Succeed in Marketing: Avoid These 21 Common Mistakes

Digital marketing might be daunting, especially for individuals who are new to it – so unsurprisingly, errors will occur. Even the most seasoned marketers will have a digital marketing strategy that fails to produce the desired outcomes from time to time. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) ensures that your next online marketing campaign succeeds by avoiding these 21 common digital marketing strategy blunders.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

1. Not Optimizing for Local Search

Google has made a number of modifications to its local search algorithm in recent months to improve the searcher’s local results, including the “Possum” update.

Being near the searcher’s location has become even more essential for companies with a physical presence. Businesses Owners that use location information to their advantage will improve their rankings on search engine results pages (SERPs).

Use location-specific keywords in your meta descriptions and page titles to boost your local ranking.

For example, on directories, association listings, and review networks, make sure your company name and address are referenced.

2. Not Using Custom Title Tags and Meta Descriptions

A unique title tag and meta description should be used on every website page.

It not only explains the content of your page to search engines, but it also serves as a sample for SERPs when used in snippets.

Make sure your metadata is descriptive, as this will entice visitors to click on your ad and make a purchasing decision.

To keep your metadata from being truncated on SERPs, stick to the prescribed character limits.

3. Not Optimizing for the Right Keywords

The foundation of search is keywords. While it’s tempting to focus on keywords that might bring you much traffic, it’s more effective to target specific phrases that closely match your offering to attract qualified visitors.

Examples of keywords to avoid:

• When you are small business owners, digital marketing efforts are important to target local or national keywords.
• Keywords that attract your target audience for information rather than making a purchase.
• Keywords that are more popular but have a higher level of competition.
• Keywords that people aren’t searching for are attracting target audiences who aren’t interested in your products or services.

4. Not Controlling Internal Link Juice

That website with hundreds of links on the home page has been seen before.

Many businesses mistake linking all of their primary navigation from their homepage.

Internal links have a negative SEO value because they decrease the link juice that those internal links can spread through a website in the form of PageRank.

Consider a site with 200 pages that link to a total of 100 pages, implying the amount of authority conveyed from the homepage to each page is divided by 100.

You’ll double the amount of authority passed from the homepage and improve the likelihood that your inner pages rank by cutting the number of links in half.

The amount of link juice present on a website should be spread evenly. The PageRank Juice Calculator, for example, can tell you how much link juice a page has to distribute so you may optimize your site’s navigation and marketing campaigns.

Content Marketing

5. Not Knowing Your Target Audience

Knowing your target audience is crucial for content marketing success and marketing budget. You can create appealing and useful content if you know your target audience.

Define custom audiences based on actions, interests, purchase intent, and life events to complement your target demographic information.

You can provide content that truly benefits your readers while simultaneously forcing them to pick you over the competition if you use this information.

6. Producing Content That’s Not Useful

Most businesses believe that to be engaging, they must produce a continuous supply of content on all platforms for a successful marketing campaign.

However, it’s essential to prioritize quality over quantity. Answer reader queries or satisfies your users’ demands in your content. Always write for your audience first and search engines second.

7. Not Writing Specifically For the Web

Online copy differs significantly from print. Most online readers don’t read text on the Internet; instead, they scan it for important information.

Therefore, you’ll need to develop scannable material for your online audiences in order to get your message across.

Here are some tips:

• Be concise
• Prioritize key information
• Use easy-to-read fonts
• Use large enough text
• Have ample white space
• Delete marketing fluff

8. Not Promoting Your Content

After you’ve produced high-quality material, use SEO methods to improve your chances of getting it noticed.

For example, you may enhance the position of your pages in SERPs by utilizing appropriate keywords, title tags, picture tags, and headings.

Boosting the distribution of your material on social media is another excellent approach to getting exposure. Because no two social media platforms are comparable, be certain to tailor your content and tone to each one appropriately.

Online Advertising

9. Trying Only One Source of Online Advertising

Organic search is a wonderful method to generate website traffic, but obtaining the desired outcomes might take months.

Advertisements on the Internet may help you obtain results more quickly. We propose starting with a few platforms to see where your target audience is most likely to be found.

For instance, Google AdWords offers targeting based on search keywords, whereas Facebook targets demographics and interests.

You may also target niche audiences by experimenting with different channels such as LinkedIn and Twitter and other social media accounts.

Ultimately, you’ll want to locate the most effective online advertising sources for your needs.

10. Not Matching Your Landing Page to Your Ads

You’ve got the ideal ad campaign in place, but are your visitors staying on your landing page once they’ve clicked on your ad?

People click on advertisements expecting to be taken to the same information, product, or service you advertised, so make sure your brand’s marketing strategy is good and the landing page is identical to your ad.

According to Google AdWords, your landing page is analyzed for relevance, transparency, trustworthiness, ease of navigation, and effectiveness in encouraging visitors to spend time on your site.

If your landing page fulfills these criteria, your Quality Score will improve – which means you’ll be able to anticipate improved ad outcomes and lower cost-per-click.

11. Taking Remarketing Too Far

You might retarget visitors to your website if they click on a sponsored link or buy something.

This is an example of remarketing (also known as retargeting). People who have already visited your site may be shown advertisements again in order to persuade them to return.

People despise remarketing because they feel like they’re being tracked across the Internet, even if it’s extremely successful.

To avoid irritating your potential customers:

• Set a cap on how often you advertise to limit the number of times someone may see your adverts.
• Make minor changes to your ad postings and targeted approach to improve relevance.
• To avoid ad fatigue, vary your advertisements and rotate your creative social media marketing.
• Exclude people who have previously converted from your remarketing list.

12. Not Optimizing Display Ad Placements

You may use Google advertising to get your ad seen on a wide range of websites across the Internet, including pages, sites, mobile apps, and videos.

Even if they don’t match your brand or are relevant to your business, Google will make the selections for you using automated placements.

To minimize these common digital marketing mistakes, go to the placements page in AdWords and remove any locations that aren’t relevant to your campaigns, such as spam websites and mobile apps.

Make sure to keep an eye on things over a longer period and remove any underperforming ones if necessary.

Email Marketing

13. Neglecting Email Marketing

Email marketing is often neglected in favor of “newer” forms of marketing such as social media.

However, this may be a missed chance to engage with your audience. Email marketing is well-known for its high return on investment and continues to be one of the most effective ways to contact customers online.

• Always get permission to email people and provide a mechanism for them to unsubscribe
• Segment your email list to target your communications better
• Monitor the analytics of your email campaigns, including open rate, click-through-rate, and unsubscribes

14. Not Building an Email List

“The money is in the list” has been a motto for digital marketers for years. To put it another way, expand your email list, and your company will flourish.

Your email list will allow you to communicate with your audience regularly, encouraging them to become long-term customers. To grow your email list:

• On your website, include opt-in forms.
• Encourage your email subscribers to distribute your messages.
• Invite your social network fans to sign up for updates.
• Use pop-ups on your website to encourage visitors to sign up.
• Customers that consent to receive offers may get a discount.
• The only way to download excellent material such as e-books, tutorials, and white papers is to provide an email address.
• Prepare upcoming material such as blog entries or a new product before selling it.

15. Impersonal or Incorrect Personalization

When it comes to email marketing, there are numerous issues with personalization.

Even though most individuals realize that most emails sent out by businesses are automated, when you get their name, gender, or hobbies incorrect, a certain amount of trust is lost.

Before you send an email, many marketing software allows you to customize it thoroughly.

Many platforms also provide technology that can help you identify your consumers’ interests so you may better promote products and offers for their future purchases.

Social Media

16. Creating Too Many Accounts Too Quickly

Businesses frequently start using various platforms simultaneously, despite being unable to publish regular content to engage their followers. As a result, they can’t keep up most of the time, and they flee the media entirely.

Instead, start with a manageable number of accounts and gradually branch out only when you’re confident that you can consistently provide relevant and engaging content across each platform.

17. Being Anti-social on Social Media

Your audience wants to interact with real individuals, not faceless corporate machines, so use a personal tone of voice that reflects your company.

Instead of talking solely about yourself, engage in two-way communications. Adhere to the social networking “Rule of Thirds.”

Your social media content should be one-third about your brand, one-third around the industry or thought leaders, and one-third based on conversations with your audience.

Conversion Optimization

18. Not Having a Single Purpose

You may already be aware that it’s critical to deliver advertisements to a distinct landing page rather than your homepage as a marketer.

While the homepage represents your entire brand and encourages people to explore your site, your landing page should only have one goal: converting visitors into customers through a single call-to-action.

Landing pages with a single goal, on the other hand, tend to do better since they help narrow a visitor’s attention and get more people to follow through with your call-to-action.

In addition, the more options consumers have, the longer it will take them to choose. So, limiting choices may improve conversions.

19. Ignoring Site Speed

According to Conversion XL, a website that takes longer than three seconds to load will lose 57 percent of users. Having a faster website also improves your search engine rankings.

Google’s algorithm uses several signals, including site speed, to rank websites. By optimizing your code, images, server response time, and browser caching, you can boost the speed of your website.

Here are a few free tools to evaluate the speed of your website:

• PageSpeed Insights
• YSlow
• org

20. Failing to A/B Test

Don’t try to guess what customers want, steal from competitors, or follow “best practices” in order to make your website load faster. You won’t really understand why your marketing efforts are working or failing if you don’t A/B test them.

A/B testing and split testing are forms of comparative analysis that compare a variation of a website, mobile app, or email to the current version in order to determine which one performs best.

The next time you run a campaign, do A/B testing to make educated decisions based on “what you know” rather than “what you believe.” Remember to test just one aspect at a time and retain the elements that result in good improvements.

Wrapping It All Up

21. Trying to Do Everything Yourself

Digital marketing is a time-consuming endeavor in a rapidly changing environment.

If you don’t know the skills or resources to do it all by yourself, consider asking someone with deeper expertise to help you define and execute a strategy to get a better ROI.

In addition, they can help you stay abreast of the latest digital marketing strategies and tools so that you can gain a competitive edge.