The digital world is full of marketing terms and acronyms like ROI (return on investment), CPC (cost per click), CTR (click through rate), KPI (key performance indicator) and countless others.
It becomes a little overwhelming. You start to feel like you’re reading a different language. But what is this new language trying to tell you?! We’re here to decipher the code and put it into your terms. Let’s get started.
Digital marketing is an umbrella term used to describe any type of online marketing including search engine optimization, PPC, social media marketing, and email marketing.
We are going to break up our digital marketing terms into several categories including social media marketing, search engine marketing and email marketing. Some of these digital marketing terms can be applied to all three so pay close attention.
Social Media Marketing Terms
1. KPI – Key Performance Indicator
KPI’s appear in all types of marketing and businesses use them to measure the success of their campaigns. Your KPI can be any type of analytic like a click through rate, engagement rate, bounce rate and so on. We will talk about several marketing terms that be can key performance indicators in your campaigns.
2. CPA – Cost Per Acquisition
This is a metric used to determine how much it costs to acquire one customer. You can calculate this by dividing the total cost of your campaign by the number of conversions. This metric is important because it actually shows you how much you are spending per conversion. If this cost is too high, you should consider reworking your marketing campaign.
3. Lookalike Audiences
Lookalike audiences are built using email lists. This is a way to target users that are similar to the ones you already have. You can upload your email list to your Facebook ad campaign and it will take these emails and find similar users to target. You can even exclude the emails that you upload if you do not wish to advertise to current customers. With lookalike audiences you’ll be able to easily reach new customers that are similar to your existing customers. If you do not have an email list, work on acquiring quality subscribers with these seven tips!
4. A/B Split Testing
When running any type of advertisement, it’s best to split test. This means you will have 2-3 similar ads that are all running at the same time to see which performs best. You can run the same image and switch up the copy or vice versa. A/B split testing will help you better target your audience by showing you which advertisement people liked more. When you are finished with your split test you will be left with an ad that performs great and helps you capture those potential buyers!
*This can be applied to email marketing as well.
5. CPI – Cost Per Impression
CPI measures how many times your ad appears on a site whether or not the users actually sees or interacts with it. This is similar to the marketing term “reach” but reach measures how many people see your content and impressions measure how many times your ad or content was displayed. Impressions build brand recognition while reach will help you build your brand. You can learn more about the differences between reach and impressions here.
6. Lead Generation/Lead Magnet/Lead Nurturing
These three marketing terms go hand in hand. Lead generation is exactly what it sounds like – how your business generates leads or how you grab the attention of your customers. A lead magnet is a small giveaway, free ebook, guide, etc. that your business offers to customers in exchange for their email. A lead magnet is a tool that is going to help your business capture those potential customers. Once a potential lead becomes a lead, you will need to nurture them until they become a customer. Typically business nurture their leads through their sales funnel. Lead nurturing can be in the form or sending emails, retargeting them on social media or actually calling your potential customers to follow up with them.
7. CTR – Click Through Rate
When running a social media advertising campaign, the click through rate shows how many times an ad was clicked on by users. In order to calculate your CTR you will need to take the total number of clicks your ad received and divide it by the number of times it was shown (impressions). Then convert that number to a percentage.
*You will see this term again in our email marketing section*
8. Engagement Rate
Blog, Facebook posts, tweets and photos on Instagram all have engagement rates. This is how much users are interacting with your brand. How many comments did you get on that post? How many shares did that blog receive? Usually the higher your engagement rate is, the better your content is – which is great for SEO. If search engines see that users are interacting with your website and social media channels you will be viewed as a notable source in your industry.
