Online
Marketing Success Requires Key Elements
As
the years go by the online marketing world grows tremendously and there is an
increasing number of people who want to get into online marketing. But in most
cases some people really don't even know what that means or what it takes.
There are so many things that go under the overall online marketing tree that
if you spoke to a hundred different "Internet Marketers" and asked
them what they do, you would probably get a hundred different answers. Most of
us have a hard time even trying to explain what it is we do to inquiring minds.
In
it's definition, online marketing is the provision and promotion of products
and services online. It merges the creative and technical aspects of marketing:
design, development, advertising and sales. Since the beginning of the internet
and search engines, internet usage has rapidly and steadily increased since the
80s/90s. The daily usual number of internet searches has increased a lot from
just under 10,000 in the late 90s to well over 4 billion in the past year. That
tally's up to more than a trillion internet searches a year with just Google by
itself!
People
are not just doing informative searches, but searches for products/services
too. This means that the majority of consumers find out about the products and
businesses they buy and do business with mainly through the internet. However,
most search engine users usually only focus on the first page of search results
- typically the top five results. Considering that more and more business is
conducted online every year, it means that competition for these positions has
grown and that they have major value to savvy business owners. It has come to
the point where competition in local, national or international markets
requires a consistent strong online presence. Gaining and maintaining a
position on the first page of SERPs (search engine results pages) influence
people to trust the solidity, dexterity and genuineness of your
business/service.
Online
Marketing Success is composed of a number different things like seo, ppc, social
media, and online public relations are just a few of them. All of these
strategies, when implemented properly and effectively, work in unison to boost
website visibility with the ultimate goal of increasing conversions. Conversion
is the result you want for a visitor to your website to make a purchase, phone
call, download, complete a form etc.. It is whatever result based goal you have
set for your website.
So,
in this post I am going to give you some information and insight about some of
the typical things you would need to learn and do if you were to start your own
online marketing business.
Here
are just some of the things you should learn and master to become good at
online marketing...
SEO
SEO
(Search Engine Optimization) will give you long term with the goal to increase
popularity,visibility, authority, relevance and in result more conversions. SEO
could be a whole course by itself. There are plenty of ebooks, blogs, courses
and websites dedicated mainly to SEO training. It is extremely important and a
huge part of what most advertising & marketing specialists do in their
regular daily routine. There are thousands of internet marketers who spend
literally day after day doing SEO and nothing else. It can take a long time to
master the process/perfect the different techniques out there. Also, it is
always changing, so staying on top of it all can be really exhausting. Every
good internet marketer can have SEO as their main specialty and still be
learning something new almost every day.
Part
of SEO is the development of a website's content and structure. The most
important thing to remember when conducting this is to write and build a
website for users, not search engines. It is the main goal of a search engine
is to show it's users relevant results. Their technology is always advancing
and has become much better at recognizing low quality websites were the sole
purpose is to get hits and be manipulative then penalize them. This means that
the difficulty with which a website is controlled and the quality of its
content are important factors in obtaining visibility on the major search
engines.
Web Design
Before
you start advertising & marketing anything on the internet or build an
online marketing business, you need to have a website of some sort. There are
plenty of tools and resources available (such as Word Press) that will help
build a site for you. However, it still takes time to learn how to use those
tools and actually get a site built the way you want it. Even the most rookie
friendly systems have a learning curve and can take some time to set up. Then,
you must learn some coding in order to make changes in certain places and
customize your site beyond the basic themes/templates that site builders
include.
And
don't forget about DNS settings, domain registrations, settings tweaks, system
installs, content uploads etc.. Those things also take time to do and require
you to learn how to do them. There's a lot that goes into building a website
and it's just one part of being an online marketing pro.
Writing Content
This
is one thing that can take up a LOT of time in the daily routine of just about
most internet marketer. Content is king in the world of advertising &
marketing. You need it for just about everything you do. It doesn't matter if
you are constructing a static site, updating a blog, marketing sites, writing
articles, responding to emails, sending out your newsletter, replying to
comments, participating in forums, copy writing, and so on... You will be
writing and writing some more. It's all about content in the internet world so
get ready to wear out many keyboards on your computer!
Blogging
The
Internet has without a doubt moved towards blogs in the past couple of years
and will likely continue to do so until they are the predominant force in the
online world. Blogging is a very essential part of online marketing in a lot
ways. Depending on your business standards, it can really be very vital to
success online. It is good for making a brand for yourself, getting your
content out to the internet, helping to spread your brand, building up a
following, or you can make money from your blog only. Some marketers solely
earn their whole incomes off of blogging. Although, in most cases, they are
typically know as a blogger.
Social Media Marketing
I
know you might have accounts with Pinterest, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter,,
Google Plus, and possibly a few others. If you don't then you certainly know
someone close to you who does. Well, a typical internet marketer will have all
of those profiles plus another 10 or 20 or more accounts on other social media
sites that they have to manage.
Think
about how much time you spend on those sites every day. It's not hard for an
hour or more to pass without even noticing it. And you are only using them to keep
up with family, friends, and what's go ing on around town. Internet marketers
do all of that plus use them to network with business associates and prospects,
keep up on our industry, spread the word about our content, and for other
marketing reasons.
Being
a social media consultant and doing all the social media marketing and updating
for companies is something many people do as a full time business. It can take
up a lot of time, but some how online marketing pro have to squeeze it into
their daily routine along with about a thousand different things.
Pay Per Click
When
you search something on Google you will notice there are usually some ads at
the top above the organic rankings and a tower of them on the right side next
to the organic results. They look a lot like the regular results but are
slightly different. PPC are paid ads that show through Google AdWords. When
somebody says PPC ads this is what they are referring to, even though there are
technically many different forms of PPC. An individual bids on specific
keywords in order to get an ad displayed and then they pay for every click they
get on the ad.
This
method is very popular with online marketers and other businesses that sell
products or services online. The keyword research, set up, and management takes
a lot of time, effort and skill. You can waste a lot of money if you just throw
up your ad and let it go. Top PPC pro's can spend several years testing,
tweaking and learning their systems in order to master Adwords and make their
campaigns the most profitable.
Email Marketing
Email
marketing is simply building up a list of email subscribers, creating a trust
worth relationship with people so they join your list, sending them good useful
content/resources, keeping them updated on the latest news in the niche they
are interested in or about your business, and sending all sorts of other
information. One popular saying in the IM world is, "the money is in the
list" and there is a lot of truth to that. But it can be a little
difficult to build a profitable list and as an online marketer you might be
spending a lot of time perfecting this skill.
Product Creation
Product
creation is a huge thing that online marketer's do is create information
products such as ebooks, along with business services, SEO, membership sites,
marketing tools, and so on. This stuff can take a long time to develop
depending on what it is. Almost every website or web based service you use, or
ebook you read, were created by some sort of online marketing expert in one way
or another.
Videos
A
huge part of Online Marketing Success nowadays is video production. I remember
that back in 2003 this wasn't really a big deal at all. There were very few
people doing them in those days. But video marketing has exploded in the past
few years and will only continue to grow into the future. Videos can be
instructive, funny, informational with the intent of maybe going viral, or made
for advertising purposes. Whatever the reasons for videos, the fact is they are
a part of running an online marketing business now and they can take a lot of
work to do.
Because
of the rapid increase in the use of the internet to find all kinds of products,
services, organizations and tools, a advertising & marketing strategy
centered around the internet is the modern way to advertise or promote what you
have to offer. Online marketing is also the best form of marketing because it
actually offers a way to track and analyze data. This means that your
strategies can be tested, created, retested, refined and revised so that your
site is designed to get the most conversions as it can possibly get.
Alright
in conclusion, as I said, those are just SOME of the main things you will be
doing regularly with online marketing. There's a lot more that you will surely
be doing on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly basis. I only scratched the
surface of what being an online marketing pro fully entails. I didn't even get
into client servicing, media buying, webinars, forums, training, etc.. It
virtually never stops!
So,
it's definitely not all fun and games relaxing on the beach with your laptop
like many people think. Online marketing is a real business and there is a lot
of work involved to build, grow, and maintain it. But if you are up for the
challenge and willing to put in the time and effort, it can be a very rewarding
way to make a living!
