Whether your business has a marketing budget of £500 a month or £500 a day, prioritising and testing the right channels for your business will always help you get the most bang for your buck. Below, we look at some of the most effective marketing channels in 2020 for businesses with budgets of all sizes.
1. Your Website
For online businesses, your website is your shop window and one of the most crucial elements to get right. Although much of your marketing will have the goal of sending people to your website, getting your website right first is absolutely crucial when building your digital advertising strategy.
Use tools such as SEMrush to highlight any technical issues on your website, and make sure to keep your user experience and purchasing process as simple as possible to boost your conversion rate once you get them to your website.
2. PPC Marketing
Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing is widely acknowledged as one of the most effective forms of online marketing. The most prolific PPC channels are Google Ads, Bing Ads and Facebook/Instagram Ads, and they’re called PPC because you only pay when someone clicks on your advert, rather than paying for impressions or reach.
PPC differs between search engines and social media, so it’s important to consider your buyer journey and target audience when planning any form of paid marketing platform. Search engine marketing (on Google and Bing) will show your adverts to customers who are actively searching for your product online, and social media marketing will show your ads to an audience of your choosing – generally made up of demographics, interests, location and more to make them aware of your brand.
While social media ads are a really cost-effective form of marketing, they tend to drive awareness and top-of-funnel activity, whereas search engine ads are usually more appropriate during the mid-end funnel stages. What’s more, is that all forms of PPC marketing can start with a budget of as little as £1 a day, and with costs from £0.01 per click.
3. Content Marketing & SEO
Another very effective method of marketing is using content marketing and SEO. A long-term activity, a website optimised for search engines will drive regular, targeted leads to your business organically, from people actively searching for topical or product information.
For example, if you’re a company that sells windows, try thinking of some related topics that people searching for a new windows supplier would be searching for, such as the types of windows available, the benefits of double (or triple) glazing and ways to keep new windows clean. Google Trends and Google Keyword Planner are two great tools that help you measure the level of demand for search terms, helping you decide the keywords to prioritise.
Although content marketing won’t always lead to immediate sales, it helps your brand to position itself as an authority on that particular topic, so you’ll be at the forefront of your customer’s minds when the time comes for them to buy.
4. Referrals
For e-commerce and service providers alike, referrals are a great source of low-cost customer acquisition, and you can encourage your current customers to refer their friends and family by giving them unique discount codes, referral codes or by creating an affiliate programme. Make this as easy as possible for your customers by creating unique links that are shareable to social media, or set up automated email reminders to keep it simple.
5. Email marketing
Finally, email marketing is still one of the best ways of keeping not only your prospective customers in the loop, but also to engage with your previous and current customers regularly.
Split your database into segments based on lifetime value, frequency of purchase, engagement rates or purchase history to keep your communications relevant, and use email marketing to create cross-sell and upsell opportunities for your other products.
In 2020, there are more channels than ever before for marketing. However, using the five methods above will give you the most bang for your buck for marketing budgets large and small.
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