With the whole world shifting towards the internet, businesses have switched their efforts in approaching customers from traditional marketing to digital marketing.
Digital marketing is done through different channels varying on what the business is trying to sell and what its target market is.
SEO, PPC, Social Media Marketing, Content Marketing, Email Marketing, and Influencer Marketing are some examples for digital marketing channels.
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Choosing the right digital marketing channel is the most important digital marketing decision a business has to take as the business’s reputation and impression to customers solely depend on it.
In this article, we will understand what digital marketing channels are and identify the most profitable digital marketing channels that your business should invest in for the best ROI.
Here is the table of contents. This blog covers tons of useful information. Bookmark this page or save it, don’t get overwhelmed, go through each step, and you will surely succeed.
Table of Contents
What Are Digital Marketing Channels?
Digital marketing refers to any and all marketing that is done digitally. Since the whole world has shifted towards using the internet for basically everything, it makes sense for businesses to start marketing digitally as well since that is where their target market resides.
However, the digital world is too big to be approached by a single channel. Just like traditional marketing where businesses relied on different marketing channels to approach different target markets e.g. billboard advertisements, newspaper advertisements, personal selling through door-to-door salespersons, etc., digital marketing also has different channels to approach the customers that are available on the internet.
These are called digital marketing channels with examples of email marketing, affiliate marketing, social media marketing, etc. Each marketing approach takes place on the internet and has the same goal but follows a different channel to approach customers, for instance, email marketing approaches through mail while affiliate marketing approaches through entertainment applications backed up by celebrity influencers.
6 Digital Marketing Channels With High ROI
High ROI (return on investment) is one of the most reliable metrics out there to measure success when it comes to marketing. It would make sense to compare how much you invest in a marketing channel with how much you end up earning from it.
Since there are a plethora of digital marketing channels a business can opt for, we will focus only on the most profitable digital marketing channels with the highest ROI that almost always work for any business, no matter what niche you’re in or how distinctive your target market is.
1. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Search Engine Optimization is the one digital marketing channel that enjoys the highest traffic. Basically, SEO works by helping your website be optimized to appear on a search engine’s results. Since users all across the internet rely on Google to find their answers, whether they’re looking for a DIY tutorial or a thousand-dollar purchase to make, it makes sense for businesses to invest highly in Google SEO.
What it is
Google SEO helps the business’ website appear on high ranks on the Google SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages), making it more likely for the user to click on their website and deal with them instead of their competitor.
How it works
SEO is mainly done based on keywords. Keywords are the phrases your target market often enters on Google to search for products in your niche. For example, an important keyword for a local burger joint would be ‘best burgers near me’.
These keywords are used in the content of your website to increase the likelihood of your website appearing on top results of Google SERPs.
But that’s not the only technique for SEO. In fact, there are more than a few techniques of conducting SEO mainly branched in the categories of On-page SEO and Off-page SEO.
- On-page SEO is basically all the efforts you make on your own website to help it appear higher on Google SERPs. Examples include writing keyword-rich content, optimizing heading tags, internal linking, etc.
- Off-page SEO refers to all the efforts you make outside of your website that help your business appear higher on Google SERPs. Examples include link building, social media marketing, reviews, etc.
- Local SEO is also a popular term that is used for businesses that focus on higher Google rankings only for local customers. For example, if a barber in New York only wants to focus on its target market residing in New York and creates website content along the keywords of ‘best barbers in New York’, it would be considered local SEO.
2. Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising
PPC Advertisement refers to a digital marketing technique where businesses advertise their product directly on different digital outlets in the form of ads that are displayed on the basis of keyword relevance. The best example and application of this is Google Ads where businesses pay Google to advertise their business on certain keywords.
However, what makes PPC different from other advertisement types is that you only pay the ad network when an organic user actually clicks on your ad, making it a pretty safe expense.
What it is
PPC advertisement is mainly used to directly get leads from your target market and convert them.
Practically, PPC advertisement is mainly conducted through Google Ads, which enables your ad to be displayed on all Google applications, and by directly buying social media ads, e.g. Facebook ads.
How it works
To get the best results from your PPC campaign, it is essential for the business to conduct thorough keyword research, create persuasive and compelling ad copies, design attractive graphics, and experiment with different PPC elements.
In addition to ROI, other metrics that can help you understand the success of PPC campaigns are CTR (Click Through Rate), Conversion Rate, Cost per Conversion, and ROAS (Return On Ad Spend).
3. Social Media Marketing
After search engines, social media applications enjoy the highest amount of digital traffic, which signifies how important it could be for businesses not only to advertise their businesses on these platforms but to also engage with their customers and build meaningful relationships.
What it is
Social media marketing mostly focuses on businesses creating a social media profile which they use to create and share content, engage with their customers and stakeholders, and run ad campaigns. Many businesses also use social media marketing to attract customers to the business’s website, leading them to the landing page of the business.
How it works
Social Media Marketing is mostly done on the following platforms:
- Facebook: Mostly used for ads and creating a meaningful digital presence.
- Twitter: Mostly used by brands to interact with customers and other public groups and brands, e.g. competitors or celebrities.
- LinkedIn: Mostly used to showcase the professional side of the business to share opportunities for recruitment or boast achievements of the business.
- Instagram: Mostly used for SMM that focuses on graphics, sharing visually pleasing photos and videos that attract customers. Recently, Instagram has also been a popular platform for Influencer Marketing.
Social Media Marketing consists of thorough research for your target audience and creating content tailored to their interests. Most SMM is also heavily reliant on using hashtags to direct the content shared by a business to their target market, much like how keywords are used in SEO.
4. Content Marketing
Content marketing refers to creating content for the purpose of attracting your target market to your business. This could either be by creating informative content that highlights what your business is all about or persuasive content that highlights your product’s USP and indulges the customer to choose you over your competition.
What it is
Since all forms of marketing include some form of content, having a unique and engaging content strategy is key to your business’s success.
The most common forms of content marketing are:
- Blog posting (mostly includes SEO keywords)
- SEO Web Content
- Email newsletters
- Copywriting
- Script Writing
- Social Media Captions
How it works
Effective content management is always done through subsequent research of your target market to understand how they like to be communicated with, which helps you identify your brand’s voice and minimizes communication barriers that could jeopardize customer satisfaction.
Common metrics to judge the content marketing success of a business are traffic analytics, page views, time on page, bounce rate, CTR, and social media shares.
5. Email Marketing
While emailing may seem too old school in 2023, email marketing is still one of the most popular channels for digital marketing that has an average ROI of 4200%! That means you earn $42 on each dollar invested.
What it is
Email marketing is mainly done by sending emails to your existing or target market to inform them, update them, and persuade them to engage with your business. In contrast to other digital marketing channels, email marketing is one of the best digital marketing outlets that strengthens customer relationships as the business directly engages with its customer base.
Two of the most common email marketing campaigns are:
- Newsletters (weekly emails to the customer base to inform them about the business and the niche’s environment)
- Cold-emailing (writing copies for potential customers to convert them into leads)
How it works
Creating an email marketing campaign requires the business to create an email list of recipients that are relevant to your business. Since emailing mostly content, you also need to invest in copywriters that write attractive captions and content writers that write the body of each email.
Since email marketing is a direct way to approach customers, many businesses also offer exclusive discounts to their email subscribers to help them feel more important to the business.
The best technique to uplift your email marketing success is by A/B testing subject lines and CTAs, while the most important metrics to judge the campaign’s success are CTR, open rates, and conversion rates.
6. Influencer Marketing
In all forms of marketing, any platform that converges a lot of target markets for a niche can be leveraged by a business as a digital marketing channel. For example, Facebook converges many users which is why many businesses advertise themselves on Facebook through the digital marketing channel of social media marketing.
What it is
Recently, however, there has been a unique development in digital marketing outlets which was created by influencers. Internet celebrities have a big following. And since for many businesses, their followers can be considered as their target market, businesses leverage this by paying the influencers to sponsor their product through the digital marketing channel of Influencer Marketing.
In addition to offering the business a new market to advertise their business to, influencer marketing also helps businesses create a better brand image since influencers have intrinsic trust and credibility that can be shared by the sponsored product.
However, influencer marketing is also risky where the bad reputation of an influencer can also affect your business negatively, which is why you have to be careful choosing influencers to sponsor.
How it works
The first step is to thoroughly research your own target market and then identify influencers that have a following sharing your target market- but before approaching the influencer, make sure they align with your brand values positively.
After filtering out the best influencers, try to create unique sponsored pitches that these individuals can share with their audience that can help promote your business the most.
The success of Influencer Marketing is generally measured by metrics such as likes, comments, shares, impressions, conversions, etc.
Conclusion
In summary, digital marketing channels are different ways a business can approach its targetted customer. But since each marketing channel comes with its own costs, choosing the most profitable digital marketing channels can help you get the best bang for your buck.
If not all, most of the digital marketing channels mentioned above should help you boost your business’ growth and attract more customers to your business.
With that being said, good luck with your digital marketing campaigns!
Interested in more? Check out What Are The Best Email Marketing Practices To Get Conversion?
