Digital Marketing

1: Understand marketing through the Internet

The elements of Internet marketing: definition of digital marketing; definition of e-commerce and e-business; the internet micro- and macro-environment; benefits of Internet marketing e.g. reach, scope, immediacy, interactivity, targeting; adaptive and closed loop marketing.

The Internet marketing mix: product and branding; place e.g. channels, virtual organisations; price e.g. auctions; promotions; people; processes; physical evidence; digital marketing tools/e-tools; the online marketing matrix including business and consumer markets; the online customer.

Interactive order processing: choosing a supplier; selecting a product; check stock availability; placing order; authorisation of payment; input of data; data transfer; order processing; online confirmation and delivery information; tracking of order; delivery; data integrity and security systems; technology e.g. three-tier architecture (client-server-database); web-forms.

2: Be able to use the Internet for promotion using digital marketing communications

Search engine marketing (SEM): definition of SEM, definition of search engine optimisation (SEO); advantages and disadvantages of SEO; best practice in SEO; paid search engine marketing, pay-per-click advertising (PPC); landing pages; long tail concept; geo-targeting e.g. Google AdWords; opt in email and email marketing.

Online public relations (OPR): definition; advantages and disadvantages; best practice in OPR; online partnerships and affiliation; interactive display advertising; mobile commerce; viral marketing; using offline techniques to support online media.

The Internet as a community: customer ‘ownership’ of sites via interactivity, instant messaging (IM); chat-rooms; discussion groups; blogs; portals e.g. yahoo; social media networks e.g. Facebook; file sharing sites e.g. YouTube; Flickr, Twitter; how businesses can use these media; online reputation management tactics.

3: Be able to produce market research to support customer relationship management

Market research: secondary research data e.g. published surveys and reports, online research communities; Google insights and trends; blogs; government information e.g. census; types of research e.g. researching customer needs; types of information required e.g. quantitative data or qualitative data; primary market research methods e.g. online surveys; open and closed questions; focus groups; listening labs.

Steps in online market research: establish the project goals e.g. secondary research – background to a business problem, primary research – new product for existing customers; determine your sample; choose research methodology e.g. survey sent via email or advertised online; create your questionnaire e.g. www.surveymonkey.com; pre-test the questionnaire; conduct interviews; enter data; analyse data; produce the reports.

Relationship marketing: benefits of relationship marketing e.g. loyalty, lower costs, easier targeting; electronic customer relationship marketing (eCRM); operational CRM; analytical CRM and data mining e.g. Amazon past purchase suggestions – collaborative filtering; web analytics; conversion optimisation; segmenting customers e.g. by value, by loyalty; eCRM technology e.g. Sales-Force software; implementing eCRM eg attracting new and existing customers, incentivising customers, embrace, capturing information; collaborative CRM; maintaining dialogue online and offline; vendor relationship management VRM.

Security and trust issues: ‘permission marketing’; value of orders; lead times; payment authorised in advance; consumer trust; transaction security e.g. data, financial details; UK Data Protection Act.

4: Be able to design an Internet Marketing plan

The Internet Marketing plan: situational analysis, key performance indicators in Internet marketing e.g. click through rates, churn rates, sessions; SWOT e.g. examination of business strengths e.g., customer data, weaknesses, opportunities e.g. opt in email campaigns, threats; environmental analysis; competitors analysis; channel analysis e.g. texting; set objectives; target markets e.g. segmenting by channel; decide media e.g. pay per click; control; feedback.

Creating an online pay-per-click campaign: preplanning e.g. online and offline analysis of the business (as above); customer demographics; the industry and competitors; goal definition e.g. branding campaigns; set budget, Cost Per Action (CPA) and targets; keyword research; copywriting; bidding; measure; analysing; testing; optimising.