You can have all of the best products on the web, but that doesn’t matter if you don’t bring customers to your online store.
Promoting your business is a key part of growing your revenue and increasing your chances of long-term success. While your friends and family might be willing to support your business when it first launches, you really need to get your name out there and start building a customer base.
One way you can promote your business is to invest in paid marketing. What is paid marketing? It’s a strategy that allows you to set a clear budget, target niche groups, and track your results.
Keep reading to learn more about what paid marketing is and how it can boost your brand.
A way to promote your online business
Generally speaking, paid marketing is an advertising method — you pay for space to promote your brand. However, paid marketing in an online context tends to be more specific. There’s a big difference between paying for a billboard on the side of the road and running a paid ad campaign through Google.
“Efficient paid advertising requires a well-prepared strategy and uses complex algorithms to show your ads to users that might be interested in your product or service,” writes Mary Plahonina, head of marketing at ReVerb.
Some paid ad platforms let marketers target specific audiences (e.g., male sports fans between the ages of 24 and 45), while others run their promotion models with keywords. With a keyword-based marketing campaign, a business would pay to display their ads when customers enter specific search terms (like “high heels” for a shoe store or “unique gift ideas” for a candle maker).
“Paid ad targeting can be very specific and allows you to reach relevant visitors who are interested in your brand, fit the demographics of your sales personas and reside in the exact geographic location you want to target,” writes Luke Marthinusen, founder and CEO of MO Agency.
“Let’s say you own a hair salon. You can advertise to potential clients within a 2–3 km radius of your store. You can’t do this with organic SEO or social.”
Paid marketing is beneficial to online and in-person businesses. The targeting and niche promotional options also make this ad option affordable to small businesses and startups.
Different types of paid marketing
As you start to explore different paid marketing options, you’ll discover different platforms where you can promote your business. For example, you can boost your social media posts to reach more people or purchase sponsored content on relevant publications. You can also buy ads on Google or Bing, a move that’s commonly known as search engine marketing.
“Search engine marketing (SEM) or paid search involves purchasing ads or sponsored listings on relevant search engine results pages (SERPs),” writes Jodi Harris, director of content strategy at Content Marketing Institute (CMI). “It involves keyword targeting, platform-specific display variations, ongoing algorithm changes, and a highly noisy and competitive marketplace for popular phrases.”
You can launch an SEM campaign for as little as $5. However, some e-commerce brands have powerful advertising teams that pour millions into SEM each year. Remember, if you’re bidding on the keyword “athletic shoes,” your brand might be competing against Nike, Adidas, and Under Armour for ad space.
So, what is paid marketing able to do for you on a channel-by-channel basis? For a detailed look at your paid marketing options — including different terminology you might not be familiar with — check out the glossary Joe Martinez, cofounder of the Paid Media Pros YouTube channel, created. He breaks down the differences between paid ads and paid social posts, along with concepts like bidding and retargeting.
A good tool for long-term success
This promotional option can help increase your online sales in the short term while also helping your brand in the long run. If potential customers are clicking on your ads and converting, they’re more likely to return to your business or share it with their friends.
“Paid advertising is not just about getting your company’s message out into the world,” writes Muhammad Anas, senior digital marketing executive at Dexterous. “It also gives you more reach and followers, which will lead to significant increase in traffic and good conversion if done the right way!”
Consider paid marketing a foundational tool to help you grow. You can invest more in paid marketing as your business grows, or you can refocus your efforts on other channels.
Jotform: A way to grow your business
There are multiple ways to grow your online business, and Jotform is here to help you with that.
Our software comes with more than 100 integrations, including PayPal, HubSpot, and Mailchimp. Learn more about what we do and how our form templates can help your business thrive.
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