In order to draw in the largest number of customers from online sources, businesses are increasingly turning their attention to the field of Web marketing. Long an emerging niche within the broader marketing industry, this field has become central to continued and sustained success for all businesses who wish to reach new demographics, market directly to their target audience, and make sure that their brand comes across as one that is youthful, exciting, connected, and in line with the times. Web marketing’s evolution has seen it take on numerous online Website types and media resources over the past decade or so, evolving into one of the most comprehensive tools for reaching interested customers. The definition of this type of marketing can be split into a few key areas or sectors.
Email Marketing
Perhaps the original form of online marketing, this type of routine involves signing customers up for email lists that keep them interested in company products, discounts, and community programs. Emails are dispatched to customers based on a large number of demographic factors that are extensively researched by marketers. These include the customer’s frequency of purchases, the date of their most recent purchase, and the actual items that they had in their cart at the time of checkout. By analyzing these key data points, marketers are able to turn emails into relevant information that brings the customer back for subsequent purchases and establishes a solid revenue stream for the company over time.
Social Media Marketing
From one of the oldest to one of the newest forms of Web marketing, this part of the industry involves leveraging the power of social media as a tool for communication, customer service, and product promotion. Here too, marketers analyze demographic and analytics information in order to make targeted campaigns delivered solely online. In this context, they’re looking at age groups, the customer’s location, their other likes, their friends, and even their educational background. Marketers use this information to determine how likely customers are to “like” or “follow” their brand digitally, and they turn these demographic indicators into opportunities for promoted social media posts, social media advertising placement, and targeted information that drives customers to either online or offline retail venues.
Search Engine Marketing
Another key aspect of this type of marketing is targeting search engines and using them for Website placement and gravitas. The goal of search engine marketing is to associate some carefully chosen keywords with the company’s online presence, ensuring that those who search for selected terms will see the company’s Website either as the first link in their results or at least on the first page of results returned by Google, Yahoo, Bing, and others. Marketers also use this same keyword positioning to determine how to place contextual, text-based advertisements in search results in order to get the larges number of successful clicks.
Content Marketing
Finally, the marketing professional concerned with a connected audience will also focus extensively on content marketing. This involves developing the authority of a given company or brand through informative blog posts. These blog posts also work their way into search marketing efforts, by using keywords and key phrases that are bound to be associated at major search engines with the company’s Website. This final piece of puzzle brings all of the others together and gives the company a strong, persuasive presence in all online outlets.
Related Resource: Social Media Marketing
A Growing Field for the Connected Company
Marketing to Internet users is the best way to draw in connected customers who value authoritative content and quality products. According to author, Randy Duermyer, the goal of web marketing is to leverage the power of everything from email to Facebook to search engines, grabbing customers’ attention with targeted information that makes them a repeat buyer.
