“Discover 7 essential digital marketing strategies you need in 2023: Understanding your audience, goal setting, developing your online presence, SEO, social media, affiliate marketing, and digital products. Success awaits!”
Have you ever thought about starting digital marketing? With today’s social media apps and AI technology there’s never been an easier time to start.
When I started my digital marketing journey just 1 year ago, I was a complete beginner and had no background in the online space. As a result, I came up against dead end after dead end.
I knew I needed to start social media, create a webpage, make content on social media but I had no clue what a funnel or SEO was. The amazing thing about the internet is you can find so much free information, but it’s easy to get fed up wondering HOW to put it all together.
So, in this blog, I’ll break down the ‘what’, and ‘how’ of digital marketing, so you can take the guess work out of digital marketing.
So, What is Digital Marketing Anyway?
Today, we turn to the internet for everything – to learn, ask questions, shop and socialize.
According to the Global social media statistics research summary 2023 [June 2023] (smartinsights.com) 60% of the world’s population is using social media, spending an average of almost 2.5 hours a day on social media platforms.
But what does this have to do with digital marketing? Well, Digital Marketing is the promotion of your own or other people’s brands to potential customers via social media, email marketing, or paid advertising.
Most companies are using some sort of digital marketing to reach more customers and increase sales, but more and more people like you and I are learning digital marketing skills to earn another income stream, or even replace their 9 to 5 income. This blog is all about inspiring other women to get started!
Grab My Free Guide to Starting Your Own Digital Marketing Business Today
Your Niche and Your Ideal Customer
You know what they say, market to everyone and sell to nobody. A niche is a narrow segment of a market with a distinct and specific subset of potential customers who share common characteristics, interests, needs, or preferences. You need to determine your niche so you can serve this particular group of consumers rather than attempting to appeal to everyone.
As a beginner I recommend starting with an evergreen niche, its stable and not subject to trends. According to the blog How to Select Great Evergreen Niche Business Opportunities (affilimate.com) the top 3 evergreen niches are:
- Health – examples include yoga for pregnant women, golf for beginners or vegan living
- Wealth/Finance – examples include make money online, passive income, budgeting or investing
- Relationships – examples include parenting, toddlers, babies or homeschooling
Another popular niche to start with is travel.
Next, identify who your ideal customer is. Your ideal customer is the person or group most likely to engage with your content, products, or services. Identifying and understanding your target audience is a vital step. so don’t skip over this part.
The easiest way to do this is by creating customer personas, which are fictional representations of your ideal customer, based on real data and insights. This includes gender, age, location, income, interests, values, pain points and which social media apps do they spend time on.
Example persona: “Sarah, the fitness enthusiast”
- Demographics: Female, 28 years old, lives in urban areas, works as a marketing manager, earns a moderate income.
- Psychographics: Values health and wellness, follows a plant-based diet, enjoys yoga and outdoor activities, passionate about sustainable living.
- Behavior: Active on Instagram and Pinterest, follows fitness influencers, subscribes to health and wellness newsletters.
By creating personas like “Sarah,” you can talk directly to ‘her’ with your digital marketing content.
SEO and Keyword Research for Digital Marketing
Understanding search Engine Optimization (SEO) cannot be overstated. It involves various techniques to improve a website’s visibility in search engine results and is divided into two categories: on-page SEO and off-page SEO.
on-page seo
On-page SEO refers to the optimization strategies you apply directly to the content and structure of your web pages to improve their search engine ranking. Here are some key elements of on-page SEO:
- Keyword Optimization: Incorporate your target keywords naturally into your content, including in the page title, headings, meta descriptions, and throughout the body of the text.
- High-Quality Content: Create informative, valuable, and engaging content that addresses the needs and questions of your target audience. Google values content that provides genuine value to users.
- Meta Tags: Optimize meta tags, including the title tag and meta description, to include relevant keywords and entice users to click on your search results.
- Header Tags: Use header tags (H1, H2, H3, etc.) to structure your content logically and make it more readable. Include keywords in these tags where appropriate.
- Optimized Images: Optimize images by adding descriptive alt text and compressing them for faster page loading, which is a ranking factor.
- Internal Linking: Include internal links to other relevant pages on your website. This helps search engines understand the structure of your site and improves user navigation.
Off-Page SEO
Off-page SEO focuses on improving your website’s authority, reputation, and visibility through strategies applied external to your website. Here are some examples of off-page SEO:
- Backlinks: Reach out for backlinks from reputable websites. Backlinks act as “social proof” in your content.
- Social Signals: Engage on social media platforms to promote your content and brand.
- Online Reputation Management: Monitor and manage your online reputation, including reviews and mentions. Positive online reviews can boost your credibility.
- Guest Blogging: Contribute guest posts to authoritative websites in your niche. This not only builds backlinks but also establishes you as an expert in your field.
- Local SEO: If you have a local business, optimize for local SEO by claiming and optimizing your Google My Business listing and encouraging customer reviews.
- Content Marketing: Create valuable and shareable content that naturally attracts backlinks and social shares.
keyword research
Keyword research is the process of identifying specific words and phrases (keywords) that your ideal customers use when searching for information online, and helps you understand what your audience want. Here’s are my tips:
- Generate Keyword Ideas: Brainstorm keywords relevant to your business or niche. Think about what your ideal audience are searching for.
- Use Keyword Research Tools: Utilize keyword research tools to provide insights into keyword search volume, competition, and related terms. I recommend free SEO and keyword research tools when starting out.
- Competitor Analysis: Analyze your competitors’ websites and see which keywords they are using.
- Long-Tail Keywords: Consider using long-tail keywords (phrases with three or more words) as they often have less competition and can be highly relevant to specific queries.
- Searcher Intent: Understand the intent behind keywords. Are users looking for information, products, or solutions? Tailor your content to match the searcher’s intent.
Organic Content vs Paid Traffic
There are two main strategies you want to use to gain traction: organic traffic and paid advertising. I recommend focusing primarily on organic traffic when starting out though.
Organic traffic refers to visitors who find your website through unpaid, search engine results or social media marketing. You gain organic traffic through optimizing SEO, making quality content and consistent posting. Organic traffic is cost-effective and is sustainable long-term. The downside is results can take time, and competition can be fierce.
Paid advertising involves creating and running online ads on platforms like Google and Facebook Ads. You can target your ideal audience and use the analytics tools to find ways to improve. The downside is it can get expensive, and consumer “ad fatigue” may affect performance over time.
Digital Product Creation
Digital products include anything from e-books, online courses, software applications, mobile apps, and digital art, among others. What I love about digital products is you create your product once; target a large global audience and have little to no distribution costs. Learn more in my blog Create PLR (Private Label Rights) Digital Products for Free.
There are a few things to get right to be successful in this space. Start with identifying a specific problem or need within your niche. Once you identify the problem, use your knowledge to develop a solution in the form of a digital product. You not only want to address the problem but also provide a seamless user experience in a visually appealing way. I recommend using another free tool Canva to create digital products.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is a symbiotic business model between businesses who want to expand their reach and affiliate marketers i.e people like you and I who earn commissions by promoting their products or services. It’s been around for years but has recently grown in popularity. Something like 80% of brands now have affiliate programs, check out this article out on 157 of the highest paying affiliate programs in 2023.
For high ticket and monthly affiliate programs (which is what I prefer) you don’t need a large social media following so it’s very beginner friendly and little to no cost to get started. I break affiliate marketing down in my blog Affiliate Marketing Demystified.
Email Marketing
Email marketing is an indispensable tool in the digital marketer’s arsenal in 2023. It is vital that you start building an email list as early on as possible and use it in combination with affiliate marketing (you’ll definitely need it for high ticket), digital product creation efforts.
Building an email list and crafting weekly emails to your subscribers helps to build a relationship, by letting people see the real you and keeps them updated on your latest product and service offerings.
And you guessed it, you can also use tools to automate email workflows, schedule email sequences and track open rates to go back and improve your strategies. You will eventually have to pay to maintain an email list, but when starting I recommend free tools. Here is a list of the 7 best email marketing tools, I personally use Zapier.
Wrap Up
Digital marketing is definitely an awesome and exciting way that ordinary people are earning passive income or even replacing their 9 to 5 in the 2020’s. I hope I’ve helped make sense of the plethora of information available online to help you decide if this is for you. I’d love to hear your comments and questions.
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