The tools of the marketing trade evolve quickly — particularly when it comes to selling your services online. Today, there’s no faster, easier or more cost-efficient way to connect with potential clients than through the internet. First, you must learn which tools will best help you do that — and the lingo that goes along with them. Understanding what certain digital marketing terms mean helps you quickly find and test various online advertising tools for your firm. They’ll also help you track, interpret and improve your campaign’s results over time.
Top 10 Digital Marketing Terms and Tools to Learn in 2019
With that in mind, here are 10 digital marketing terms anyone who’s new to online advertising must know in 2019. Are you leveraging these concepts to grow your own firm’s clientele? If not, now’s the time to start trying them out!
Digital Marketing Term #1: Lookalike Audience
This is how Facebook marketers describe groups of people who share the most similarities with your current clients. Finding and engaging with these prospects through Facebook ads or posts is a powerful way to increase your firm’s clientele. Facebook even has a tool built into its ad platform that helps you create your own Lookalike Audience to target. To get started, simply upload a list of your existing customers and install the Facebook pixel on your firm’s website.
Digital Marketing Term #2: Custom Audience
This is another Facebook-centric digital marketing term you’ll need to learn before using their ad platform. “Custom audience” simply refers to any people already on your contact list you’d like to target with Facebook ads. To get started, you’ll need to upload an email list for your firm’s current clientele or other website data. Once you’ve created your Facebook custom audience, you can keep updating it as your firm’s clientele grows over time.
Digital Marketing Term #3: Quality Score
This digital marketing term describes Google AdWords’ automated system that determines how much your online search ads cost. Raising your quality score is important, because it helps you decrease your costs-per-click and shows your ads to more people.
Digital Marketing Term #4: KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)
This digital marketing term tells you whether your online campaigns are effectively meeting your firm’s client acquisition goals. Now, it’s easy to get lost down a rabbit hole, trying to track literally everything your firm does. To avoid this, we recommend you only track metrics you can easily measure in tools like Google Analytics. We’ve listed some good KPIs for newbie marketers to track according to campaign type below.
Good KPIs to track for pay-per-click (PPC) ads may include:
- Monthly ad impressions
- Click-through rate (CTR) per ad
- Total conversions
- Cost-per-lead (CPL) for each new client your firm acquires
Good KPIs for digital marketing referrals (i.e., if you’re using affiliate campaigns or have a B2B referral-sharing program in place):
- Total leads referred each month
- Total referrals converted into signed clients
- How much revenue each referral generates for your firm
- Referrals generated according to source (this helps you compare costs, volume and lead quality across different channels or partnered firms)
Digital Marketing Term #5: Remarketing Emails
Remarketing describes several emails (often called a “drip marketing campaign”) sent to keep prospects warm until they’re ready to convert. Remarketing email campaign tactics that work particularly well for law firms include:
- Newsletters (mention cases won this month, charity projects, community outreach, etc.)
- Testimonials from current clientele (newest cases won, award amounts, etc.)
- Invitations to attend open houses or networking events
Digital Marketing Term #6: Describing Things as “Mobile-First” or “Mobile-Friendly”
A “mobile-first” marketing approach prioritizes ad campaigns, landing pages and website designs that look and perform best on mobile devices. Since Google rolled out its mobile-first indexing initiative in March 2018, compliance is crucial. And it’s easy to see why this digital marketing concept is so important for newbies to understand. Just look around you: Everyone spends more time on their phones these days than using laptops or desktop computers. So, a mobile-first marketing strategy is non-negotiable for growing your firm’s clientele online.
Digital Marketing Term #7: Responsive Design
This digital marketing term is closely related to the mobile-first approach we described above. It means that ideally, your firm’s website loads quickly and functions the same across all screen sizes and devices. Whether your prospects are on a desktop computer, tablet, or smartphone, the site’s design “responds” and looks the same way. A bad user experience on certain phones can make it harder for people to find your firm or book appointments. That’s the last thing you want if you’re trying to attract new clientele!
Digital Marketing Term #8: Pay-to-Play
This digital marketing term is exactly what it sounds like: if you want to play, then you have to pay. Free website traffic and lead referrals from social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter are a thing of the past. In other words, RIP, organic reach and free content marketing on Facebook to gain new clients! No matter what social media channel your firm prefers (i.e., LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest), it now costs money to show your followers ads or content posts.
Digital Marketing Term #9: Marketing Automation Tools
These are useful tools that help you automate certain digital marketing tasks, which lets you accomplish more with less. Whether it’s converting leads without full-time intake staff or scheduling follow-up emails, these tools keep smaller practices lean and efficient! Some popular examples include:
- Hootsuite to schedule automated social media posts for weeks or months in advance
- Unbounce to a/b test landing pages as well as website contact form templates
- LeadingResponse’s Lead Management System (LMS) for scheduling newsletters, drip marketing email campaigns, signing and storing documents/retainers, contacting clients via email or text and so much more! Best of all, this marketing automation tool is 100% free to all firms that partner with LeadingResponse for their client acquisition needs.
Digital Marketing Term #10: Multichannel Marketing
These days, one Facebook page or Google ad campaign isn’t going to bring in enough new clients every month. In fact, no firm should focus on just one marketing channel — or even two. Today’s most effective digital marketing efforts span across multiple search engines, social media platforms, target locations, and audience demographics. Consider testing new media against the old, such as Facebook video ads vs. traditional TV, print or radio spots. It’s a great way to streamline your marketing efforts and spend less of your firm’s budget on advertising!
Meet Your Monthly Lead Volume Goals & Eliminate the Guesswork
If your firm’s business development efforts take up too much time or money each month, partner with LeadingResponse. Then, you can enjoy a reliable stream of high-quality prospects and quit your second (and unpaid) digital marketing job! To request your free lead volume estimate today, simply fill out the contact form on this page.
