Internet Marketing 101 and its Types

Internet Marketing or Online Advertising is a widely used PR & Marketing process adopted by almost every commercial brand and company out there. It is the lifeline of commerce and each day sees more and more companies using the online platform to reach out to their existing customers as well as blinding new client bases.

Internet Marketing usually involves a publishing party, who generates the content for advertisements and branding, and an Advertising party, who publishes the generated content to the designated sites and portals.

Internet Marketing is a highly successful and rapidly growing industry. The year 2011 saw the revenue rates outgrow that of cable and broadcasting television networks. There are various methods through which Online advertising helps generate revenue such as:

1. Cost per mile (CPM)
   CPM basically refers to a process in which the advertisers pay an agreed rate per thousand displays of their message by potential customers, to the publishers. The publishers use many intuitive methods to increase page views.
2. Cost per click (CPC)
   CPC also known as Pay per Click (PPC) refers to a process where the advertisers pay the publisher every time a customer clicks on their published ads. Many prefer CPC over any other technique and as a result CPC has overshadowed CPM in terms of preferable mode of compensation for the publishers as well as the advertisers.
3. Fixed Cost
   Another popular revenue generation process is Fixed Cost. This entitles the advertiser to pay a lump sum amount of money, generally after an agreed fixed period of time, despite the number of clicks or customer visits.

Different types of Internet Marketing Techniques

Type #1: Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

SEM is a technique which involves promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in SERPs by optimization and advertising. SEM tends to use Search Engine Optimization (SEO), which enables rewriting and re-adjustments of the website content so as to achieve a higher ranking in search engine results pages like Google, Yahoo or Bing, etc.

Many Search Engine Marketing Companies have sh-roomed up in recent times and they work on creating unique PR and marketing strategies for them or their client’s websites so as to help boost their Search engine ranks.

There are various processes that the SEMs use to optimize the site rankings:-

• Keyword Search and Analysis
• Website Saturation and Popularity
• Back End Tools
• Whois Tools

Type #2: Email Mailing

Email Mailing is the process which was used as a means of online marketing during the birth of Internet Marketing. IT involves direct communication of a commercial message to a group of people using email.

It usually involves sending out ads, proposals, sales pitches etc. in order to generate trust and strong client base. Email marketing is usually done to either consolidate relations with existing client and customer database or to add new ones.

There are usually two types of Email Marketing:

• Transactional Emails
• Direct Emails

Type #3: Referral Marketing

Referral Marketing is a process to increase marketing through word-of-mouth approach. This is usually done by encouraging the customers and contacts to talk and spread word about a brand or product, as much as is possible.

Online referral marketing uses digital marketing platform such as the internet to market its content to its client base. The publishers traces customer behavior online through their digital PR & Marketing team or sometimes hire an external advertising agency to do the process.

Online referral marketing has proven to be more beneficial than traditional offline referral marketing models. Offline referral marketers use traceable business cards, that contain QR codes which connects them to their respective online contents for sale, while providing a way to track that sale back to the business card owner.

Type #4: Content Marketing

Content Marketing is a type of internet marketing that enables creation of quality content be it media or any form of publishing to various customers, sites or pages in order to induce customer relation and build client base. The information type for content marketing ranges from White Paper, newsletter, articles, Blogs, Videos, Info-graphics, Case-studies etc.

Content Marketing in today’s generation is the most valuable source for generating revenue as well as client base. Even though there are thousands of content being published every day across the world, but business goes to those who have a unique material. Thus, content is considered to be the king. A piece of content can literally make or break a business.

Major Benefits of Content Marketing are:

• Content marketing helps in generating more sales efficiently
• Content marketing puts you in the spotlight and reflects you as innovative and thoughtful
• Content marketing involves cheaper investments as compared to other forms of marketing
• Content marketing helps build valuable customer relations
• Content marketing done right, can help enhance your brand value

Type #5: Social Media Marketing

Social Media marketing involves sharing ads and product or company information via Social media Platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+ etc. Social Media Marketing campaigns usually focus on creating unique promotional posts, videos or content in general, so as to engage the social media audience in their campaigns. The audience then usually shares these contents amongst their peer circles and in this way the brand value increases s and the company gains reputation and a strong client base.

In the context of the social web, engagement involves having the customers and stakeholders not just as viewers but also participants and potential clients. Social media when integrated with business enables anyone and everyone to think, create and share their ideas and opinions to promote and propagate the business. Each involved individual becomes a part of the marketing cog, and functions in their own right to further the brand name and products or simply generate great traffic.

Social Media marketing thrives on audience engagement and the marketing strategy for social media campaigns need to be precise, unique and attractive enough to loop in the audience and push their product.

Conclusion

Internet Marketing is more focus on the reputation and ranking of your site’s. With the help of various strategies of Online Internet Marketing, you can boost your business at the top rank. If you want to get the top ranking of your site’s, please hire an SEO Company. The SEO expert will help you to get ranked high. Search Engine Optimization is also the part of Internet Marketing. Before hiring an SEO Company, please read carefully the services of the Company.

About the Author!

Savita Gehlawat is primary contributor to this Guest Post. She is a professional content writer. Now, she is working with SaffronSEO. She loves music, ethical hacking and reading digital marketing strategy.