There’s no way around it. You need to be familiar with at least a few, basic digital marketing terms in order to stay in the know in the digital world.
Consider this. You own a business and you’re meeting your digital marketing strategist. You think your meeting is going very well until you hear words that seem to make little or no sense to you. Yet, they sound very professional! How do you figure out the conversation, without stopping to guess their meaning? By knowing them already and using them like you were born with that knowledge!
It’s never too late to learn new things. So let’s begin with 10 must-know digital marketing terms that will simplify your understanding of the digital marketing process.
- Buyer persona
A buyer persona is a representation of your ideal customer. You build this persona based on market research and real data on your existing customers. You consider demographics, buyer motivations, goals and behaviors in order to help you define your target audience. Also, it will help your sales team qualify leads.
- Call-to-action (CTA)
A CTA is any button, link, or image intended to attract customers and prompt them to take a particular action that aligns with your long-term business goal. Thus, a CTA encourages visitors to visit a landing page, make a purchase, subscribe to your newsletter or download a whitepaper. The CTA is of utmost importance as it has the potential to turn a random visitor into a lead.
- Landing page
A landing page is the website page on which visitors to your site arrive. It is a valuable asset for inbound marketing and lead generation. It serves to capture visitor information in exchange for something that might be valuable to them – like an offer. Landing pages are created with a view to attract different audiences who are at varying stages in the buying process. The aim is to convert new visitors into dedicated customers.
- Bounce rate
Website bounce rate defines the percentage of people who arrive at any page on your website. Then, they leave without visiting other pages, or clicking anything on them. So, a low bounce rate is good news. On the contrary, a high bounce rate would lead to low conversion as people aren’t spending time reading your content or clicking on any link.
Email bounce rate refers to the percentage of email addresses in your subscriber list which did not receive your emails. If you have a high bounce rate, it probably means that your list is outdated, or that many addresses on the list are invalid. However, it is important to distinguish between hard and soft bounce. A hard bounce is a permanent failure to deliver your email, for whatsoever reason, so you can clear these addresses from your list. If an email isn’t delivered because of temporary reasons, like the receiver’s inbox being full, then it is considered a soft bounce.
- HyperText Markup Language (HTML)
HTML is the most widely used web language to develop web pages. It defines the basic structure of a website. You can build on this structure using other technologies like CSS and JavaScript. HTML is important to know, as it is fundamental for content creation on a website. It can help you add headings, format paragraphs, insert images, use bold or italics in a text, and so on. It’s easy to learn, so don’t let the jargon scare you.
- Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
CSS is what gives your website its personality. It builds on your HTML framework, allowing you to compose its look through colors, fonts, background images etc. CSS is what determines the final look and feel to your website. It is also what enables websites to adapt to varying screen sizes and devices, making it an extremely important skill for website developers to possess.
- User interface (UI)
In simple terms, UI refers to anything that users may interact with while using a digital product or service. It could be graphical, voice-controlled, or even gesture based. The aim is to create a user interface that allows the user to interact intuitively and easily with the software or hardware. The user interface could include the toolbar, menu bar, buttons, and more.
- User experience (UX)
UX is a summation of every aspect of the user’s interaction with the business and its product or service, right from discovery to purchase and use of the product or service. A good UX always meets customers’ needs and even goes beyond giving them what they want.
- Editorial calendar
Basically, an editorial calendar is a plan for your content. It covers the kind of content you wish to create, the audience you’re targeting, the topics for your content, and the timeline along which you will be publishing that content. It shows you, at one glance, everything you have worked on as well as what still needs to be accomplished. An editorial calendar goes a long way in keeping your content neatly organized and focused towards your business goals. Find out why you need an editorial content calendar on our blog.
- Evergreen content
This refers to content that is always relevant to readers and remains useful for them whenever they might discover it. This kind of content proves useful to its readers, as well as to the marketer through the SEO value it provides. In order to produce evergreen content, always check before you post it online. Once you’re satisfied that the content will bring value to your reader, post it. To help you out, here is a list of 10 things to do before you publish your blog post.
Now that you’ve read some of the most important digital marketing terms, do you feel confident to venture into this territory? Once you understand them and know how they work, you can plan your digital marketing strategies more efficiently. Even better, you can start having a proper conversation with your team and partners. To give you further insight, read about another 5 important digital marketing terms that will prove useful to your strategies.
At Them You & Me, we help in the digital transformation of your business through an effective and personalized digital marketing strategy. If you’d like to talk with us, or would like us to help you with your digital strategy, visit our website or send us a message.
