After finishing my degree (which is absolutely not essential for a career in digital marketing, just to point out), I started my career in digital marketing and haven’t looked back since. Often people starting out try to learn about complex software or expensive training, yet the truth is every agency or business does things differently and utilise different tools, and will likely want to be able to teach you how they work almost from scratch. 

So, we’re here to strip things back and tell you the key things you should be focusing on in order to get those interviews and hopefully secure a fantastic job in digital marketing! 

Utilise Free Online Courses

First up, once you’ve decided you want to go in the direction of digital marketing, it’s time to learn a bit about it. There are plenty of expensive courses out there that people think they need to take, when really there are so many free courses and resources out there to help you build a foundation of knowledge to then go on to apply for jobs. 

Something that worked really well for me personally is Google’s Fundamentals of Digital Marketing, a free online course which introduces the core areas of digital marketing, from SEO to PPC and social media to websites. It takes around 40 hours to complete and you can do each module one at a time, fitting it easily into your schedule if you’re currently studying or working. 

Applying for entry level digital marketing jobs is all about showing interest, so you don’t necessarily have to have finished it when you are first applying for jobs, but just put on your CV that you’re currently working through the course. I’d absolutely recommend finishing it even if you do get a job, as it will give you a great overview and also introduce you to areas that you may be interested in moving forwards. 

To summarise, don’t feel you need to spend lots of money on complex courses, just learn the basics and show you’re interested in learning more! 

Get the Right Experience

Next up, it’s important to get the right experience. Many people aim to apply for internships at big companies to put a big name on their CV, when actually, it’s much more useful to gain experience in smaller agencies. I’ve done both, and trust me when I say go for the smaller agencies! You will learn so much more and will be given more opportunities to learn, whereas in larger companies, often you’ll be passed down the more boring and mundane activities. To find the right digital marketing agency, have a read of their testimonials and you should get an idea of what they’re all about. 

We’d absolutely recommend aiming to gain work experience and your first digital marketing jobs in agencies rather than working in-house at a business, as you are faced with tasks across a wide range of different types of businesses, so you will get the opportunity to learn a significant amount more. 

When it comes to work experience, you should expect that you won’t get paid. It’s difficult for a company to justify paying someone without any experience at all when they also need to provide training, so save up a bit for your travel costs beforehand. It could lead to some fantastic opportunities. 

One piece of work experience I did was unpaid, but it led to me to a part time job throughout university and then a full time job when I finished! So, sacrificing a couple of weeks of work elsewhere has the potential to very much repay you in the future! 

Focus on Your Transferable Skills

Now you’ve got a basic knowledge of digital marketing and you have gained some experience, you might be ready to start applying for jobs. Rather than trying to force digital marketing skills onto your CV that you might not know that much about, and might struggle to expand on in an interview, the best thing you can do is focus on your transferable skills. 

Some key skills in digital marketing are the following: 

• Strong writing skills – experience writing content for a range of different purposes
• Good communicator – always felt confident communicating with a wide demographic of people
• Data analysis – confident analysing data and providing actionable insights based on it
• Creativity – able to introduce innovative ideas to different situations

These are just some examples, and try to think about how you’ve utilised those skills in real world situations and be ready to expand on them in the interview. For the majority of agencies, I’ve found in my experience, they will look for someone who has the right transferable skills and is eager to learn and build a career. As every agency does things differently, this is so much more important than anything else for entry level roles! 

Final Thoughts

When starting my career in digital marketing, I wish I would have known more about utilising free online courses, looking for work experience in the right places and focusing more on my transferable skills rather than trying to force digital marketing skills onto my CV. So, hopefully this article has been useful and you can learn from my mistakes!

The post 3 Things I Wish I Knew When Starting My Digital Marketing Career appeared first on SiteProNews.

Brands need to appeal to customers in a new way, whether you have a medical practice or sell vitamins. Consistency across your platforms is essential, particularly as digital health is accelerating so rapidly. The main component of deciding how to brand your company is to ultimately decide what you offer your customers, how it can help them and why your product is important to them.

So, we are here to help with a few different things that you should look to establish within your branding to make sure that you are maximising the potential of your healthcare business.

Highlight USP’s

As the healthcare industry is so saturated, making sure that you clearly highlight your USP’s throughout your branding is essential. Differentiating yourself could be key for your business, so find or create things that your brand offers and no one else does. Perhaps your clinics are luxurious and offer a completely different experience for the patient than others. You could be creating some of the most innovative AI in healthcare. Maybe you have brand-new state of the art equipment that is revolutionary in the industry. You might be using new ingredients with exciting benefits proven by recent research.

Finding things that make you different, and clearly highlighting them to your customers through your branding, could take your business to a whole new level. As this is the healthcare industry, make sure that you represent the benefits of the business in a professional way.

Establish Trust

No matter the nature of your business, establishing trust is really important. When it comes to healthcare, it should be an absolute priority. They need to know that what you are offering is safe, has backing from experienced professionals and that it is a product that they can trust.

When people are ingesting products, giving them to their children, changing their body or investing in something to improve their health, having trust is an absolute must. Unlike other industries, it simply isn’t enough for customers to give something a go and see if it works for them, like they might with technology or clothing. Your product or service will be having a direct impact on someone’s mind or body, so showing you are reliable is vital.

Good branding can help you to do this, by offering information about the specific qualifications of the people who developed the product or who are offering a service, the research that reinforces the benefits/safety of the product and overall providing customers with a good understanding of exactly what it is they are buying and why they should put trust in you.

Establish Brand Guidelines

Another important factor when it comes to branding in the healthcare industry is making sure that everyone in your company has an in-depth understanding of the company’s branding, which can be achieved through establishing brand guidelines. When you are rebranding or creating your initial branding, make sure that you create in-depth brand guidelines with information about the company’s branding history, mission, values and vision for the future.

It is also important to include information about the colour palette, preferred file formats, sizes, spacing, logos, typography and so much more. Within the healthcare industry, consistency is particularly important, so making sure that everyone has the same understanding of the brand is key.

Final Thoughts

Working on your branding within the healthcare industry is more important than ever. There is nothing worse than a company rebranding multiple times because they didn’t get it quite right the first time around, so investing time and money into this initially will help your business significantly in the long run. It would be worth working with a branding agency Manchester or London based for some of the best talent, as they will be experts in getting to know your business through and through, then reflecting this in a professional and effective way through your branding.

As the industry is so saturated in all areas, now is the perfect time to get ahead with your branding!

The post The Importance of Branding in the Health Industry appeared first on SiteProNews.

Transformed Consumer Behaviours

As mentioned in the introduction, Covid-19 has encouraged consumers to make the shift to online shopping. Whilst younger generations are already accustomed to e-commerce, older generations have had no choice but to adapt in order to continue with their non-essential shopping. In doing so, it is likely that many older consumers realised the benefits, such as avoiding busy shopping centres, accessing sales, easily comparing prices between websites and accessing brands or shops that they could not reach otherwise. 

E-commerce has become an aging marketplace that companies must adapt to. For example, offering clear ‘how-to’ guides on some of the basics that other users take for granted, or thinking more carefully about the needs of older consumers in order to take advantage of this new online audience. The potential for growth online is at an all-time high as a result of the pandemic, so make sure that as a business, you take advantage and properly take into account all age brackets. 

Second Hand Shopping

Another dominant trend that has continued to grow year on year is consumer demand for ethical products. People are becoming more aware that their consumer choices have the ability to influence either positive or negative change when it comes to the environment and also the welfare of people all around the world. Hence, there is a focus on buying ethically and sustainably. 

One area that is particularly successful is second-hand shopping, since not only is waste reduced as products that would have gone to landfill have the chance of a second life, but it also massively reduces the CO2 emissions that would have been produced making new products. Recycling clothes or other products is both economically and environmentally friendly. 

Online businesses will need to highlight what they are doing to reduce their emissions, how they are helping the environment and the ways in which they are participating in fair trade. Also, a focus on implementing some kind of second-hand or recycling initiative could draw in eco-friendly shoppers. In such a competitive online marketplace, being ethical could be that unique selling point that sets you apart from another business. 

Focus on Retention and Qualified Users

As e-commerce becomes increasingly popular and competitive, there has also been an increase in certain costs. Bidding for ads becomes more expensive as more companies compete and the demand for the best website developers in the business also increases cost. So, when companies are paying more than ever before to get customers onto their website, they want to make sure that they stay and buy something. 

This increase in cost has resulted in a focus on customer retention and drawing in qualified users. A qualified user is someone who has shown interest in your product in some way and so is likely to become a customer. Say someone searches for ‘portrait photographer London’, it is likely they will be looking for a general photographer based in London. So, if you are an animal portrait photographer in London, optimising your website to draw in consumers looking for a ‘portrait photographer London’ is unlikely to bring you qualified users since they will reach your website but will not purchase anything when they realise you are not offering the service they are looking for. The important focus here is on bringing qualified users to your website. This might reduce your traffic but result in your sales going up. 

Final Thoughts

The significant shift in consumer behaviour made 2020 a huge year for e-commerce. So, in order to succeed in 2021, online businesses will need to adapt to both cultural changes, for example a focus on sustainability and ethical shopping, whilst also keeping up with the competition by understanding exactly what their customers are looking for and targeting them. 2021 is set to be an exciting year for the world of e-commerce.

The post E-Commerce Trends to Watch in 2021 appeared first on SiteProNews.

Increased Efficiency

Technology has the ability to significantly improve the efficiency of a business. Whilst technology has of course been embedded into the industry, the extent to which it is now used on a daily basis has not been seen before. Software is available that can reduce the workload of staff in all areas, for example being able to process major transactions through Blockchain without having to waste time going through banks. The time that is saved can be invested in other areas of the business, so software like this is becoming increasingly popular. This should give any business a lasting competitive advantage.

Online Real Estate Auctions

Whilst online real estate auctions have existed for some time, as a result of Covid-19 their popularity has sky-rocketed. Buyers are able to buy properties quickly, usually at below-market price, and they aren’t caught up in a property chain. Sellers can quickly offload properties that they no longer want or need without having to wait for months on end for the deal to go through. The pandemic meant that physical auctions couldn’t take place, so online versions took their place. The benefits of being able to buy a property without the added inconvenience of travel costs is likely to make this a trend that sticks around. People can also check out the multiple listing service, Bright MLS, that Showcase IDX offers to brokers and agents in the real estate industry.

Targeted Online Advertisements

The development of ad technology means that real estate agencies are able to target potential buyers much more accurately. Things like proximity, interests and purchase history can all be considered when trying to find the perfect buyer for particular properties. For example, when trying to sell multi-million pound properties, you might target people with an interest in designer clothing or those who spend a lot of time in the area the property is in. 

If you wanted to target families, you might focus on people spending money on baby products or family holidays. Research of demographics (also made much easier through technology) will inform which direction you take, yet targeted ads should definitely be considered as a significant element in any social media marketing strategy.

Social Media

Aside from paid advertisements, organic social media is also an extremely powerful tool which enables real estate businesses to interact with potential customers, build a strong sense of brand and share exciting content. There are so many ways you can do this, but here’s an introduction to get you started. 

Firstly, make sure you are using hashtags. So many people use the hashtag feature to find something they’re looking for, making it a very useful tool. For example, if you have a luxury home to sell in Mayfair, you would hashtag things like #LuxuryMayfairProperty and #ExpensiveHousesLondon, alongside more generic hashtags such as #HouseInspiration and #RealEstateLondon. This will attract the attention of the people you think could be potential buyers. 

Social media is also fantastic to generate a buzz. Going back to the luxury home in Mayfair, if you post professional photos onto your social media, not only might it draw in buyers, but it will also encourage interest from people who might see it as their dream home. Even if you do not have a luxury real estate company, posting ‘dream homes’ will still help to engage people with your content. For maximum success when creating your social media strategy, try to find a balance of posting content directly linked to your business and also things that your followers will find interesting. 

360 Video Tours

Whilst photos are useful, people find it difficult to get a real sense of what a property is like without seeing it in person. That was the case, until the development of virtual reality enabled 360 degree video tours of homes. People are able to gain familiarity with a property before deciding whether to view it. In terms of efficiency for the real estate agents, this is fantastic, as it saves them from wasting time travelling to properties to meet  potential buyers and showing them around just to be told that it isn’t quite for them. Adding this user friendly tool to websites will draw in more potential customers who aren’t wanting to waste their time. Whilst this has existed in the past, it has become more useful than ever during the pandemic. 

An important element of this is the use of drones, which is common when creating 360 tours, as well as aerial images and videos of properties. Aerial photography was extremely expensive prior to the use of drones. Thanks to the accessibility of the technology, drones can be used by real estate agents themselves if need be without needing to outsource professional photographers. The potential for agencies to create high quality content has gone through the roof.

The post How is Technology Transforming the Real Estate Industry? appeared first on SiteProNews.