Digital Marketing

In simplistic terms, digital marketing is the promotion of products or brands via one or more
forms of electronic media. Digital marketing differs from traditional marketing in that it involves
the use of channels and methods that enable an organization to analyze marketing campaigns
and understand what is working and what isnt typically in real time.

Digital marketers monitor things like what is being viewed, how often and for how long,
sales conversions, what content works and doesnt work, etc. While the Internet is,
perhaps, the channel most closely associated with digital marketing, others include
wireless text messaging, mobile instant messaging, mobile apps, podcasts, electronic
billboards, digital television and radio channels, etc.

Why Digital Marketing Is Important

Digital media is so pervasive that consumers have access to information any time and
any place they want it. Gone are the days when the messages people got about your
products or services came from you and consisted of only what you wanted them to
know. Digital media is an ever-growing source of entertainment, news, shopping and
social interaction, and consumers are now exposed not just to what your company says
about your brand, but what the media, friends, relatives, peers, etc., are saying as well.
And they are more likely to believe them than you. People want brands they can trust,
companies that know them, communications that are personalized and relevant, and
offers tailored to their needs and preferences.

Manage Customer Relationships Across All Channels

Digital marketing and its associated channels are important but not to the exclusion of
all else. Its not enough to just know your customers; you must know them better than
anybody else so you can communicate with them where, when and how they are most
receptive to your message. To do that, you need a consolidated view of customer
preferences and expectations across all channels Web, social media, mobile, direct
mail, point of sale, etc. Marketers can use this information to create and anticipate
consistent, coordinated customer experiences that will move customers along in the
buying cycle. The deeper your insight into customer behavior and preferences, the more
likely you are to engage them in lucrative interactions.
 Challenges Facing Digital Marketers

Proliferation of digital channels. Consumers use multiple digital channels and a variety of
devices that use different protocols, specifications and interfaces and they interact with those
devices in different ways and for different purposes.

Intensifying competition. Digital channels are relatively cheap, compared with traditional media,
making them within reach of practically every business of every size. As a result, its becoming a
lot harder to capture consumers attention.

Exploding data volumes. Consumers leave behind a huge trail of data in digital channels. Its
extremely difficult to get a handle on all that data, as well as find the right data within exploding
data volumes that can help you make the right decisions.

Three Keys to Digital Marketing Success

So, what does it take to do digital marketing right? Here are three keys to digital
marketing success:

1. Manage complex customer relationships across a variety of channels both digital and
traditional.

2. Respond to and initiate dynamic customer interactions.

3. Extract value from big data to make better decisions faster.

10 reasons you need a digital marketing
strategy
Using a digital plan to support digital transformation

If you want to develop an online marketing strategy, where do you start? Well, it doesnt need to be a huge
report, a strategy can best be summarised in two or three sides of A4 in a tablelinking strategies to SMART
objectives and KPIs to make sure youre on track. Yet despite this it seems that many organisations still dont
have a plan.

When Im running a training course on digital strategy its always an interesting starting point to ask attendees
do you have a digital strategy a defined plan covering digital you could point me to? Of course, on a
course, you would expect many attending not to have a specific digital strategy, but it still seems surprisingly
commonplace.

Do you have a digital marketing strategy?

2014 update: Previously, in 2012 and 2013, we ran an informal poll to see how widely used formal digital
strategies are. Results from the start of 2012 were quite shocking with around two-thirds to three quarters
not have a digital plan. It seems that many are doing digital marketing without a prioritised plan of activities to
integrate online marketing
When we did the research for our free Managing Digital Marketing report published in 2014 we were
interested to see how this percentage looked for a defined sample. This is what we found:
 So, the latest research suggests an improved approach to planning in this sample of marketers, with fewer than
half without a digital strategy. Congratulations if youre one of these companies!

A recommended approach for developing a digital strategy

But what if youre one of the companies that doesnt have a digital strategy yet? Well, I think the two simple
alternatives for creating a plan may suggest a way forward:

1. No-specific digital channel plan.

2. Separate digital plan defining transformation needed and making case for investment.

3. Integrated digital plan part of marketing plan digital becomes part of business as usual.

So, what are the takeaways to act on here? It seems to me that:

Using digital marketing without a strategic approach is still commonplace. Im sure many of the companies in
this category are using digital media effectively and they could certainly be getting great results from their
search, email or social media marketing. But Im equally sure that many are missing opportunities or are
suffering from the other challenges Ive listed below. Perhaps the problems below are greatest for larger
organisations who most urgently need governance. Theres arguably less need for a strategy in a smaller
company.

Many, a majority of companies in this research do take a strategic approach to digital. From talking to
companies, I find the creation of digital plans often occurs in two stages.First a separate digital marketing plan
is created. This is useful to get agreement and buy-in by showing the opportunities and problems and map out
a path through setting goals and specific strategies for digital including how you integrated digital marketing
into other business activities.

Second, digital becomes integrated into marketing strategy, its a core activity, business-as-usual, but doesnt
warrant separate planning, except for the tactics.

If you dont have a strategy, or maybe you want to review which business issues are important to include
within a strategic review, weve set out the 10 most common problems, that in our experience arise if you
dont have a strategy.
Recommended resource: RACE Digital Strategy Qualification

Create a comprehensive action plan for online marketing and update your knowledge of digital marketing.

Learn more about our Online strategy qualification.

10 reasons why you may need a digital channel strategy?

1 Youre directionless
I find that companies without a digital strategy (and many that do) dont have clear strategic goals for what
they want to achieve online in terms of gaining new customers or building deeper relationships with existing
ones. And if you dont have goals you likely dont put enough resources to reach the goals and you dont
evaluate through analytics whether youre achieving those goals.
2 You wont know your online market share
Customer demand for online services may be underestimated if you havent researched this. Perhaps more
importantly you wont understand your online marketplace: the dynamics will be different to traditional
channels with different types of customer profile and behaviour, competitors, propositions and options for
marketing communications. See online marketplace methodology post.

3 Existing and start-up competitors will gain market share

If youre not devoting enough resources to digital marketing or youre using an ad-hoc approach with no
clearly defined strategies, then your competitors will eat your digital lunch!
4. You dont have a powerful online value proposition
A clearly defined online customer value proposition will help you differentiate your online service
encouraging existing and new customers to engage initially and stay loyal.

5. You dont know your online customers well enough

Its often said that digital is the most measureable medium ever. But Google Analytics and similar will only
tell you volumes not sentiment. You need to use other forms of website user feedback tools to identify your
weakpoints and then address them.
6. Youre not integrated (disintegrated)
Its all too common for digital to be completed in silos whether thats a specialist digital marketer, sitting in IT
or a separate digital agency. Its easier that way to package digital marketing into a convenient chunk. But of
course its less effective. Everyone agrees that digital media work best when integrated with traditional media
and response channels.
7. Digital doesnt have enough people/budget given its importance
Insufficient resource will be devoted to both planning and executing e-marketing and there is likely to be a
lack of specific specialist e-marketing skills which will make it difficult to respond to competitive threats
effectively.
8. Youre wasting money and time through duplication
Even if you do have sufficient resource it may be wasted. This is particularly the case in larger companies
where you see different parts of the marketing organization purchasing different tools or using different
agencies for performing similar online marketing tasks.
9. Youre not agile enough to catchup or stay ahead
If you look at the top online brands like Amazon, Dell, Google, Tesco, Zappos, theyre all dynamic - trialing
new approaches to gain or keep their online audiences.
10 Youre not optimising
Every company with a website will have analytics, but many senior managers dont ensure that their teams
make or have the time to review and act on them. Once a strategy enables you to get the basics right, then you
can progress to continuous improvement of the key aspects like search marketing, site user experience, email
and social media marketing. So thats our top 10 problems that can be avoided with a well thought through
strategy. What have you found can go right or wrong?

This entry was posted in Digital strategy development. Bookmark the permalink.
 The Importance of Digital Marketing
Posted by TCii on Fri, 05/08/2011 - 17:08
Back to blog homepage for: TCii Strategic and Management Consultants

Theres no denying it, the world is rapidly shifting from analogue to digital. People are consuming
more and more digital content on a daily basis on mobile phones, laptops, desktop computers at
work, and more and companies that have not yet recognised this in their marketing strategies need
to adapt fast.

Why is digital marketing so important? Because it is not only a rapidly growing force in the current
marketing playing field, it is set to be the future of marketing, and it seems likely that digital media
will soon replace more traditional forms altogether.

While older generations will no doubt lament the demise of paper-based newspapers, books,
communication methods and traditional TV and radio broadcasts, those who have grown up with the
internet and mobile phones as a God-given right are already embracing the brave new world of digital
consumption.

The facts are that digital methods of communication and marketing are faster, more versatile,
practical and streamlined, so it is perhaps unsurprising that once the technology became available we
began quickly moving into the digital age. The good news is that digital offers just as much potential
to marketers as it does to consumers.
Before we look at the benefits of digital marketing, lets take a quick snapshot of some of the key
forms of it at present:

Websites and SEO content

Blogs
Internet banner ads
Online video content
Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising
Email marketing
Social media marketing (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.)
Mobile marketing (SMS, MMS, etc.)

This is far from an exhaustive list, and new forms of digital marketing, such as augmented reality, are
arriving all the time.

So, why digital marketing?

First of all, digital marketing is infinitely more affordable than traditional offline marketing methods.
An email or social media campaign, for example, can transmit a marketing message to consumers for
the merest fraction of the cost of a TV ad or print campaign, and potentially reach a wider audience.
But one of the main benefits of conducting your marketing digitally is the ease with which results can
be tracked and monitored. Rather than conducting expensive customer research, you can quickly view
customer response rates and measure the success of your marketing campaign in real-time, enabling
you to plan more effectively for the next one.

Perhaps the strongest case for incorporating a digital element into your marketing is that digital media
forms are quickly overtaking traditional forms of information consumption. According to the Office for
National Statistics, over 82% of UK adults went online in the first three months of this year: that's
over 40 million individuals.

The bottom line is, the digital age is here, and those businesses that fail to adapt to the new
marketing climate are at great risk of going extinct sooner rather than later
 Why Digital Marketing is important for
Business Promotion
Written by Tarun K. Karan

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While older generations will no doubt lament the demise of paper-based

newspapers, books, communication methods and traditional TV and radio
broadcasts, those who have grown up with the internet and mobile
phones as a God-given right are already embracing the brave new world
of digital consumption.

Theres no denying it, the world is rapidly shifting from analogue to

digital. People are consuming more and more digital content on a daily
basis on mobile phones, laptops, desktop computers at work, and more
and companies that have not yet recognised this in their marketing
strategies need to adapt fast.

So, What is Digital Marketing?

Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating and
delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the
organization and its stakeholders.
In simplistic terms, digital marketing is the promotion of products or brands via one or more forms
of electronic media. Digital marketing differs from traditional marketing in that it involves the use
of channels and methods that enable an organization to analyze marketing campaigns and
understand what is working and what isnt typically in real time. Digital marketers monitor
things like what is being viewed, how often and for how long, sales conversions, what content
works and doesnt work, etc. While the Internet is, perhaps, the channel most closely associated
with digital marketing, others include wireless text messaging, mobile instant messaging, mobile
apps, podcasts, electronic billboards, digital television and radio channels, etc.

Why is digital marketing so important?

Because it is not only a rapidly growing force in the current marketing playing field, it is set to be
the future of marketing, and it seems likely that digital media will soon replace more traditional
forms altogether.

Digital marketing is infinitely more affordable than traditional offline marketing methods. An
email or social media campaign, for example, can transmit a marketing message to consumers for
the merest fraction of the cost of a TV ad or print campaign, and potentially reach a wider
audience.

But one of the main benefits of conducting your marketing digitally is the ease with which results
can be tracked and monitored. Rather than conducting expensive customer research, you can
quickly view customer response rates and measure the success of your marketing campaign in
real-time, enabling you to plan more effectively for the next one.

The facts are that digital methods of communication and marketing are faster, more versatile,
practical and streamlined, so it is perhaps unsurprising that once the technology became available
we began quickly moving into the digital age. The good news is that digital offers just as much
potential to marketers as it does to consumers.

The bottom line is, the digital age is here, and those businesses that fail to adapt to the new
marketing climate are at great risk of going extinct sooner rather than later.
The importance of using digital
marketing channels
The use of digital
marketing channels
is key if you want to
reach your clients,
says Dez Derry.
Law firms are still not
using social media
properly
Id like to start this
article by asking
you a simple
question.When did
you last go online?
Being online is not
just about checking
social media,
reading news
stories or shopping.
Your emails came
to you online, the
text messages on your phone may well have been transferred in part via an online system, and your
TV broadcaster can use the internet to update your listings or subscription to your set top box.
My point is online digital channels are everywhere, yet there are still a lot of law firms lacking any
desire to embrace digital channels fully. Were now at a stage where an entire generation of young
adults do not remember what the world was like before the internet. For them it is something that
has simply always been there and in turn theyre influencing other generations to use digital
channels to find the services they need.
The legal sector needs to start acting now and make the most of what is no longer a digital revolution
but is now a digital normality. Other business sectors have embraced digital marketing and it has
done wonders for them. Looking at retail, its hard to find anyone thats not at least once purchased
something online via Amazon or had their weekly supermarket shopping delivered. In fact the UKs
online retail association IMRG and consultants Capgemini predict that this year online retailers will
earn over 10bn for the first time ever, and thats just in December, so why shouldnt law firms also
take a cut?
Different digital channels offer different solutions for growing your business and using them together
can make a massive difference.
Telling people who are:
Website: This is your most important digital channel and the place where your online clients will
learn the most about you. Easy to understand content needs to be updated regularly with the whole
site mobile optimised too, meaning it can be viewed on any device. This is increasingly important
with figures published by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) showing that globally
1.2 billion people access the web via mobile broadband.
Video: A video on your website gives your firm a personality and allows you to get across
information that isnt always easy with text alone. It also keeps people on your homepage for longer
which means your clients are more likely to get in touch and become a paying client. Showing how
professional you are in your videos will also reflect how professional you are in the services you offer.
 Search Engines: Following the previous steps will help your website appear above your competitors
in the results of search engines like Google, when a potential client is searching for a service you
offer. You can increase this further by looking at pay-per click (PPC) campaigns to refine exactly
where you appear when certain search keywords are used. A full service digital agency can assist you
in creating a PPC campaign so youre able to generate good leads and analyse how well the campaign
is working.
Reaching a wider audience:
Social Media: Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn are where peer recommendation come
into play. Being on social media allows current clients to talk about how great your service
independently. It also gives you a chance to add links to your blog and your website, while also
interacting with potential new clients.
Blogging: As explained earlier, writing a regular blog helps keep your website higher up in search
engine results. But as experts in law, writing short articles on legal matters, offering basic advice, or
opinions on recent sector changes show that if the reader ever needs a lawyer youre the one to
contact. It also gives you another chance to point your social media channels to your website.
Email: Offering an email newsletter is a great way of keeping in touch with previous clients for
repeat business. According to the Direct Marketing Association email marketing ROI was 21.48 for
every 1 spent in 2012, proving its a fantastic investment.
Using digital channels does not mean you have to stop the traditional methods used to interact with
new and current clients. But as more and more people look for services online, the importance of not
accessing the market via digital channels become clear. If you are not using the channels your clients
are to find the services they want, then you will be left behind.