Powerful Marketing Channels That Drive Sales in 2021

From the beginning of time, marketing has been there before we even knew what to call it. The difference today is that we have so many powerful marketing channels to use.

However, once you set your eyes on powerful marketing channels for your business, you won’t be only able to build a standout reputation, but will also drive magnificent sales to your business.

Below, we’ll cover:

• Marketing channels meaning along with examples
• Types of marketing channels and the role of each
• Powerful digital marketing channels
• The functions of marketing channels

Simple Marketing — Lemonade 🍋

Any sort of telling people about your services, products, offers, etc, is called marketing, whatever on however you decide to do it. Be it using digital marketing channels such as Facebook, Twitter, or email. Be it a billboard on the highway, a television ad, or putting your products on digital shops like Amazon or AliExpress.

Remember the iconic lemonade wood stand with a cardboard sign saying “Lemonade at $50”? 🍸 That’s marketing before the digital life.

The fresh lemons at the end of the driveway with the objective of enticing passers-by to get a glass. Also marketing.

If the seller calls out what’s written on the sign “Fresh cold lemonade for $50!” More marketing.

But all of this is offline marketing, hence all the hard work.

And since digital marketing drives quicker results and costs much less, today’s discussion is about the functions of marketing channels, roles, and meaning.

Marketing Channels Meaning ❓

A marketing channel is a medium on which you ensure as a merchant that your service, product, and brand are known by an unlimited number of possible clients. In other words, it’s the venue that organizations, brands, businesses use to drive, product and brand awareness, drive sales, increase engagement, traffic, etc.

Note: 💡

Many people conflict the term “distribution channels” with “Marketing channels” Let me fix this conflict once and for all. Channels of distribution are different than those of marketing.

Marketing is the process of attracting customers into seeing, considering, and buying your goods or services. Therefore, when we say marketing channels, think of two directions:

1. Digital marketing channels, like email, SMM, display ads, PPC, affiliate, SEM, SEO, etc.
2. And offline marketing channels, like billboards, guerilla marketing, telemarketing, printed ads, the lemonade cart, etc.

In simpler words, just announcing your brand, product, service, offers, is called marketing. And the medium on which you do so is called the marketing channel. But how you get those products, once sold say from an online store to your customers’ doors, that’s part of the distribution.

Distribution is the process of getting the manufacturer’s goods into the hands of consumers. The route the products take until they reach the customer. Therefore, when we say distribution channels, think of the way the manufacturer gets his productions into the buyer’s hands. Which could take many routes.

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Let’s say you, a retailer, buy products from a wholesaler and then distribute them to the consumers, where did the wholesaler get the products? 🤔

From the manufacturer. 🤓

That’s one distribution process. Another is when the manufacturer happens to be you, and you sell directly to the customers, that’s called a zero-level distribution process.

But how are you going to get them to take the action and buy from you?

This is where marketing jumps in, you will market to your brand and products using the digital marketing channels we’ll talk about below.

Now that you know the difference between distribution and marketing channels meaning, it’s about time we dive deep into our main topic, the functions of marketing channels, and each one’s role.

Digital Marketing Channels 💲

Digital marketing is the umbrella under which all types of marketing activities take place on all marketing channels or platforms such as email marketing, search engine optimization, social media marketing, etc.

1. Email

The most underrated digital marketing channel there is. Do you want direct response rates, more sales, effective personalization? Email marketing should be your best friend. Only if done right.

Check the below figures for more illustration:

• Personalized email subjects accounted for 50% more open rates (Yes Lifecycle Marketing).
• Interactive emails have a 300% increased open rate – try adding videos in your emails.
• in 2023 expected email users will hit 4.3 billion.
• The average ROI for each $1 spent on email marketing is $42 (DMA).

Convinced, but still don’t know how to use email marketing to convert sales? Check this: 5 Superpower Email Copywriting Techniques That Really Convert

The role of marketing channels that email marketing alone can cover:

• The email signature: Can drive store and social media visits, and hint at your recent content.
• The email banner: It can increase engagement and attention to important announcements like new product line, course, or event
• The series of emails sent during free trials: these series play the role of a tutor. Promote your tutorial videos and give the best hints on what you have to offer once they become paying customers.

💡 Tip:

The roles of email marketing don’t end up at those roles, therefore we covered How to Integrate Email Marketing with Social Networking Strategy to make sure you get the most out of email marketing by integrating it with other networks as well.

Now it’s time to tell you about the second most powerful digital marketing channel for driving sales:

2. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Content marketing and SEO are parallel fundamentals of marketing. You can’t pursue any SEO results without using the right content writing practices. slacking and selecting random keywords will not only end in vain but sabotage your domain authority and put you behind in miles.

Our advice: 💡

• Conduct thorough keyword research to determine the best keywords that eventually add up to your business goals
• Determine your content pillars to set your content directions
• Your content marketing efforts should be side to side with your SEO, offer insight through high-quality unique content to win both the SERPs (search engine result pages) and your readers’ trust.
• Distribute/market your content on other marketing channels (crosspost)
• Use Google Analytics to track and benchmark your ranking and authority

💡P.S. One of the best ways to Increase Sales on Your eCommerce Website is Using “ How To Content ” 💯

Now moving to the most prominent and partially easier but essential to every marketing funnel. Social media marketing is the number one channel anyone having business goals takes into consideration before even starting his business.

Let’s be honest, we’re all guilty of starting our social media business pages to save our domain names and end up neglecting them for not pursuing our business with full commitment. That means it’s the easiest place to start marketing your business. But, just like every other channel, it requires effort and perseverance.

3. Social Media Marketing (SMM)

In our recent eCommerce reports for 2021, we found that personalization and connectivity are the utmost factors for driving sales. And social media was proven to be the best channel for connecting and getting closer to our customers.

We decided to take another approach with our readers and become a genuine source for eCommerce insight in the MENA region. This approach has served us a huge deal in getting more leads and increasing our customer base for the long run. And if not for our solid social media marketing strategy, we wouldn’t have achieved this much in a short time’s notice.

So, how can you too achieve this?

• Make sure to leverage social ads to increase your reach and get more people to notice your business, especially at the start.
• Craft social media campaigns that encourage people to check your products or book a service.
• Try announcing special offers that are only valid through social media.
• Keep on track with how your strategy is performing, and always test and tweak for improvements and more results.
• Use tools like Social Bakers, Hootsuite, Canva, Kicksata to improve your social media presence.
• Keep updated with the Top 20 Social Media Updates in The Last Quarter.

💡 Insider Tip:

Don’t get easily frustrated with social media ads when you face any sudden error or when it’s just not getting results. It could be like that at first.

Try to be as specific as you can with your target audience. Continuously adjust your audience demographics based on location, gender, age, and interests until you find what’s best for your business.

The role of marketing channels that social media marketing intervenes with: 🔭

• Marketing any type of content from any other channel.
• Increasing the share and engagement of blog posts.
• Boosting your online store visits.
• Conducting dynamic ads to the products listed in your store.
• Create awareness for every other channel you use.
• Increase your content reach and drive sales.
• It appears in the SERPs as well… etc.

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4. Pay Per Click (PPC)

Every business owner should have at least the slightest notion of how powerful PPC marketing could be to the improvement of his business.

💡 Read also 👉 Step-by-Step Guide for Beginners to Profitable PPC Ad Campaigns

As far as the world of marketing goes, remains pay-per-click marketing unbreakable. Especially today that brands have new and diverse options with PPC that can, and surely will increase their ROI.

Google Ads and Facebook/Instagram Ads are the two prominent PPC channels in 2021 providing promising options for every business owner. Google Ads for example help you target people who are searching for businesses or services like yours.

💡 P.S. It’s highly recommended to hire a marketing agency to manage your PPC campaigns if your budget allows and ensure the highest ROI possible.

👉 More about your full guide for all google ads types and features

5. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a business model that fulfills various functions of marketing channels, one of them is to drive passive income. Hence adding to the role of marketing channels which’s to eventually drive sales.

Affiliate marketing allows you as a website owner to promote another brand’s product and get a commission for selling it.

 

Online store owners place display ads on their sites for a percentage of profits. That’s why affiliate marketing campaigns are a powerful place to start collecting profits. Besides, you receive universal coverage with limited costs. The more affiliates to your business, the merrier.

The affiliate business model has three ways of earning money: pay per click (PPC), pay per sale (PPS), or pay per lead (PPL).

What does this mean?

It means your brand or business gets free advertisements until the agreed-upon action takes place (a click, a sale, or a lead)

💡 We think you’ll also like: The Only Affiliate Marketing Tools You’ll Need in 2021

Final Words

So yeah, there are more digital marketing platforms than ever before and they don’t seem to be getting any lesser. Even the roles and functions of marketing channels intervene.

Anyhow, who said that’s a necessarily bad sign?

It’s not!

You see, the more online channels there are, the more presence you get, the more eyes on your brand, and the more connected to your customers you will be.

It’s now known for “Omnichannel selling”, it means selling on multiple channels at once. Every channel intertwining and connected with the other platforms like a spider web creating a large beautiful pattern.

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Did you like the information provided in this article? Which channels are you planning to focus on for the next quarter? Let us know your opinions in the comments below!