7 Most Valued Digital Marketing Skills

Reading Time: 4 minutes

When it comes to digital marketing, there’s no shortage of options. From content creation to advertising, here’s a look at the seven most valued digital marketing skills and how they can help your business succeed. These skills are in high demand and can help you stand out from the competition. If you’re looking to move up in your career or switch industries, these are some of the most valuable skills to have on your resume. The world of digital marketing is always changing, which means that there are always new skills to learn in order to stay competitive.

1) Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the practice of improving the visibility of a website or a web page in search engine results pages (SERPs). It’s one of the most valuable skills to have, but it can be difficult to master.

“As an entrepreneur and digital marketing professional, you’ll need to know how search engines work in order for your business’ website content to rank well on Google, Bing, Yahoo and other major sites. But if you’re just starting out as an entrepreneur or digital marketer who wants their own company name on the first page of SERPs without spending thousands on paid advertisements – then SEO is for you!” says Helen Ferris, Founder at Imaginemaids.

2) Content Marketing

Content marketing is the process of creating and distributing valuable, relevant and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience – with the objective of driving profitable customer action.

Daniel Foley, Head of Content at SEO-Audits.io adds, “It can be used to build your brand, generate leads and drive sales. Content marketing is one of the most effective ways to connect with your customers online by providing them with what they want when they need it most.”

3) Video Marketing

“Video marketing is a great way to engage your audience. It can be used in many different ways, such as promoting your brand, products and services; educating customers about them; showing how products or services work. Video marketing is one of the most powerful tools you can use to build your brand, promote products and services, and generate leads. Video marketing works best when it’s entertaining, educational or inspiring,” says Alice Rowen Hall,  Co-Founder at Rowen Homes.

4) Digital Advertising

Digital advertising is an effective way to reach your target audience. It involves placing ads on digital platforms like Facebook, Google Search, and Instagram. PPC stands for pay-per-click marketing and it allows you to bid on keywords related to your business in order to get more traffic from those ads.

According to Daniel Foley, Founder of Daniel Foley SEO Consultancy, “Social media advertising can be used to increase awareness of your brand or product through the promotion of its content on social media channels like Twitter, and Facebook, etc., influencer marketing allows you to connect with influential people who might share your message or promote your products/services depending upon their interest levels towards them (i.e., if they’re following a particular sport). Native advertising refers specifically to non-promotional sponsored posts/articles that don’t look like advertisements but still get shared by users.”

5) Social Media

Social media is a form of communication that involves the sharing of information (e.g., pictures, and videos) via social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Social media marketing is the process of creating and distributing content for social networks for purposes such as brand awareness or product sales.

“Social media networks are used by businesses to promote their products and services to potential customers. This can be done in many ways including posting links to your website on Facebook or Twitter so people can follow them there; sharing images with other users on these sites; creating groups within these websites where you can discuss topics related to what you do – this way it feels more like a community than just another page on the Internet!” speaks Holly Cooper, Content Head at Unagi Scooters.

6) Email Marketing

“Email marketing is the best way to reach your customers. It can be used to sell products and services, collect customer data, and help you stay in touch with current and potential customers. Automated email campaigns are great because they allow you to send emails at any time of day or night without having to worry about managing multiple accounts or scheduling times when everyone will be available. You can also use automated emails for lead generation campaigns by using them as part of an opt-in form on your website or landing page so that visitors who visit your site are automatically added to one big list of subscribers who receive weekly updates from you via email (and hopefully buy from you, too),”  mentions Andrew Cooper, Owner at Simply E-Liquid.

7) Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO)

Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the process of improving the performance of a website or web-based application. CRO is the process of testing different elements of a website to see what works best. It’s also about measuring and improving your website’s performance, so users can get a better experience when they visit it.

“The goal of CRO is to increase conversions from visitors who are not yet ready to buy something from you but may be interested in something else instead. You need these people on board before they leave without converting into buyers because their time spent on your site could have been used elsewhere if they had gone somewhere else first!” adds Paul Somerville, Editor-in-Chief at Electric Scooter Guide.

The most valued digital marketing skills are those that drive customer interactions and analytics. They will also drive customer interactions and analytics. 

With a strong understanding of how people interact with your brand, you can measure their behavior in order to improve the overall customer experience. This can mean anything from understanding what content performs well on social media platforms to measuring the effectiveness of your paid advertising campaigns.

In order to achieve this goal, it’s important for marketers to have an understanding of data-driven decision-making processes such as A/B testing and segmentation (which allows you to create targeted ad audiences). It also helps if you know how customers use technology like smartphones or wearables so you can make sure they’re seeing relevant ads at all times.

Conclusion

The digital marketing skills that have emerged as the most sought-after are those that drive customer interactions and analytics. These skills complement a company’s existing offerings, allowing for deeper engagement with customers, more effective marketing campaigns, and better ROI on investments. As technology continues to advance at an exponential rate, so does our ability to use it effectively in order to get ahead of our competition.

5 Digital Marketing Trends For 2021 And Beyond

Reading Time: 6 minutes

2021 is moving faster than we anticipated. 

Local SEO, Mobile-first Indexing, Featured Snippets, Page Speed, etc., were popular digital marketing trends at one time.

As of today, most business owners and digital marketing professionals have them on their priority lists.

But, that’s not all. 

The winds of change are all over again.

Now, ambitious concepts like augmented reality, shoppable posts, and chatbots are emerging. 

They’ve inspired new digital marketing trends, which are sure to dominate the rest of 2021 and beyond.

So, let’s dive into the upcoming digital marketing trends and understand how they will help businesses.

But before that, let’s check your website’s health.

Audit Your Website

Before running any digital marketing campaigns for your website, you must analyze its health.

It will help you identify any underlying issue or problem that can negatively impact your campaign’s performance.

You can fix those issues beforehand and save yourself from wasting a lot of bucks!

For a quick and easy analysis, you can use a free website analyzer tool, and it will instantly show you all the errors on your site.

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You can fix these errors to prepare your site for future digital marketing campaigns and prevent any losses that might be accountable to them.

If everything is fine in the website audit report, you are good to go with your digital plan. 

In a nutshell, being cautious and proactive always helps!

With that, it’s time for us to look at the new digital marketing trends for 2021 and beyond.

Digital Marketing Trends For 2021 & Beyond

Trends symbolize progress. If you don’t keep up with them, you are simply not growing. 

Here are the upcoming digital marketing trends that urge you to get creative or else get left behind.

1. In-Email Purchases To Be Common

Personalized emails, sophisticatedly targeted and tailored to the user, can deliver 6 times higher transactional rates.

When you combine email marketing with retargeting efforts, you can trigger and lead users into buying your products or services.

But, they generally don’t like a lengthy process, even when they are ready to purchase. 

You have to keep it short and give users an instant buying option: in-email purchases. 

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When you email a person, ‘Hey, you were looking for this product on our site and, we got an exciting offer or discount just for you.’, you lure them.

Tell them more, ‘This offer is valid only for today, and we’d suggest you click the button below to buy it instantly. Don’t worry, we won’t take you out of your inbox.’, and they will be triggered.

Result: They make a purchase. You make a sale.

ECommerce sites will find this digital marketing trend quite fascinating, as it might give them a better ROI than their other digital marketing strategies.

And as more and more businesses add this to their digital plan, it will be normal to buy from our inboxes!

2. Shoppable Posts/Stories Pick Up Pace

As online shopping continues to grow, social media shopping seems to be picking up pace. 

While the ‘Buy Now’ button was already there on most social media platforms, ‘shoppable posts and stories’ have further boosted social buying.

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In 2020, 16% of US Consumers indulged in shopping via social channels. This is up from 12% of shoppers who said the same in 2019. 

I hear you ask why?

Because users don’t have to switch between apps when they are in the moment of buying, plus, they don’t have to sign in to an unknown store. They can make payments and checkout from the social media app only.

Using the shoppable options, eCommerce brands create interactive ads and sell products in a much easier way. 

That said, shoppable posts and stories are now a buzzword among digital marketers. It’s gaining popularity and is a great way to leverage the massive potential of social media platforms.

3. Chatbots Driven Sales Will Boom

A chatbot is an AI-driven technology

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Originally, chatbots helped businesses automate their customer support process by:

  • Providing round the clock service
  • Giving instant responses
  • Answering simple questions
  • Solving common problems
  • Resolving multiple queries simultaneously
  • Serving each customer individually

And by 2020, nearly 80% of businesses had included chatbots in their digital strategy. 

But, the use of chatbots has gone a lot farther from just providing customer support.

As chatbots evolve and learn from the available data, they can perform many other tasks. 

One of them is generating sales. By guiding users to make informed buying decisions, chatbots can help businesses multiply their profits.

Digital Marketing,Digital Marketing Trends,5 Digital Marketing Trends For 2021 And Beyond,Audit Your Website,In-Email Purchases,Shoppable Posts,social media shopping,Chatbots,Voice Shopping,Augmented Reality

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They can offer personalized suggestions to the customers using the customer’s buying and browsing history and make sales happen.

In this way, chatbots help businesses generate more sales. And trust me, they are getting good at it with time.

As per an estimate, chatbots will help in reducing business costs by $8 billion by 2022. They’d not only be providing customer support but also driving sales. 

Hence, chatbot-driven sales will boom, and they’ll dominate the digital marketing trends in years to come.

4. Voice Shopping Goes Upward

In 2020, 24% of Americans or around 60 million people owned a smart speaker. 

This is up from 21% in 2019, and by 2022, 55% of all American households will have a smart speaker.

That said, more and more people are using voice-enabled devices to perform voice searches.

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Recently, people have started voice shopping. They are issuing commands to their voice assistant to search for products and services. 

After careful analysis, they are buying what they need with the help of voice assistants. 

Thus, voice-enabled devices such as smart speakers have become an efficient sales channel.

Businesses are now optimizing for voice searches and implementing ideas that make voice shopping more lucrative.

They are fostering innovative voice interaction strategies to get on user’s shopping lists and drive more sales.

With that, voice shopping will be one of the fast-growing digital marketing trends in years to come. 

5. Augmented Reality Unveils New Possibilities

Augmented reality offers an interactive experience to the users. 

It helps them explore new things by offering computer-generated perceptual information in real-world environments.

For example, users can now feel how makeup items will look on their faces before buying them. 

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Or, they can get an idea about how a furniture item they are planning to buy will look in their room. 

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Also, if they spot a new car in their neighborhood, AR will help them identify and learn more about it.

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By 2023, there will be approximately 2.4 billion mobile AR users worldwide, a rise of 2.2 billion from the 200 million in 2015.

Thus, augmented reality is of great interest to businesses and will shape an important digital marketing trend in the future.

The Winds Are Changing Fast

Technology, innovation, and user adoption are key drivers of changes in the digital world. 

They bring new ideas and concepts to the table, inspiring marketing trends and influencing business decisions. 

As a part of the digital world, you must look ahead of time and embrace the new trends well in time to outperform your competitors.

If you miss out on them, someone else will attract all your customers and sales, leaving you repenting forever.

So, watch out for the latest trends and think of innovative strategies to grow your business.

According to you, which digital marketing trends mentioned above will dominate in the future? What’s that one trend you’ll be optimizing for? Drop your views in the comments below.

This is guest post by Sahil Kakkar.

Sahil is the CEO and Founder of Rankwatch – a platform, which helps companies and brands stay ahead with their SEO efforts in the ever-growing internet landscape.

He likes making creative products that can help in automation of mundane tasks and he can spend endless nights implementing new technologies and ideas.

You can connect with him and the Rankwatch team on Facebook or Twitter.

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