Myths and truths about digital marketing » Portal Insights

Have you ever stopped to think about the changes that have occurred due to digital marketing? Until ten years ago, marketing strategies were heavily focused on offline advertising and design. The goal was to get everyone's attention, all the time. The campaigns wanted to reach the masses – at most, a segment of the public.

As time went by, companies began to realize that the internet could be a good tool for promoting brands, products, services and even ideas.

Going back a little in history, the internet was created in 1969 to facilitate the exchange of war information. However, it was only in the 1990s, with the creation of the first browser, that the tool became accessible to civilians for domestic use.

Today, the internet is not only in homes and businesses, but in people's hands. With our cell phones, we do practically everything: payments, price research, shopping, games… there are no limits to what a 4G can do.

This is where digital marketing comes in. After all, why not make use of technologies to undertake digital marketing, delight the customer and make a profit?

The era of digital marketing

Currently, it is very difficult for a business to survive without digital marketing. With much of the world connected, billions of people have access to the most varied information without leaving their place.

In the online environment, it is possible to use digital channels, such as blogs, websites, social networks, emails and other tools to solve the pains and desires of customers or potential customers.

Remember what we mentioned earlier that marketing used to try to reach the masses? So it is. Today, one of its purposes is to reach the right individual at the right time. Through a series of algorithms, it is easier to discover the desires, needs and purchase moment of those interested in a product or service.

This is because, on the web, communication flows more easily, favoring the use of more agile techniques, which increase the network and make brands and products increasingly known.

Digital marketing is a path of no return. In fact, it came to add to other business strategies, enabling results to be measured to create an intense relationship with the consumer.

However, even with the advancement of Digital Marketing, which is renewed every day, there are still entrepreneurs who are resistant to this concept. This is due to a lot of erroneous and distorted information disseminated on the internet and in other media outlets.

We have separated three myths and three truths regarding the topic that will further clarify horizons and improve prospects for the future of your business.

Myth 1: Digital marketing replaces traditional marketing

The first thing to understand in this matter is that, unlike traditional marketing, digital marketing cannot be considered a strategy.

To begin with, there is something within marketing, widely disseminated by Philip Kotler, called Marketing Mix. The concept basically represents the four fundamental pillars of any marketing strategy:

• price;
• square;
• product;
• promotion.

Therefore, traditional marketing is a robust tool of which digital marketing is a part, being included in the “place” category, also understood as channel or media.

Therefore, digital marketing does not replace the other variables that determine marketing success, such as pricing based on seasonality, printed pieces, product development, customer success and commercial strategy for sales, among other examples.

Myth 2: Digital Marketing is cheaper

This is yet another myth propagated by the media. After all, the concept of expensive and cheap is totally relative. Let's see:

Invest in banners on the network Display of Google it can be considered cheap when we see the CPC (Cost Per Click) lower than other placements. But, if we take into account that the CTR (Click Per Impression) is no more than 0.5%, while the positioning in Google search it can be up to 20% in some markets, what is cheap is expensive.

On the other hand, offline strategies, considered expensive, can obtain good results, satisfactorily compensating for the cost invested. For example: making business cards can yield more contacts and possible commercial transactions than a one-day ad on Google.

In a way, cards are financially more expensive, especially if we take into account the time and effort involved in distributing them across different parts of the city. But, in the end, they can give as much or more qualified returns than ads promoted on social media.

Of course, when defining the strategy to be used in your campaign, you need to consider several factors, such as target audience, seasonality and learning curve. However, it is not possible to say that digital marketing is cheaper than other advertising tools.

Myth 3: You need to be active on social media

You may have heard many managers of agencies and companies that sell social media tools say that digital marketing, as a communication channel, requires a presence on social media.

It is believed that, nowadays, having pages on Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn is essential for relationships with customers. After all, it is through them that contacts are kept active and possible sales can be closed.

But get ready for the bombshell we're going to tell you: there are companies out there making a lot of money without having official pages on any social network.

It turns out that not everything on social media is rosy. There are some disadvantages, such as, for example, the reduction in the organic reach of posts for business profiles and the extremely segmented audience.

There are businesses, such as restaurants, that do not look for kitchenware suppliers on Instagram. Some may even do this, but generally this market is driven by sales representatives and more complex sales processes.

Of course, if there is funding, the ideal is to be present in all channels that can help the company. However, if you have to make choices, social media is not always worth it.

Truth highlighted

There are many myths surrounding this topic, but we cannot fail to highlight the true facts that can considerably improve the performance of a company that uses digital marketing.

Truth 1: Yes, knowing your target audience is important

Defining the target audience is one of the main steps in planning any campaign or business. After all, your identification is what will offer opportunities to the enterprise and help position the brand in the market.

However, in digital marketing, there is a deepening of this concept, called buyer persona. This is a semi-fictional representation of your real client. In other words, it is a slightly more detailed description of the target audience.

More than describing details, such as age, sex and social class, it is necessary to include behavior patterns, motivations and life goals.

Identifying a persona or target audience is not a simple task. It takes research, conversations and getting closer to this potential client for the strategy used to be effective.

Want an example? If you are going to develop planning for a company you have never heard of, there is no point in creating a buyer persona just with Google searches. You will need details that you will only get by talking to the managers and target audience of that company.

Experienced professionals, when they come together to define the persona, in a way already know who the audience is. However, personal contact offers you something that you can't find in other tools: insight.

Having a sudden understanding of a given situation can guarantee a more precise definition of your target audience’s desires.

Truth 2: You will need to build content

If you've drawn up the planning and have already defined your buyer persona, it's time to get the attention of your target audience.

For this to happen you need to provide information to your customers, or potential customers, through content. It is essential to transform information about the product, brand or service into easy, creative and accessible language for your persona.

Content, in digital marketing, can have various formats: texts for blogs, videos, podcasts and email marketing are just a few examples. It is worth remembering that the most important thing is that the content is diverse and useful.

Therefore, do deeper research on the topic and describe your text, but not only with the technical and conceptual part. Involve feelings, everyday situations and, above all, true information. The more surprising and sincere your content, the more people will read it and, possibly, interact with the brand.

Consistent content not only guarantees famous “views”, but is the path to building trust, credibility and reputation.

Truth 3: People’s attention is the most valuable asset

Time is the only asset for which we have no return: the more time we spend, the less we have. Therefore, the brand must always keep in mind that people's attention is just as precious as time.

Those 15 seconds that someone takes the time to check an Instagram story, for example, are of immense value and can have an indelible impact on the consumer. It is essential, therefore, to think about useful content that catches and holds people’s attention.

Making them care enough to stop what they are doing to pay attention to what the company says is difficult; however, those who achieve the feat are one step ahead in the race for public loyalty.