Digital Marketing vs Digital Branding

Digital marketing and digital branding are two very different concepts. While digital marketing is all about acquiring new customers, digital branding is focused on retaining current customers and building loyalty among them. In digital marketing the focus is on creating a consistent online presence across different channels; such as websites, social media and digital advertising. This allows customers to identify a company’s products or services with ease. In digital branding the focus is on customer satisfaction and long-term relationships with clients.

What is Digital Marketing and What Are Its Objectives?

Digital marketing is a broad term used to describe any marketing activity that uses digital channels. Digital marketing has several objectives, which include:

• Continuous stream of new leads
• Increased sales
• Brand building
• Less cost of customer acquisition
• Improved qualified traffic
• Online reputation building
• Better local SEO

What is Digital Branding and What Are Its Objectives?

Digital branding is the process of creating a consistent online presence for a company. This allows customers to identify a company’s products or services with ease. The objectives of digital branding include:

• Build awareness
• Create an emotional connection
• Convey distinguishing attributes
• Gain credibility and trust
• Achieve buyer preference

Which One of These Approaches Is More Important for Businesses?

There is no easy answer when it comes to deciding whether digital marketing or digital branding is more important for businesses. However, digital marketing is undoubtedly essential for companies that want to grow and expand. It allows businesses to reach more customers and increase their digital conversions. Digital branding, on the other hand, is key for businesses that want to build long-term relationships with their clients and ensure customer satisfaction. Digital branding allows companies to retain existing customers, while digital marketing helps them acquire new ones.

Smartsight establishes the importance of digital marketing with 10 reasons you need a digital marketing strategy.

Which One of These Approaches Is More Challenging for Businesses?

Digital marketing poses several challenges if not carried out properly. For example, digital marketing is all about creating a digital presence for your company. This digital presence, though, must be consistent across all digital platforms. If you are not sure how to do this properly, you will end up spending more time and resources trying to make things work rather than focusing on digital growth. Digital branding, on the other hand, requires companies to have a strong digital presence to create the kind of online personality that customers are looking for.

A Better Return on Investment (ROI)?

Digital marketing and digital branding present different challenges depending on potential ROIs. Digital marketing has a far more versatile digital approach than digital branding and, as such, offers greater opportunities for businesses. For example, digital marketing does not require your company to have an online presence before it starts working its magic. On the contrary, digital marketing can help you create such a digital presence from scratch if necessary. Digital branding, on the other hand, is more limited in scope as it is working on retaining existing customers and works best when digital and social media efforts are combined. Digital branding can help you build a strong online presence for your brand, but this digital presence will only be fully effective if you manage to connect with consumers through social media platforms. Digital marketing makes it possible for businesses to reach out to more potential customers and digital branding helps build a strong online presence. Digital marketing also offers greater opportunities for businesses to expand, while digital branding is linked to digital conversions.

What’s Better for Your Company?

The answer to this question depends on the kind of business you have and its objectives. Digital marketing is more challenging than digital branding but presents more opportunities for digital growth. Digital marketing can help you become more visible online, while digital branding helps you create a digital presence that will retain your current customers and boost your digital conversions. Digital marketing is also better suited to new businesses since it does not require an existing digital presence the way digital branding does.

Conclusion

So to conclude the answer to which approach is better overall is dependent on a number of factors such as the type of business you have, the industry you work in, at what stage of growth your company is at etc. If we were to take 10 random businesses, it is more likely that 7 out of these 10 businesses would benefit more from digital marketing rather than digital branding. This is because as mentioned while digital branding is good at retaining customers, digital marketing can consistently bring in new leads which could convert to new customers.

If you want to learn more about branding or the importance of brand identity, then please read our article on the importance of brand identity. Or alternatively our article on how to attract the right kind of traffic.

If you are looking for a team that can handle your digital marketing needs, why not get in touch with WTBI, check out our digital marketing services page for more details.