Last night René Power joined David Edmundson-Bird and this years Digital Marketing Communication Management Students at Manchester Metropolitan University to talk about the five most important digital marketing tools.
The Five Key Digital Marketing Tools
- Your Website
- SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)
- PPC (Pay Per Click Marketing)
- Content Marketing
- Email Marketing
Your Website
Whilst a lot was discuss over the evening one of the key takeaways for the evening is that whatever else you are doing online, every business needs to have a website at the minimum as the core hub for all online activity. Whilst this may seem obvious its important to remember that your site is about what your customers want and not just what you want. It was mentioned that the age of boring corporate sites is past (or at least it should be!) with bold sites like Apple representing the future of web design as well as more responsive sites for mobile.
SEO
The next key element of any digital marketers arsenal was said to be search engine optimisation to help your website actually get found. A short poll showed that despite the room being filled with marketers over 90% of people still click on organic results before checking out the adverts. René recommended staying away from black hat SEO (spammy and unnattural link building) especially with Google’s recent penguin and panda updates hitting digital marketers hard. Instead marketers should focus on building links through guest posts, social media connections, great content, organic recommendations and a hint of PR.
PPC (& Paid Promotion)
Pay Per Click or PPC was also discussed as being a key tool, especially at times when your company is launching a new product, releasing a whitepaper, or needs to generate extra website traffic based around an event. Although Google obviously claimed the first mention, social networks got a mention here as well with Facebook PPC and LinkedIn being a viable option depending on the product and audience that you are targeting.
Content Marketing
You really got a feel that the section on content marketing could have taken up an event of its own and René’s passion for it clearly shows in his blog posts on Smart Insights and his own blog. Content Marketing allows you to build credibility with your audience, especially when publishing frequently around key topics even if it feels like you occasionally cover the same ground. As long as you focus on creating great content that is useful or entertaining then there was lots of potential for it to help grow any business. The types of content mentioned included blog posts, whitepapers, and slideshows and Hubspot was an example given of a software company doing content marketing really well.
Email Marketing
The last area discussed was database and email marketing although René was keen to point out it was about more than just getting the email. Seth Godin’s book Permission Marketingwas recommended as a great introduction to the way that he thinks about email marketing and much of digital marketing itself. Rather than just getting the optin you need to focus on “turning Strangers into Friends and Friends into Customers” as the subtitle of the book suggests.
Moving Forward With Digital Marketing
It almost goes without saying that the above tools are important for every online marketer, but it’s always really interesting to hear from the perspective of a more experienced marketer. You may also wonder where social media itself comes into all of the above and it was discussed that this was left out of the session on purpose due to a future event being held for the class of DMCM1213. A short Q&A session held after the main presentation touched on how you bring everything together and also how elements of responsive web design and mobile marketing are changing things.
Unfortunately I had to make an early escape but after connecting with René on Twitter I managed to squeeze in a few more questions relating to B2B marketing as this is one of his main specialities as well as the topic of his forthcoming book. You can check out the full Twitter Q&A below…
@renepower If you were creating a mobile strategy for #B2B right now, what would be your number one focus? #dmcm1213
— Daniel McClure (@danielmcclure) November 28, 2012
#dmcm1213 @danielmcclure asks about no 1 focus for #b2b mobile strategy >> Multi-platform and responsive/adaptive design from outset
— René Power (@renepower) November 28, 2012
@renepower Also what is your go to lead generation activity for #B2B marketing online? #DMCM1213
— Daniel McClure (@danielmcclure) November 28, 2012
#dmcm1213 @danielmcclure asks about #b2b lead gen > Have ONE online hub (site, blog, FB page) engaging, useful, optimised content, good CTAs
— René Power (@renepower) November 28, 2012
@renepower And one last question; What is your number one tip for building #B2B relationships online? #DMCM1213 – Thanks in advance!
— Daniel McClure (@danielmcclure) November 28, 2012
#dmcm1213 @danielmcclure asks for No 1 tip on #b2b relationships online >> Linkedin Contacts, Groups, Answers – connect and nurture!
— René Power (@renepower) November 28, 2012
Overall this was a very well presented event and René Power proved to be both friendly and helpful. If you ever get a chance to see his speak in person, or perhaps check out his new book I would highly recommend it! And if you just want to know more about B2B digital marketing then make sure you check out his slideshow below…
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