Below is a guest post by freelance writer Aimee Claire.
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In this day and age, online marketing is an essential tool for business success. It’s also an area in which Louisiana is leading America, with over 19,000 skilled people working in software development alone. Forty eight percent of businesses feel that being online has expanded their geographic reach, and has resulted in increased levels of business; however, to ensure success the online marketing must be right.
An evolving business
Online marketing is undergoing a constant process of evolution and change. This is a natural product of the competition for customers, the battle between marketers, and search engines that try to prioritize organic content, plus the emergence of new marketing opportunities. This means that it is not enough for a business to learn one or two basic techniques and try to apply them by itself. If it wants to be truly competitive it needs to acquire and apply new techniques all the time. For that reason a business might need to employ its own specialist or bring in an outside agency.
In the early days, online marketing was all about email and the web. Now spam blockers and increasingly sophisticated search engines have changed both these areas dramatically and new factors have come into play. Social media marketing, incorporating the use of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and so on, has become enormously important. The emergence of new technologies has also had an impact, with some strategies, especially in the field of local search, being developed especially for mobile phones.
The best online marketing agencies use specialist software developers, researchers, designers and copywriters to stay abreast of these changes and to keep their clients’ profiles high.
A must in any industry
Some people see online marketing as something that is only of relevance to product-focused retail organizations. In fact, research shows that it’s vital for businesses of all kinds. Even a local business with only one outlet, unable to use mail order, can attract new customers from further afield by raising its profile. A business that only sells to other businesses can benefit enormously from carefully targeted marketing that boosts its reputation within the relevant sectors. An important fact to note is that a business that doesn’t engage in successful marketing risks losing out, as its competitors almost certainly will.
With over 78% of Americans now using the Internet, it would be difficult to overestimate the importance of this marketing medium. Every demographic is represented and, of course, a good agency can target precisely the groups a particular business needs to reach.
Finding an agency
The huge success of the online marketing industry in Louisiana means that businesses based there have lots of choice when it comes to finding an agency. Search Influence in New Orleans has seen its revenue grow by over 300% in the past three years, supporting the advertising and marketing sectors, while Verma Systems in Baton Rouge are the go-to people for IT companies. AFS in Shreveport lead in logistics and transportation, and AAC Enterprises in Metairie specialize in promoting manufacturing businesses. Bringing in an agency like this does require an investment but the returns on that money will themselves illustrate why good online marketing matters so much in today’s business world.