7 digital marketing best practices for startups

Digital Marketing best practices for startups in Dubai

1 Video Marketing

This is a useful technique to get your target audience engaged with your brand in a way that is easy to understand. The secret to success is to market the brand’s story, products and services
by connecting with the existing and potential customers at an emotional level. As per recent analytics (Hubspot/The-Ultimate- Guide-to-Video-Marketing2020), 78% viewers watch video content per week, and 55% daily.

Meanwhile, recent survey (Hubspot/The-Ultimate-Guide-to-Video-Marketing2020), results conclude that 72% of customers prefer to know a brand, product and service through a video. Invest in video marketing today!

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2 Influencers Marketing

We are talking about a collaboration between your brand and individuals who have a significant influence to endorse it. Influencers drive traffic, increase awareness and bolster your lead generation
efforts. Recent study shows that 19% of marketers will spend $1,000 – $10,000 per year on influencer marketing in 2020, while 18% are spending between $100,000 – $500,000 per year. 7% of companies plan to invest over a million dollars in influencer marketing in 2020 (source: Big Commerce/Rochelle Bailis- Blog/Influencer- Marketing-Statistics). Evidently, influencer marketing is an option you cannot ignore.

3 Website Marketing

The website of the company is the key platform where clients can learn about your brand and take actions that lead directly to the growth of your business. The implementation of search engine
optimization (SEO), content marketing plan and social media engagement – are key objectives to get people to visit your website more. Given the current circumstances, the website becomes a
means of interactive content for your existing and potential customers. By using virtual tours, contests, games, live Q&As, hosting web events and such you can increase visits and Time-on-Site (TOS).

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4 Social Media Marketing

Social Media Marketing has today become an indispensable part of your digital marketing strategy. With everybody jumping on this bandwagon, the trick is to be unique, bordering on sensationalism.
It has to be seamlessly integrated with video and influencer marketing.
Here are some questions to ask when defining your social media marketing goals:

1) What is the one thing about your brand the customers do not know about and how will it be useful to them?
2) Who is best suited to talk about your brand to your target audience?
3) Where would your target audience hang out and how would they use social media?
4) What message will bring in the Wow factor to your brand?
5) What are the ways and means of making your message viral?

5 Pay-Per-Click Marketing (Google AdWords)

The primary tool for PPC marketing is Google AdWords which displays ads at the top and right side of Google’s search engines. This helps the business be searched by the target audience using
specific terms related to the brand, products/services and contents.

Some sure-fire success pointers:

1. Generate ads that provide specific details of your brand, products and services that people search for. Again, this has to be integrated with video marketing so that a coherent brand message is provided to the customer across media.
2. Plan out your budget for every campaign so as not to exceed marketing allocation. The best way is
to start small and adjust as you go.
3. Identify target demographics for every campaign: such as gender, age, interests and location.
4. Answer the most relevant questions like – how often do customers click on ads?
What will be the optimum budget for a Google Ad words campaign?

6 SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

It is all about understanding what people constantly search for online, the type of answers they look for, and the type of content they want to read. Knowing the answers to most searched questions would allow you to connect to your target market and provide solutions. Data analytics drives this strategy. Understanding your customer’s needs, wants and habits at the never before experienced level. Basically, you would have to understand the pulse of your audience-What is their internet behavior? What do they look for on the web? What keywords do they use? How and where do they browse – organic traffic or inorganic?

7 Link-building

Online directories allow your business to be visible locally to potential clients, this is the most cost-effective tool in digital marketing. When creating an ad, it is essential to include complete information of your product or service and ensure that your listings are done in collaboration with your partners, vendors and some of your customers too wherever possible so as to render more credibility while driving traffic to your website.

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Key Take Away

Digital marketing has never been a more important tool than in today’s challenging times. The top digital players such as Google, Amazon, Facebook to name a few, are accelerating their platform performance each year, therefore exponentially opening higher value for the marketing investment of each company. If you are a business startup, it is best to start with the basics and soon. And, if you have already included digital marketing in your overall plan, it is high-time to look at new ways of improving efficiency and effectiveness of those strategies and campaigns. Otherwise, expect your brand’s growth to be at a standstill or a snail’s pace while your competitor’s is munching on algorithm statistics.

Invest your marketing budget wisely to bring optimum ROI

(The author is the Marketing Communications Specialist with LB Image Consulting and Marketing Management  (www.thelb.ae), an agency specialized in Brand Engagement and Digital Content Creation for visual and emotional experiences for your brands, be it an individual, product, service or a corporate. She can be contacted on [email protected].