Digital Marketing: The Power of Performance
31 August 2021
31 August 2021
Covid-19 has shifted how we live our lives, how we do business, and how we communicate. No surprises then that it’s also shifted how we consume media, how we buy and sell products and services, how we advertise, and how we drive brand awareness. The consistent thread tying it all together – digital performance.
At the start of the pandemic, there was an enhanced need for a digital presence. Customers were at home, restrictions had closed high street stores, businesses were forced into ‘WFH’ mode, and life as we knew it paused. But the need to sell, the need to succeed and drive revenue was more important than ever. How long would lockdown last? Would we live this way forever? Would government support be enough to sustain a business?
As we now approach the end of summer 2021, Covid-19 is still very much a social norm. Therefore, the need for a digital strategy in every business is still ever present. Whether it be B2C or B2B in retail, ecommerce, events, IT, corporate finance, you name it – the need to be heard amongst the digital noise is a key priority. And as that need to be seen and heard becomes more apparent, the competition for top ranking is becoming a hugely competitive space.
It’s no longer enough to just have a strong website. Organic traffic is good, but to compete with others, to be seen by the right people at the right time; to be seen before the rest – that takes budget, it takes strategy, and it takes expertise. Grabbing those high intent buyers first and grabbing them when they are ripe to convert. That is what turns a digital presence, into revenue.
Especially in E-Commerce right now, competition is fierce, and markets are tough. As people are largely still home based, consumers are engaging with products and services from their personal devices meaning social media platforms are hugely powerful in converting clicks to revenue. Google shopping campaigns and other pay per click campaigns are also increasing in price for key search terms, resulting in large bids for the most convertible terms in the retail sector. That is fine for larger brands, but for those with small budgets or small headcounts, it makes the market a flood of expectation versus reality.
That’s where Loud Mouth Media come in!
There are both organic and paid media techniques to assist your business in digital performance. We have included some of our top tips below to ensure you too can enjoy the success of digital strategy:
As with anything, good things take time. Digital Marketing is no different. It takes time across both Paid Social, SEO and Search Engine PPC for platforms to learn what you do, who you are, and what kind of audience converts for you. Similarly, it takes time to see trends, recognise commonalities, and understand what digital performance means for your brand.
Our top tip with timing, is the longer you run a campaign, the more successful it will be – not just because the platforms will complete the learning phase. But because it allows you to listen to the data and react accordingly. That might be adjusting a campaign approach, it might be refining your audience to just your top buyers, but more than anything – it’s about truly understanding your ‘Search Impression Share’ and ensuring you push the limits. What is SIS? The number of people your ad reached, versus the number of people it could have reached.
Knowing your audience is key to digital performance and goal conversions. The key is knowing the difference between your audience who support the brand and drive engagement, and your audience who will convert to revenue. Where they sit in the funnel, what platforms they can be found on, what time they can be found, what content they respond well to; and how they can be encouraged to convert.
Our top tip; Consider the right platform for your business and your buyer personas. Brand awareness will come in time, but revenue is hard to find. Know your audience!
This tip feeds into knowing your audience as well – relevancy is knowing what audience will convert your goals. Whether those goals be engagement, form submissions, sales or lead generation, it’s important to know the platforms you’re choosing are relevant to goal conversion.
For example, the audience targeting features across paid social versus Google PPC are vastly different. Even between the likes of Facebook / Instagram versus LinkedIn, the criteria can be hugely different. For Facebook / Instagram its largely personal interests focussed, versus LinkedIn allows for job title targeting, income targeting and sector targeting. If you have a B2B brand, you might consider LinkedIn over Facebook / Instagram which doesn’t have an income bracket targeting option. Our top tip; Always remember relevancy, and ensure you get in front of the right audience for your goals.
Money makes the world go around as they say, but in the case of digital marketing – budget really does make your life easier. Now this is easier said than done, especially in a time where Marketing budgets are tight. But the more budget you have available, the more options available to you.
A lot of digital marketing agencies will have a minimum spend each month, and that limit is there for good reason. Our top tip; The larger the spend, the more your strategy can cover a full funnel approach. In other words, you can fill the top of your funnel with awareness, as well as seeing leads fill your retention / loyalty at the bottom of the funnel. The more you put in, the more you get out.
Especially when considering an omni-channel approach, it pays to split your budget across platforms and across the likes of PPC, SEO and Paid Social. But when LinkedIn is 3-5 times more expensive than Facebook, your budget will need to accommodate the best platforms for your goals.
A lot of businesses put their money into what they see as the most valuable PPC avenue, search advertising. Making sure your business gets seen by those using specific key words in a search engine – makes sense, right? How often do you Google something in a day? It’s the largest search engine in the world and have over 1Billion searches every day.
However, remarketing is the Robin to a Google Search Batman, together they are stronger than ever. Our top tip; It pays to put budget behind remarketing, and ensure you reach your audience throughout their customer journey, from that initial touch point right through to converting to a sale. Remarketing is also a great option for those with a smaller budget, as you can ensure your money goes behind the audience who have already engaged with your brand, your website, your products and/or your services.
Experts are saying that post-pandemic, it takes 7-12 touch points to convert a lead – that could be someone calling you back or reading your email, even clicking and making a purchase. So, the more touch points you can control to move your audience down the funnel, the better.
With all this talk of budgets and being seen, sometimes it can be easy to forget the landing pages you’re driving your audience to. SEO is the juggernaut of organic traffic and works on the premise that if your website performs well - based on the technical SEO basics and what Google wants to see – your organic traffic and brand positioning will see strong developments.
One key area of what Google wants to see – Core web vitals scoring high. What does that mean? Load speed and site performance. Working off a mobile first index, if your landing page or website home page isn’t loading fast on a mobile, you might hit trouble. So, our top tip, ensure the landing pages you’re promoting are fast loading, are optimised for mobile, and offer an ease of use for your audience. Customer experience is key, especially when you have worked hard to gain their clicks!
As a Google Premier Partner, Loud Mouth Media have access to hugely valuable data from Google identifying key insights in your sector and in the digital space in general. We have the expertise available to create, adapt, manage and advise on your campaigns, and being one of the Top 10 Digital Agencies in the UK to offer this added service, there’s a reason we are award winning.
Get in touch today, and let’s explore how you can enjoy the power of digital performance!
