ADA University

Digital Marketing
Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

1. What is Digital Marketing?

“Digital marketing” is the process of building and maintaining customer relationships through online
activities to facilitate the exchange of ideas, products, and services that satisfy the goals of both parties.

2. Media Types & Channels

There are three types of Media: Owned Media, Paid Media and Earned Media.

Owned Media Paid Media Earned Media

- Social Media Platforms - Paid Media - PPC (Pay Per Click) - UGCs
- Website - Display Banners - Reposts
- Blog - Facebook & Instagram Ad - Influencer Reviews
- SEO - Youtube Ad - Press Coverage
- Email Marketing - Other Social Media Ads (Twitter, - Customer Reviews
LinkedIn, Snapchat, etc) - Online Forums
- Influencer Marketing
- In-app Ads
- PR (Sponsored Articles)

2.1 Owned Media

Owned media refers to marketing content you own – content you can publish for free. It includes content
you publish on your website and blog posts and your social media channels (not including your social
ads). It also includes email marketing.

Generally speaking, owned marketing content is free and you can fully control who sees it. That makes it
a powerful tool in your content strategy. The target audience for this type of media is often prospective or
existing customers.

Owned Media Channels:

- Social Media Platforms

- Website
- Blog
- SEO
- Email Marketing

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
Correct implementation of Owned Media:

- Build relationships with an audience

- Increase brand image and brand loyalty
- Deliver a consistent message
- Drive organic traffic
- Create long-term relationships

Benefits of Owned Media Channels:

- Brand Control: Since this media is developed and distributed by the brand, it represents the
media that brands control the most.
- Longevity of Content: Brands can make sure that this media is available / accessible for longer
periods of time.
- Ability to Change: Brands can quickly create and adapt media to meet the ever-changing needs
and interests of the audience.

Challenges of Owned Media Channels:

- Difficulty in Scaling(Audience Engagement): It takes time and resources to organically build

and grow a large audience.
- Mistrust: Many people do not trust communications that come directly from brands. It takes time
to have trust.

2.1.1 Social Media Platforms

Social media marketing is a form of digital marketing that uses social networking platforms to
increase brand and product exposure and cultivate meaningful relationships with consumers online.
Social media now has 4.9 billion users globally and accounts for more than one-third of total time
spent on the internet. With these statistics in mind, it's no surprise that social media marketing can be
incredibly valuable to marketers in many different ways.

Why Social Media Platforms are Important?

Connecting with New Audiences: Billions of people worldwide use social networks on a daily basis.
Therefore, it is important for organizations to be present where these online conversations and discussions
are happening. For example, ~60% of Instagram users said they find new products on the platform,
making it worthwhile to be there.

Building Relationships: Social Media enables marketers to build and maintain relationships with both
new and existing customers around the world who may have been difficult to reach in the past by
traditional means.

Builds brand story: Social media also enables you to build your brand story in the mind of your
audience. This can be achieved by telling the story of your brand through videos, ads, case studies, and
other forms of media formats on social channels. You can build a strong recognizable brand identity in the
minds of consumers by communicating your brand values and message in a consistent authentic way and
telling your brand story through the content which you post online.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
Organic Feedback (Managing Reputation): The agility of social media allows brands to leverage
organic and real-time feedback from customers simply by reading what they are saying about their
brand, products, or competitors when they post or comment. This technique is called social
listening. It's used to find what works well for your brand, what you can change and adapt
and to give you ideas for new products or features your customers would be interested in.

Offers positive customer experience: Social media also enables you, as a brand, to offer an
instant and positive customer experience to people who reach out to you or discover your
brand online. When people associate your brand with a positive customer experience and
feel you've responded in a genuine way, they're more likely to positively engage with your
brand, buy from you, and possibly even become a brand advocate.

Conducting Market Research: Social media isn’t just great for interacting with your community,
marketers can also use it to stay on top of what their competitors are doing. By listening to the social
media conversations, marketers can glean what is working well (or not) for their competitors. They can
then build these insights into their social media marketing strategies and tactics.

Evaluating Analytics and Insights: Most social media platforms have their own analytics tools, which
allow you to keep track of what your community is interested in, who is engaged, and what activities and
content are best performing. This data can help determine which content to promote and how to
appropriately modify any advertising or marketing activities.

Increasing Website Traffic: If your community likes your social media content, they may seek out more
information about your products and services on your website, which will result in more website traffic
and potentially more sales.

2.1.2 Website

A website is the primary channel of distribution when it comes to owned media. They act not only as the
mouthpiece of your brand, but are often the first place where content you create will be published, and set
the stage for how you want users to engage with your brand.

Websites are used for different objectives according to the company type:

Selling Products (E-commerce Sites): eCommerce sites allow companies to sell their products directly
to website visitors online. Visitors can browse products, read through benefits and features, and purchase
items by paying online with a credit card or other payment method.

Collecting Customer Data (Lead Generation Sites): lead generation sites allow companies to collect
contact details from people they might like to do business with. Visitors can browse company content and
enter their contact details into a web form on the website in return for something from the company. This
is called a lead magnet. Examples of lead magnets include eBooks, free trials of a product, access to a
webinar, podcast or video content. (Example businesses: Banks, Private Universities)

Demonstrating Product Portfolio: portfolio sites allow companies to show or demonstrate their products
and services online. Visitors don't purchase directly on the site but they can learn about a company and its
offering by reading through their content and product/service information.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
Booking Call or Reservation: customers can book a call or make a reservation for the services of the
company.

2.1.2.1 Common Website Goals:

Increase total users: The number of unique visitors to a website

Increase average time on site: The length someone typically spends on a website or web page

Provide a better user experience: Improve the emotional reaction a person has to using a website

Higher numbers of return visits: The number of people returning to the website

Build positive brand affinity: How positive people feel about a brand or company

Enhance Customer Experience (CX): Improve the feelings or perceptions customers have of a company
after interacting with its website, products or services

Degree Bounce Rate: Bounce rate is a metric in web analytics that measures the percentage of visitors
who land on a webpage and then leave the site without interacting with any other elements on that page.

2.1.2.2 eCommerce sites specifically aim to:

Increase Revenue: The amount of money generated directly through online sales

Drive more transactions: The number of sales on a website

Improve eCommerce conversion rate: The % of people who visit the site and then buy (sales / total
visitors)

Increase Average Order Value (AOV): The average amount someone spends when they buy
(revenue/sales)

2.1.2.3 Lead Generation sites aim to:

Increase number of leads: The total number of contact details (good and bad) received through the
website

Increase qualified leads: The total number of good leads that meet a certain quality standard and will be
contact by your sales team

Drive higher lead conversion rate: The % of website visitors who fill out a web form and become a lead

Improve lead close rate: The % of qualified leads who your sales team successfully sell to

Increase lead quality: qualified leads by channel, location and lead magnet type

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
2.1.3 Blog

Companies use their blog to provide useful information to their customers to allow them to understand
their brand and help them make up their mind to choose them as the solution to their needs. Blogs are the
best tools for driving organic traffic to the website.

Blogs are used for:

- To share Company Updates

- Tips and Advice related to company products:

● 10 Ideas for Enjoyable At-Home Workouts

● 5 Essential Tips for Treating Acne
● 7 Steps to Planning an Affordable Vacation

2.1.4 SEO
Search engine optimization is the process of getting company web pages and content to rank higher in
non-paid (also known as “organic”) search engine results so that companies increase the quality and
quantity of traffic to their website or content. Optimizing for organic search is a key tactic in digital
marketing because it leads to discovery, awareness, interest, and conversion without paid effort. SEO
makes a content visible to the audience and easily searchable on Google and other search engines without
the need to pay for clicks.

2.1.4.1 The three pillars of SEO:

While SEO changes frequently in small ways, its key principles do not. Since Google came onto the scene
in the late 1990s, we can break SEO into three components.

- Technical optimization: is the process of completing activities on your site that are designed to
improve SEO but are not related to content. It often happens behind the scenes.

- On-page optimization is the process of ensuring the content on your site is relevant and provides
a great user experience. It includes targeting the right keywords within your content and can be
done through a content management system.

- Off-page optimization is the process of enhancing your site’s search engine rankings through
activities outside of the site. This is largely driven by backlinks, which help to build the site’s
reputation.

2.1.4.2 Search engine algorithms:

Search engine algorithms are computer programs that look for clues to give the searcher the exact results
they are looking for. Search engines rely on algorithms to find web pages and decide which ones to rank
for any given keyword

There are three steps to how search engines work:

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
 Crawling, which is the discovery stage.
Indexing, which is the filing stage.
Ranking, which is the retrieval stage.

Crawling:

The first step is crawling. Search engines send out web crawlers to find new pages and record information
about them. We sometimes call these web crawlers ‘spiders’ or ‘robots’. Their purpose is to discover new
web pages that exist, and also to periodically check the content on pages they’ve previously visited to see
whether they've changed or been updated.

Search engines crawl web pages by following links they’ve already discovered. So if you have a blog post
and it's linked from your homepage, when a search engine crawls your homepage, it will then look for
another link to follow and may follow the link to your new blog post.

Indexing:

The second step is indexing. Indexing is when a search engine decides whether or not it is going to
use the content that it has crawled. If a crawled web page is deemed worthy by a search engine, it will be
added to its index. This index is used at the final ranking stage. When a web page or piece of content is
indexed, it is filed and stored in a database where it can later be retrieved. Most web pages that offer
unique and valuable content are placed into the index.

A web page might not be placed in the index if:

● Its content is considered duplicate.
● Its content is considered low value or spammy.
● It couldn’t be crawled.
● The page or domain lacked inbound links.

Ranking:

The third step is really the most important step, and that is ranking. Ranking can only happen after the
crawling and indexing steps are complete. So once a search engine has crawled and indexed your site,
your site can be ranked.

There are more than 200 ranking signals that search engines use to sort and rank content, and they
all fit under the three pillars of SEO: technical optimization, on-page optimization, and off-page
optimization.

Some examples of signals that search engines use to rank web pages are:

- Keyword presence in title tag: Engines check to see whether the keyword or a synonym was
mentioned on the page and within the title tag.
- Loading speed of web page: Engines check to see whether the web page loads quickly and is
mobile friendly.
- Website reputation: Engines check to see whether the web page and website is considered
reputable for the topic being searched for.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
2.1.5 Email Marketing
Email marketing is the channel that allows you to reach out to subscribed consumers who want to hear
from you.

Email Marketing is used for:

● Acquire new leads/ registrants/ customers/ clients

Example: A software company offers a free webinar on a popular industry topic and promotes it through
social media and their website. Visitors who sign up for the webinar are added to the company's email list,
where they receive follow-up emails about related products and services.

● Drive immediate sales

Example: A beauty brand sends a limited-time offer email to its subscribers, providing a 20% discount on
all products for the next 48 hours. This encourages recipients to make a purchase within a short window
of time.

● Build stronger relationships with existing customers/clients with personalized offers

Example:An online fashion retailer, "XStyle" sends a personalized email to a long-time customer who
frequently purchases dresses and accessories. The email includes a special offer for a limited-edition
collection of dresses tailored to the customer's style preferences and previous purchase history. This
personalized approach helps strengthen the relationship between XStyle and the customer.

● Provide company or product information

Example: A tech company sends out a monthly newsletter to its subscribers, highlighting the latest
product updates, industry trends, and company news. This keeps customers informed about the company's
progress and innovations.

● Increase revenues by cross-selling and upselling to existing customers/clients

Cross-selling is a sales technique where a seller encourages a customer to purchase additional,

complementary, or related products or services along with the primary purchase

Cross-Selling Example: An e-commerce platform sends an email to customers who recently purchased a
DSLR camera, suggesting related products such as camera lenses, tripods, and photography courses, with
a special bundled discount.

Upselling is a sales technique where a seller encourages a customer to purchase a more expensive item,
upgrade, or add-on in order to make a more profitable sale

Upselling Example: Example: A software company, "XXX Solutions" offers a basic version of their
project management tool. A customer who has been using this basic version for a while and has achieved
significant results receives an email from"XXX Solutions”. In the email, "XXX Solutions" highlights the
advanced features and benefits of their premium version, including more robust reporting, integration
capabilities, and priority support. The email suggests upgrading to the premium version with a

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
limited-time offer of a 20% discount for the first year.

By enticing the customer with additional features and benefits, "XXX Solutions" aims to upsell the
customer from the basic plan to the premium plan, thereby increasing the customer's investment and XXX
Solutions’ revenue from that customer

● Keep customers informed of upcoming events and promotions

Example: A local restaurant sends out a weekly newsletter to its subscribers, announcing upcoming
special events like wine tastings, live music nights, and exclusive dining offers for loyal customers.

2.1.5.1 Email Campaigns:

There are many different types of email campaigns to acquire and retain customers, from registration
emails, to product updates, newsletters, and renewal notices.

There are five levels of audience engagement campaigns. The higher the level, the more specific and
automated email campaigns become:

- Foundational: Baseline communications sent to your broadest audience, such as newsletters,

bulletins, holiday greetings, and company or product announcements.
- Promotional: Email messages to generate revenue or product demand, such as sales and special
offers, free trials, discounts, and holiday shopping.
- Informational: Communications to establish and grow relationships, such as product-related
education, how-tos, articles, and lead nurturing programs.
- Engagers: Email messages to inspire comfort, familiarity, and interest among brand subscribers,
such as surveys, reviews, or rewards.
- One-on-one: Communications targeted at individuals based on their actions, inactions, or
personal data, such as welcome, post-purchase thank you messages.

2.1.5.2 Email Components

There are certain components that contribute to writing and designing effective emails:

- Audience
- Sender name
- Subject line
- Copy/Email text
- Design
- Calls to action (CTA)
- Imagery

2.1.6 Mobile App

Mobile apps play a pivotal role for brands in various aspects, particularly in terms of sales, accessibility,
data collection,customer support and more.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
 ● Sales Point:

Direct Sales Channel: Mobile apps can serve as a direct sales platform, allowing customers to browse,
shop, and make purchases seamlessly. This direct access can significantly boost sales by providing an
easy and convenient way for customers to buy products or services.

In-App Promotions and Offers: Brands can run exclusive in-app promotions, discounts, and special
offers that encourage purchases. Push notifications can remind users of these deals, leading to increased
sales and higher conversion and retention rates.

● Easily Accessible:

24/7 Availability: Mobile apps provide customers with constant access to a brand’s products and services.
With a mobile app, customers have all they need at their fingertips, whether it’s making a purchase,
checking an order status, or contacting customer service. This convenience can enhance customer
satisfaction and loyalty.
.
● Data Collection (by SDK):

Companies can track the users by the help of SDK and then retarget the users on other social media
channels via advertisement.

● Customer Support:

Mobile apps can integrate various customer support options such as live chat, FAQs, and support tickets.
This makes it easy for customers to get help quickly and efficiently, improving their overall experience.

Let's explore the utility of mobile apps, focusing on fitness application examples.

- Easy access to information and services

Example: Users of the Fitness app easily access a wealth of fitness-related information, including
workout routines, nutrition plans, and health tips. The app's interface allows users to quickly find the
information and services they need to support their fitness journey.

- To engage and retain customers (Push notifications)

Example: The app sends personalized push notifications to users, reminding them of their fitness goals,
providing tips for staying motivated, and notifying them of upcoming events or challenges. These
notifications help keep users engaged with the app and motivated to continue their fitness journey.

- Create personalized experiences for customers

Example: Fitness App uses AI algorithms to analyze users' workout habits, preferences, and progress.
Based on this data, the app generates personalized workout plans and suggests nutrition adjustments
tailored to each user's specific goals and needs.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
 - Build loyalty and trust

Example: The app rewards users with virtual badges and achievements for hitting milestones and staying
consistent with their fitness routines. These gamification elements help build a sense of achievement,
loyalty, and trust between the user and the app.

- Deliver promotions and discounts

Example: Fitness app sells fitness equipment and nutrition brands in their own marketplace to offer
exclusive discounts and promotions to its users. These special offers are delivered through the app,
providing added value to users and encouraging them to make purchases.

- Provide real-time customer support

Example: The app features a built-in chat support system where users can get real-time assistance from
fitness experts and customer support representatives. Whether users have questions about exercises,
nutrition, or technical issues, they can get the help they need instantly.

- Collect data on customer behaviors and preferences which can be used to create targeted
campaigns.

Example: The app gathers data on users' workout routines, dietary preferences, and progress over time.
This information is anonymized and used to analyze trends, identify popular features, and create targeted
marketing campaigns to further engage and retain users.

- Collect customers data

Example: Fitness App securely collects and stores user data in compliance with privacy regulations. This
data is used to provide personalized experiences and is never shared with third parties without explicit
user consent.

2.2 Paid Media

Comprises any form of media designed to promote your brand or content on the internet for a fee.

Paid Media Channels:

- Paid Media - PPC (Pay Per Click) with Google Ads

- Display Banners
- Facebook & Instagram Ad
- Youtube Ad
- Other Social Media Ads (Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, etc)
- Influencer Marketing
- In-app Ads
- PR (Sponsored Articles)

Correct implementation of Paid Media:

- Reach more people

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
 - Build Awareness

- Generate Familiarity

- Drive Sales

- Drive Website Traffic

Benefits of Paid Media Channels:

- Wider Reach - Marketers can access larger audiences much more quickly and effectively
- Targeting Specific Audience - Marketers can target the specific audience by filtering
- Trackable - Paid media systems can measure the behaviours of the audience and report on the
media’s performance
- Testing & Optimizing - You can show different types of ads to the customers to see which ad is
performing better and you can optimize the campaign budget according to which option is
performing well. A/B testing.

Challenges of Paid Media Channels:

- Budget - As it is paid, you need to allocate a budget. It is the challenges especially for the
startups and the companies that are newly built.
- Technical Limitations - You need to have some coding skills or developer
- Competition (Ad Saturation) - Since people are bombarded with so many ads, it can be
challenging to get your audience’s attention.
- Building Trust / Less Credibility - while easy to promote, paid media can sometimes be
perceived as spam or inappropriate.

2.2.1 Paid Media - PPC (Pay Per Click) with Google Ads

Pay-per-click (PPC) is an online advertising model in which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their
ads is clicked on Google. This channel will help you get high value traffic and clicks from an
interested audience. As the audience is actively searching for keyword related to their issue,
using paid search helps to bring you top of the list when customers are searching and ready
to buy or take action.

Paid media helps you to target a specific audience. Paid media also helps you scale up your digital
marketing campaign and reach more people than non-paid formats. In tandem with various reporting tools
such as Google Analytics, you will be able to analyze who is seeing your media and how the audience
engages or interacts with your campaigns. This, in turn, enables you to adjust and optimize your paid
media performance. With paid media you can take ad formats and brand content and show it to people
who you believe will find it relevant, useful, or engaging. Essentially, this means you have control over
where, when, and what is seen.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
Paid media is useful for building awareness and generating familiarity, as it provides the
basis for audience reach, ad repetition, and defined audience targeting. It is also a good way to drive
website traffic, lead generation and conversion.

2.2.1.1 Benefits of Paid Search

Relevance: If there's a potential customer on a search engine looking for something, can you resolve their
need? Can you give them the product or service that they desire at that particular moment? If so, then you
want to make sure that they see your ad in the PPC listings.

Timing: This person could be searching at any time day or night. Equally, if you're launching a new
product, sale or need to get a promotion out there quickly, you can run a PPC campaign and show your ad
almost immediately.

Qualified nature: People are actively searching for particular keywords. If they choose to click your ad,
they're coming to you as a qualified inbound visitor. As they've looked at all your competitors but they've
decided to choose you, they have qualified themselves in.

Control: By running ads you have full and instant control over how much you want to spend, how the
odds will read, the keyword searches you want to show up for as well as the landing pages that people
will see when they click through your ad. You control that entire process.

Measurability: Because you can easily track the metrics of paid search, you can evaluate performance in
terms of clicks, to phone calls, to conversions, leads, sign-ups, and sales.

Accountability: Precise measurement gives you accountability within your organization, that is, you
spent X and you got Y, helping you justify the investment in time, resource, and money spent.

Visibility: Your product, brand or services are highly visible at the top of the results page so you are front
and center when potential customers are actively looking.

2.2.1.2 Campaign Elements

Keywords: what people are looking for, and what questions they are asking Google.

Ad Copies: what users will see when they search a keyword on a search engine.

Landing Pages: where the user goes (lands) after they click your ad.

2.2.2 Display Banners

Display campaigns are image ads distributed and presented across millions of websites and apps called
the Google Display Network. Display campaigns also allow you to follow up with people who have
already seen your ads or visited your site (called “remarketing ads”).

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
Thanks to the targeting capabilities of online display, companies can target audience interests, age, gender,
community, keywords, and more. So the ads shown to the audience are highly relevant, which drives
higher awareness and consideration as well as traffic. Goals and KPIs for display tend to be
awareness-driving outcomes rather than direct conversions through the channel.

2.2.2.1 Benefits:

- Have the potential to increase brand awareness for your brand or product amongst your target
audience.
- You can drive consideration for your brand or product within your target audience with visual
advertising formats.
- You can choose to increase the reach, broad or narrow, of your content across a large target
audience.
- You can drive frequency of the exposure to re-enforce your brand messaging.
- You have the opportunity to choose from multiple types of ad formats to fit your advertising
needs when choosing display.

2.2.2.2 Objectives:

Building brand awareness: Objectives are focused on serving ad impressions, customer engagement,
reach and frequency. This is when you have a new business, have launched a new product, or are
announcing a sale and your primary goal is to increase awareness of your brand, product, or promotion.

Influencing consideration: Objectives are focused on targeting a specific audience who are making up
their mind about whether to buy a product or engage with the company. This is when you want to set
yourself aside from other businesses with a similar product. You need to educate your customer on your
product and show them your unique selling points.

2.2.3 Facebook & Instagram Ads

Meta ads (ads across Facebook, Messenger, Instagram or Meta Audience Network) are paid messages
from businesses that are written in their voice and help reach the people who matter most to them.

Advertisers create campaigns that have specific goals, which we call advertising objectives and they
create ads within those campaigns to help them reach those objectives.

For example, a business may create a campaign because they want to get more people to visit their
website. When they create ads within that campaign, they'll choose images, text and an audience that they
think will help them get that increase in visitors. Learn more about how ads work and how they differ
from boosting a post.

Facebook & Instagram Ads used for

- Brand awareness: Increase overall awareness for your brand by showing ads to people who are
more likely to pay attention to them.
- Reach: Show ads to the maximum number of people in your audience while staying within your

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
 budget. You can also choose to reach only people who are near your business locations.
- App installs: Drive more installs of your app by linking directly to the App Store and Google
Play Store. You can also choose to target high-value users.
- Traffic: Grow the number of people who are visiting your website, app or Messenger
conversation, and increase the likelihood that they'll take a valuable action when they get there.
- Lead generation: Make it easy for interested people to learn more about your business.
Encourage them to sign up for more info or spend time with your app or website.
- Engagement: Get more people to follow your Page or engage with your posts through comments,
shares and likes. You can also choose to optimise for more event responses or offer claims.
- Conversions: Increase actions on your site or app. Whether you want purchases, leads,
registrations or other types of conversions, this objective prompts people to do something.

2.2.3.1 Step by step guide to create Facebook ad:

https://www.facebook.com/business/ads

2.2.3.2 All Ad Formats:

https://www.facebook.com/business/ads/ad-formats

2.3.3.3 Targeting types:

1. Interest based Audience - This is the default selection for your ad set in Ads Manager. Attract
new customers by refining your new audience with categories such as location, demographics,
interests and behaviors.
2. Custom Audience - People who have already shown an interest in your business. Custom
Audiences allow you to connect with and retarget people who have already shown interest in your
business, whether they're loyal customers or people who have used your app or visited your
website.

Custom Audiences allow you to target users that:

- Are on your customer list

- Visited your website
- Use your app
- Engage with your profiles and content

3. Lookalike Audience - People who share interests with your current customers. Using your
Custom Audiences as a source, you can target your ads to new audiences but resemble your
existing audiences with the Advantage Lookalike. To create a Lookalike Audience, you'll choose
a Custom Audience to act as a source audience.

2.2.4 Youtube Ad

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
Youtube advertising means advertising on Youtube, the online video-sharing platform, promoting video
content, or in relevant search terms in Youtube Search. As Google owns Youtube, Youtube advertising is
possible only through Google Ads.

Youtube Ads used for:

- Drive Sales
- Drive Leads
- Website Traffic
- Brand Awareness and reach
- Product and Brand Consideration

2.2.5 Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is a form of marketing that focuses on leveraging influential people, or influencers,
to help promote a brand, product, or service.

Influencer Marketing used for:

- Brand Awareness
- Driving Website Traffic
- Increasing Sales
- Boosting Engagement

Influencer Marketing is the great way to reach niche audiences. A niche audience is a group of people that
share a particular interest or set of characteristics. It is typically used to target specific demographics with
tailored marketing strategies. Niche audiences are often smaller than more general audiences, but they can
be more engaged with a brand due to their shared interests and characteristics.

2.2.5.1. Influencer Collaboration Models:

- Paid Model: Pay money for the post

- Barter Model: Give your product to an influencer as a gift for the post
- Affiliate Model: Provide the unique link to influencers and pay according to the performance.
Each sale coming from influencers link, you pay money

2.2.6 In-app Ads

Mobile app advertising allows app developers to make money through ads delivered inside of their mobile
apps. These ads are served through a mobile ad network –– a platform that connects developers and
advertisers.

2.2.7 Paid Media - PR (Sponsored Articles)

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev
PR is short for "public relations" and refers to the strategic communication from an organization to the
public to maintain or cultivate public image and/or respond to public discourse.

2.3 Earned Media

Earned Media represents content about your organization, services, or products, but created and
distributed by others.

Earned Media Channels:

- UGCs
- Reposts
- Influencer Reviews
- Press Coverage

Correct implementation of Earned Media:

- Builds Trust
- Build Credibility
- It is Free
- Creates Word-of-Mouth
- Reach wider audiences

Benefits of Earned Media Channels:

- Most Credible: Posts written and shared by others carry the most credibility. They tend to be
perceived as the most believable, authentic, genuine, and truthful.

- Wider Reach: Getting others to share content with their own networks can exponentially
increase a brand’s reach and exposure.

- It is Free: The posts that are shared by others are free so you do not need to spend from your
budget.

Challenges of Earned Media Channels:

- Lack of Control: Brands cannot control what others say about them. Negative posts spread faster
than positive ones and have the potential to go viral.

- Hard to Track: When others post, it may be difficult to know who is hearing about your brand.

2.3.1 UGC (User-generated Content)

User-generated content (also known as UGC) is original, brand-specific content created by customers and
published on social media or other channels. UGC comes in many forms, including images, videos,
reviews, a testimonial, or even a podcast.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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Where does UGC content come from?
Customers, Brand loyalists, Employees.
More: https://blog.hootsuite.com/user-generated-content-ugc/

2.3.2 Reposts

When someone retweets a post or shares any of your content, you’re garnering earned media.

Brands can encourage content sharing by adding prominent share buttons to their product pages and blog
posts.

Beyond this, you can encourage sharing by creating contents that have the potential to go viral.

2.3.3 Influencer Reviews

Influencer reviews happen when an influencer mentions your brand or product on social media, as well as
in videos, in interviews or across any other channel for free.

Although brands often pay for these mentions, they can also happen organically. Companies can
encourage influencer-generated earned media by sending them free products, providing exclusive
behind-the-scenes access or inviting them to events. Or influencers share their opinions about the brands'
product if they really like it or maybe dislike it.

This is one of the best earned media examples.

2.3.4 Press Coverage

The media coverage that counts as earned media is when you are mentioned or written about without
paying anyone to do so. It happens when your company does something newsworthy. When your brand is
mentioned in digital media (digital news websites, digital magazines) this generates huge amounts of
awareness and trust for your brand.

3. Differences between Traditional vs Digital Media

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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 Traditional Marketing vs Digital Marketing

Expensive Cost-efficient

Takes Time Can be Executed Quickly

Difficult to Measure Measured in Real-time

One-way communication Interactive

Static (Delayed Communication) Dynamic (Instant Communication)

Mass Targeted

Limited to a certain geographic area Reach people all over the world

Few Content Types Diverse Content Types

4. SMART Objectives

When you start thinking about your digital marketing strategy, one of the key considerations is objectives.
A well-known convention for writing down efficient objectives that will satisfy business and marketing
stakeholders is to use the SMART model. When defining your objectives, they should have the following
qualities:

4.1 Specific

Having a specific objective means having a well-defined and clear goal, stating exactly what you aim to
achieve. The objective needs to be crystal clear, and anyone who reads it, even outside the Marketing
department, should understand what it hopes to achieve.

Here are some tips to make your objectives specific:

- Think simple, sensible, and significant.

- When defining your goals, think about the following questions:
What do I want to accomplish?
Why is it important?
Who is involved?
Where is it located?

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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 What resources or limits are involved?
- Write down a summary of your goal and reshape it to be as specific and clear as possible.
- The goal should describe an action that involves the customer.
- Sometimes a unique objective is clearer and more realistic than having too many that will
dilute your impact and focus.

4.2 Measurable

Once you have specified the aim of your objective, the second step is to make the objective measurable.

This means that you need to have an obtainable goal that can be measured using numbers – for example,
increase website visits by 10% by June.

You can verify this aspect of your objective from the following questions:

- What are the current key performance indicators (KPIs) for the business?
- What digital data can you leverage? This includes traffic, cost per click (CPC), lead
generation, social media tracking, among others.
- What is the current situation and what evolution do you expect to see?
- How much?
- How many?
- How will you know when the objective has been accomplished?

At the end of the campaign, you should be able to look back and precisely quantify your impact and
be able to translate the numbers in a business target.

4.3 Achievable (Attainable)

Now you need to think about the execution of this objective. Is it achievable? Is it too ambitious? Do you
have the resources necessary to achieve this goal? It’s the reality check.

Crafting an achievable objective means that it is reachable within the current available skills, budget, and
time, and it takes into account the potential constraints or limits that exist.

To define the achievability of your objective, think about the following points:

- How can you accomplish this goal?

- How realistic is the goal, based on other constraints, such as financial factors?
- What is the allocated budget that you currently have for this?
- How many hours a week can the team work on this? Who will be the point of contact
responsible for achieving the goal?
- What things may stop the team from reaching their goals?

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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4.4. Relevant

At this stage, you need to ask yourself whether this objective is relevant in the bigger picture.

Remembering what we said at the beginning of this section, the marketing objectives should tie in
nicely with the business objectives. Even if you started by studying the business objective to develop
the marketing one, once the marketing objective is crafted, take a step back and check that it is still
relevant.

Here are some questions you can ask to check your objective against the overall goals and business
priority include:

- Does this seem worthwhile?

- Is this the right time?
- Does this match our other efforts or needs?
- Is this the right team? Are you the right person to reach this goal?
- Is it applicable in the current socio-economic environment?

4.5. Time-bound objective

Finally, your objective needs to be time-bound in order to set limits to the time spent on this particular
objective and to fit the business timeframe in terms of target, product development, and other major
time-bound events.

An objective needs to be achieved within a set timeframe. This helps to create focus, and meet
deadlines, milestones.

A time-bound goal can be identified by answering these questions:

- When?
- What can I do today?
- What can I do six weeks from now?
- What can I do six months from now?
- Based on research, what is the appropriate timeframe that should be given to achieve this goal?

Selecting the length of time you think it will take to reach your goal will help you figure out how
aggressive you need to be with your marketing efforts.

5. Outbound vs Inbound Marketing

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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5.1 Outbound Marketing:

Outbound marketing begins with the brand advertiser pushing out a message to a specified target audience
with the objective being to drive awareness of a product or service. This is done by rapidly spreading
word of the campaign product or service to the target audience using, for example, visual display banner
and video formats multiple times to ensure people remember the product. This is known as ‘drive product
recall, and is achieved through audience reach and repetition. It is your more traditional way to do
marketing. Essentially, you have a message, you have an audience, and you are pushing that message to
your audience. Your hope is that the message captures your audience’s attention. This concept applies to
digital marketing as much as traditional marketing.

5.2 Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is the exact opposite; it’s almost like reverse marketing. Inbound marketing involves
trying to pull your audience towards your content, brand, or service. It is about attracting those people
who are already interested in your product or service so that they seek you out and engage. With inbound
marketing, potential customers find you through channels such as blogs, search engines, email
subscriptions, word of mouth, and online reviews/recommendations. As a marketer, you are attempting to
find ways to create the conditions where people are drawn to your brand via your content, with the
objective of turning them into a customer.

In today’s business world, inbound marketing is the most important aspect to digital marketing as it
allows you to attract customers who consider your content or service relevant to them. The strength
of inbound marketing is ‘user intent’. What do we mean by user intent? In essence, it is the audience
who have the internal drive to take action to find your product. This action is based on their own needs,
and how and when they want to proceed with a sale or conversion. Good inbound marketing provides
efficient and effective routes for your audience to come to your brand. It stands apart in its effectiveness at
encouraging audience action – particularly when that audience has a finite attention

6. Buyer’s Journey

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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Now it’s time to examine the buyer’s journey. The buyer’s journey is the process a consumer goes through
before purchasing a product or service. This process can look different depending on the industry or
product you are associated with, but generally has five main stages from awareness to retention, and it is
commonly visualized as a funnel.

When you target an audience, you must consider where in the buyer’s journey this audience sits. Do they
already know your product? Have they tried it before? Have they ever purchased from your competitor’s
brand? What do they think about your brand and product? What are the pain points that would prevent
this audience from purchasing your product?

Understanding the context around your audience and the elements needed to move them down the funnel
are critical for a successful digital marketing strategy. Their place in the buyer’s journey will influence the
media you choose to communicate with them. The idea is to uncover insights and use them in your digital
marketing strategy to move your audience through the stages of the funnel.

You should aim to create your own buyer’s journey based on research, adding precision to the general
model. This is deeply rooted in the inbound methodology – in other words, how to attract a
highly-qualified audience by providing the necessary tools for their decision-making process.

Awareness: To communicate a benefit by emotional message, and tell your potential customers about a
brand, product, event, or offer
Interest: To increase emotional engagement

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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Consideration: To bring your company to the forefront of the choice by providing more functional details
such as product features
Conversion: To convert intent into action
Retention: To make the consumer feels special and increase the chances of recommendations

6.1 Awareness

The Awareness stage represents the moment when the consumer becomes aware of a problem they
want to solve in their life and perceives your product ad as a potential solution. In this stage,
marketers should focus on creating visibility and recognition. This is a critical stage for new products,
brands, or added benefits to an existing product. This stage will focus on getting your product out there,
implementing it as part of a broader scope of existing solutions for an issue.

Awareness is the very first stage of the buyer’s journey and is all about education. At this point, potential
customers are likely to have no idea who you are and what you do. So it’s up to you to get in front of your
target audience and create an association between your brand and a current or future need.

Typically, at this stage, you have two types of customer:

The first are those who know they have a particular problem already but do not yet know the solution.
Your job here is to show your prospect that you understand their problem and can provide relevant
information, and resources, that help your target audience to solve it.

The second is those who do not yet know they have a problem. So in order to engage this particular buyer,
you should focus your attention on creating content that creates an emotional bonding with them.

What you do not want to do at this stage is to sell! I get that this might sound strange, considering that
selling your product or service is ultimately the end goal. But just sit tight; that stage will come, but it is
not right now. There are very few customers who will buy a product they have never heard of, from a
brand they don’t know, after the very first touchpoint. Putting decision-stage ads and content in front of
people that aren’t yet ready to see them is a mistake that so many brands make. Instead, you should be
laying the foundations of product knowledge prior to the ‘hard-sell’, this will ensure that when the time
comes to close the deal things run a lot smoother.

During the awareness stage, your potential buyer might be asking themselves a number of questions. In
fact, 72% of buying decisions begin on Google so, the chances are, they are typing these questions
directly into Google searching for help. So what you want to do is create content that ranks highly for
these particular keywords. Of course, the questions your target audience asks will vary depending on the
product or service. So it’s important that you do your research and learn as much as you can about your
target audience and then you will be able to accurately predict the types of questions they are likely to
ask.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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Digital media channels that could be used for awareness stage: PPC, Display Advertisement, SEO
(informational), Social Media Ads, Influencers (word-of-mouth), Youtube Ads.

Objective: Awareness, Website Traffic or Traffic to Social Media

6.2 Interest

The Interest stage represents the moment when the consumer is looking for options that will help
solve their problem. At this stage, the consumer has a selection of ideas in mind but will need more
information and experience to make a decision. This is a quest for knowledge that, in the digital
marketing landscape, translates into reading reviews, blog articles, social media, and product websites in
order to gain as much information as possible. During this stage mostly owned media (website, social
media accounts) play an important role.

Objective: Lead Generation

6.3 Consideration

The Consideration stage represents the moment when the consumer knows about your brand and thinks it
might be a good fit for their needs or what they are trying to achieve. They may have other brands in
mind, but your company is in the mix. At this stage, inbound strategies are highly effective because, if
correctly used, they ensure that the brand or product more frequently appears in the consumer’s search
results and social media feeds.

After carrying out all the preliminary research, your customer has decided that they need to make a
purchase in order to solve their problem. And thanks to your cleverly targeted awareness stage content,
they have come across your brand. You’ve done a great job so far in capturing their interest, and if you’ve
managed to get some form of contact information, be it an email address or phone number, now is the
time to reach out.

During the consideration stage, your prospect is likely to be sizing your brand up against its competitors,
so you need to highlight exactly what makes you better than the rest. Give them some content that will
push you closer to making that sale. Things like case studies, pricing guides, product demos, webinars,
and FAQs. Just make sure that you are as helpful and friendly as possible. So don’t lose their business
over something small, such as taking too long to respond to a query.

Social Media Retargeting Ads, Email Marketing, Influencer Marketing could be the digital marketing
channels that you can use during this stage.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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6.4 Conversion

The Conversion stage represents the moment when the consumer is ready to buy your product or take
action on your site. The consumer has done their research and, based on their needs and motivations, has
decided on a product as the best solution for their problem. At this stage, the consumer has not yet paid
for the product or service, and the role of the marketer is to create a point of contact to drive the
conversions. This is generally achieved with targeting and re-targeting, promotional offers, and creating a
sense of urgency.

By this stage, your customer should have all the information they require in order to make an informed
decision. They have narrowed down their options to a select few possibilities, so they are almost ready to
go ahead with the purchase. So what’s holding them back?

Your customer wants to know which option offers the best product or service, with the best features, and
at the best value for money.

They just need that extra bit of reassurance to convince them that they are making the right decision, so
content like customer reviews play a huge part in the decision stage. Spiceworks discovered that 97% of
customers rely on recommendations and ratings during the buying cycle. So make it easy for your
prospect to find! Give your prospect the proof that your product or service does exactly what you say it
will by featuring testimonials and case studies from current customers on your website. And if that’s not
solid enough evidence for them, then offer them a free trial. If your product is a pretty complex tool,
specifically aimed at B2B, then a live demo is a great way to speak to the prospect face-to-face. This will
help you to build a solid relationship and answer any questions they might have as you take them on a
walk-through of your prized product.

Ultimately, your job is to make the sales process as easy as possible for each and every customer.

Social Media Retargeting Ads, Email Marketing, PPC (transactional), SEO (transactional), Influencer
Marketing could be the digital marketing channels that you can use during this stage.

6.5 Retention

The Retention stage is often overlooked, but it is a key stage for ensuring reoccurring revenue and
creating a group of active brand advocates. Once the consumer has used the product and is satisfied, it is
crucial to provide added value and create a real relationship. In this stage, you are addressing an already
convinced consumer who thinks your product is great for them, but you still need to keep them satisfied
and create a desire to come back to your product. The more you know about your customers, the more
you will be able to provide additional value to them and delight them, not only with your product, but
with your brand experience and personality.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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6.6 Aligning Buyer’s Journey with Channels

Digital marketing has a set of primary components or channels that are used to achieve the marketing
goals set for each function. These will overlap because multiple components can be used for different
functions. Working in collaboration is key to moving your leads through the funnel and converting. Using
the full circle of marketing tactics is known as a 360 or integrated marketing strategy. The common
definition of a 360 marketing strategy is that it is a marketing plan that is both online and offline, on
social media, and more. It's a holistic promotion that truly covers all the bases.

Content: Based on the inbound methodology, content is king. It is your content that attracts interested
consumers and encourages them to find out, learn, and research about your product and brand. Content
marketing is the number one priority in your inbound strategy as it will be at the center of all efforts and
campaigns as the added value to build trust with the consumer, and eventually convert them into
customers.

Display and Video Advertising: Based on an outbound strategy, marketers and brands can drive
awareness and consideration by using engaging banner and audio visual formats displayed to audiences
who fit a certain profile on channels across the web. This can be done by targeting interest groups,
programmatically or using retargeting methods to ensure you are targeting the ideal audiences at all times.
Goals and KPIs for video and display tend to be awareness-driving outcomes rather than direct
conversions through the channel.

Social Media Marketing: Through content distribution and social engagement, social media marketing
enables you to create a real connection with consumers, keep them informed, and make it easy for them to
reach your website, ask for information, and provide feedback. Social media allows you to showcase your
brand’s personality and connections with other companies, influencers, and causes, making your company
more relatable.

Paid Search: This channel is directly tied to conversion and sales. Because consumers turn to their search
engine to find answers, being top of search engine results pages (SERPs) is a competitive advantage.
Knowing that consumers online will click on the top links presented and rarely look past the first page, it
is essential to be visible when consumers search and are ready to buy.

Search Engine Optimization: SEO is most useful for discovery and researching activities on search
engines. Good SEO means your content will be considered more relevant by search engine and will
hopefully list your website closer to the top of the page in the organic, non-paid search results.

Email Marketing: The consumer doesn’t always proactively come on your website or find you on
Google. However, email marketing is the channel that allows you to reach out to subscribed consumers
who want to hear from you.

Automation: By using specialist software, digital marketers can set up campaigns to automatically
engage prospects and customers at key times using email marketing and social media channels. You can
set up a workflow which is a number of rules for sending emails or delivering social content to different

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

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people on your prospect or customer list to keep them engaged with your brand as they come to a
purchase decision. This is called lead or prospect nurturing, and it can have a very positive impact on
consumer purchase patterns.

Analytics: This enables you to connect each campaign, visits, and conversions, and tie it all together to
understand the consumer journey through your marketing channels and sales funnel. Different campaign
analytics tools are incorporated in the various social media platforms, search engines and email service
providers. You can also track website visitors using web analytics to understand what happens after a user
clicks on your campaign ad and land on your site. Both campaign and website analytics are essential for
optimization of channels by providing marketers with the data to make informed decisions.

6.7 Mixed stages

Awareness & Interest: The Awareness and Interest stages are driven by discovery when the consumer
slowly becomes aware of their problem and the potential solutions. This stage is driven by your content’s
relationship with the main topic. A user may not carry out a detailed search, meaning that positioning on a
broad topic and sharing content that stands out (video or advertising) will help your product become part
of the conversation. The ideal situation is for your content to be engaging and interesting, bring added
value to the conversation, and provide solutions to the consumer’s problem. Developing a strong social
media presence and engagement is recommended for bringing your product forward organically and on
your target timeline.

Consideration and Conversion: Consideration and Conversion are stages where the consumer is more
focused. At these stages, the customers know the available solutions and are now wondering which one to
choose by looking for additional information, experience, reviews, and creating a mindmap of the best
quality/price/value ratio. As consumers will likely search for additional information by asking precise
questions about the product, you need to optimize your content for search engines and invest in paid ads
on keywords translation to ensure the 'Consideration' stage is well-integrated in your strategy. The more
your product or brand is associated with a specific topic and keyword, the stronger the association will be
shaped in the consumer’s mind. This can increase content discovery and engagement significantly.

Retention: Retention uses more personal components, such as email marketing automation and analytics,
to provide a consistent customer experience, reaching out, following up a purchase, and using the correct
information to create a sense of intimacy between the customer and the brand. Using information such as
a birthday date, membership start date, or favorite topic or product can produce engaging content that
triggers an emotional response from the customer.

Module 1: Introduction to Digital Marketing

Prepared by Manaf Khudiyev