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Advertising has always been a cost factor for businesses. Of course, you need it, but at the same time, you’re aware that that might take up a large portion of your budget. Traditional advertising, in particular, can be very expensive.
Luckily, many digital marketing strategies can help grow your brand, generate leads, and make sales while remaining affordable and cost-effective. Combine them all, and you have a powerful digital marketing campaign.
We have five of the best cost-effective strategies available for you to maximize below.
Five Cost-Effective Digital Marketing Strategies
Utilizing the Basics of SEO
Let’s start with the most obvious and important one: SEO (Search Engine Optimization).
If you’re a business owner looking to grow your organization online, SEO is pivotal to its success.
As Search Engine Land says,
“[SEO] is a fundamental part of digital marketing because people conduct trillions of searches every year, often with commercial intent to find information about products and services,” before noting that “greater visibility and ranking higher in search results can have a material impact on your bottom line.”
You want your business’ website to be at the top of those rankings so that you can capitalize on your users’ searches. And getting to those top positions isn’t as expensive as most people think.
While there are many strands to it, the basics, such as keyword insertion, building cross, and outbound links, creating engaging content with multimedia, and having simple site navigation, can be easily administered within a budget.
As search inquiries are organic results, it’s only natural that the SEO process and implementation are organic itself. Although it might take longer to see results, those results won’t cost you as much as other digital marketing strategies, making SEO a prime choice to kick off your online marketing campaign.
Connecting with Existing and Prospective Customers on Social Media
How great is it that the likes of Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter allow you to communicate with your customers for free?
Although there are paid features on these social media platforms, you don’t have to use them. Instead, you can maximize the potential of your page by creating engaging content and connecting with current and prospective customers.
Primarily, you have to create “content of value” for your customers, such as “how-to” blog guides and articles, special promotions, celebrating moments, linking to industry-related articles, and being part of major social issues. This level of positive publicity can result in better growth for your brand and customer relationships.
Concerning the cost, well, we did mention that it was for free. And even if you did use social media advertising to promote your page, it’s minimal.
Just consider this interesting stat: “The CPM (cost per thousand impressions) on social media can be as low as $2.50. This is 3x less expensive than advertising through traditional media.”
No matter how small your budget is, you can still make a positive impact, generating leads for your business.
Remarketing Across Multiple Channels
If you are worried that you lost the conversion of a customer that visited your website, you can relax. It’s surprisingly very common, and you can easily get them back with remarketing.
Remarketing is follow-up ads that your customer sees once they have left your website. For example, you might notice a banner advert of a site you once visited on another page (like the example below). That’s remarketing, and it’s a highly useful and cost-effective tool in your arsenal.
It offers several benefits, such as building your brand’s visibility (like traditional advertising), attracting more leads, and potentially more customers. It can also be shown on multiple channels, such as website ads, social media, and even through automatic emails.
Although the return on investment might not be as high–only “26% of customers will return to a site through retargeting (with 7.37% of users responding to special offers in the Ads)” when you consider the cost-outlay for it, it’s worth it.
As MailChimp states:
“Analysis shows that you pay approximately $2.28 to reach 1,000 viewers,” as opposed to pay-per-click ads, which “costs $35.09 to reach the same number of people.” Ultimately, that means businesses “save more than $32 per 1,000 views.“
Maximizing Google Maps Presence with Ads
If you have the perfect location for your business, then you must maximize it.
Google Maps is one of the most used search engines with users wanting to find products or services close to them. That’s why you need to create Google Maps Ads (check the picture below and notice the circled business) to grab your audience’s attention.
If you want some more proof of how effective this campaign is, consider the following stats:
- 84% of consumers conduct local searches
- 75% of consumers who search up for a product or location nearby are more likely to visit a store within the next 24 hours,
- 28% of these searches end up as a sale
There are also the added benefits of increased traffic to your website, leading to more on-page conversions and leads. You’ll also boost your brand’s awareness online and on Google Maps and reach more customers, particularly those using mobile devices for searches.
Finally, it helps customers understand more about your business as it links to your Google My Business page, which details your N-A-P, customer reviews and rating, announcements, photos, and store hours.
So, how much do Google Map Ads cost?
While it is still technically a pay-per-click advertisement, it is cheaper than others. As stated by WordSteam:
“the overall average CPC in Google Ads is between $1 and $2. That’s on the Search Network [Regular Google]. On the Google Display network [which is Maps], clicks tend to be cheaper, averaging under $1.”
But perhaps the most significant factor is that Google Maps Ads are relatively new and haven’t been maximized enough by businesses. So you can get a headstart on your competitors!
Traditional Email Marketing
A little email never hurt anyone.
If you think that email marketing is out-of-date, think again: “42% with more than 500 subscribers say their email marketing strategies are effective or very effective”. So why’s that the case?
Because it provides a direct communication line with your customers, whereas banner and PPC advertising, and social media platforms, require the user to search the right terms and be on the network at the right time. Email marketing is consistent and always present.
It directly targets the audience, ensuring they get viable and useful information that can prove beneficial. It helps build relationships with new and existing customers (helping retention) while promoting your brand and word of mouth (with existing clients passing your good work onto others).
There’s also the key point that email marketing drives conversions, with “the average click-through rate of an email campaign is around 3% (of total recipients), whereas the average click-through rate from a tweet is around 0.5%.”
As for the budget, it’s nothing compared to other digital marketing. “For every $1 spent, email marketing generates $38 in ROI”, making email marketing “the channel generating the highest ROI for marketers.”
All you need to do is create engaging and personalized content that appeals to your audience, enticing them to convert to your page. It’s that simple and affordable.
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