What is the difference between digital marketing and traditional marketing?

If you are outside of the marketing world (or even if you aren't), the phrase "digital marketing" can sound kind of like a buzzword that is overused and under-explained.

If an agency, consultant, or your favorite AI has recommend you invest more in digital marketing, you probably want a better understanding of what digital marketing actually means and how it is different from what you are doing right now.

Digital marketing: a simple definition

To put it simply, digital marketing is any promotion or positioning activity that takes place on digital channels. From a tactical standpoint, this can be anything from occasionally posting homemade social media content to investing in a $100k+ eCommerce hub. While every company's digital marketing strategy is going to look slightly different, it will always come down to reaching their audience via the Web, instead of more traditional means.

The real difference

Looking beyond tactics, digital marketing exists to address the fundamental ways buyers' decision-making processes have changed.

Since the development of digital technology, the way people shop from anything, from simple consumer goods to six figure enterprise solutions, looks different. Whether you find most of your business through word-of-mouth or widespread advertising, your buyers are still using digital techniques to find, research, and compare their options.

A successful digital marketing strategy takes into account the way your target audience interacts with the online world. In the same way that you would purchase space on a billboard along a route your target demographic often travels, you can use data-driven techniques to reach those same people when and where you know they will be online.

While traditional marketing tactics like print advertising and sponsorships still have their place, investing in a digital marketing strategy addresses what has been a continual change, not just in the market, but in people.

Data driven

One of the clear differentiators between digital marketing and traditional marketing is the sheer amount of data and metrics available to marketers running digital campaigns. When a campaign is launched or content is published, marketers have near real-time feedback on how their audience responds. This also gives them more opportunities to test, iterate, and optimize on a timely basis.

What does a digital marketing agency do?

The role of a digital marketing is simply to give buyers everything they need to make a decision. This process takes different forms depending on where a customer is in the digital sales funnel. A digital marketing agency will work to spread brand awareness with prospective buyers near the top of the funnel, while people at the bottom of your sales funnel may need to be sent email insights to be prompted to buy.

The key to success in digital marketing

The bottom line of digital marketing is trust. As automation becomes increasingly prevalent, buyers are looking for trust and transparency more than ever before. While digital marketing presents business with many tactics for expanding their sales funnel, if their strategy isn't grounded in growing trust, they are likely to struggle to find success.

If you are still trying to figure out of an expanded digital marketing strategy is right for your business, view our service pages to see your potential opportunities for succeeding online.