A digital marketing strategy is a very important part of the global marketing mix of a business irrespective of its size as well as whether or not it’s doing business online.
Small business marketing for a regional company may include many offline local advertising methods, however it also needs to include a healthy portion of digital marketing strategies in order to maximise sales in today’s economy. A small business which is doing most or all of its business online has to embrace a digital marketing strategy which helps online users see it.
There are a number of areas of online marketing which are of interest to a small business. Some of them are far more important to local, offline businesses, while others are more efficient for those exclusively operating online. Many organisations engage in multiple areas of small business marketing on the internet.
Search Engine Marketing
Search Engine Marketing (SEM), as the name suggests, is a marketing activity which exclusively focused on search engines. In this type of marketing, you promote your website, product, or service on search engines such as Google, Yahoo! As well as Bing.
Here’s how SEM works:
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Step 1:
Begin by bidding for a set of keywords which your target audience uses to search for your products or services. For instance, if you sell shoes in Johannesburg, South Africa, something like ‘best formal shoes in Johannesburg SA or ‘awesome sports shoes in Johannesburg’ would be good keywords to target.
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Step 2:
Once you choose a keyword, put together an ad for it. Often, search engines only display text ads, which means that you’ll need to include highly compelling as well as motivational copy, so the maximum number of individuals click on your ad.
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Step 3:
Finally, begin your paid search campaign. When someone enters the keywords which you’ve targeted into a search engine, your text ad will show up in the search results. Every time a person clicks on your ad, you’ll pay a small fee. That’s as, in SEM, you’re charged on a ‘pay-per-click’ basis.
