Marketing Reflections Journal

I entered Digital Marketing hoping to learn how to develop, polish and expand my online presence both as an individual and as a business. My expectations were to learn how push the concept of my brand out to an audience with similar interests through a digital marketing campaign. Specifically, I wanted to get some tips on how to get my digital content a higher Google ranking. My thoughts were that this class would assist me in building awareness for my current business plan and help with future marketing campaigns that I plan to be a part of.

To this point, I've learned a great deal about the importance of keywords and long tail phrases that will help improve my search engine ranking. I've also learned that paid searches, or pay-per-clicks, is a budget friendly way of marketing my concept faster than organic Search Engine Optimization efforts.

The most important and difficult aspect of digital marketing that I've discovered is the creation of a “Unique Selling Proposition” (USP).  Constructing a convincing USP is a challenge, which requires a significant amount of original thought. Through continuous research and use of the resource tools provided, I hope to find what value my business or product offers that my competitors don't. I will emphasize our differences to distinguish myself and pursue my potential audience.

Display Advertisements are another way of increasing brand awareness and marketing a business. When properly targeted, display ads inform and remind consumers of products and services. Through the use of Google Adwords or similar resource tools, a business can find placements through websites, categories or keywords and long tail phrases.

Placement of advertising is crucial for successful digital marketing when examining Affiliate Marketing. Chris Brogan, CEO of Human Business Works clearly illustrates this in his latest blog post; Sponsored Posts Would Work Better if You Improved Context. Chris believes that sponsorships have potential for quality business, but paid advertisement has to be relevant to the content of the publishing site. Therefore, it is important when working with a sponsor company that both parties have similar interests and goals or else the partnership doesn't make sense.

I plan to use all of the marketing channels that are reviewed in this course in my future digital marketing efforts. The channel most beneficial for my brand awareness, audience and potential business partners is Affiliate Marketing. A strong business relationship will benefit my publisher monetarily and give my concept maximum exposure. Coupon codes and special trial offers for my products and services running through relative sites are a good starting point in getting conversions for my company.

Brogan, C. (2014, July 14). Sponsored Posts Would Work Better If You Improved Context [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://www.chrisbrogan.com/sponsored-posts-would-work-better-if-you-improved-context/