Marketing Fundamentals
Module 5: Digital Marketing Essentials
Learning Objectives
- Understand the digital marketing landscape
- Recognize website's role in marketing
- Explain social media marketing basics
- Understand email marketing fundamentals
- Grasp SEO and content marketing concepts
- Identify when and how to use paid advertising
Key Concepts
Why Digital Marketing Matters
- Global reach
- Precise targeting
- Measurability
- Cost-effectiveness
- Interactivity
- Real-time agility
Website Fundamentals
Essential Elements:
- Purpose clarity (what do you want to accomplish?)
- User experience (intuitive navigation, clear hierarchy, fast loading, mobile-friendly, accessible)
- Essential pages (homepage, about, products/services, contact, blog)
- Clear calls-to-action
- Trust elements (testimonials, trust badges, contact info, professional design)
Landing Pages: Standalone pages for specific campaigns with single goals
Social Media Marketing
Platform Selection:
- Facebook: Largest, diverse demographics, community building
- Instagram: Visual, younger demographic, lifestyle brands
- LinkedIn: Professional network, B2B marketing
- Twitter/X: Real-time, conversations, news
- TikTok: Short video, younger audience, creative content
- YouTube: Long-form video, tutorials, demonstrations
Strategy Components:
- Clear goals (awareness, traffic, leads, engagement, sales)
- Content pillars (3-5 themes)
- Content mix (educational, entertaining, inspirational, promotional, conversational)
- Consistent posting frequency
- Active engagement
Best Practices:
- Lead with value
- Strong visuals
- Compelling captions
- Strategic hashtags
- Post when audience is active
- Monitor and respond promptly
Email Marketing
Building Lists: Website signups, lead magnets, checkout opt-ins, social promotion (never buy lists)
Email Types:
- Welcome emails (highest open rates)
- Newsletters (regular updates)
- Promotional (sales, offers)
- Educational (teaching content)
- Transactional (confirmations, receipts)
- Re-engagement (inactive subscribers)
Best Practices:
- Subject lines under 50 characters
- Personalization and segmentation
- Mobile optimization
- Clear CTAs
- Optimal timing
- Easy unsubscribe
Key Metrics: Open rate, click-through rate, conversion rate, unsubscribe rate, bounce rate
SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
How Search Works: Crawl → Index → Rank
On-Page SEO:
- Keywords naturally incorporated
- Quality content
- Title tags and meta descriptions
- Clean URL structure
- Internal linking
- Mobile-friendliness
- Fast page speed
Off-Page SEO:
- Backlinks (quality over quantity)
- Social signals
- Brand mentions
Local SEO: Google Business Profile, local keywords, consistent NAP, reviews
Content Marketing Creating valuable content to attract and retain audiences.
Content Types: Blog posts, videos, podcasts, infographics, ebooks, case studies, webinars, tools
Strategy: Audience focus, quality over quantity, consistency, active distribution, SEO integration
Paid Digital Advertising
Search Advertising (PPC): Ads in search results, pay per click, high intent
Social Media Ads: Platform-based targeting, visual formats, various objectives
Display Advertising: Banner ads, retargeting, broad reach
Video Advertising: YouTube, social platforms, engaging format
Best Practices: Start small, clear objectives, precise targeting, compelling creative, aligned landing pages, conversion tracking, continuous testing
Exercise
Conduct digital marketing audit: website assessment, social media review, content evaluation, email marketing analysis, advertising observation, identify gaps and prioritize improvements.