Why Upskilling Your Staff On Digital Marketing Is Crucial

There are numerous variables that play a role in a company’s success. Currently, in South Africa, we are facing a tough economy, strong competitors in most industries, aggressive inflation and a weak rand compared to the dollar. This makes the importing the goods a challenge. To succeed as a business is becoming harder and harder every year. This is why it’s essential to start thinking outside the box and start to explore digital marketing and consider upskilling your staff.

For most companies, a strong and effective digital marketing strategy can serve as a solution. Not only is it more cost effective compared to traditional ways of advertising but it can also be more effective depending on your industry. Whether it’s something you outsource or take care of in house, below are some of the skills required in order to execute on a digital marketing strategy for your business.

Skills required in digital marketing

Search Engine Optimisation

If your business has a website, then an essential digital marketing skill to consider is search engine optimisation (SEO). We’ve mentioned it in a few articles before but 90% of all online purchases begin with a search engine. Knowing this, a way to steal market share from competitors would be to focus on improving your organic rankings.

Pay-Per-Click Advertising

Pay per click is a form of advertising where, you guessed it, pay per click. Usually this would be in the form of search, display and video ads in search engines like Google. For example, if you are selling shoes, you can have your business appear on the top of search results by running an ad aimed at targeting people searching to buy shoes online. If someone clicks on the ad and gets directed to your website you would be charged for that click.

Social Media Advertising

Social media used to be a digital marketing nice-to-have. However, today it’s a necessity! Why? Because that is where most of the attention is. It’s crucial to have someone on your team who understands the psychology of the different social media platforms, someone who can assist in helping your brand articulate its products and services in a way that is native to the platform and that doesn’t necessarily look like a normal form of advertising.

E-mail Marketing

E-mail marketing doesn’t sound much like a skill but trust us when we say that only a handful of marketers can execute it successfully. Email marketing is not just about sending out a weekly e-mail consisting of updates within your business anymore. If that is what you are doing, the chances are it’s not producing results for you at all. E-mail marketing today is a form of personalised communication to a specific individuals, at a specific time, depending on where that individual is within the buying journey.

Copywriting

Today, content marketing is becoming a key pillar within a marketing strategy for most companies.  With that said, it’s important to have a skilled individual who can assist in writing your company’s copy. It’s not just about putting words on a page anymore. It’s about writing compelling copy that resonates with its target audience in a way that it creates an emotional connection between the reader and your business.  This would include copy for your website, blogs, video scripts and more.

Conversion Rate Optimisation

If your company is dependent a website to generate sales or leads then having a conversion rate specialist onboard will only be beneficial. You might have a site, and you might have daily visitors, but that doesn’t mean it’s designed to turn visitors into leads or customers.  Knowing this, it’s essential to understand that specific user interface (UI) changes can have either increase or decrease your leads and sales. That is why you need someone that specialises in converting visitors into business. Taking the above into consideration, can you see how digital marketing skills can help you grow your business?

Interesting in learning more about digital marketing?

Get in touch with the Digital School of Marketing

The Digital School of Marketing’s Digital Marketing Course is jam-packed with information on all the core elements of digital marketing and strategy.  This digital marketing certificate will give you the underpinning knowledge to grow yourself within the digital marketing field. The course provides a solid platform to assist any business operating within the marketing sphere. Register here.