Tag Archive for: Digital marketing company Iowa

Which Digital Marketing Strategies Produce The Best ROI?

At the end of the day, the main factor that matters most to businesses utilizing digital marketing is return on investment (ROI). There are several digital marketing strategies available, but some are geared towards short term ROI and quick sales while others are long term focused. SEO, SEM, content marketing, social media, and email marketing can all be beneficial digital strategies, but depending on the main goals of an organization some work better than others. This post will explore the different digital strategies, benefits, and which have the potential to produce the best long term ROI.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Many businesses claim to have effective SEO strategies in place, yet are they sustainable? SEO is all about optimizing your website to increase organic search rankings and overall online visibility. This includes both on-page and off-page optimization factors. The ultimate purpose of SEO is to drive more traffic to an organization’s site, which hopefully results in increased sales. Some long term benefits of efficient SEO include:  sustainability of rankings, precise keyword targeting, brand credibility, flexibility, data is traceable, and it typically costs less than other digital strategies. If implemented and monitored correctly, SEO is clearly an efficient digital strategy that can boost ROI.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
Depending on the industry, SEM campaigns can be hit or miss. SEM is a digital strategy that allows organizations to rank ahead of their competition on search rankings through sponsored advertisements. It is typically associated with short term ROI and obtaining quick leads, but does have some long term implications. Google AdWords and Bing Ads are the clear front runners in the SEM world. AdWords is the more popular option among PPC marketers, but the quality of Bing Ads can’t be ignored. SEM offers some major benefits such as increased visibility, higher quality leads, precise targeting, development of audiences, and campaign data that can be tracked. Ultimately, SEM is a great digital strategy if done right, but it typically coincides better with organizations seeking short term ROI.

Content Marketing
The importance of content marketing can often times be overlooked by businesses. Content marketing is essentially the development of online content that provides value to visitors, and is typically created with intentions to drive traffic. It is an integral part to SEO and building long term online visibility. Some important benefits of content marketing according to Forbes include: reputation, building trust, conversion potential, cost effectiveness, and lasting value. At Onimod Global our content marketing strategy for clients is about quality and consistency. We develop content with the purpose of ranking for relevant search queries, increasing site traffic, and converting visitors to leads.

Social Media
Social media is an interesting digital strategy when it comes to ROI. Whether paid or organic, social media marketing is all about constructing an organization’s reputation through channels like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc. It can be difficult to derive ROI from organic social media marketing efforts, but don’t underestimate its value. Paid social media advertising on the other hand can produce ROI sometimes unmatched by other digital strategies. Benefits of social media marketing can include: ease of entry, development of target audiences, cost effectiveness, precise targeting, and massive potential for brand awareness exposure.

Email Marketing
Although Email marketing is one of the earliest digital strategies to come about, it has yet to disappear. There is a reason for this – it still produces ROI. According to Smart Insights, “67 percent of businesses list email marketing as their highest ROI online marketing strategy.” Email marketing strategies today typically consist of newsletters, promotional offers, and other ways to build subscriber lists. The superior benefits that email marketing offers according to Forbes are retaining previous customers, attracting new customers, pure ROI focus, traceable data, and overall simplicity compared to other digital strategies.

Contact Onimod Global
Is your business in need of superior digital marketing services to increase ROI? Reach out to us at Onimod Global and see what digital solutions we can provide for you!

The 7 Best Ad and Landing Page Elements to Boost Online Conversions

When it comes to success with paid search, it’s not just about ad copy. You have to pay attention to your ad extensions and your landing pages as well.

In this article, Mona Elesseily from Search Engine Land discusses the specific ad features and page elements that searchers/shoppers want when they’re shopping online. She also covers ways to also incorporate the elements using PPC/paid search.

1. Images

Seventy-eight percent of shoppers want images.

Shoppers respond well to images. It’s the reason Google has been and is continuing to increase the number of images we see on search engine results pages (SERPs). It’s also the reason good online retailers allow us to zoom in and view products from different angles.

An awesome way to increase the number of images in the SERPs is to use product listing ads (if applicable). We love how product ads allow us to take up space and show more than one product in the shopping pack. We like adding ad annotations like price drop alerts (in Bing), merchant badges and product ratings to make ads pop even more and grab buyer attention.

Focusing on feeds now will pay dividends in the future, as shopping feeds will likely appear in more places in the SERPs (Think image search and local ad units), and feed-based advertising will become much more commonplace. It’s a good idea to prep for opportunities that will come along in the not-too-distant future.

2. Product reviews

Sixty-nine percent of shoppers want product reviews.

It’s a great idea to have them on your site and also to incorporate them into PPC ads using review extensions. Review extensions are finicky, as there are lots of search engine policies related to posting “accurate and current” reviews. It’s not uncommon to have ads disapproved a few times before they get approved.

It’s worth noting that reviews can be no more than 12 months old to appear in Google Trusted Stores, and hence, review extensions. Consistently ask customers to review products, so that review extensions (and seller ratings, for that matter) will continue to appear in your account.

3. Side-by-side product comparisons

Forty-six percent of shoppers want side-by-side product comparisons.

These are effective ways to compare your company products or to compare your product against the products of competitors. Graph or table format tends to be the easiest to read and allows shoppers to better digest information.

Here’s an example from Phillips and some of their natural light wake-up lights:

http://searchengineland.com/figz/wp-content/seloads/2016/10/Screen-Shot-2016-10-02-at-11.34.27-PM-800x472.png

Personally, I like to highlight (or badge) the most popular product. Badging is very effective in improving online conversions, and I’ve seen increases of more than 20 percent when tables include a badge. In the example below, the pro version of the product is the most popular and is denoted using the color blue.

http://searchengineland.com/figz/wp-content/seloads/2016/10/Screen-Shot-2016-10-02-at-11.39.19-PM-800x378.png

This example would have been even better if the blue column were marked “best seller” (or similar wording).

4. Customer testimonials

Forty-two percent of shoppers want customer testimonials.

I find these very useful, especially if there’s a striking difference between you and your competitors.

I work with a company that manufactures a product that’s more expensive than their competitor’s product. Their testimonials highlight other benefits and do an effective job of making the extra cost negligible. The “negative” is offset by the awesome knowledge and customer service.

screen-shot-2016-10-03-at-12-07-27-am

Testimonials effectively encourage people to bite the bullet because they know their overall experience will be good and that they’ll be thrilled with their purchase.

5. Video product demos

Thirty percent of shoppers want video product demos.

This is especially true if the product is complicated or hard to understand. For example, let’s say you sell car replacement parts, and the parts are tricky to install. Here’s an example of videos from 1aauto.com.

screen-shot-2016-10-03-at-12-17-30-am

In PPC, video extensions are a good option to consider. At this point, these are only available in Bing.

6. Live chat with shopping assistant

Twenty-two percent of shoppers want live chat with a shopping assistant.

A good option for this is the ActionLink extension in Bing. We’ve seen higher ad engagement as a result of including this, especially in industries where people have a lot of questions, like home renovations.

7. Links to media coverage of company products

Nine percent of shoppers want links to media coverage of company products.

On sites, people often include “as seen on” and other such credibility indicators. Be sure to also include links to media coverage. I test short video clips of the media coverage on pages. Sometimes, having clips in addition to links to media coverage boosts conversions.