What is Digital Marketing?

Since 2019, searches on Google for "digital marketing" have increased by 50%, but at the same time, "what is digital marketing" is within the Top 10 searches within the scope of that term. As technology expands and social media grows, the definition of digital marketing has perhaps gotten a bit lost and convoluted. In this article, we explore what digital marketing encompasses, and show you why it is way more than just viral videos on social media.

First thing's first, let's reset our understanding of "marketing"

Before we delve into the world of digital marketing, let's go back to basics (our favourite thing at Mpowering Solutions) and review what the term "marketing" even means. According to the Chartered Institute of Marketing, UK:

"Marketing is the management process responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer requirements profitably."

This is a very formal and wordy way of saying, marketing is about attracting and retaining paying customers for a business.

Oftentimes there seems to be a misconception that traditional marketing is just about advertising, when in actual fact, advertising is an arm of marketing and not the entirety of it. According to American marketing professor E.J. McCarthy, there are the 4 P's of marketing:

Product

The product or service being offered to the customer

Price

The selling price of the product

Place

The distribution of the product

Promotion

Communicating and advertising the product

In businesses, often there are other teams to manage the first 3 P's (broadly speaking: Buying teams for Product, Merchandising teams for Price, Area Managers for Place), so the final P of Promotion is what is handled by Marketing teams, hence the modern confusion of what marketing is about. In actual fact, the holistic management a brand is all part of marketing, and every team has a part to play in the marketing of the brand, whether they are aware of it or not.

So then, what is digital marketing?

Bearing the above definition of traditional marketing in mind, digital marketing is pretty much no different. Digital marketing is about attracting and retaining paying customers, but using digital channels such as websites, social media, emails and so on.

Like with traditional marketing, there seems to be a common misinterpretation that digital marketing = social media marketing. At Mpowering Solutions, we are here to dispel this notion, and show why digital marketing encompasses so much more than just social media. Yes, social media is important, given its prominence in everybody's everyday lives. But do not confuse impressions with conversion. In fact, we feel so passionately about this notion that we have a blog post dedicated to it.

So what does digital marketing entail? Below are just some of the categories within the realms of digital marketing:

• SEO Marketing

• Website Design

• Content Marketing

• Social Media

• PPC Marketing

• Affiliate and Influencer Marketing

SEO Marketing

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation, and is arguably the most important aspect of digital marketing. Gone are the days of the Yellow Pages; Google is now the world's directory, so if you want to your business to be successful, you need to have an online presence, which is ideally a website, and this online presence needs to be findable on Google.

(There are other search engines out there, but given the fact that 91% of search market share is owned by Google, we will use them when referring to search engines in general)

Our first ever KISS (Keep It Super Simple) blog post was on SEO, so go have a read if you want to learn more about SEO. But essentially, SEO is about ensuring your website is searchable and visible on Google when potential customers search for a query relevant to your product or service.

In order to make your website optimised for Google, a lot of it has to do with the structure and design of your website, which is why website design in itself is a marketing tool, as explained below.

Website Design

A lot of what contributes to strong SEO is down to a website's design and structure. If a website is designed in a user-friendly way, with a sensible and logical site structure, then users are happy and will stay on the website to find their desired product or information. And the longer they stay on your website, the more Google is satisfied that your website is relevant to the query the customer used to get to your site.

Whether it's the actual design elements such as the colours and fonts or the content of your website and whether it is satisfying your visitor's requests and demands, the design of your website is incredibly important for your business to be trusted and taken seriously. In fact, a staggering (but not surprising) 75% of consumers judge a company's credibility based on their website design.

Think of a store you've visited recently where you ended up purchasing something. Chances are the store had a clear sign above the door, the store itself was clean, the products were neatly presented and you could find what you wanted easily. Yes, you bought something because you found what you wanted, but you purchased from the store because you trusted them. The condition of the store gave you the confidence that you were buying from a reputable store who would not scam you and would adhere to your consumer rights if you needed to return or exchange your product at a later date.

Conversely, if you walked into a store that had a broken sign, the store itself was a mess and poorly lit, and the products looked like a suspicious mishmash of things, you probably won't buy from them, because you are suspicious of them. You don't know if the goods you buy are genuine, you don't know if you'll get charged more than agreed... You just don't trust them.

The same goes for your website. It is the digital version of your store, your windowfront, your gateway to the purchasing public. It is imperative that your website is designed in a way that instils trust. The good news is that is easier than you may think, so much so that we've written a post about why you should build your own website.

Content Marketing

We throw the word "content" around a lot these days, because technically, everything is content. The news is content, a podcast is content, a video is content, a photo is content... So content marketing is the creation and distribution of valuable, insightful and relevant content to consumers.

So is content marketing essentially social media marketing? Not quite. Again, social media is part of it, but only a part and not the whole.

One way Google determines whether your website is credible and trustworthy is whether it is updated and refreshed. This is because the world continues to change and evolve. Advice that was given 10 years ago is sometimes no longer relevant nowadays, so if your website hasn't been updated in 10 years, Google believes that there is a chance that the information you provide on it is outdated.

Look at SEO. Once upon a time, you could climb the search engine rankings by repeating key words on your website; nowadays, this is called keyword stuffing and you can actually be penalised for that. A great example of how advice that was correct 10 years ago is no longer relevant.

One way to do content marketing is to have a blog and write blog posts. This is a great way to add newness to your website. If you write on topics that are related to your business, you are also demonstrating your authority and expertise in your field, something that Google takes into consideration when ranking your website on the results page. You don't have to write a blog post every day; the occasional refresh is better than nothing at all.

Social Media

When it comes to content marketing, social media plays a crucial part in the distribution of this content. There are so many social media apps out there, from the well-established Facebook and Instagram to the new kids on the block like TikTok and BeReal. With 56.2 million social media users in the UK alone, it is a vital way to get your brand out there and raise brand awareness. But not all social media platforms were created the same, and one of the errors in some brands' content marketing strategies is that they try and tackle all platforms.

The reality is that each platform has a different demographic, even if it's slight, thus a different customer base: Facebook's user demographic is 56.7% male, with a prominence in the 25-34 age group, whereas TikTok's demographic is 57% female, with the majority of users under 30 years old. Immediately you can see that the audience is almost the exact opposite of each other, so if you're a fast fashion apparel brand aimed at teenagers, TikTok should be your go-to platform, whereas if you're looking to appeal to adults with disposable income, Facebook is perhaps a better shout.

What works on one platform may not work for another. A viral video on TikTok will not translate on Pinterest. A thought-provoking post on LinkedIn doesn't work on BeReal. So it is unwise to jump onto every social media platform just because. Instead, take time to research the demographics of each social media channel to see which channel resonates with your brand and business, so you can create content that suits that platform and is subsequently relevant to your potential customers.

PPC Marketing

Akin to traditional out-of-home marketing like newspaper ads or billboards, PPC (Pay Per Click) marketing is when you pay for an ad space on Google and also social media platforms. Often they are signposted with the word "Ad" or "Sponsored" to signal that they are adverts. There are a few things that determine the prominence of your PPC ad, which you can read about on our PPC blog post, but the main thing you need to know is PPC goes hand-in-hand with SEO: where SEO is about organic traffic, PPC is paid. The two should co-exist together at the relevant times, and can work very well when executed correctly.

PPC on Google is pretty straightforward as a concept: you pay for an ad space for searches of relevant keywords or phrases. Given that Google is the dominant search engine, it is easy to just assume Google ads are the way to go. However, in reality, you should look at which demographic or country you are looking to target. For example, if you're looking to break into the Chinese market, you should look to invest in Baidu instead, as Google is not used in China.

So much like social media, with PPC marketing, it is worth just double-checking that you are buying ads on the platform that is relevant to your business and target demographic.

Affiliate and Influencer Marketing

These two are a more subtle way of placing ads. Affiliate marketing is when publishers such as a magazine or blog promote your product or service, and earn a commission whenever a sale is made via the affiliate link. So let's say you read an article in Vogue about home decorations and the photo of the yellow vase catches your eye. You click a link that takes you to the product page of the yellow vase on beautifulvase.com, and you end up purchasing said vase. Beautifulvase.com pays Vogue a commission for advertising the vase, which resulted in a completed purchase. Affiliate ads have to be declared, but often they are full page editorials or full articles that are in the look and feel of the publisher, so the ad placement looks so organic and natural, which is a contrast to traditional ads that just advertise the product or business. Publishers can also be paid if other goals are agreed, such as clicks instead of purchases, but whatever the metric, the premise is the same.

Influencer marketing is similar in concept, but instead of a publisher, you pay an influencer. Influencers are often content creators on social media who have a large following, and sometimes these are celebrities. Like affiliate marketing, marketing content needs to be declared, often with the #ad hashtag, so it is clear to their followers that they are being paid for promoting this product. And again, like affiliate marketing, it is often done in the style of that particular influencer's existing look and feel, so it resonates with their followers.

These forms of marketing are great if you want to target a specific audience, such as a readership of a certain blog or the followers of a particular influencer whose values align with your business's.

So there you have it!

These are a few examples of digital marketing tools and strategies. There are more out there, but these are some of the key ones to highlight as an introduction of digital marketing.

At Mpowering Solutions, we provide many services and solutions that fall within the definition of digital marketing. If you've built a website and want to ensure it is up to professional, industry standards in terms of user interface and friendliness, we can perform a Website Assessment to score your website and give you advice, or for any eCommerce stores, our CRO Audit checks your webstore's functionality and interface to ensure your customer journey is smooth and simple to maximise your chance of conversion. If you want help with SEO marketing, we have our SEO Audit where we take the website assessment one step further and check your website's accessibility and SEO performance. If you need help with content creation, we offer Copywriting services to help you write your website content or even blog posts if needed.

We offer plenty more services, from thorough strategic consultations to digital admin via the Helping Hand package. If you require a service or advice on a topic that we haven't listed, get in touch and we can explore the topic further and provide you with advice on how to proceed. We are here to help, so let us help you with your digital marketing needs.