting capabilities, allowing businesses to track the success of their campaigns and make data-driven decisions. Platforms like Mailchimp also offer integrations with a range of other marketing tools and platforms, such as e-commerce platforms, social media platforms, and more, making it a great choice for businesses looking for an all-in-one marketing solution. Additionally, Mailchimp offers a range of pricing plans to meet the needs of different businesses, from a free plan for small businesses to more advanced plans for larger organizations. Overall, email marketing platforms provide businesses with the tools they need to effectively reach, engage, and connect with their target audience through email marketing. Content Marketing Tools Content marketing platforms allow businesses and organizations to research, analyze, and monitor content and influencer performance across various social media networks. These platforms provide insights into which content is trending and performing well in specific industries or topics, allowing businesses to make informed decisions about the content they create and share. For example, BuzzSumo, CoSchedule, Ahrefs, SEMrush, etc. are a few popular content marketing platforms. With BuzzSumo, businesses can search for content based on keywords, topics, or domains, and filter the results by date range, content type, and social network. These platforms also provide insights into the influencers who are driving engagement for specific pieces of content, making it easier for businesses to identify potential collaborators and partners. They also provide a range of features for content and influencer outreach, including the ability to track mentions, monitor brand and industry trends, and find and reach out to influencers. Overall, content marketing tools help businesses and organizations looking to gain insights into their competitors, industry trends, and popular content, and for those looking to effectively leverage influencer marketing to reach their target audience. Marketing Automation Tools Marketing automation tools are software platforms that help automate repetitive marketing tasks, such as email campaigns, social media posts, and lead nurturing. They typically use customer data to deliver targeted and personalized messages, track customer behavior and engagement, and provide insights and analytics to improve marketing effectiveness. Some popular marketing automation tools include HubSpot, Marketo, Pardot, Infusionsoft, etc. Marketing automation tools offer a range of features, such as lead management, email marketing, social media marketing, analytics, and more. They are designed to help businesses generate and manage leads, engage with customers, and measure the effectiveness of their marketing campaigns. They are widely used by B2B (business-to-business) companies and are known for their scalability and robust functionality. Video Marketing Tools Video marketing tools are software platforms that can help businesses create, distribute, and analyze video content as part of their marketing strategy. Some popular video marketing tools include: Video creation tools: such as Adobe Premiere, Final Cut Pro, and iMovie, allow businesses to create and edit high-quality video content. Hosting and distribution tools: such as YouTube, Vimeo, and Wistia, enable businesses to upload, store, and distribute video content to their audiences. Analytics tools: such as Google Analytics and Vidyard, provide insights into how videos are being consumed and engaged with by audiences, including metrics like views, engagement, and retention. Interactive video tools: such as HapYak and WIREWAX, allow businesses to create interactive video content with clickable calls-to-action and other interactive features. Live streaming tools: such as Facebook Live, YouTube Live, and Twitch, enable businesses to engage with their audiences in real-time and share live events, webinars, or product launches. Overall, video marketing tools can help businesses create compelling video content, distribute it to the right channels, and measure its effectiveness, ultimately helping to drive engagement, build brand awareness, and generate leads. These tools provide businesses with the necessary tools and resources to execute effective digital marketing campaigns and achieve their marketing goals. It is important to choose the right tools based on the specific needs and goals of the business. When you start blogging or own a website the first thing you would target is your SEO which includes both online and offline SEO. This means you would need the following tools CRO Tools Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the process of optimizing your website or landing pages to improve conversion rates and increase the number of visitors who take a desired action, such as making a purchase or filling out a form. There are several tools available to help businesses with CRO, including: A/B testing tools: These tools allow businesses to test different versions of a web page or landing page to see which version converts better. Examples include Optimizely, VWO, and Google Optimize. Heatmapping tools: These tools provide businesses with visual data on how visitors interact with their websites or landing pages. Examples include Hotjar, Crazy Egg, and Mouseflow. User feedback tools: These tools allow businesses to collect feedback from website visitors to identify areas for improvement. Examples include Qualaroo, Survicate, and UserTesting. Website optimization tools: These tools provide businesses with recommendations for optimizing their website or landing pages based on best practices. Examples include Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, and Pingdom. Personalization tools: These tools allow businesses to personalize their website or landing pages for individual visitors based on their behavior or interests. Examples include Evergage, Monetate, and Dynamic Yield. Funnel tracking tools: These tools allow businesses to track visitors through their entire conversion funnel, from initial visits to final conversions. Examples include Kissmetrics, Mixpanel, and Woopra. Overall, using a combination of these CRO tools can help businesses identify areas for improvement on their website or landing pages and optimize them to increase conversion rates and improve overall performance. Analytics Tools Analytic tools help digital marketers gain insights into their audience's behavior, preferences, and interactions with their brand across these channels. This, in turn, helps them make data-driven decisions to optimize their digital marketing efforts and improve their return on investment. Some examples of analytic tools commonly used in digital marketing include Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, Facebook Insights, Twitter Analytics, and LinkedIn Analytics. These tools provide insights into metrics such as website traffic, engagement, conversion rates, and audience demographics. While analytic tools are not the only digital marketing tools, they are an essential component of a digital marketing strategy as they enable marketers to track and measure the success of their campaigns and make data-driven decisions to improve their performance. CRM Tools CRM tools are used to collect and manage customer data across these channels, which helps businesses to understand their customers better and deliver personalized marketing messages. CRM tools typically include features such as contact management, sales management, marketing automation, and customer service. By leveraging this data, businesses can target their marketing efforts more effectively and deliver more personalized experiences to their customers. Examples of CRM tools used in digital marketing include Salesforce, HubSpot, Zoho, and Freshsales. These tools integrate with various digital marketing channels to provide a holistic view of customer interactions and engagement. CRM tools are digital marketing tools that help businesses to manage their customer data and improve their marketing efforts by providing insights into customer behavior and preferences. Chatbots Chatbots are software programs that use artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language processing (NLP) to interact with users in a conversational manner. They can be integrated into various digital channels, such as websites, social media platforms, messaging apps, and email, to provide instant customer support, answer questions, and provide product recommendations. In the context of digital marketing, chatbots can be used to: Provide personalized product recommendations based on customer preferences and behavior Offer promotions and discounts to drive sales Qualify leads and schedule appointments Collect customer data for marketing purposes Provide customer support and improve customer satisfaction Chatbots can also help businesses to automate their marketing and sales processes, freeing up resources to focus on higher-level tasks. Examples of chatbot platforms used in digital marketing include ManyChat, Chatfuel, Tars, and MobileMonkey. These tools provide drag-and-drop interfaces to build chatbots without requiring coding skills. Chatbots are digital marketing tools that help businesses to improve customer engagement, provide personalized experiences, and drive sales through digital channels. Website & Hosting Server A website can be an effective marketing tool for businesses by providing a way to establish a digital presence, engage with customers, and collect data for analysis and improvement: Brand Awareness: A website is often the first point of contact for potential customers, and can provide a way for businesses to showcase their products or services and build brand awareness. Search Engine Optimization (SEO): A well-designed website can help improve a business's search engine rankings, making it more visible to potential customers searching for relevant keywords. Lead Generation: A website can be optimized to generate leads through calls-to-action, forms, and landing pages, allowing businesses to capture visitor information and follow up with potential customers. Customer Engagement: A website can provide a platform for businesses to engage with customers through blogs, forums, social media integration, and other interactive features. Data Analysis: Hosting servers can provide analytics on website traffic, such as visitor behavior, demographics, and referral sources. This information can be used to improve marketing efforts and website design. Website performance: A website hosted on a reliable server can load quickly, providing a better user experience for visitors. This can improve a website's search engine rankings and increase engagement with potential customers. Scalability: A hosting server that can scale up or down according to website traffic can ensure that a website stays online during times of high demand, such as during a product launch or a sale. Security: A hosting server can provide a secure environment for a website, protecting it from cyber threats and potential data breaches. This can help build trust with customers and protect a business's reputation. Analytics: Hosting servers can provide data on website traffic, such as visitor behavior, demographics, and referral sources. This information can be used to improve marketing efforts and website design. Email hosting: A hosting server can provide email hosting services, allowing businesses to communicate with customers using their own domain name. This can help establish brand credibility and professionalism. Overall, a reliable and secure web hosting server can help a business protect against cyber threats, ultimately helping to drive engagement, build brand awareness, and generate leads. With digital marketing, the most common way of content promotion is blog posts that require a good blogging site. If you plan to own a website instead of posting on free blogging sites, then it is advisable to find a good domain name and a hosting server. Domain names are available on various platforms like Google, GoDaddy, Bluehost, and others. Most of these channels provide hosting services as well. Sites like flippa also provide domains that are for resale. If you want to rank higher on Google faster, then most people go for resold domains with good domain authority and traffic. In this article, we have discussed a few important types of digital marketing tools that are needed for starting your digital marketing journey. As you progress you will need more sophisticated tools like funnels and their automation. For more on digital marketing check other published content.

If you are a copywriter and have been trying to rank your content on Google, then you have come face to face with the much-talked-off algorithm RankBrain. Why discuss the algorithm? The interesting part is that this algorithm relies much on LSI keywords. During the early days of the search engine, Google used a technique called Page Rank, which depended much on the backlinks and keywords in the content that matched the searched query. With time and more advancement with searches, there were nearly 15% of fresh keyword searches every day which meant Google would take longer to find the relevant stuff and may also tend to return irrelevant content. To overcome this gap, Google introduced a new ranking algorithm that was based on Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning techniques. This meant it kept track of not only the searched terms but also related keywords and phrases which fell under the category of LSI keywords. Latent Semantic Indexing means hidden keywords with similar meaning or intent as the searched terms. For instance when a user searches for "You are an owl" It actually means "You are a bird" but the literal meaning says "You are a nocturnal animal" or "You are a fool". As humans, it is well understood, but machines need to understand the hidden intent of the words and phrases. This is well handled by the RankBrain algorithm. Having known that the Google searches depend on LSI keywords it becomes of utmost importance that the content must be created around these keywords without indulging in stuffing and spamming. LSI technology originated from LSA (Latent Semantic Analysis) which was patented in 1988 during the initial days of the internet which then expired in 2008. However Google has denied the use of LSI, but it is evident that a similar yet more advanced algorithm must have been incorporated by Google which does identify related keywords and phrases based on synonyms and intent. However, this advanced algorithm also has the ability to improvise based on past searches. This gives way to the fact that it would be good to incorporate LSI keywords into your content while optimizing. Originally LSA was used for concept searches and categorization of documents which gradually made its way to Search Engine Optimization. There are three forms of LSI keywords in use synonyms substitution sentimental and logically related words and phrases The tools mentioned in "5 FREE Keyword Tools" will help identify the LSI keywords other than these, below are a few more free tools that can identify semantic keywords around the main or head keyword. It can also give related phrases for the seed keywords. To know more about keywords and their types check the article "Types of Keywords". KwFinder Semantic Link Twin Word Key Search Keys4Up Along with the above tools Google Related Search terms found at the bottom of the results page or the Semrush keyword magic tools can also be used in their free versions. The intent of identifying these keywords is to build content around them so that Google's algorithm identifies the relevancy of your content with the related keywords and phrases. This will boost your page rank while decreasing the bounce rate of your page. The relevancy of the content to the related keywords will also roll out the possibility of spammed content. To know more about SEO and related topics in Digital Marketing check other articles.

In the previous articles and blogs, we discussed different matrices a website holds and how they impact the rankings in one way or the other. We understood the importance of metrics like Page Authority or Domain Authority, but we never discussed how search engines like Google rank a website. Google makes use of several powerful algorithms to rate and rank a webpage. We will highlight a few of these which are of utmost importance when it comes to ranking a webpage higher in SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages). Panda This was initially launched as a filter in 2011 which later became a part of Google's core algorithm. Panda mainly focuses on content quality to avoid any spammy content ranking higher in the search results. It checks for low-quality content with duplicacy, plagiarism, thin content, keyword stuffing, and spam. If your page has any or all of these then expect a penalty from the algorithm. Whereas, user experience, relevancy, and good website design can lead to higher rankings by this algorithm. Penguin This was initially launched as a filter in 2012 and later became a part of the core algorithm in 2017. Its main function is to identify websites with poor backlink profiles or unnatural backlinks. For a better understanding read backlinks and their types. Prior to the launch of this filter, website owners linked their pages to other sites merely for ranking purposes without adding value to the content. This led to spammy links and an unnatural backlink profile, to avoid this Google introduced Penguin. HummingBird Initially launched in 2013, it led to the complete overhaul of the core algorithm. This was a real-time algorithm that checked the presence of keyword stuffing in the content. Prior to its launch, content writers stuffed high-ranking keywords or LSI keywords without context. The content proved low quality and out of context with the user intent for the search. This meant poor search results and to avoid this and to present relevant content to the user for their search query this algorithm was introduced. This algorithm is also responsible for the Knowledge Graph display on the SERP along with playing a vital role in the listing of Local Searches, Voice Searches, and Autocomplete during searches. RankBrain This is the father of all Google algorithms as of now, initially launched in 2015 it is backed by AI and is known to improvise itself with every search. It keeps a track of user experience with the results and makes a distinction on the intent of the content in relation to the search query. It depends on 2 main factors, CTR (Click Through Rate) and the dwell time. CTR is the percentage of clicks to impressions while the dwell time is the time a user stays on the page. If the title and description of the page are relevant and trigger user interest then the CTR increases, whereas if the quality of the content is good and has enough material to make the user stay longer this increases the dwell time. This in turn affects the rankings on the search results page as a result of the algorithm. The algorithm also considers returning users. E.A.T Initially launched as part of Search Quality Guidelines in 2014 and been updated since. E.A.T stands for Expert, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness which is not a ranking factor but has a direct impact on it which is why a webpage has to mark itself as high-quality and relevant content. Easier said than done, a webpage needs to come from an expert source, link to authorized resources, and prove itself to be trustworthy. This also means you need to have updated contact details on the About/Author Page and have expert content published which must be backed by facts and figures from trusted resources while gaining credible reviews for your content from your users and to top it all must have a brand presence to give it authority and reputation. All in all the off-page SEO techniques will come handy in scoring high on E.A.T. This algorithm has the highest effect on YMYL (Your Money Your Life) website which involves sites and pages dealing with finance, news, medicines, and anything that has a high impact on people's life. Mobilegeddon Initially launched in 2015, it was the first update for Mobile from Google. With more users moving toward mobile devices it was necessary to render relevant results that met the mobile user experience criteria. It was a strategic move towards a Mobile-first approach which was backed by the introduction of AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages). This update impacted mobile search results to rank those websites higher which had a better user experience. Possum Launched in 2016, it was an update related to Google My Business (GMB) results impacting local search results. Post the launch, businesses outside the city limits, businesses located at the same address, and businesses owned by the same parent company got affected. For scenarios 2 and 3 stated above, with the "Possum" update duplicate listings are almost always removed. This does not mean other listings for the same address never show up, one may have to tweak their GMB page to make it to the local pack listing. Also, the searches beyond borders meaning searching an address that is just outside the city limit did not show up which got corrected after the algorithm update, pushing the relevant results to a higher rank. FRED This algorithm launched in 2017 was meant to address thin content on web pages that were more ad centric than content relevancy. This meant pages with aggressive monetization measures would be penalized. Aggressive monetization involved all sorts of Black Hat SEO techniques including deceptive ads, low-quality links, irrelevant content, content addressing all sorts of topics, no mobile-friendly experience, and others. The intent was to provide high-quality and relevant content to the user. Pigeon This is another algorithm related to Local Search Results, launched in 2014. As part of the Pigeon update, the listing on local search results related to a Google Map location shows at most three listings meaning a three-pack style which was a 7 local pack style earlier. Also, the local search radius was narrowed down which gave more weightage to the distance from the user searching the location. This algorithm update was a step toward binding the local search algorithm with the web. Possum update seems to be a step further. Page Experience Rolled out in 2021, this UX update aims at measuring page experience using three new metrics together called core web vitals. The new metrics are determined to measure the speed and performance of the page and are named largest contentful paint (LCP), first input delay (FID), and cumulative layout shift (CLS). LCP measures the time taken for the largest visual block to load, FID measures the delay in the responsiveness of the page, the lower the value the better the page is, and CLS measures the overall page stability which means the layout must not change while the user is still reading. Google was already measuring the load time, HTTPS, and other vital components of user experience prior to this update. While we have discussed the major algorithms Google uses while ranking websites, there are a few other mentions which either out of the core update or are yet to be integrated, but it is worth a talk. Page Ranking, BERT & MUM Page Rank algorithm first introduced by Google in 1998, is still a matter of consideration to date. With newer algorithms making way, it may be replaced by more powerful tools that can calculate the relevancy of the site and its power to rank higher. Page Rank relied on anchor text, clicks, internal links, and backlinks. There are multiple score calculators out there in the market which work along the same lines, but Google's Page Rank Toolbar wasit is discontinued. Next comes the BERT (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) is Google's natural language processing model based on the neural network that was launched in 2019 and the current search engine relies on this. It is a complementary part of RankBrain meaning RankBrain was not replaced. This algorithm helps in understanding long queries better without omitting prepositions from the sentence. MUM (Google Multitask Unified Model) is under work and yet to be launched. Its discussions began in 2021 and MUM is known to be 1000 times more powerful than BERT. It is known to have the ability to understand 75 languages and has the ability to break any language barriers. The intent was to return entire details of the data related to a user search rather than returning data for only what was asked in the query. MUM is set for release in the future. After having understood some of the popular algorithms used by Google for running a search, it is easy for SEOs to tweak their pages at the right points to rank them higher on Google. For more on such details check other blogs.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is a form of digital marketing that involves promoting websites or web pages through paid advertising on search engine results pages (SERPs). SEM typically involves the use of pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, where advertisers bid on keywords that are relevant to their business and target audience. What is Search Engine Marketing and How is it different from PPC advertising? Digital Marketers must know about advertising. When a business has set up a new website and wants to let its customers know instantly the approach they would take would be the SEM. This is primarily because SEO is an organic approach and takes time to show the results. While a business page has anything but time to reach its customers, else they will run short on business and customers. The brighter part is your ads get displayed to those customers for exactly what you are offering them as what they are searching for. The process of increasing a product or service's visibility on a SERP(Search Engine Results Page) through paid advertising is called SEM. Marketers can also use SEM for specific eCommerce Platforms where users search for products they want to buy. These sites are also referred to as product-based search engines. Digital Marketers also consider YouTube as a search engine platform. Shopping search engines, such as Google Shopping, allow users to search for products across multiple websites and present results in a standardized format, making it easier to compare products and prices. Additionally, many shopping search sites offer tools like price tracking, product reviews, and alerts for price drops, to help customers make the best purchasing decisions. When these sites advertise their content or product for specific keywords then it falls under SEM. Typically advertisers don't get charged for displaying ads, it's more like when a customer clicks on these ads that they get charged which again depends on pay models like PPC. There are typically two pay models involved with this type of marketing. PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising model allows businesses to pay only when their advertisements are clicked. Impressions-based advertising model allows businesses to pay depending on the number of times users have seen the ad. Advantages of involving SEM in a digital marketing strategy: Reach likely customers Quickly appearing in the search results. Learn which ads perform better Control over where you send searches. Different SEM Ads depending on Ad formats Text Ads are classic ads with a title as a link and a description that appeal to the searchers on SERP. Shopping Ads are specifically for eCommerce businesses that show products related to various companies displayed in the search results. Local services ads are specifically for businesses with locally based customers. For displaying these ads businesses must have been screened by Google as legitimate businesses that are businesses with verified My Business Page. Google Maps ads are meant for local businesses with the major difference from Local service ads being that they can be for local product-based business searches as well. Call ads are specifically meant for mobile searches when the customer is searching on mobile and receives a call button in the searches. Video Ads are meant for video platforms like YouTube when the customer is searching for a product and the relevant ad is displayed. Ad Extensions for various Google Ad Formats For most of these ad types, Google provides Ad extensions that feature additional information about a business such as a website link, a phone number, or an address. Sitelink Extensions include additional website links. Call Extensions make it possible to call the business. Location Extension lets customers find local businesses by pulling it up on Google Maps. Price Extension is for e-commerce businesses that show the product price along with its details. Structured Snippets Extension which highlights specific aspects of products and services. What is a Google Merchant Centre? Google Merchant Center is a free tool provided by Google that allows online retailers and merchants to upload their product data to Google and make it available to Google Shopping and other Google services. With Google Merchant Center, merchants can manage their product information, including product images, descriptions, prices, and availability, and make it accessible to consumers when they search for products on Google. When a consumer searches for a product on Google, relevant products from merchants enrolled in Google Merchant Center may be displayed in a carousel-style format, including a photo of the product, its name, price, and a link to the merchant's website. These product listings can then be promoted through PPC advertising on Google. By combining Google Merchant Center with PPC advertising, merchants can increase the visibility of their products, drive traffic to their websites, and ultimately increase sales. The cost of each click on a PPC ad can vary depending on the competition for the specific keywords and target audience, but with a well-optimized campaign, merchants can see a positive return on investment (ROI) from their advertising efforts. Setting Up a Google Ad Define your campaign goal or objective. Choose the campaign type such as search, Shopping, Local, or Video. Set up a budget. Choose a bidding strategy like conversion, clicks, or others. Google uses machine learning to optimize ads. Select target audience. Create your ad Setup conversion What is Ad Auction? Ad auction determines which ads show in what order for each search result that contains SEM ads. Ad Rank determines ad position. Ad matching happens based on keywords. Keywords are the phrases used in a search. For more on Keywords read the article "Types of Keywords". The relevancy of the ad displayed depends on the matching type which can be broadly classified into Broad Match - phrases that relate to the keyword Phrase Match - that includes the meaning of the keyword Exact Match - same meaning or intent as keyword Factors determining ad rank Your bid - the price you are willing to pay for getting your ad displayed. The quality of your ad and landing page is determined by the Quality Score for diagnostic purposes. Use of Ad extensions - use all relevant ad extensions for your ad to rank higher. Apart from the above to rank your ad higher you need to provide value to your customer. Including one keyword in the headline, providing specific CTA, and optimizing the landing page for relevancy and reliability can help score your ad rank higher. What is Display Advertising? Placing paid ads anywhere on Google or Bing or any search engine property while performing a search for a given keyword or search term falls under SEM. Another option for placing ads is websites or applications that are not Google properties. These ads are termed display advertising. These ads can be placed on Websites, Apps, YouTube, and Gmail. The significant difference with SEM ads is that they are not ads that are shown after a user searches for the given product or service, these ads are merely displayed yet are targeted based on Machine Learning Algorithms. Google Display Network has a major role to play in this display advertising. Google Display Network is a group of more than two million websites, videos, and apps where programmatic display ads can appear. For more on ad networks read this article. There are two types of Google Display Ads : Uploaded - which are uploaded by the user which could be a Banner, Leaderboard, or a Skyscraper Ad depending on the size. Responsive - Google ads will automatically generate ad combinations. Now that you have understood the major differences between SEM, PPC, and Display Advertising you may be in a position to set up an advertising campaign on your own. Search Engine Marketing Funnel The typical SEM funnel has the following stages: Awareness: Potential customers become aware of a business's brand, products, or services through SEM advertising. Interest: Potential customers show interest in a business's offerings and start to research more about the products or services. Consideration: Potential customers compare different products or services to determine which ones best meet their needs. Intent: Potential customers express a desire to make a purchase and start to consider the options for making that purchase. Evaluation: Potential customers evaluate their options and make a decision about which product or service to purchase. Purchase: Potential customers make a purchase and become a customer. Loyalty: Customers continue to use a business's products or services and may become repeat customers. By understanding the stages of the SEM funnel, a business can tailor its SEM campaigns to target specific stages of the funnel and improve the customer experience, ultimately increasing conversions and driving growth. Search Engine Marketing Strategy A well-structured SEM strategy can help increase visibility and drive targeted traffic to a website, ultimately leading to increased leads, sales, or conversions. A successful SEM strategy typically involves the following steps: Keyword research: Identifying the keywords that your target audience is using to search for products or services like yours. Ad copy creation: Writing compelling ad copy that accurately represents your brand and is optimized for the keywords you are targeting. Campaign structure: Deciding on the type of SEM advertising to use, such as pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, display advertising, video advertising, or shopping advertising, and organizing the campaign structure in a way that makes sense for your business. Budget allocation: Deciding on a budget for your SEM campaign and allocating it in a way that maximizes your return on investment (ROI). Bid management: Setting bids for your targeted keywords to ensure that your ads are displayed in the right place at the right time. Tracking and analysis: Continuously monitoring and analyzing data to see what's working and what's not, and making informed decisions based on that data to adjust your strategy and maximize your results. It's important to remember that SEM is a continuous process and that your strategy should evolve over time as you learn more about your target audience and what works best for your business. Search Engine Marketing Plan Developing a search engine marketing (SEM) plan is essential to ensure that your SEM efforts are aligned with your business goals and objectives. Here are some steps you can take to create an effective SEM plan: Define your goals: Start by defining your business goals and objectives for your SEM campaign. What are you trying to achieve? Do you want to increase website traffic, generate leads, or boost sales? Identify your target audience: Determine who your target audience is and what their search behavior is like. This will help you to identify the keywords and phrases they are likely to use when searching for your products or services. Conduct keyword research: Use tools such as Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Ahrefs to research relevant keywords and phrases. Consider both short-tail and long-tail keywords that are relevant to your target audience. Develop your ad copy: Develop ad copy that is clear, concise, and compelling. Make sure that your ad copy is focused on the benefits of your product or service, rather than just its features. Set your budget: Determine how much you are willing to spend on your SEM campaign. You can set a daily or weekly budget, and adjust it as needed based on the performance of your ads. Choose your SEM platform: Consider which SEM platform is best suited for your business. Google Ads is the most popular SEM platform, but there are other options such as Bing Ads, Facebook Ads, and LinkedIn Ads. Create your ads: Create your ads based on your ad copy and keywords. Make sure that your ads are visually appealing and that they include a clear call to action(CTA). Monitor and optimize: Monitor the performance of your ads and make adjustments as needed to improve their performance. Track metrics such as click-through rates, conversion rates, and cost-per-click to ensure that your SEM campaign is delivering a positive return on investment (ROI). By following these steps and creating a well-defined SEM plan, you can effectively target your audience, increase website traffic, and drive conversions for your business. Search Engine Marketing Campaign To set up an SEM campaign, you'll need to determine your target audience, choose the keywords that you want to target, create relevant and compelling ad copy, and set your budget for the campaign. You'll also need to decide which search engines you want to advertise on and what type of SEM advertising you want to use, such as pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, display advertising, video advertising, or shopping advertising. To optimize your SEM campaign, you'll need to continually monitor and adjust your bids, ad copy, and targeting to ensure that you're getting the best results possible. You'll also need to track your results and analyze data to see what's working and what's not so that you can make informed decisions and adjust your strategy as needed. SEM gives you the ability to immediately place your website at the top of search engine results pages (SERPs), which can increase visibility and drive targeted traffic to your site. With SEM, you have complete control over your ad spending and can adjust your bids and targeting at any time to maximize your results. SEM provides you with immediate, quantifiable results, allowing you to track the performance of your campaigns and make informed decisions to optimize your strategy. For more information on other digital marketing channels read these articles.

Most people including myself initially are confused with the terms Copyright and Copywrite. While these two terms are used frequently in digital marketing, they are often used one over another. This article will clarify the differences between these terms and dive into the subject to some extent. What is Copyright and How is it different from Trademark or Patent? Copyright protects the expression of an idea, the exact words or form chosen to convey the idea but does not include the idea itself or the procedures, processes, systems, methods, concepts, and discoveries which are protected under Trademark. It may also not include facts, names, titles, short phrases, typeface, fonts and lettering, blank forms, familiar symbols, and designs that may be protected under Patent. Copyright protection is governed by Law. While most countries do not have strict laws pertaining to copyright they do exist in some form. Copyright protects the expressive content of work independently created by the author, not underlying thoughts and ideas. This kind of work must be fixed in nature, meaning one that you can see or hear, and if you cannot, some technological device that can. It need not be permanent, but cannot be too short or transitory. Registering the work with the copyright office creates a public record of the work. Copyright laws give authors certain exclusive rights in their work for a limited time. As per Federal law, Copyright laws generally last for the life of the author plus 70 years, or works made for hire or anonymous works may last either 95 years from the date of first publication or 120 years from the date of creation whichever is shorter, while the works created before 1978 have a different term calculation. Though copyright laws may seem to prohibit any other individual from making use of any other author's works, Fair Use may be an exception to the same, which allows journalists to use copyrighted text in news reports or for authors to parody another author's work. Also, First Sale Doctrine allows the owner to sell a copy of protected work to resell or otherwise dispose of that copy. Used book stores work on this exception. A "Creative Commons License" may be issued to grant permission to users to use copyright-protected content. Plagiarism Plagiarism is a violation of copyright law. This is when you use someone else's words or ideas in some concrete form without crediting the source and present them as your own. Types of Plagiarism Verbatim - when you use the exact same words without quoting the author. PatchWork - when you use some part of the content here and there Paraphrasing - when you rephrase the content by replacing a few words Global - when you use the entire work and present it as your own Self - when you copy your old work and present it as new There are many tools out there in the market that protect your content from plagiarism. Turnitin is the best know plagiarism checker used by most brands but does not come cheap so try out some free tools mentioned in this video. What is Copywriting? Copywriting is the art of crafting words for the sole purpose of conversion. Simply put, it is writing to generate action. In marketing, every piece of content published is to suit the prospects pertaining to their sales lifecycle which is measured through the AIDA funnel. Copywriting is the messaging that fuels an entire business. It is used in various marketing materials like sales pitches, websites, emails, promotional videos, direct mail flyers, catalogs, advertising campaigns, and others. The message itself is referred to as copy and the best copy establishes a connection with the audience. It always compels the prospect into seeing the next message. Copywriting is for a single Call to Action(CTA) and is unidirectional How is Content writing different from Copywriting? Content writing is different from Copywriting, while content is for engagement and brand awareness, copywriting is for sales. Content writing is also important for business and is usually through content mediums like blog posts, videos, social media, and others. Content writing educates the audience and organically builds relationships with them. How to write a good copy? Copywriting is usually established with a strong headline, subject, or opening statement depending on the medium whether it is a sales pitch, email, ad campaign, website article, or video script. A good copy usually lets the prospect know what lies for them if they crack the deal. The product may be out of the world but if the user is not convinced to use it, then that copy was not good enough and so was copywriting. Any copy is termed successful if the prospect takes the call to action. The copy must also include the solutions to the prospect's problems. Just plain promise without solving any existing problem can fail the copy. Also, every copy must hold a single call to action. For example: Use our shampoo and get black hair in 10 days! Click to get a 10% discount. Buy in the next 5 min to save 100$! These are a few catchy headline phrases that can generate curiosity and compel the reader into impulse buying the product. These are a few instances of good copywriting. While we understand what good copywriting must include, we must also need to know what to avoid. Generalizing the copy for all categories of the audience is a waste of time, instead, target a segment to generate a higher call to action. Avoid highlighting the features in the copy, instead convert features to benefits. For example, if your device is backed by solar power, you can instead say - "Always available". Fancy language or usage of complex terms can confuse your audience, instead, use simple phrases to convey the message. Hope this article gives clarity on the two most misinterpreted and often interchanged terms in digital marketing "Copyright" and "Copywriting". For more useful articles on digital marketing click here.