Reflections Edward Sanchez Digital Marketing

(Sanchez, 2015)

 This month while attending Full Sail University for my Entertainment Business Masters degree, I had the wonderful opportunity to learn about Digital Marketing from our course director Kristen Stewart. My intended goal for this course is to learn how marketing plans are created and why exactly, are they so integral to this day and age. Within the first week I learned what “Content Marketing” is and it’s relevance in marketing field, the importance of “Search Engine Optimization” (SEO), and discussed what factors maximize the efforts of an SEO campaign. We also discussed useful tools currently available that aid in monitoring the performance of strategies being used in a campaign.  Lastly, by the second week we covered topics pertaining to best practices for using “Paid Searches” and planning our own campaign for our specific business.

 What is “ContentMarketing”? It is the strategic act of driving profitable customer action, utilizing valuable content created and distributed to a specific target audience. When it comes to content marketing not all content is created equal. A creator should ensure the content made is valuable, relevant and consistent with the consumers they are trying to attract.  However content alone will not be effective, a marketing strategy must accompany the content. How do you create quality content when you don’t know who your audience is? What do you do after you gain the attention of an audience? The marketing strategy answers these questions. Ultimately content marketing is the integral piece of the puzzle needed to communicate with your customers and piqué their interest in a specific product. (Content Marketing Institution, 2007)

 I was truly interested in (SEO) or “Search Engine Optimization”. I had heard the term before and the name alone caused my brain to shut off. Kristen was able to demystify it and explained it simply and plainly. SEO is how search engines rank your content and it’s relevance to consumers. Understanding SEO enables you to customize your content and create it in such a way that optimizes its relevance, potentially resulting in a higher ranking. Search Engine Optimization is free (organic), a company cannot pay to be placed or ranked higher than another company, and they must optimize their content similar to everyone else.  This infographic illustrates some of the best practices to enhance your content for SEO

(Search Engine Land, 2016)

 Using a blogger account created for the purpose of acclimating students to the digital world, Kristen explained how to set up specific tools that will aid us in learning the concepts of Digital Marketing.  We linked Google Analytics, Webmasters, and AdWords to our blogs, which afforded the class the opportunity to observe these tools in action.  Ms. Stewart recommended other resources such as Google Adsense, SEMRush, Spyfu, Keyword Density Checker, Pintrest, and more be researched to determine how each can benefit us individually.

 Lastly, we discussed the pros and cons of utilizing a “Paid Search” strategy for digital campaigns. When you search a topic, do you genuinely avoid the ads that populate at the top of a search? If you are like me, the answer is a resounding yes. Statistically, numerous consumers avoid the paid ads. However, having a paid ad may offer validity with a company to a certain degree. Consumers may overlook the paid ad, but actively seek the ad free version of the company further down the list. Using a combination of “Paid Search” and “SEO” can create a sense of legitimacy in the consumers mind.

Overall, this class is a blast and a wealth of extremely useful information. Applying these skills, tools, and principles towards our final project, which is to create a marketing strategy for our individual businesses, will prepare us for the real world. As entertainment business students, the ability to understand marketing in a digital world is integral to our success.  Whether it is marketing a video game product or starting a multi-million dollar recording studio, creating a winning marketing strategy will set us apart from the competition. I have high expectations for the second half of this mind-blowing class.