Companies are always seeking new ways to differentiate themselves from competitors, both to attract new customers and to build stronger affinity with those they already have. From email to social media and content campaigns, there are multiple exciting tools available to companies operating in today’s market. A digital marketing agency can help your company get the most out of these innovative tools, and here we go into more detail about what they do.
What Can a Digital Marketing Agency Help With?
Email Campaigns
In essence, this strategy involves sending a promotional email from your company to prospects who have given their permission to receive email communications from you. Obtaining this permission is essential, and asking prospects to “opt-in” should include clearly stating what kinds of emails the subscriber will receive, in addition to individualizing the content in both the subject line and body and offering a clear unsubscribe option.
While this sounds simple enough in principle, successful execution means creating the right email to send out. For example, it could be used to promote a new product or service that your company is offering, which can then be turned into leads that your sales department can follow up on. It can also be used in a more informational way that enhances customer engagement and brand affinity, such as newsletters or company announcements.
Social Media Management
Companies understand that consumers spend significant time on social media platforms, and attracting their attention sometimes means going there to meet them. This means creating promotional content specifically for these platforms and websites, as well as monitoring impact and engaging directly with consumers in these environments. Since this space tends to shift rather quickly, many companies engage a professional digital marketing agency for help.
While the objective of effective social media management can sometimes be to drive direct sales, this may not always be the highest priority. Quite often the higher goal is to simply generate traffic and visibility by engaging the public in dialogue that ultimately helps build brand awareness. These impacts can be measured in numerous ways, including likes, shares, comments, and increase in traffic to your company website.
Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization, or SEO, is a set of tools and methodologies designed to make web pages and digital content more attractive to internet search engines. In basic terms, when an internet user enters a word or phrase into a search engine, that search engine applies multiple criteria in deciding how to rank the results it displays to the user. The results that it considers most relevant will be ranked higher.
There is both art and science involved in determining what search engines consider “most relevant”, and the definition continues to evolve as search engine companies modify their criteria and the algorithms that end up affecting web page rankings. Because it can be a moving target, SEO is another area where companies often turn to a digital marketing agency for help to ensure their web pages and digital content are as highly ranked as possible.
Content Strategy
This strategy involves creating pieces of content such as articles, videos, podcasts, and graphics and distributing them to target audiences in hopes that it will drive traffic, generate customer engagement, build brand awareness, and ultimately increase sales. In contrast to traditional advertising that directly promotes a company’s products or services, a content campaign offers something free to prospects in the form of entertaining or educational storytelling.
In order for a content campaign to be considered successful, the specific pieces of content should be created in such a way that they achieve a high SEO ranking to have the widest impact possible. Content should also be very engaging in a way that encourages people to share it with their friends and colleagues. Additionally, a successful content strategy allows companies to really drive home their brand values and ideology with target audiences.
Native Advertising
Native advertising is designed to operate subtly, almost as if a story is sending advertising messages in disguise. This is in contrast to traditional advertising, which can often be rather blatant in trumpeting the quality or value of a brand’s products and services. To achieve this subtlety, native advertising seamlessly blends a company’s message into a piece of content so that customers don’t recognize something is being “sold” to them.
This technique was created as a response to the cynicism that modern consumers sometimes feel when bombarded with billboards, television commercials, and other forms of in-your-face advertising. Native advertising emphasizes entertainment and information, offering something of value that contains subtle brand messaging within. While meant to be less obtrusive, it is important to note that it is still advertising and not meant to be deceptive to consumers.
Pay-Per-Click Advertising
If you’ve spent time and money building a terrific website for your company, it’s important to make that investment count by driving as many online visitors as possible to that site. Pay-per-click, or PPC, is an advertising tool that does just that by directing visitors to your website when they click on an ad that you have strategically placed somewhere on the internet. It’s a very effective tool to attract qualified and interested customers when used correctly.
Once you create an ad, you can place it in strategic places on the internet that target the exact audience you want to reach. You will only pay for the ad once a visitor actually clicks and is redirected to your web page. The amount you pay is typically very small and is called the cost per click. It’s a cost-effective way to buy traffic to your site instead of the more daunting challenge of attracting it organically.
These are some of the most common and effective techniques and strategies that companies use to differentiate themselves from industry competitors. Employing things like search engine optimization and a robust content strategy will attract more customers, create better engagement, and ultimately increase sales. Contact Anthem Software to discover the best way to put these digital tools to work for your company.
