Image credit: Unsplash
Let’s admit it, 2020 was a tough one for us all. But with all the hardships that the world has overcome, many habitual things have changed, and we’ve certainly learned a lot. One of such valuable lessons was how important online presence is for a business. Especially when physical access to a store, venue, or office becomes off-limits.
To make sure you’re all set, on this page, we’ll go over the 5 major digital marketing strategies that should be given additional attention in 2021 with tips and examples.
1. Search Engine Optimization
SEO remains one of the most fundamental strategies for a business in 2021. After all, your potential customers have to find you among a plethora of your competitors. Therefore, your pages and website content need to be optimized and understandable for your audience and Google crawlers.
Several things here to bear in mind:
- Site speed is a major factor that influences your site ranking, so your website must be fast (this is exactly why so many business owners are currently investing in building progressive web applications for their sites);
- Optimized images and media (large-weight media can harm your page load time);
- Proper use of keywords (keeping in mind the intention of your users, and no keyword stuffing);
- Clear page hierarchy (needed for easy navigation and site crawling);
- Smart cross-linking within the site and enough quality external links;
- No broken links and pages (conducting regular audits can help with that).
2. Pay-per-click Advertising
PPC is also effective in marketing in 2021. Unlike SEO, it can bring you much faster results if you set up your campaigns correctly. The only downside is that you pay for the clicks which automatically means much higher marketing costs on your end when compared to organic search that’s reached by SEO. In any event, this strategy can be your main focus if it works well for your audience.
Be it Google Ads, Bing Ads, or social media ads on Instagram and Facebook, such content is marked as an “Ad” in the search results or feed. Here is an example of the SERP for “organic bath salt”, see the Ads block on the right? This is PPC.
Screenshot taken on Google
3. Social Media Marketing
SMM is another vital strategy in marketing. With a huge number of people being active on social media, it becomes crucial for businesses to maintain decent social media accounts. To say the least, this is a fabulous way to connect with your target audience in an informal setting.
For starters, Facebook and Instagram ads provide amazing PPC commercial opportunities. Furthermore, Pinterest and the two aforementioned socials give the chance to sell things in the “Shop” sections. This is done by connecting an online store’s catalog, granting users the ability to buy things from the convenience of social media.
Moreover, cross-linking content is a lifesaver for a rich SMM content strategy. Yet one more important point to note for 2021 is putting up social media widgets on your website. Such widgets should pull content from social media that was made by users and that features your brand. By doing so, you can inspire your users and build trust in your brand. For example, this is what a section like this looks like on a lipstick product page on the official MAC Cosmetics website.
Screenshot taken on the official MAC Cosmetics website
4. Influencer Marketing
One more strategy that’s currently accelerating the world of marketing deals with influencers. In essence, this type of SMM takes a spin at content that has your brand mentioned in social media by opinion leaders.
Unlike in the case with standard user-generated content (in which any customer can feature your company or products or mention your services), influencers are considered as authoritative individuals whose opinions are trustworthy. Usually, such figures have tons of followers, are well-recognized, yet aren’t celebrities.
To provide you with an example, even pets can be influencers! Below are some screenshots of a recent 2021 post on the official Skechers Instagram account. The influencer whose content was used on the Skechers account is a pug nicked “itsdougthepug” on Instagram who can boast having over 4 million followers! No wonder that this repost has over 1.7k likes, right?
The Skechers team not only tagged the pug’s account back when putting up the post on their page. They’ve also tagged the products that are visible on the page (shoes with a pug print), making the post shoppable which is an outstanding marketing move.
Screenshot taken on the official Skechers USA Instagram
5. Good-old Emails
Of course, the days of emails aren’t gone yet either. Drip campaigns and various mailers are still a very efficient marketing strategy. The question for 2021 lies in how consistent the send-outs are, how useful the content in them is, as well as how neat they look visually.
The main things you should get right with your emails are finding the golden meridian with intervals (i.e. how often you send them) and making sure that you’re bringing value to your recipients. The bottom line here is that we all get tons of emails on a daily basis, so, in order for yours not to get in the spam folders, their content mustn’t be a stab in the dark.
Thus, do your best to have nice subject lines and put together beautiful emails. By the way, you can make use of tools like Campaign Monitor which allows crafting emails using drag and drop as shown on the screenshot below.
Screenshot taken on the official Campaign Monitor website
Over to You
Summing up everything covered in this article, driving traffic and converting users into buyers are among the main aims of digital marketing. There are so many strategies out there that you can incorporate and take for a spin to benefit your business. Hopefully, the tips given on this page will serve you as a good start and help you grow your business.
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About the Author
Kate Parish, Chief Marketing Officer at Onilab with 8+ years of experience in Digital Marketing and website promotion. Kate always strives to stay in pace with the every-advancing online world, and the sphere of IT and PWA development. Her expertise includes in-depth knowledge of SEO, branding, PPC, SMM, and the field of online sales in general.
