Top 5 Digital Marketing Skills To Master For 2022

It's no secret that the world of digital marketing changes fast. This is why in this article I'm going to be breaking down 5 of the absolute most important digital marketing skills you need to master if you want to stay on top of your game. Let's get to it!

It's funny, actually, looking back over my career and over the last many years of doing all kinds of different digital marketing from web design and SEO, moving through paid ads and social and content strategy and essentially, just how different the stuff that we're using today inside the agency is, compared to

the stuff that we were doing 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 years ago. I mean it's almost completely different now. Attention spans are shorter. There's new technology. The way that customers and clients engage with content online, it's almost completely different. So, the stuff that kind of got you to this point isn't

going to be the things that are going to take you forward into the next decade. And that's what this article is all about. Alright, so let's get things started.

 1. Marketing Fundamentals

What I believe is probably one of the most important skills that you need to master is Marketing Fundamentals.  But essentially, digital marketing is just marketing done digitally. 

I know, it's not really profound but at the end of the day, that's really what it is. This is why it's really important if you want to succeed with digital marketing to make sure that you're dedicating and allocating a sufficient amount of time to really master the basics of marketing, those fundamental principles like positioning and differentiation, and all the points around branding and how to really build kind of a solid and likable brand for today's day and age. 

I really can't stress this enough. It is absolutely, fundamentally, crucial that you understand the basics of marketing and fortunately, once you sort of gut these into your system, once you've spent some time learning them and really trying to master them, here's the beauty, this time is going to be really well spent because human behavior, which is essentially really what marketing is, is understanding and leveraging different aspects of human behavior, how you can sort of I want to say manipulate but essentially, influence the direction and the decisions people make, well, regardless, human behavior really hasn't changed all that much. 

At the end of the day, we're still just people. This means, by even understanding the basics of how people work and how they make buying decisions, well, you're gonna be able to apply this information this year, next year, for the next 5-10 probably the next hundred years. For example, by spending a little bit of time learning about consumer behavior, marketing fundamentals, you'll probably come across the fact that consumers make buying decisions

emotionally, not logically or irrationally, this doesn't mean that you don't want to include logical or rational elements, it just means that you want to lead with the emotional aspect first so you can sort of get that buy-in and get that conviction and then follow up with the logical and rational elements of your product or service so that you can allow them to justify the decision to themselves and to others. 

The beauty is that once you understand that one very simple concept, it's really never going to change and it's going to be able to be applied to all of your future marketing making it all that much more effective moving forward. 

2. Focus on Conversation Generation

Alright, the next skill that you're going to want to master, moving forward, is: to Focus on Conversation Generation. 

Now, as a die-hard proponent of direct response marketing which is really all about generating those leads and getting them to take action as soon as possible, well, a big element or a big switch that we've been seeing lately is sort of a transition from straight-up lead gen to conversation gen because at the end of the day you can generate all the leads you want but what you probably want are those conversations that are going to lead to bigger and more essentially, buying opportunities for your business.

Now yes, lead gen is still very much alive and still very much a part of the stuff that I consult on and the stuff that we do inside the agency. But, if you really want to take your marketing to the next level and really master it, you're gonna want to focus on that next step which is essential, turning those leads into conversations. 

Now, it's a bit of kind of give-and-take here about what you're willing to sacrifice on the front end and how valuable a lead is compared to a conversation and that's kind of a whole other discussion but what I want to make sure you understand here, is that when you're structuring your marketing campaigns, you really want to think a little bit further down the funnel and really concentrate on not just generating that lead but turning it into a conversation. But, more on funnel marketing in just a minute here. 

Now, here's a bit of a prediction. You see, over the last couple of years we've been seeing a ton of people flood the scenes with lead gen services and all sorts of different agencies and consultants offering traffic generating lead generating services like running Facebook ads or YouTube ads or basically, anything to get leads. But, where you've got an opportunity to really shine, whether it's as an agency or as a business owner or entrepreneur, is really thinking further than that and again focusing on those conversations because generating traffic really isn't that hard, it really just comes down to finding the right people that you're trying to get in front of having the right offer message that you can sort of workaround to make sure it's irresistible and then choosing the right media source, whether it's Facebook ads or Instagram ads or YouTube or whatever. So, traffic is pretty much everywhere but what isn't everywhere is the skill or the art or the ability to take that traffic and actually convert it into a conversation that gets somebody interested in doing business with you.

3. Full Funnel Marketing

Alright, so the next skill that you're going to want to master moving forward is something that I alluded to just earlier, which is: Full Funnel Marketing. Essentially, what you want to do here is be aware and be cognizant of the entire customer journey, both, pre-sale and of course post-sale. But, that's something entirely different. 

Rather, what I really want you to do is, when you're running your marketing campaigns, think about every step that a customer prospect or potential customer is going to have to take in order to, essentially, become a paying client or customer with your business. Now, obviously, this is going to involve some element of lead gen which is that very top of the funnel, that cold traffic, the people that have no idea who you are or what you do or why they should even care. 

But, I want you to then take it a step further and focus on the warm traffic. You see, essentially once you've generated that lead, how are you gonna take that lead and turn it into a conversation and then for bonus marks, take it a step further, how are you gonna take that conversation and move it from warm traffic to hot traffic by actually getting them to take their credit card out of their wallet and become a paying customer. 

The main point that I really want to leave you with here, though, is that really marketing isn't siloed or isolated, it's not just one element of either generating traffic or doing lead gen or even generating conversations. But rather, I want you to think about the entire marketing funnel from that very first moment that someone gets introduced to you and to your business, all the way through to the point that they become a paying customer or client.

And then again, if you want even more bonus marks, think about all the touchpoints that are gonna happen after they become an actual paying client or customer, how can you really make sure you're delivering a phenomenal experience that's going to lead to better retention, better customer loyalty, and more ratings and reviews and referrals for your business. 

4. Video Marketing

Alright, so the next skill that you're gonna wanna master, is probably no surprise and should probably, hopefully, be pretty obvious but it's worth saying anyway because still not enough people are dedicating the time, energy and resources to this phenomenally powerful tool and that is: Video Marketing. 

You see, when it comes to marketing your business and when it comes to really build on that know like and trust factor, well, nothing really beats face-to-face communication. The ability to sit down, look someone in the eye, have a conversation, understand where they're coming from and how or if your business is even able to help. 

But, obviously getting face to face with every single one of your potential prospects or customers, well, might be hard, might even be impossible which is where video steps in and it really is the next best thing, because it allows you to not only hear someone's voice but you can see their face, you can read their facial expressions, you can try to judge, whether they're coming off as taking or genuine or fake and sales kind of slimy. 

The other thing with video is that it allows you to build a ton of trust very quickly because again, short of being in person and really able to read the body language and hear the inflections and the tone of voice and the style and all that, well, it really is the next best thing in getting all of those messages across. 

Plus, you're able to cram in a ton of value and a ton of information very quickly. For example, if a picture is worth a thousand words, well, then a video might be worth a million words because you're able to imply all sorts of different nonverbal cues and again, all of those things that come down to style and tone and pace and so on. Now, here's the funny thing with video, if you're not doing it already, you probably know you should be doing it and even if you're already doing it, you probably know you should be doing more. 

But, what is it that stops most people from getting involved and really cranking out more videos? Well, the answer is pretty simple and it really comes down to this myth or this mistaken belief that everything with video needs to be perfect. Now, this is understandable. After all, we've sort of been raised and brought up watching really polished and really perfected videos through TV shows and movies and basically, any kind of media we see on the screen. 

But things have changed and essentially, the barriers to entry to creating video, have come way down and we're really kind of tired and almost sick of overly polished and Hollywood type productions, especially if they're coming from a business or from somebody that you kind of want to engage with. In fact, in a lot of cases we've done a number of different studies testing a really highly produced incredibly expensive video against something shot with just an iPhone that really is a pretty low budget, and when it comes to running them as ads against the target market, the low-budget one often just absolutely destroys the really expensive high budget one. 

Now, this isn't to say that there's not a time and a place for a really beautiful really polished piece of video media. But it shouldn't be an obstacle. You shouldn't let perfectionism get in the way of you just really getting out there filming something and publishing it. Plus, the other benefit of video is that you can mess up a whole bunch of stuff and then just edit it out. And nobody will ever know.

5. Automation

Alright, and moving on to the fifth digital marketing skill that you need to master is Automation. And after all, there is so much to do and so little time and this is where automation steps in as a very valuable skill, both for yourself and for your own business. 

But also, potentially to offer to clients or customers to help them automate some of their business. Essentially, automation is the offloading or the delegation or basically using tools and technology and software to take care of a lot of the repetitive tasks that you don't need to be doing, probably shouldn't be doing, in your business but that still need to get done. What this means is that you're able to get a whole lot more done, a whole lot quicker and in fact, in some cases, you're able to get a whole lot more done pretty much instantly because the automation can be set up ahead of time to just run behind the scenes and trust me, it's a lot faster than any human being could ever hope to be. 

For example, in one of my marketing agencies, we can generate a lead for a client using Facebook Ads, we can take that lead we can nurture them with SMS and text and email and voice mail and essentially, start the conversation from our end and follow up with a very strategic sort of automated, follow-up sequence, right up until we get that response and then from there, it gets even further automated so that we can nurture them again and turn that conversation into a full-fledged client. And we can do this all on behalf of the client without the client needing to lift a finger, which is magic. 

And that's the power of automation. It's essentially, like having a full sales team or a full marketing team or a full appointment setting team or whatever you need to do, working for you 24/7( 365days ) all the time without you needing to do anything once that initial work has been put in and the automation is set up. But, even if you don't want to get that fancy with automation, it's still a valuable thing to master and to incorporate into your business and you can still use it to do some basic, but incredibly important things, such as sending out automated email newsletters that go out whenever somebody downloads your guide or buys one of your products. 

Automated re-targeting and re-marketing advertisements that follow someone around like a creepy stalker. Anytime they visit your website, automated customer management follows up with customers and makes them feel cared for and looked out for. Even if it's a robot doing it. And, people like robots anyway. Even automated grocery shopping which yes, is not marketing-related but it still saves me a ton of time.

Conclusion

The point is, that using technology and automating repetitive and really often boring processes. This can save you a ton of time and make you that much more effective and efficient and really get the work done that needs to be done so you can get back to doing those high leverage, really valuable activities that are going to drive your business forward. 

Thanks so much for reading this article.