What activities does digital marketing encompass?
- The Company's Website
- Email and social media channels
- Search engines
Digital Marketing - Inbound and Outbound
Essentially, it is a combination of inbound and outbound marketing. These terms describe the direction of communication between companies and customers. It is important that the tools and formats are well coordinated.
What is outbound marketing?
In this approach, the company reaches out directly to (potential) customers and presents them with an advertising message. The company initiates the first contact.
This is achieved through traditional, non-digital methods such as cold calling, direct mail, posters, print, TV, and widely distributed digital messages. The goal is to reach as many people as possible. The reach is far greater than with inbound measures, but this approach doesn’t just reach your target audience—it also reaches people who haven’t yet had any contact with your company.
Outbound marketing is therefore an excellent way to increase brand awareness.
What is inbound marketing?
Inbound Marketing is a digital marketing tool that allows you to deliver online content to the right audience through targeted marketing. The goal is to drive active searchers to your website through the right keyword strategy (conversion). You achieve this with content and information that is valuable to your target audience. Content, SEO, and social media are key practices in this approach.
The goal behind these measures is to convert them into . They can then be provided with personalized information again. In this way, the marketing team qualifies leads until they are ready to be handed over to the sales team.
Here’s an example:
- Reach your target audience with a blog post that appears in Google Search results for a specific search term. This post answers your potential customers’ questions and sparks their interest in your business.
- On your SEO-optimized website, users can quickly find additional helpful content. They can download it in exchange for their email address or contact you directly via an easy-to-find form.
- A lead has been generated. Now you still have the opportunity to win over the customer and positively influence their purchasing decision.
What strategies are part of the "inbound" digital marketing approach?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
The first step is to analyze the structure of your website. For each page, define relevant terms and topic areas. To do this, check how often these terms are searched for and how high the competition is. A keyword strategy is then derived from this analysis.
On-page and off-page optimization measures are important for digital marketing. These help your website achieve better rankings in organic search engine results. This, in turn, leads to more traffic to the respective landing page. That, in turn, can generate new leads.
Don’t forget about mobile devices. So-called responsive websites are a must. In 2021, Google switched to “mobile-first indexing” (MFI). What does that mean? Content from websites that’s only available on desktop devices is ignored by Google Search. From this perspective, it’s essential to make your website mobile-friendly for SEO purposes.
Always check the usability. Ideally, employees from different age groups should test the digital experience for your customers on a variety of devices.
Content Marketing
High-quality content aims to increase website traffic, generate leads, boost brand awareness, and, as a result, drive revenue. This is further supported by SEO measures as part of a digital marketing strategy, ensuring that your target audience can actually find your content.
With high-quality content, you can influence the information-seeking and decision-making behavior of potential buyers. This behavior has also changed significantly in the B2B sector in recent years:
Just under 80% of B2B buyers speak with a salesperson only after conducting their own research.
If you respond with relevant, well-presented content, you’ll increase your chances of making a sale many times over.
Performance Marketing
Performance marketing involves digital marketing strategies designed to elicit a specific response from customers. For example, a customer might click on an appealing ad if it matches their interests.
Those who combine channels effectively (omnichannel marketing) can make a significant contribution to effectiveness through performance marketing.
One tool of digital performance marketing is search engine advertising (SEA).
Paid campaigns make it possible to reach relevant target audiences on Google or social media. With Google Ads, ads are billed on a pay-per-click (PPC) basis. This means that every time a user clicks on an ad, the advertising company incurs a cost.
These paid ads are targeted to a specific keyword. When a potential customer enters that search term, the ad appears on the first page, above the organic search results. There is a high probability that the associated website will be noticed and clicked on.
Social Media Marketing
Digital marketing on social media can increase brand awareness, generate more leads, build customer loyalty, or attract new customers. Depending on the market—B2C or B2B—Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn may be good options for your business.
What’s the best way to proceed?
- Develop a strategy that aligns with your marketing goals.
- Research buyer personas (your target audiences).
- Identify the right platforms for your campaigns.
- Create a schedule and consistently produce relevant content.
Monitor and evaluate your social media channels to find out what resonates with your target audience.
Marketing Automation
This is a digital marketing tool that allows you to automate activities and campaigns. However, you’ll need the right CRM tools to do this. Marketing automation helps you collect data, generate leads, and segment them.
Leads are entered into a list based on various criteria. These include:
- downloaded content
- Demographics
- specific interactions with your content
- Willingness to Buy
- Completed Workflows
This data helps you share specific content with potential customers in a targeted manner.
Email Marketing
This is another way to connect with customers and direct them to your website. Send your customers information about new products, promotions, or special offers. This helps you stay in touch and can help you reactivate past leads.
Email marketing is a cost-effective digital marketing tool for sending personalized and automated messages to target audiences.
News Section & Online Public Relations
Posting information, news, or press releases on various digital channels is a highly effective strategy. Prominently placed posts do more than just boost brand awareness.
A good link from a high-quality site brings you traffic and has a positive effect on your overall search engine ranking.
We’ll help you make your digital marketing profitable.
8 Questions That Are Often Asked About Digital Marketing
Can any company engage in digital marketing?
The answer is yes. The size and number of employees at your company—or your industry—don’t matter. The only difference is that you’ll use a different strategy in B2B than in B2C.
To put it simply, here’s what you need to do:
No matter what you sell, identify your buyer personas (target audiences) and their needs. Then, provide valuable digital content tailored specifically to these personas.
How Does Digital Marketing Work in B2C?
The focus of your activities is on quickly encouraging website visitors to make a purchase. You can achieve this with more specific calls to action (CTAs).
Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter are the more suitable platforms for B2C.
What Are the Benefits of Digital Marketing in B2B?
Companies operating in the B2B sector rely on lead generation. The primary focus is on generating Sales Qualified Leads (SQLs). These are valuable leads for the sales team that are expected to convert into customers.
Your marketing team is responsible for reaching high-quality leads. A well-designed, search engine-optimized website and social media channels such as LinkedIn are the ideal platforms for this.
How much does digital marketing cost?
Depending on your strategy, you’ll need a larger or smaller budget. There are a few things to consider here:
- Anyone who creates content, is active on social media, and does SEO needs experienced staff or a good agency to handle these tasks.
- Content takes time. Likewise, a well-thought-out editorial plan featuring high-quality content—which is designed to support regular communication—takes a lot of time.
- If you want to run online ads, you’ll need a budget, which you can set yourself. The cost per click on your ad depends on the keyword you target. The number of competitors targeting the same keyword also plays a role.
Here’s an example of how you can calculate ROAS (Return on Ad Spend). This metric shows you the results of your campaign and thus illustrates the costs. This measurability gives you greater confidence in your planning and in defining your future strategy:
Example: You invested €1,500 in an online campaign and generated €5,000 in revenue. You were able to generate 30 leads from the online campaign. Each lead cost you €50. Your ROAS is therefore 333%. The higher this value is, the better.
The campaign was therefore successful, as the ROAS is three times higher than before. An ROAS below 100%, on the other hand, would mean that this campaign is not efficient and should either be discontinued or revised.
What is the main advantage of digital marketing?
You can see clear, measurable results from campaigns in real time. This is a major advantage over traditional offline marketing activities. After all, it’s impossible to measure how many people actually notice a radio spot, a billboard ad, or an article in a print publication.
Digital marketing allows marketers to see what works and what doesn’t.
How do you measure and evaluate digital marketing?
Using tools like Google Analytics, you can track which device (mobile or desktop) your website visitors used. This provides you with metrics that you can then use to make decisions.
For example, are you getting too few organic visitors? If so, you know that you should optimize your website for SEO.
These insights allow you to analyze target audiences and their behavior. As a result, you can make informed decisions at each stage of your digital marketing funnel. These decisions will then, for example, direct your potential customers to your website sooner.
In the digital marketing funnel: What is the benefit of relevant content? When is each type of content delivered?
The ultimate goal of inbound marketing and content creation is to generate more revenue. When you use digital marketing with relevant content, you increase awareness among your target audience.
The moment of initial contact often occurs at the beginning of the decision phase. However, if you provide your personas with relevant content, you can move that moment of initial contact forward to the awareness and consideration phases, thereby increasing your sales team’s likelihood of closing a deal.
Awareness
During the awareness phase, you generate reach and attention. Blog posts help you drive more organic traffic. To do this, you also need to focus on SEO and choose the right keywords.
Consideration
During this phase, personas explore the product and compare it with the competition. However, these prospective customers are not yet ready to make a purchase.
Reports, webinars, and white papers provide them with even more detailed information to help them make a decision.
Decision
At this stage, it’s important to present clear, compelling reasons to buy the product and to provide all the necessary information. Provide clear details about the contract, delivery, and payment options. Any references can further influence the purchase decision in a positive way.
How do digital marketing and sales work together?
It’s easy to explain:
- You can generate leads using digital marketing tools.
- These should be qualified to the extent that the sales team can contact customers at the right stage of the buying process.
- The sales team provides feedback to the digital marketing staff on whether the leads are valuable.
- Further customer analyses and optimization of marketing activities may then be necessary.
The better the coordination between marketing and sales, the more revenue and success will increase.
How Can You Succeed with Digital Marketing?
Plan your route in detail. This includes:
- the definition of the desired goal
- the target audience
- the necessary measures
- Omnichannel Marketing
- Taking into account both digital and offline marketing activities (for example, telephone calls can support newsletter or ad campaigns)
- Collecting Data Using Marketing Automation
- Dialogue and interaction with customers to understand their needs and respond to them
