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With millions of businesses out there vying for the same attention, online marketing is essential to promote your products or services. It is increasingly playing a major role in the growth and success of many businesses, it’s easy to set up and manage and cost-effective. And with people increasingly reliant on the internet for everything, it makes sense to connect and communicate with them where they are most active. WFA spoke to two industry experts in the digital marketing space to find out more.
Search Engine Marketing
Charlotte White, Account Executive from Barefruit Marketing says that Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is one of the most important channels to generate web traffic to your website.
“It’s the process of increasing website visibility on search engine results pages though paid search advertising. Essentially, you are paying to rank first when someone searches with a keyword on Google. If Google Ads, previously known as AdWords, rings a bell, this is what we are talking about, says White.
Bidding on keywords
“Google Ads allows you to bid on keywords so that ads, which look like a link to your website, are shown to people searching online. You bid against other advertisers for the right to have your ad shown when someone searches using a specific keyword. You only pay, however, when a user clicks on your ad. By setting a daily budget, you can cap the amount that you spend each day.”
More than just Search
White says that while SEM is great for attracting those who are searching for particular keywords, Google Ads also provides the opportunity to create and serve digital ads across the internet. By advertising on the Google Display Network, your ads can be shown on millions of sites, such as YouTube, eBay and Gumtree.
Somfy Oceania’s Marketing Executive Mary Ladu concurs:
“There are many methods you can employ to boost your online marketing, but there are two we particularly love at Somfy – Facebook Advertising and Search Engine Marketing (SEM),” says Ladu
“At Somfy, we’ve found SEM is a cost-effective method in helping the business grow when used in conjunction with Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), and it can give instant brand awareness in search engines making it both fast and affordable.”
SEM also works hand-in-hand with Facebook advertising to effectively increase brand awareness and help with remarketing objectives.
“Somfy’s approach has been to utilise both Facebook advertising and SEM to give our audience multiple touchpoints, furthering the buyer’s journey towards becoming a paying customer.”
Marketing experts estimate that a person has between 7-13 touch points with a business before converting. Every time they see you on social, in search engines and even in their inbox, you’re reinforcing your brand with that individual.
Both mediums give you the opportunity to reach your audience at a lower cost.
“We found quite early on that using digital mediums was more cost-effective because we were able to advertise to Somfy’s exact target audience.”
Instead of paying a large sum to reach thousands of people within a broad demographic as you would with TV advertising, you can specify a narrow audience to increase your conversion rate.
“When an ad is not working, it’s very easy for us to quickly change and optimise it to get better results,” says Ladu.
“Google Analytics gives us the ability to directly attribute a conversion to a specific Somfy ad, so we know exactly what’s working and what isn’t. You can see how many people clicked the ad, the journey they took through our website, how much time they spent on the website and even which page they exited the website from. There is a fountain of knowledge about your customers available right at your fingertips.”
White says that approximately 83% of Australians (aged 13+) have an active social media account. And so, no business can afford to ignore Facebook as a channel for advertising. “Facebook ads are simple to set up, easy to manage and editable at any time. You can be so responsive and creative with advertising when ads can be quickly put live, edited or turned off. What’s more, you can set campaign and daily budgets to manage media spend, and you only pay when someone clicks on your ad.”
Why Facebook Ads are great
“The most impressive feature of Facebook Advertising is the ability to target ads to Facebook users based on their aged, location, interests and online behaviour. This way, you’re not wasting precious marketing budget on people who couldn’t care less about your business offering.”
“What we love the most about Facebook ads is that you can select your ads to be shown to people who are more likely to click on a link, add a product to a cart or even make a transaction. Essentially, Facebook has so much data on each individual user, that it is now possible to target people based on how they are predicted to act when served your ad,” White says.
Things to keep in mind
Last year Apple announced product and policy changes that will affect how data is shared across iOS, coming into effect in January 2021. The new iOS 14 update will force people to opt-in for their data to be tracked on their mobile device and across the web. By opting out, Apple’s proposed changes will limit the ability to effectively reach, understand and engage people on Apple devices. Over time, you may see an overall decrease in ad performance and personalisation and an increase in cost per action.
“To ensure your Facebook advertising isn’t affected too greatly by this change, it is important to verify your domain in Facebook Ads Manager. Facebook has videos and instructions to help you verify your domain,” White says.
“We’ve seen how online marketing has increased sales for clients, time and time again. It’s an essential part of any marketing strategy for any business.
TOP TIPS FOR ONLINE MARKETING FROM SOMFY’S MARY LADU:
Research your audience and your competition – Learn how your potential customers and your competitors are using Facebook and search engines. This will help you determine your ad content, including your keywords (both positive and negative). Analyse data on your existing customers and target an audience similar to them to ensure your ads are only being shown to the most relevant audience and that you’re not wasting ad spend. You can layer in filters for your target audience including interests, demographics and geographic location to target local customers.
Set a budget – “It sounds like a no-brainer but ensuring you set a realistic budget which can then be split into daily ad spend will keep you on track and prevent your ads overspending on your behalf,” says Ladu. Both Facebook advertising and SEM make it easy for you to start small, test a few things out and see what works until you get the right formula for your business. As ROI increases, you can increase your daily ad spend, remove ads that aren’t working and refine existing campaigns.
Set clear goals – The easiest way to find out if your campaign is working is to set clear goals before you start. Do you want people to submit an enquiry? Download a brochure? Purchase something from your online store? All of these goals can be tracked in your analytics tool and will quickly help you see which ads are working and which need to be removed or optimised.
Update your website – Ensure your audience is having a seamless experience from search results, to Facebook, to your website. Your landing page copy and design is just as vital as the ad content. It is the final step in the journey in influencing them. Have a clear Call to Action and make it easy for your audience to complete the goal i.e. submit an enquiry, download a brochure or give you a call.
Analyse and optimise – These two actions are crucial in all aspects of business and are particularly easy to do with digital marketing. “With so many analytics tools available, it’s simple to review your ad performance and make quick tweaks such as adding new keywords, changing ad copy or adjusting your keyword bids.”
