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In the hustle and bustle of the modern era, it can be hard to determine what type of marketing could set you up for success. After all, the success of your marketing projects can heavily influence the success of the rest of your business. 

Digital marketing has been growing in leaps and bounds. For example, in 2022, companies have increased their spending budgets by up to 18.63% on digital marketing in comparison to only increasing traditional direct marketing budgets by up to 2.4%. 

This could lead one to believe that digital marketing is the future of marketing your products and services. There are a lot of techniques to master when it comes to the world of digital marketing.

To give you the best chance to make a success of your business’s future, we will have a look at the differences between direct and indirect marketing and what the three major forms of digital direct marketing are, as well as look at their pros and cons.

What are the differences between indirect and direct marketing?

The best way to describe the differences between indirect and direct marketing techniques is if you think of indirect marketing as a slow-burn long-term investment like building an audience, brand recognition, and message.

In contrast, direct marketing reaches out to a target audience that is more likely to make an immediate purchase.

One of the biggest reasons a company would run indirect marketing is that it allows for far more content to be released without running the risk of wearing out your welcome with your audience. If balanced correctly, indirect marketing builds brand loyalty, which in turn leads to repeat sales.

However, when it comes to direct marketing and the raw power it holds in its potential to drive immediate sales are second to none.

A robust direct marketing campaign can see your sales targets not only reached but absolutely destroyed!

At the end of the day, only you will know if a direct or indirect marketing campaign will suit your brand and business better.

Ideally, you should run both, but for small or new businesses, a digital direct marketing campaign can help your business get through the rough start-up months easier and faster.

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What are the three major forms of digital direct marketing?

Now that we have covered the differences between indirect and direct marketing let’s take a look at what the three most commonly used forms of digital direct marketing are, how to use them, and what pros and cons they may have.

These are email marketing, sms marketing, and pay-per-click marketing, which includes social media marketing. Instead of rattling everything off here, let’s take a look at each category in depth below.

Email marketing

An email marketing campaign may be digital direct marketing’s secret weapon. From Solo ads to promoting your latest webinars, promotional conferences, or reminding customers what they forgot in their cart, digital direct email marketing has loads of potential to drive your sales through the roof.

Furthermore, you can use direct email marketing to send newsletters or upcoming promotion catalogs to your customer base as well as create targeted drip campaigns that you can herd toward your sales force.

You do not have to stop at upcoming sales and promotions. Once you have built a substantial email list, you can utilize this power to offer your biggest customers a personalized flash sale or discount coupons on their birthdays, for example.

Pros

• Access to a target audience
• Boosts sales in a short period of time
• Can have a return investment as high as $36 for every $1 spent

Cons

• If solo ads are used, it can be hard to produce repeat sales.
• Sending too much marketing material may result in losing clientele instead of gaining them.

Related reading: How To Get Results With MLM Solo Ads

SMS marketing

Sms, also known as short message service, direct digital marketing is very similar to email digital direct marketing but just a little more focused on time-exclusive events. However, promotions are not the only type of marketing your company can use sms marketing for.

Text messages can also be used to keep clients and customers up to date on orders or future products that may become available.

Alternatively, if you sell a service instead of a range of products, then you can use sms digital direct marketing to confirm and remind clients about appointments.

Just bare in mind at which hours you are sending your smses, as sending them out of office hours may result in upsetting some clients and customers.

Pros

• Offers high engagement from your customers.
• Real-time communication with clients and customers
• Sms digital direct marketing offers the most reliable delivery rate out of all communication methods.

Cons

• Sms digital direct marketing can only be used during limited hours.

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Pay-per-click marketing

Pay-per-click digital direct marketing offers the widest variety of marketing platforms that range from social media marketing, such as youtube videos, to photography that, if done correctly, could be held in the same regard as actual art that is posted on Instagram or Facebook.

Les, we forget the very engaging Google ads that will help your digital ads appear on Google search pages and many other sites that span the entirety of the internet. The best way to ensure the greatest results when using pay-per-click digital direct marketing is to ensure you match the content to the correct platform.

However, the largest caveat in this option is that, for example, in social media ads, you do not get to research and control exactly who your ads reach. It is up to the individual platform providers’ own algorithms and strategies, which means results vary rather heavily from platform to platform.

Pros

• Pay-per-click digital marketing offers a wide variety of content types and platforms to choose from.
• Social media marketing can increase brand awareness and sales simultaneously.
• Pay-per-click digital marketing can create an air of trustworthiness around your product or service at a faster rate when aligned with the correct influencer.

Cons

• Pay-per-click digital direct marketing can be less cost-effective than the other options that we have discussed today.