These days, online marketing is the dominant form of advertising. However, many small and medium-sized businesses still hesitate to get on board. Instead, they opt for a few standard advertising techniques to slowly yet steadily bring in customers over time. These techniques simply don’t work in an age where most people use the internet to search for products and services.
The Importance of Digital Marketing
When people are interested in your company, the first thing they’re going to do is find everything they can through online research. They especially look for reviews to find out what people are saying about your company and whether it’s a good place for them to do business.
Online marketing can help you create a positive social media presence that will reach an enormous amount of people, locally and around the world. Additional benefits of online marketing are:
- Lets you interact with potential customers and understand precisely what they want
- Allows customers to learn more about you and your business to help build brand loyalty
- Improves your company’s online presence
- Allows you to measure and track your marketing results (customer responses, sales, etc.)
On-SERP SEO
One current marketing trend right now is On-SERP SEO. This is a strategy that utilizes zero-click results to answer questions. For instance, if you typed “Where can I find affordable online marketing solutions?” into Google’s search bar, it will autogenerate answers–in the form of snippets–at the top of the page.
The right online marketing technique will get you on the zero-click results list in no time on multiple search engines, leading to higher quality leads and immediate, measurable results.
Advertising on Smart Speakers
Another trend is the rise of advertisements on smart speakers like Alexa, Siri, and Google Home. These devices have grown in popularity over the last three years, mostly due to the voice assistant feature.
You simply ask a question like, “Hey Siri, which companies sell affordable online marketing solutions?” and a recorded voice will offer choices. This allows your company to create ads and input company information that customers can access quickly and easily as they use these devices.
Data Visualization
The proliferation of smart speakers has lead to the third trend: data visualization. Visuals are essential to digital advertising. You need to create visuals that catch the eye of a potential customer right away. Visual content is extremely popular right now, and when businesses combine visual search technology–like data visualizations, infographics, images, and videos–with minimal text, it makes ads more attractive to customers and easier to remember.
There are several digital marketing trends your business can use to improve your online presence and build a loyal customer base. If you own a small or medium business and want to make a bigger impact online, contact IWD today and ask about our marketing solutions. We have everything you need to make your business succeed in the digital age.