What Is Internet Marketing? Your Guide to Internet Marketing in 2024

Internet marketing definition

Internet marketing is a type of marketing that promotes a business and its offerings through online channels to drive site traffic, generate leads, and increase sales.

If you’re looking to expand your marketing efforts, internet marketing is a great opportunity to reach more prospects and convert them into customers.

Want to learn more about Internet marketing? We’ve got you covered. In this article, we’ll answer these questions:

• What is Internet marketing?
• What are some examples of Internet marketing?
• What are the benefits of Internet marketing?
• How can I use Internet marketing?
• Why is Internet marketing important?
• How can I start building an Internet marketing strategy?
• What does an Internet marketing company do?
• Do I need Internet marketing for my business?

Need an Internet marketing consultant? Give us a call at 888-601-5359 or contact us online to get in contact with one of WebFX’s talented Internet marketing consultants today!

Free Comprehensive Guide

Digital vs. Traditional Marketing

Download this guide to understand the key advantages, costs, and opportunities for each to decide which is best for your marketing strategy!

Get My Free Guide

What is Internet marketing?

Internet marketing, also called digital marketing or online marketing, involves promoting a brand and its products or services to online audiences using the Internet and digital media.

With Internet marketing, you use a combination of online strategies to help you build better relationships with your audience and attract more interested leads.

7 Internet marketing examples

Internet marketing uses several techniques and strategies to drive online traffic, leads, and sales. Online marketing involves using these major strategies:

Internet marketing strategies

1. Search engine optimization (SEO)
2. Content marketing
3. Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising
4. Social media advertising
5. Social media marketing
6. Email marketing
7. Web design

Let’s go through each one:

1. SEO

SEO definition

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of optimizing your website to rank higher in search results. This strategy helps you appear in more relevant search results, so you can drive more qualified traffic to your site.

Much of SEO involves increasing your rank in search by using techniques to:

• Research and incorporate keywords or search terms that your target audience uses into your content
• Generate high-quality content that provides your audience with relevant answers to their questions
• Improve user experience by improving web design
• Earn backlinks from authoritative sources in your industry to gain online reputation

2. Content marketing

Content marketing definition

Content marketing strategy focuses on sharing valuable, industry-relevant information with your audience.

With quality, relevant content, you can build up an attentive audience and get them to check out your business. Content comes in numerous forms including:

• Blog posts
• Infographics
• Videos
• Ebooks
• Podcasts
• And more

Content marketing is about consistently creating helpful and high-quality content. Your content must be:

• Easy to read: The vocabulary is around an 8th-grade reading level.
• Researched: It integrates your target keywords and answers your audience’s questions clearly, succinctly, and accurately.
• Unique: It adds relevant information to the discussion in your own style.
• Interesting: It provides a good experience for your reader.
• Error-free: It is grammatically correct and provides useful, accurate information.

3. Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising

Online paid advertising generally involves paid search ads and display ads. Most online paid advertising functions on a pay-per-click basis, where businesses pay for the ad only when users click.

Much of the benefit of online ads comes from the fact that most online ads are less intrusive than their traditional ad counterparts like billboards or cold calling.

PPC advertising is one of the best Internet marketing strategies to drive traffic to your site quickly at a low cost. With PPC advertising, you can easily appear high in search results, and the return is high since you only pay when someone clicks on your ad.

4. Social media advertising

Social media advertising is also another cost-effective Internet marketing strategy to start generating an online presence.

If you want to use social media advertising, you’ll need to choose which platforms you want to use to reach your audience. Popular social media advertising platforms include:

• Facebook
• Instagram
• X formerly (Twitter)
• Pinterest
• LinkedIn
• YouTube

Social media platforms gather a plethora of user information, which you can use to target your ideal customers — the ones who are most interested in your offerings.

Pulling in these audiences with various engaging social media ad types will boost your traffic and engagement, as well as your sales and conversions.

5. Social media marketing

Social media networks provide a great opportunity to market online because they are easy to use to share information. That’s why social media marketing is a great option for your business.

With social media, you can:

• Increase brand awareness: Social media lets you have a larger online presence. You can build up your brand identity and show up as a relevant interest for your audiences. When your audience sees your presence on social media, they’ll get more familiar with your brand.
• Interact with audience members: Social media provides useful platforms for interacting with your audience one-on-one. Whenever your audience has questions, concerns, or thoughts they want to share, you can be there to provide quality interaction right when they do. Your engagement with your audience on social media can help set you apart from your competition and show that you care for your audience.
• Build your brand voice: Social media is one of the best places to show off what makes you unique. You can showcase how your quality products and services improve your audience’s life. You can also show off the relevant content that you produce.

Social media provides an essential means of engaging with your customers, building your brand voice and identity, and providing people with great customer service.

6. Email marketing

Email marketing enables you to connect one-on-one with leads interested in your products or services. There are several different types of emails you can send, but some of the most popular ones are:

• Newsletters
• Customer service
• Follow-up
• Loyalty/rewards
• Recommendations
• Promotions

You can also take advantage of the advanced targeting and personalization options that come with email marketing strategies. With emails, you want to hit users with reminders and deals when they’re most likely ready to convert.

Send personalized emails to your audience when:

• You publish new content they might like: Show off your new content and get your audience to interact with your content and brand. Show that you have something in common with them.
• They look at your products and services: You can send promotions on those products or services, or recommend similar ones they might be interested in.
• They abandon a cart of products: Remind them of the items in their cart to increase the chances of them making a purchase.
• They’re celebrating a birthday or special event: Discounts and coupons sent on these days work great for getting your audience to convert.

When you personalize an email, be sure to include the subscriber’s name. It makes them feel connected to you and that you care about them enough to get to know them. Adding their name makes them more likely to engage because they’ll know the email content is specific to their interests.

Tools like EmailMarketingFX can help you efficiently and effectively personalize emails.

7. Web design

Your site’s web design is important for online marketing because it acts as your business’s central online hub. Your presence and activities on other online platforms most often lead your customers to your website where they can convert.

A good portion of website marketing focuses on building websites that appeal to your audience and get them to continue engaging with your site’s pages.

Having a good design means making sure that your UX is flawless. It also involves aspects like:

• Creating a modern design that suits your brand
• Implementing easy-to-use navigation and layout
• Responsive web design
• Website security
• Providing fast load times

Benefits of Internet marketing

Internet marketing allows you to connect with your customers using their preferred communication channels and build strong, long-lasting relationships with them.

Here are the benefits of Internet marketing:

• It drives a better return on investment (ROI): Internet marketing strategies are more cost-effective than traditional marketing strategies. These strategies have a better ROI because you target more interested leads, making them more likely to convert.
• It allows you to reach more interested audiences: Online marketing enables you to reach audiences interested in your products or services wherever they may be.
• It allows you to interact with audiences regardless of the time: With automation and other Internet marketing techniques, you can stay in touch with your audience 24/7, so you can be there right when they’re ready to convert, no matter the time or time zone.
• It can be tailored to any industry and any business size: Whether you’re a small business or an enterprise, you can use Internet marketing to reach your audience, who is guaranteed to be online.
• It provides convenient ways for audiences to convert: The Internet makes it easy for your audience to convert. All it takes is the push of a button to buy, sign up, download, or contact you.

6 ways to use Internet marketing

Let us count the ways you can use Internet marketing for your business:

Ways to use Internet marketing

1. Build brand awareness
2. Generate website traffic
3. Attract qualified leads
4. Nurture and convert leads
5. Reduce churn
6. Improve customer satisfaction

Let’s discuss each one.

1. Build brand awareness

You can use various Internet marketing strategies to increase brand awareness, one of which is SEO.

For example, let’s say you have a veterinary clinic and want more pet owners to know about your practice. You can use SEO for veterinarians to rank in search engine results pages (SERPs) when users search for terms relevant to your practice.

When your website appears and ranks in SERPs, more pet owners become aware of your practice.

2. Generate website traffic

If you want more online users to visit your website, you can employ Internet marketing strategies like PPC.

With PPC, you can drive qualified traffic to your site by displaying ads on websites and relevant SERPs. This strategy lets you reach online users who may be interested in your brand and offerings. Because they’re likely doing their research, they may click your ad and visit your site.

3. Attract qualified leads

Several Internet marketing strategies can draw prospects to your business. You can use PPC to target specific audiences and drive qualified traffic to your site.

Content marketing is also an Internet marketing strategy that attracts qualified leads. By creating helpful content that addresses your prospects’ pain points, you’re organically attracting prospects to your business.

For example, let’s say you’re in the business of outdoor recreation. By publishing content relevant to your niche, such as fishing 101 or cycling safety tips, you’re getting the attention of your prospects.

Because your content has been helpful to them, they’ll likely trust your business and engage with you.

4. Nurture and convert leads

Nurturing your leads to conversion takes a variety of Internet marketing tactics. A key strategy you can use is email marketing.

Email marketing enables you to stay in touch with your leads. You can send personalized messages such as birthday messages and special offers on products they’re interested in.

5. Reduce customer churn

Customer churn, or attrition, occurs when customers stop buying your products or subscribing to your service. To reduce attrition, you must take care of your customers and keep them satisfied.

A variety of strategies can help you reduce churn. One of them is a loyalty program, which rewards customers who repeatedly purchase or interact with you.

Social media marketing is an Internet marketing strategy that helps you retain your customers. You can create groups that cultivate a sense of community, and where you can gather their feedback and answer community questions.

6. Improve customer satisfaction

Ensuring your customers are satisfied with their experience with you is important to growing your business. That’s because satisfied customers will likely repurchase from you and refer you to other people they know.

Digital marketing strategies like email marketing and content marketing play a role in keeping your customers happy. You can conduct surveys through email to gather their feedback and sentiments on your products or their transactions so you can improve their overall experience.

Meanwhile, creating free, helpful content for your customers and prospects is a great way to show them that you’re a brand that can address their concerns.

Keep reading to learn how to use Internet marketing to grow your business.