Online marketing has fast become a dominant player within the marketing industry. It’s a key contributor to the growth of many businesses, both big and small. There are plenty of tips out there that can help with your own online marketing efforts this year.
Whether you’re familiar with online marketing techniques already or you’ve been used to traditional marketing methods, any form of online marketing should be embraced in 2023. By ignoring the impact and effectiveness of online marketing is purposely preventing your business from achieving significant milestones in the lifespan of the organization.
With that being said, here are ten ways to improve your online marketing efforts in 2023 so that your business can profit from this marketing type.
- Look for opportunities to diversify your efforts
As a business, a willingness to adapt and expand upon your efforts is important. It’s necessary to be adaptable, otherwise, you risk being left behind while newer businesses take that all-important spotlight.
With that being said, when it comes to online marketing, it’s important to look for opportunities that will diversify your efforts. From exploring newly created social media platforms to identifying trends within online marketing that are being used by your competitors. It’s essential to diversify your efforts and find methods of marketing that work for your business in particular.
Remember, it might be that some marketing methods don’t work for your business, and hence it’s important to monitor the performance of every method you try. That way, you’re not wasting your time unnecessarily on practices in marketing that aren’t fitting your business and the audience you’re trying to engage with.
- Create an updated digital strategy
A digital strategy is a very much-needed process to put in place. Without a strategy, your marketing team might not have much sense of direction in what they should be doing day-to-day, let alone on a weekly or monthly basis.
Think about what your current strategy looks like, whether you have a digital version of your marketing strategy or not. What should you include in your digital strategy? Here are a few suggestions that might help:
- Set goals
- Consider buyer personas
- Plan your content creation types
- Pinpoint key performance indicators (KPIs)
These are just a few inclusions to make into your digital strategy. Goals provide motivation and direction in your marketing efforts. With buyer personas, you might have multiple customer types that all need to be catered to from a marketing standpoint, differently.
The type of content you create and where you distribute the content is essential, which is why you want to plan out your content within your digital strategy. That and identifying key performance indicators that you can monitor as you go is also a great way to ensure your time is well spent as a marketer.
- Utilize paid social
Paid socials are a great way to promote your business and to help enhance the exposure your content receives as a result.
As a marketer, you should be open to using both organic and paid-for marketing as they both go hand-in-hand. If you’re new to paid socials then there’s plenty of guidance online on how to get started and how to ensure your marketing budget is well spent.
For example, if you’re looking to drive more traffic to your website, then taking advantage of something like Google Ads is a great way to help better direct traffic to your site. Of course, the content you create is important to ensure your paid socials are effective in their efforts.
This is where performance measuring your content is essential to helping create effective marketing campaigns that convert leads to customers or encourage customers to come back to repeat buy.
- Take advantage of user-generated content
User-generated content is not something to be slept on as a business. If you’ve got a lot of customers already raving about your products and sharing their thoughts and own content online, then this is something to take advantage of.
Many big businesses are now taking what is effectively a free form of advertising and using it on their own platforms, with the creator’s consent of course.
User-generated content is a great way to showcase your products in action and used by those that it was intended for in the first place. It also creates loyalty within your current fanbase of customers, as well as showing off to any prospective customers who might be closer to the end of the buyer funnel.
This type of content, of course, should be incorporated alongside a number of other marketing methods rather than being solely used.
- Outsource your marketing needs
Outsourcing your marketing needs might be something you think of doing if marketing currently is a struggle to operate internally. Not every business or startup has the funds or the current department available to oversee the mammoth task of marketing a company.
Building a brand from a marketing perspective is challenging, to say the least. With online marketing becoming a more competitive field, it means a lot more effort is needed to get your business noticed.
Outsourcing is a common practice used by many businesses that have limited budgets or who don’t want the financial responsibility that comes with hiring a staff member full-time into the fold.
It’s a temporary solution for many but one that can prove very effective, especially within marketing. It’s worth looking out for a top marketing agency to help with your outsourcing needs.
- Use chatbots and live chat services for additional comms
Chatbots and live chat services are a great way to help provide an additional form of communication for your audience. Not everyone will enjoy communicating via traditional methods like a phone call for example.
For some, emails might seem to prolong the effort of getting a response, and direct messaging via social media might be a bit too personal.
Another option is to introduce chatbots and live chat services in order to improve online marketing efforts. Not every potential customer will visit your site or look to shop during your office hours, which means they need support outside of these hours.
Live chat services during the day and chatbots used in the evening can help manage the stream of inquiries that come through regarding your business or the products/services offered.
- Focus on creating long-form content via your website’s blog
Long-form content is definitely worthwhile when it comes to improving your online marketing efforts. It’s often about quality over quantity when it comes to marketing. Your website’s blog is a great space for generating content and hopefully, ranking your site positively on search engines.
This type of content should be long in length, whether that’s 1,000 words or over 3,000 words. The longer and more quality the content is, the better. Having a blog certainly has its benefits because it provides a source of knowledge and information for your customers and any prospective leads.
You can become an expert in your field by creating a blog via your site. It’s definitely something worth considering to improve your marketing efforts.
- Optimize for mobile use and voice search
In 2023, one of the most important optimizations to make within your online marketing strategy is with mobile use and voice search. Mobile phones have become one of the top browsers when it comes to internet users navigating the internet and making purchases.
The same goes for voice search, with Gartner predicting that 5% of digital purchases will be initiated through voice devices in 2023.
There are a number of ways you can optimize your mobile use, one of which making sure your website is mobile-friendly. You might also wish to develop your own mobile app if it’s of relevance.
- Exist on as many social media platforms as possible
Social media continues to be a powerhouse for many businesses that are looking to ramp up their marketing efforts online. Even if you’re not particularly well-versed in the world of social media, it’s good to exist on it as a business.
Even if that means outsourcing your marketing and social media needs to the relevant agencies, it’s a must. By existing on as many social media platforms, you help increase the exposure of your brand. It takes a number of interactions for a customer to remember your brand, so being on a number of platforms that they might come across is beneficial.
- Cross-promote your channels
Finally, make sure you’re cross-promoting your channels where you can. From your website to social media handles and back, every opportunity you can make to share your content across all of your online channels is beneficial.
Cross-promotion is a great way to help build your channels equally and to help drive your audience from one platform to another. You might find that you have certain types of audiences on one channel and others on the remainder of your platforms.
Improving your online marketing efforts is a must in 2023, so use these tips to ensure you’re utilizing every effort for your online marketing campaigns this year.