5 Things To Consider When Spending Your Online Marketing Budget

Business owners and marketers have a lot options as to where to spend their budgets, especially for online campaigns. While it can appear to be overwhelming when looking for the right programs for your business, here are some core items to apply some of your budget towards.

Website Structure

Before engaging in any campaigns geared towards driving traffic to your website, make sure your website is not only current, but user and search engine friendly. Take time to make sure your website creates a good user experience and is good at generating leads or conversions so you don’t waste money attracting traffic that abandons your site. Having a responsive design is also critical for users visiting your site on a smartphone and will ensure your site is user friendly on other devices. Finally, take steps to optimize your site to be SEO friendly and visible on search engines.

Digital Marketing

Once your website structure is set up and optimized, start planning for online search programs that not only bring traffic, but qualified visitors. While on-page optimization for keywords you want to rank for (content, title tags, H1) cover SEO basics, engaging in ongoing SEO tactics will help your site rank for key terms and increase traffic. Pay Per click Campaigns can also give your site immediate exposure on hundreds of keyword combinations through text and display advertisements. Lastly, utilizing social media platforms to promote content, blogs or even special promotions will lead to increased traffic and leads.

Testing

Once you have started any online marketing programs that are bringing traffic to your website, it’s important to test the user experience visitors have when coming to your site. Even after setting up your website structure initially, if you start a PPC campaign for example, taking the time to set up a unique landing page that has even minor tweaks compared to your main site for an A/B test, will provide data on how visitors engage and ultimately convert. The results can show missed opportunities and help fine tune your site for proper conversion optimization.

Remarketing

Even when your online marketing efforts bring in qualified traffic and your site is well optimized for user experience, visitors will still leave your site without converting or generating a lead. A great way to remind visitors about your company and get them to come back to your site is through remarketing. Most paid campaigns have the option to cookie visitors who do not convert while visiting a website and allow you to serve up ads to these users as they visit various high traffic websites that are a part of display networks and lead them to come back and re-engage with your site.

Email Marketing Newsletter

While it’s easy to get wrapped up in looking to get traffic from new users and generate new business, it’s also important to maintain repeat business and customers. Utilizing email marketing and newsletters that happy customers have signed up for is a great way to stay in touch with your customers and keep them informed about your latest products, discounts or specials and get them to continue to visit your site and bring in business.

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