Digital Marketing Importance In 2022: Your Questions, Answered

The level of digital marketing importance is as high as it’s ever been in 2022. A well-planned out online presence that attracts internet users and mobile users alike is incredibly powerful. 

Despite that, effective digital marketing efforts are still thought of as secondary decisions. For small businesses, especially, they often get sidelined in favour of traditional marketing – word of mouth, leaflets, and faith in the product, for example. The fact is that your customer base is all online, and on digital platforms. Regardless of sector or industry, harnessing the popularity of digital channels in a wide range of ways is the most effective way to drive business growth and cement your online presence. 

With the importance of digital marketing established, let’s, in this post, answer some questions about online advertising and marketing methods.

Why Is Digital Marketing So Important?

Simply put, digital marketing involves putting out content on platforms where your target audience goes to – be that to scroll, swipe, or educate themselves about a product or service that they are interested in.

Not having your content on these platforms means two things:

1. Your competitors are enjoying the attention (and increased sales) of online users that are viewing their content.
2. The fact that you’re not online means you’re relying on bricks and mortar stores alone which the Covid-19 pandemic has demonstrated isn’t exactly a sustainable method.

Digital marketing is part of people’s everyday lives without them even knowing – they’re seeing advertisements, posts, and content that relates to the products and services in which they are interested. Digital marketing is important because, to be frank, there’s no other option if you want to be a successful business. 

All that’s before you factor in the idea that a digital marketing plan is borderless and can target as many territories and countries as you like. Digital marketing isn’t just a necessity, it’s an incredible opportunity for your business to expand your list of current customers. It should be an integral part of your business strategy – that’s how important it is. 

What Are 4 Advantages Of Digital Marketing?

1. Target different intents with forms of advertising: You can morph your marketing communications into ways that suit your business or the type of industry in which you operate. By undergoing keyword research you can determine the intent people have when searching for the types of goods and services you sell. The intent could be, for instance, educational, with people asking questions before making a purchase such as “What is the best TV for my flat?” or “Which vacuum cleaner is best for pets?”. Through your digital marketing activity, you could answer these questions and create content that satisfies algorithms, and customers, and sees you rank highly for the keywords that are going to lead to increased sales and leads. 
2. Achieve a lot from a little: Aside from the fact that having a Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Instagram, and Google My Business (GMB) account is free, spending money on these platforms to advertise is entirely controlled by you. You set budgets that you’re comfortable with and, in the case of Google Ads, you only pay for a paid ad when someone actually clicks on it. Money, in this instance, isn’t really the main priority because it is so cost-effective, the main element of advertising to be concerned about is creativity. With so many people on digital marketing channels, you’ve only got seconds to impress. The positives do outweigh the negatives though because a huge amount of revenue can be achieved by spending relatively little.
3. Measure what matters: Investing in digital marketing tactics can be completely bespoke to you, meaning you can create goals and ways of measuring success that matter to you. You can measure how your rankings have increased, what your return on ad spend is, or how much traffic is going to your site. By doing this you can showcase the concrete, black and white numbers to key investors and remove the ‘fluff’ that is so often associated with marketing.
4. Get your brand known: Brand is as important as product/service in 2022. Your customer base wants to know that your brand aligns with their interests, beliefs, and expectations. Utilising digital and social media marketing is one of the most effective ways of doing this. Why? Because they are expressive platforms your business owns and can shape in any way it wants to. No amount of flyers or physical stores can do that.

What Is The Importance Of Digital Marketing During The Coronavirus Pandemic?

Covid taught us a lot of things and a main one is how important it is that brands are online. Coronavirus showed us that you can’t rely on a single revenue channel (a stall, place in a department store, or a regular bricks and mortar store) to bring in all your profits. 

The pandemic has just accelerated the importance of digital marketing by at least five years with apps and platforms offering new ways for companies to sell their goods and services. 

While some saw the pandemic’s effects on their business as a threat, others saw an opportunity. Some businesses were able to use the time off work to experiment with new products and services while others used the downtime to get creative and build new strategies. Throughout this, a digital marketing strategy remained all-important. 

Inbound marketing in particular is something that has become far more important in 2022, thanks to Covid. Carrying out site audits, checking your SEO performance and making sure your content is optimised and fresh has become a key part of success in a Covid world, owing to the fact that people are shopping and spending their money online. 

Why Is Digital Marketing Important In 2022?

With the advent of voice, NFTs, TikTok and other massive technological shifts, the importance of digital marketing will remain very high in 2022.

Expect the kind of digital marketing tactics in 2022 to be varied and across a greater number of social platforms. From short reels on TikTok and IG to podcasts that allow brands to showcase a different side to them, marketers need to start looking into these early on, to avoid being left behind.

Combine this with the eventual reopening of global travel, shipping, and communication and businesses can expect a boom in demand which needs to be matched by effective digital advertising.

The wider audience isn’t going to stop spending time on social media networks and that vital opportunity to engage with them is only going to become greater in 2022. The key to it is to make sure that you’re the brand they engage with.

5 Quickfire Reasons Why Digital Marketing Is Important

1. Marketing campaigns can target people who are on their phones. 
2. It’s faster than waiting for customers to come to you!
3. Greater return on investment thanks to greater budget control.
4. You can be precise in who you speak to. Target decision-makers, demographics, and regions.
5. Skyrocket your customer service by speaking to your audience where they already are.

What Are The Types Of Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing services are broad and complex. However, in general, you can break it down into eight different types of digital marketing. They are:

• Search engine optimisation (SEO): This is all about ensuring your website is optimised for Google and other search engines such as Yahoo and Bing. SEO involves front and back end practises which result in a quick, nimble website, packed with content that is optimised with keywords and terms.
• Pay Per Click (PPC): Paid ads like this involve getting your business’s name at the very top of the search engine results page, above the organic listings. As the name suggests, companies pay every time someone clicks on their ad.
• Social media marketing: This encompasses all social media platforms and involves planning, creating and scheduling posts, and engaging with customers on the platforms.
• Content marketing: This type of online advertising focuses on creating long-form content that includes multiple short and long-tail keywords. Content marketing and SEO work hand in hand in 2022. This is due to long-form content helping websites increase their rankings because they are targeting more key terms and phrases.
• Email marketing: Despite the variety of platforms online in 2022, email marketing remains a powerful tool. The ability to send hundreds of emails at once, create personalised copy, and attach files and content to them means that businesses still regularly create newsletters and send e-shots. 
• Mobile marketing: Mobile friendly websites and marketing are essential. There’s no getting around the fact that your marketing should be centred around mobile-first. Whether it’s having a website that can work on mobile or creating Instagram ads that can be seen when people are flicking through their feed, mobile marketing is only going to become prevalent. 
• Marketing analytics: Analysing your digital advertising efforts is important to the overall picture. Without analysing your results, you’re rudderless and have no way of being able to make future decisions. By looking at metrics you can understand what marketing methods work, and which ones that don’t, for a business in your industry.
• Affiliate marketing: A posh term for using influencers to grow brand awareness, affiliate marketing is an extremely effective method of getting your products and services out there. This is because the trust between the influencer and their audience is established meaning that, in theory, if they endorse a product, the people that view their content will be more interested in that product.

Why Digital Marketing Is Important For Small Business

For small businesses, digital marketing is the key to success. By being savvy, and creating disruptive marketing campaigns, they can leapfrog competitors, especially legacy businesses, that may not use their budgets as effectively. 

By tapping into social media and digital marketing small businesses can build brand loyalty by creating content that is refreshing and disruptive. Further, companies can use their platform to listen to their customers and glean priceless information.

Small businesses can also use a multi-channel approach while keeping budgets low. In minutes a small start-up can be on every platform, working to boost conversions and leads. Finally, not only is online marketing more affordable it also allows you to measure success and ROI which, when margins are razor-thin, is priceless.

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As experts in digital marketing, we’re confident we can answer any questions you may have about SEO, content, and other marketing disciplines. If you’re a business looking for a full-service digital marketing agency then get in touch with our sales team today!