Online marketing basics: what you should know

Online PR, social media, affiliate marketing, news­let­ter campaigns, Google AdWords – these all count as part of the ideal marketing mix. There are so many different com­pon­ents belonging to online marketing that it’s often difficult to get an overview and to find the right approach for your company. You have to decide yourself which channels are relevant and which strategies are best for your business. Depending on the industry, the offer, the target group, and the objective, some channels will be more important than others. But despite all the variables, there are some online marketing prin­ciples that every marketer should know and bear in mind. We present seven essential online marketing basics for a suc­cess­ful start.

Your company’s website is generally the core in­ter­me­di­ary on the internet between the public and the business. As such, it will usually be the starting point for any form of online marketing. Even though the im­port­ance of company websites has di­min­ished somewhat due to the in­creas­ing dominance of social networks, it is still viewed as the label and business card of the company. A lot of work goes into a pro­fes­sion­al web presence, but even when it’s finished, it’s still not tech­nic­ally finished. You have to continue updating your website, maintain it, and use it as a com­mu­nic­a­tion tool. Through regular updates and exclusive news, you create an incentive for the user to visit the site. Keeping the page up-to-date and the content relevant also has a positive effect on your re­la­tion­ship with Google.

Not every company needs to create a complex website with a CMS and a large database. For small business, es­pe­cially those spe­cial­ised in catering, a blog is often a good al­tern­at­ive.

A typical online marketing mistake is losing sight of the content’s quality when deciding on the scope of the marketing campaign. In the last few years, content marketing has proved itself as being a lot more sus­tain­able in com­par­is­on to tra­di­tion­al ad­vert­ising such as TV com­mer­cials and ad­vert­ising banners. Every marketer should be aware that more and more inbound methods are being used in online marketing. This means that the content is struc­tured so well that users search for it them­selves rather than potential customers needing to be found so it can be sent to them. Therefore, the focus should be on high-quality, in­ter­est­ing, and in­form­at­ive content that offers value to the reader. By po­s­i­tion­ing yourself as the expert in your own subject area, you gain the target group’s trust. Good content is the basis for success in online marketing. It’s the found­a­tion for search engine op­tim­isa­tion and is an important quality factor since it in­flu­ences many other marketing dis­cip­lines. It is crucial that content is always unique and isn’t merely copied from other online sources.

A deadly com­bin­a­tion in online marketing: no ex­per­i­ence in the online sector, but still a big budget at hand. Many marketers begin to invest the money sporad­ic­ally here and there so that it’s evenly dis­trib­uted among the various marketing channels. This might sound like a good idea, but this approach actually leads to money being wasted. It’s better to have a strategy from the start and then follow it. Plan your online marketing mix ac­cord­ingly so that you can co­ordin­ate the channels and in­di­vidu­al campaigns. This also includes selecting the right methods and tools for clearly-defined goals. At­tri­bu­tion models enable companies to identify the most relevant and prof­it­able channels. Once you have your own strategy, you should let other de­part­ments in the company know so that they can co­ordin­ate their actions with yours. If you want to create a suc­cess­ful marketing mix, you need to stop seeing each approach as an isolated case. If you consider channels as in­de­pend­ent dis­cip­lines, without thinking about the marketing mix, then you could face some problems. For example, you could end up cir­cu­lat­ing duplicate content or, even worse, dis­trib­ut­ing content on different channels that con­tra­dicts each other.

The design aspect of a website is obviously important. Depending on the industry or service, the user expects appealing designs when they visit a company’s website and for them to be im­ple­men­ted in a modern and creative way. Design can be a unique selling point just like Apple has proven with its un­mis­tak­able corporate identity. But don’t ignore other factors that are relevant to success – you should always keep user-friend­li­ness in mind. Clear and organised nav­ig­a­tion has to be your first priority: the visitor has to be able to use the page in­tu­it­ively and quickly, and easily find their way around. A website can still look and be in­nov­at­ive, but if there are short­falls in the usability, users won’t spend much time reading it. The same principle also applies to mobile op­tim­isa­tion: you should make the design of the mobile site sleeker and simpler so that mobile users can navigate the site as easily as possible.

In tra­di­tion­al retail, customers can be per­son­ally advised – they should be wooed, cared for, and above all, well-informed. This shouldn’t be any different online, but many marketers forget this basic online marketing principle. Busi­nesses should appeal to customers and try and win them over with their online marketing tactics. Unlike in brick-and-mortar shops, where the shoppers come of their own accord, it’s a bit more chal­len­ging online as you need to find potential customers in the first place. This is why it’s so important to know your target group so that you know which adverts are better suited to them. Web analysis is an important tool that every marketer should use to measure, analyse, and maximise their online success. By using analysis tools like Google Analytics, you can obtain in­form­a­tion about your own target group, its online behaviour, and how to go about winning them over.

The last principle of our online marketing basics: never lose sight of the return on in­vest­ment (ROI)! There is a simple cal­cu­la­tion if you want to run a suc­cess­ful business: the benefit of an ad­vert­ising measure must always be higher than the costs incurred. Online marketers use a special indicator to work this out – this is the return on in­vest­ment. The ROI is used to measure the return on a business activity by showing the profit in relation to the capital invested. It is es­pe­cially important to keep track of the ROI when it comes to expensive dis­cip­lines in online marketing such as Google AdWords campaigns. This makes it possible to control the prof­it­ab­il­ity of ad­vert­ising measures. When it comes to paid ad­vert­ise­ment, you have to also take into account the probable scatter loss. If you don’t plan carefully, you will end up wasting money.