💻 The changes coming in online marketing

Reading time: 4 minutes

Greetings, ,

Even when I can see it coming, change makes me nervous.

Online marketing is changing, and I hope I can help small businesses keep up while I’m trying to keep up.

What’s changing?

Search and how people discover your business.

Attribution – how we determine whether a website visit or a sale was triggered by a search ad, a social media or a blog post.

And let’s add a healthy dollop of generative artificial intelligence to the stew.

Google is less and less interested in sending traffic to your website, especially if it can give you the answer you need without having to click away from Google.

Facebook, TikTok, X, Instagram, etc., all want you to stay on their sites. They don’t want users to click on that link to your website. And even if you DO click on that link, it’s less and less likely that your website analytics can tell you where the click originated.

When people seamlessly move from desktop to mobile browsers to apps, it becomes increasingly difficult to attribute a sale to one marketing tactic over another. Web browsers like Safari and Firefox let users block tracking codes.

AI Replacing Search Engines

People are already replacing search engines like Google and Bing with generative artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity to find answers to their questions.
And unless people already know your brand, your paid and organic search marketing will become less effective.

Part of what makes me nervous is that while it gets harder to attribute online marketing results, business owners are demanding it more.

Rand Fishkin, CEO and co-founder of marketing research company SparkToro, says marketers might have to reconsider some 20th-century measurements. Before the internet, marketers measured the success of a campaign by whether or not sales increased.

It sounds simple enough, but after a quarter century of measuring impressions, clicks, email opens, downloads, etc., the coming change makes me a little nervous. How about you?

Today’s Jargon: The Funnel

It feels like I can’t listen to a digital marketing podcast or read a marketing article without hearing or seeing a reference to "the funnel." And honestly, the more I hear it, the more confused I get.

A funnel is a metaphor for acquiring customers. In theory, your marketing initially attracts potential customers to the top of the funnel -- the wide part. As they continue to be exposed to your marketing in different formats and media, these potential customers slide deeper into the funnel, eventually transforming from potential customers to actual, cash-paying customers.

Let’s ignore the physical-world reality that whatever goes into the top of a funnel also comes out the bottom – the narrow part. In the marketing funnel, some of the people lured into the top of the funnel never make it to the cash-paying customer part.

Different Stage, Same Tactic?

Here’s where I start to get confused, and maybe you do, too. Marketers tend to talk about their tactics as they relate to the marketing funnel. For example, social media advertising is usually considered a tactic to attract potential customers into the top of the funnel.

After you’ve made people aware of your brand and pulled them into the funnel, there’s more work to be done. There’s a middle stage in which potential customers consider whether you can solve their particular problem. Then, there’s the bottom of the funnel, where the purchase decision is made.

Why do I get confused? Sometimes, marketers recommend the same tactic for every stage of the funnel. Depending on the funnel stage, they also assume you automatically know you should do X, Y, or Z.

Focus on The Tactics

I’d rather focus on specific tactics instead of listening to generalities about funnel stages. Don’t tell me I need to work on the middle of my customer funnel. Tell me I need to collect email addresses and build an email campaign.

Understanding the metaphorical marketing funnel – aka the buyer’s journey – can help any business adapt marketing messages for potential customers at each stage. But I’d rather talk about how to move prospective customers closer to purchase instead of which stage of the funnel they’re in.

Do you enjoy this newsletter?

If you do, you can help me by writing a quick review on Google. Or, please share it with anyone who might also like it. If you’re reading this because somebody shared it, get your own subscription.

Another way to read this newsletter

If you read this on LinkedIn but would like a more reliable delivery method, please subscribe to have this newsletter delivered to your email inbox. You’ll get fresh thoughts, marketing tips and jargon definitions every other week.

Until next time

The next newsletter arrives Aug. 13, just a few days after my 50th high school class reunion. Between now and then, NFL football returns with pre-season games. I’ll stay focused on baseball for the time being, though.

If you’re looking for ways to stay cool, Aug. 2 is National Water Balloon Day and National Ice Cream Day. Aug. 4 is National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day, which is particularly important to me.

Neighborhood safety and cooperation are the themes of National Night Out, which occurs on the first Tuesday of August.The annual appearance of the Perseid meteor shower is expected to peak between Aug. 11 and 13.

Until next time, be grateful. Be generous. Be patient. Love.

Thanks for spending some of your time with me, . I appreciate you.

Mark

P.S. - This newsletter was 100 percent created by me, a human.

P.P.S. - Some links in this email might be affiliate links, which could generate small commissions for me at no extra cost to you.