Internet Marketing or Online Marketing
Internet marketing is the process of marketing products and services over the internet. It is often also referred to as online marketing or e-marketing. Throughout this article, these terms will be used synonymously.
Traditionally, advertising used print and broadcast channels to promote a product or service, such as magazine ads, TV and radio commercials and flyers. In a similar way, internet marketing uses the capabilities and reach of the internet to promote products and services to online customers.
Online marketing includes tactics like Display Advertising, the use of web banners and banner ads; Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), which promote a business by increasing its website’s search engine ranking; Social Media Marketing, the process of gaining traffic and increasing sales through social media websites such as Facebook; and Content Marketing, the creation and distribution of informative content to convert prospects into customers and customers into repeat business.
Advertisers using internet marketing can take advantage of several benefits that are lacking in conventional ways of marketing. They can target a very specific audience – for example, a single 23 year old male who has completed a university degree, likes “surfing”, and lives in Sydney. They can address a larger number of consumers more easily and at a lesser cost. And perhaps most importantly, they can easily measure the results of their advertising efforts and the return on investment (ROI). Online marketing tools like Google Analytics and Google Adwords, which analyse Pay Per Click (PPC), Pay Per Impression and Pay Per Conversion, enable accurate measurements of the advertising campaign’s success.
Internet marketing is a fantastic new way for businesses to sell products and services to a global consumer base. However, it is also a very specialized and technical process, and business are recommended to hire an online marketing expert for optimal results.