What is internet marketing?
Well, marketing is the art of selling more of your products or your services. That’s my KISS (keeping it short n’ simple) definition of its core; fuller definitions depend on who you ask.
Internet marketing (which is sometimes called digital marketing) refers to the use of digital technologies and communications for marketing outcomes. Or (if you prefer a longer definition), it is the practice of harnessing digital technologies and media, including web, email, databases, mobile/wireless and digital TV, to support marketing activities which are aimed at achieving the profitable acquisition and retention of customers. The practice relies on developing a planned approach to reach customers and migrate them to online services through ecommunications and traditional communications. Customers are retained through the business improving their knowledge about those customers, interacting with them and then delivering targeted communications and offerings that match their needs to them.
Tip
The terms internet and World Wide Web (WWW) are frequently used synonymously. In fact, the World Wide Web is just one application running on the internet. Email is another, different application that runs on the internet.
Perhaps the clearest model I have come across to explain the internet marketing process is the RACE framework. RACE is reproduced here with the kind permission of one of the UK’s foremost digital marketers, Dr. Dave Chaffey:
“We created RACE on www.smartinsights.com to give a simple framework to help small and large businesses alike take advantage of the opportunities available from digital marketing. There are so many tools and tactics available that it’s difficult to know where to start. We hope RACE gives a structure to help you review and prioritise when there are so many options, but some options work better than others.”
RACE consists of four steps, or online marketing activities, designed to help brands engage their customers throughout the customer lifecycle.
Key performance indicators (KPIs) are the measures that judge the performance of your business based on the success you wish to achieve. Examples of key performance indicators are: sales/revenues, cost of goods sold, number of products returned, number of new customers, number of sales calls made, number of downloads of your sales brochure, number of subscribers to your newsletter or the number of new website visitors. KPIs are therefore of great importance and I suggest you invest sufficient time to work out the KPIs you need to measure. In addition, it is important to determine what you will measure each of your KPIs against. For example, you could measure this month’s sales against the previous month’s results, or this month’s sales against the same period last year. Doing this will help you understand the ‘direction of travel’ of your business – in other words, are you moving in the right or wrong direction? You will also need to work out how often the KPIs you have selected will need to be reviewed; daily, weekly or monthly? A simple Excel spreadsheet is all you need to record your KPIs. (Google has a online spreadsheet programme that multiple users can view and update. For more information on this feature visit www.google.com/intl/en_US/drive/start/features.html.
Step 1 – Reach: Reach means building an awareness of a brand, its products and its services on other websites and in offline media, in order to build traffic by driving visits to different web presences, such as your main site, microsites (small websites that are an off-shoot of the parent website, and which are considered a separate entity as they may present different content or indeed, a different URL) or social media sites.
Step 2 – Act: Act is about persuading site visitors to take the next step on their journey when they initially reach your site or social network presence. It may mean finding out more about your company or your products, searching to find a product or reading a blog post. It is about engaging the audience through relevant, compelling content and clear navigation pathways so that they don’t hit the back button. The bounce rates on many sites is greater than 50%, so getting the audience to act or participate is a major challenge – which is why I have identified it separately.
Step 3 – Convert: Conversion is where the visitor commits to form a relationship, which will generate commercial value for the business.
Step 4 – Engage: Build customer relationships over time, to achieve retention goals.
Digital marketing should not be driven by technology; it should be driven by the business returns from gaining new customers and maintaining relationships with those customers.
Effective digital marketing rarely occurs in isolation; rather it is most effective when integrated with other communications channels, such as phone, direct mail or face-to-face. Online channels should be used to support the whole buying process, from pre-sale to sale, to post-sale and further development of customer relationships.
Characteristics of online consumers
In addition to having an understanding of what online marketing is all about, it is also important to understand the differentiating characteristics of online consumers:
They comprise roughly an equal number of men and women.
They tend to be sceptical of online marketing efforts.
They are well-informed and discerning shoppers.
They generally respond to targeted messaging.
They generally reject messages aimed only at selling.
They place great value on information.
They like to control the information which they receive about products and the conditions under which they receive that information.
They are the ones who will give permission to be contacted by you, and they are the ones who will control the resulting interactions with you.
Why should you seek to grow your own business online?
For you as a business owner, marketing your business online will help you to:
Grow your sales: gain wider distribution to customers you cannot reach offline, display a wider product range than in-store, and/or offer better prices.
Add value: give your customers greater benefits and guide new product developments through online dialogue and feedback.
Get closer to your customers: reach your customers with online tools that can help you discover what your potential customers are searching for. Create a two-way dialogue; ask them questions, conduct online interviews, monitor chatrooms, forums and social media sites to learn more about your customers.
Save money: provide a virtual customer service, use online transaction administration and track your success at little or no cost.
Extend your brand online: provide a new position and a new experience for your customers online, whilst retaining your brand’s familiarity.
Increasingly, customers like to hang out and spend their money – and time – on the web. It is a marketplace in its own right. When shopping or buying a product, most consumers will look to the web as a primary influencer and decision tool. Even in the non-digital world, it is quite common to go into a store and find prospective customers surfing the web on their smartphones in search of lower prices at competing stores. In spite