Essential Digital Marketing Tips for Startups to Boost Growth

Over 81% of consumers conducted a Google search before buying a product. More than $600 billion were spent on digital marketing in 2023, crossing spend on ads by a large margin.

If this doesn’t push you to use digital marketing to push your business forward, then what will? 

What is Digital Marketing ?

Digital marketing refers to using a host of digital channels and methods to push your brand, products, services, etc. to a targeted audience. It leverages technology to comprehensively research user behavior, and model marketing techniques accordingly. 

The benefits of digital marketing are huge. In an era where everyone is online, digital marketing leverages this mass online presence to shape consumer behavior into buying behavior. Additionally, digital marketing has infinite measurability over your efforts. This allows for optimization over gaps, improving overall results.

Digital marketing includes marketing tactics and techniques such as content marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), and email marketing to systematically persuade and convert online impressions into buyers. 

For startups out there to make an impact, digital marketing can serve as the essential tool they require to make a name for themselves. 

8 Best Digital Marketing Tips For StartUps

Given below are 8 detailed and actionable digital marketing tricks and tips that new businesses can use to propel their efforts.

1. Ensure that your pages are optimized for mobile viewership – According to Google, more than 70% of the online traffic is through mobile phones and tablets. This makes it essential to make your web pages optimized for mobile viewing. There are a variety of steps you can take to do this:

• Using AMP – AMP, or Accelerated Mobile Pages facilitates designing fast-loading mobile-friendly web pages. AMP is an open source framework designed  to optimize mobile viewership. It is very easy to move to AMP pages, and replacing HTML tags with AMP tags shouldn’t be an issue to any website owner. 

• Single Column Design – Prefer to keep all your web pages designed to be consumed in a single column, with multiple clickable elements to encourage interactions. Multiple columns clutter the screen on mobile, leading the visitors away.

• Implement a Mobile-First Design Strategy – Design pages for mobile first, and then make them upscale to fit larger screens. Keep the buttons and CTA large enough to be clicked by fingers in mobile view. Use a hamburger menu and large texts for easy navigation.

• Optimize loading speed – Reduce image size to load faster, use browser caching to store static elements in the user’s browser, and remove redundant HTML content. Faster loading pages are discovered and indexed faster.

2. User Generated Content is your friend – User generated content refers to any piece of media, such as text, photos, media, etc. that is created by your users rather than you as a brand. The main benefit of user generated content is that it builds credibility and trust, while being an easy content engine to run. 

Here is how you can utilize user generated content to push your brand:

• Repost reviews – Try to add a creative spin to your reviews and customer testimonials and use them as a post to your social media and add a dedicated testimonials section to your website. Unique and personal experiences generate a lot of buzz on social media, highlighting your brand and products simultaneously.

• Do Contests and Challenges – Contests and Challenges hosted for your customers create a lot of organic interactions and impressions. You can use these to launch new products, highlight key features, or simply boost your social presence. You  can encourage content creation by consumers through these contests and challenges, and use them in your content strategy.

• Use video content -Try to encourage or contact some customers to create video reviews or testimonials. Video content looks much more genuine and believable and is sure to give your credibility a great boost. 

3. Prepare a content strategy – In content marketing, preparing a content strategy is a must. It outlines how you are going to generate organic impressions and traffic, and utilize it to push sales and conversions. Without a strategy, you will just be shooting blindly, wasting resources and time. Specifically: 

• Industry Analysis: Figure out what type of content is being consumed in your industry and try to position yourself accordingly. Look at your competition and the content being created by them, and try to improve upon it, while adding your own flavor to it.

• Set-Clear and Measurable Objectives: Aim for goals that are achievable and Measurable, for example, increasing organic traffic by 30% in the next 6 months. This ensures that you stay on the right track.

• SEO – Use long-tail keywords, and optimize for technical SEO as well. Thoroughly research keywords, their volume, and difficulty, using tools such as Ahrefs and SEMrush.

• Create a Content Calendar – Based on the above pointers and their results, prepare a content calendar that outlines what type of content you’re going to be putting out through various channels. Consistency is important, hence, advance planning of keyword targeting and social campaigns gives you the upper hand in staying on top of things.

• Analyze and Iterate – Measure the results of your content strategy such as organic traffic, conversions, engagement rate, etc. Using these KPIs, improve upon the areas that aren’t fulfilling your expectations. 

4. Analyze your competition – Outperforming competition is key to having a successful business, especially for new startups. Carefully considering the positioning of your competitors may enable you to find gaps in their value that you can fill, helping you differentiate and deliver more value. 

The ways to go about it are –

• Identify Key Competitors – The most important digital marketing tip for startups is to identify their key direct competitors and try to provide more value than they are providing. Analyzing their positioning can help you find a direction for your own efforts. 

• Analyze their Product Range and Pricing – Figure out how your key competitors are solving their consumer’s problems. Think of features, strategies, unique offerings, pricing, etc. It is definitely one of these areas in which you can differentiate and thereby increase your value. Creating a USP (Unique Selling Point) demands thorough analysis of competition.
• Gauge their Customer Experience (CX) – Get a feel of the customer reviews and popular opinion of your competitors. Evaluate their support and service systems and try to design a better support frontier. If your customers are more satisfied, a larger number will come to you.

5. Leverage technology to your benefit – Marketing automation is the new norm. Similarly, there are a lot of processes in which automation drastically increases visibility into insights, thereby empowering you to take more granular decisions for improvement. The main ways automation can empower you in 2024 are:

• Automate tasks – Use CRM tools, email automation tools, social media planners, HR automation software, etc. to significantly reduce the input required to do routine tasks. CRM tools give you a platform to manage your entire pipeline at a single place, making customer relationship management much more efficient.
• Use Data Analytics – Data analytics tools are powerhouses of information you need to make decisions that push your business forward. This data-driven approach to gather insights on customer behavior, market trends, and business performance can improve strategizing and decision-making.
• Use AI and Machine Learning – Artificial Intelligence tools are excellent to both automate, and to provide automated no-hassle experiences. AI chatbots, predictive analytics models, etc. can empower your customer experience.

6. Utilize Email Marketing – In the nascent stages, the best digital marketing trick for startups is definitely email marketing. It is a surefire way to get your voice heard and get your name out there. Email marketing basically means creating branded content for your business and mass emailing potential prospects and consumers, trying to get them to engage with your ideas in some ways, using a CTA (Call-To-Action).

• Create High-Quality Mailing Lists – The first step is to figure out your ideal customer profile and then gather contacts for the same. Your appeal should be clearly defined in terms of demographic, age group, occupation, designation, etc. After figuring out your appeal and ICP (Ideal Customer Profile), create a large database of contacts.
• Offer Valuable Content – Your emails should not be a blatant promotion. Offer industry insights, Ebooks, newsletters, etc. in your emails, and attach a CTA to them that leads potential consumers to your website. It shows your potential customers that you care.
• Analyze Results – Track metrics such as open rates, reply rates, engagement rates, etc. to optimize your email marketing campaigns. A/B test your email copies to optimize for best performance.

7. Invest in PPC Advertising – For startups that have appropriate funding and access to capital, an immediate recommendation is to invest in PPC (Pay-Per-Click) advertising. PPC is used to drive targeted traffic to your website for acquiring leads, driver conversions, or increasing traffic. PPC involved bidding on keywords, according to the Cost Per Click (CPC) of said keywords.

• Keyword Research – Research about the search terms in your industry and their cost per click. Diversify by using both high-intent keywords, and long-tail niche keywords. Tools like SEMrush can immensely help in this process. 

• Create Landing Pages – Landing pages are the pages that people clicking on your ads are led to. Landing pages should be able to transfer that intent into buying behavior. Closely monitor landing page behavior and engagement rates, and optimize for better performance.
• Create Compelling Ads – Your ads should reflect a deep expertise and problem-solving ability. Write compelling copies, and include a strong  call-to-action. Test out different ad copies and figure out which one works best.

8. Create a Strong Brand Identity – A strong brand identity helps you throughout the life of your startup. Have a consistent branding in terms of brand colors, and keep a consistent message surrounding your solutions. More directed efforts in this direction are:

• Create a strong brand voice – Your core values should be clearly defined, along with focus. These values should be something potential consumers can resonate with. Ensure that across all channels, you use the same values and encourage similar behavior. 

• Ensure cohesive visuals –The look and feel of your brand should be consistent across all channels such as your website, products, email, social media etc. Choose punchy brand colors and subtle accents that are memorable. Ensure that nothing screams too promotional, yet compels the consumer to check out more  of your stuff. 

• Maintain consistency – Do not make abrupt design changes or core value changes. Slowly transition, if you absolutely need to. Ensure that all the content surrounding you is updated across all channels. 

Conclusion 

Any of these digital marketing tips can help you stand out, however, the best results can be obtained by using them in combination. This list stresses the importance of technology in growing a startup, marking the importance of keeping up to date with technology. A consistent and driven effort is needed, and when coupled with the tips and tricks in this blog, consistent growth can be yours!

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FAQs

How do I start a digital marketing startup?

The basics of starting a digital marketing startup involve figuring out your niche, gathering tools and personnel for rendering those services, building a brand, reaching out to potential, and then repeating and improving upon this structure. 

How do beginners start digital marketing?

An important tip is to focus on a particular niche in digital marketing while starting, such as social media, SEO, etc., upskilling in that, building a portfolio, and then moving on to other skills. Rinse and repeat for a few years, and you become a digital marketing maestro. 

What are the top 5 C’s of digital marketing?

The top 5 Cs of digital marketing are content, context, communication, connection, and conversion. They explain the need to create valuable content with an appropriate industrial context, communicating effectively though it via various channels, connecting with potential consumers and building relationships, and converting the interactions into business. 

Do startups need digital marketing?

Yes, startups must use digital marketing to quickly get their voice heard and focus their efforts by analyzing and tracking performance metrics through various digital tools. It is the best method to ensure consistent and targeted marketing efforts.

Mohit Verma

I am an experienced professional with 9+ years of experience in Search Engine Optimization. I am on a mission to provide industry focused job oriented SEO so the students/mentees can get their dream SEO job and and start working from day 1.