What is E-Commerce and E-Marketing?
Marketers shouldn’t conceive the Internet as an impassive network of hardware and software, but as a means of creating global conversations within markets – a new dynamic dialogue.
The Internet has transformed marketing and business. With over one billion people around the world regularly using the web to find products, entertainment and soul mates, consumer behavior and the way companies market to both consumers and businesses have changed dramatically.
To succeed in the future, organizations will need marketers, strategist and agencies with up-to-date knowledge of how to apply digital media. These techniques are used to support the objectives of acquiring new customers and providing services to existing customers that help develop the customer or business relationships.
Marketing is the management process responsible for identifying, anticipation and satisfying customer requirements profitably.
Online channels should also be used to support the whole buying process from pre-sale to sale to post-sale and further development of customer relationships.
Opportunities:
For established multichannel organizations, digital media offers a range of opportunities for marketing products and services across the purchasing, sales and life cycle.
• An advertising medium
• A direct-response medium
• A platform for sales transactions
• A lead-generation method
• A distribution channel
• A customer service mechanism
• A relationship-building medium
Benefits
• Sales- Grow sales
• Serve- Add value
• Speak- Get closer to customers “360 degree view of the customer”
• Save- Reduce cost
• Sizzle- Extend the brand online
‘Electronic business’ is as broader term referring to how technology can benefit all internal business processes and interactions with third parties. This includes buy-side and sell-side e-commerce and the internal value chain.
The Internet is used to develop existing markets through enabling an additional communications and/or sales channel with potential customers. It can be used to develop new international markets with a reduced need for new sales offices and agents. Companies can provide new services and possibly new products, faster, easier and for less than our current conventional methods of delivery.
The question then becomes not can we afford to invest in this medium, but can we afford not to?
How to promote online network marketing business through social media marketing
Network marketing can be more successful with the use of online marketing outlet like social media, SEO, and PPC. The internet is a powerful way to promote your network marketing company. There are many network marketing opportunities online due to places like social media and SEO. Everyone is online so network marketing companies can take advantage of the internet to market their business. They would see quicker results online when they use social media marketing techniques and SEO. It’s much quicker than paper fliers or phone sales. The results can be seen within several days.
Network marketing companies can better market their products by opening a profile with each social media website. There are websites like facebook, twitter, myspace, youtube, Digg, stumpleupon, reddit, blogger and many more. It’s free to use these social media websites so each company should open at least one profile on each website. They can also make videos about their company and post them on youtube, blogger, or on facebook. All of these marketing efforts are free online. They could save your network marketing company thousands of dollars. Once you have these profiles open, you just need to post articles about your company and invite people to join you or add them. Social media marketing is free and highly effective.
Network marketing companies can also succeed with using SEO and PPC. People go on Google to search for companies and they don’t really know where to start. If you can get your network marketing company to show up on Google, you have a high chance of bringing visitors to your business. You can do this by posting relevant articles about your network marketing company and allow people to find you on Google by using SEO techniques. It has to be SEO specific if you want to get on top of search engines. You can bring a lot of visitors this way or by using PPC at Google.
How to get quick results when promoting your network marketing business
The quickest result that you would get when promoting your network marketing business is through the use of PPC or pay per click advertising. It offers quick results because you will get a chance to show up on search engines within several days. Your network marketing business can be listed on top of all other results which will increase your chances of exposure to potential clients. Searchers would see your ads first before they see other ads and they will most likely click on them because they’re first in line. This will increase your traffic more than any other type of marketing. You can tweet your articles but you might only get around 5 or 10 visitors but you might get around 1000 visitors if you show up on top of the search engines results. PPC is a powerful way to draw visitors to your network marketing business site but it’s costly. If you can afford to use PPC then you should use it because it can bring in more clients for you. The benefits can outweigh the cost of using PPC. PPC is great for giant companies that can afford to use it.
Many companies use PPC and they can bring in quick results. You can get as much as several thousands visitors per day. This is better than getting 5 or 10 from Twitter. You have to put in a lot time and effort to get people to come to your site when you use Twitter or Facebook but you don’t have to do a lot with PPC. You only have to pay and the rest is automatically done for you. PPC can be beneficial if you get more benefits than the cost of it. If you’re paying $.50 cents per click and you make $100 per sales then it’s worth your money. If you’re paying $.50 cents and getting about $.10 cents back then it’s not worth your money. However, there are long term benefits for using PPC. Once people know about you, they might come back and do further business with you.
PPC can show quick results but they’re also very problematic with click fraud being the current issue. Advertisers have always been dealing with click fraud and it’s very costly for them. When you use PPC, you have to monitor your bills. If you see problems, you should talk to your network. PPC click fraud is very prevalent in large communities because people click for their friends. It’s better in smaller communities. You should use PPC with precautions. PPC is also great because you don’t pay until there is a click. However, not all clicks will lead to sales and this is the down side to using PPC. PPC can be a solution for your network marketing business.
SSL (Secure Socket Layers) and other valuable technologies for E-commerce companies
When you have established your base of customers, it is important to protect their identity and financial information, to prevent an identity crisis, suits against the company, and other massive revenue losses that may occur as a result.
Fortunately, there are many ways to reinforce the security of your website:
Use appropriate security technology to protect the customer information on their site.
o There are several options to help insure customer information is safe. For instance, creating a firewall can minimize the risk of unauthorized users from getting access into the company computer system. This is particularly imperative to have for companies who host their own web server
o Another good option is implementing certified authorities. For example, VeriSign has a variety of services to help businesses protect their both the customers as well as themselves. According to their website, two of their products are an SSL Certificate service, which provides secure commerce, communication, and interactions through encryption and authentication services, and an Identity and Authentication Service, strengthening and protecting digital identities through a network approach of strong authentication and online fraud detection services.
Never collect or retain personal data unless it is strictly necessary for the organization’s purposes. Also, once personal data has been utilized, it should be properly and securely disposed of if no longer needed.
o For example, there is no reason to collect information such as a social security number or home phone number for a general on-line survey.
o Another example is, unless it is clearly stated in the terms and conditions as to another purpose for collecting personal data, if someone provides their name, address, and e-mail for a contest submission, the personal data should be properly disposed of once the contest is over.
Follow privacy and consumer protection guidelines and laws in all local markets.
o This is not only a legal obligation to consumers but also an ethical one as well. By installing the required and most up to date versions of data protection software and making sure they are conducting business according to the privacy laws in all local markets, a company can assure their customers that they are doing everything they can to protect their personal data.
o Worst case, even if for some reason there are no legal requirements in a particular market in regards to keeping personal data safe, I believe the company still has an ethical responsibility to make sure they instigate the necessary measures to secure any personal data that has been collected.
Social Media For Network Marketing Success
One of the best ways to do business these days for any savvy business owner is via the Internet. You may wonder why this is. For one thing it is network marketing, advertising and people connecting all done very inexpensively. Plus, if you use the social media sites for part of your network marketing strategy you could have fun too.
Before you implement social media for your network marketing success there are some guidelines you’ll want to follow.
The first guideline you’ll want to follow for network marketing success with social media is to provide content value to your information. There is a good reason that the content should have valuable elements and that is so your content will be accepted on the site. Try to be subtle with your marketing on the social media sites. Blatant self-promotion will result in other users ignoring you, which do you no good, or being outright banned from the site.
Another reason your content should be valuable for network marketing to work on social media sites is because it won’t gain you an audience if it has no value. The more viewers you attract the more potential customers you are engaging.
Another guideline to follow when you are using social media for network marketing is to not do hard selling or promotion on the site only. These sites were created for social interaction so you don’t want to put dozens of links to your business sites in every article or comment or forum you contribute. You may not even be allowed to place your link more than once in an article or comment and breaking this rule repeatedly could get you banned as well.
The best guideline to follow when using social media is to just join in and have fun. You can promote yourself and your business on social media sites. Social media is a very effective and cost efficient network marketing strategy but better results are gained by following some simple guidelines.