Understanding The Costs Involved In Digital Marketing

In the well-known words of Stephen King: “If you want to play, you gotta pay.” This quote is all too true regarding the highly competitive digital landscape businesses need to navigate to succeed online.

But what exactly IS the price tag attached to supercharging your clinic digitally? Let’s have a look …

Marketing Budget 101

A rough marketing budget is crucial to your success, whether you are a small or a huge company, a startup or a household name.

Because a marketing budget serves as a guide to ensure you stay on your financial target and point. Pretty straightforward, right? Wrong!

No … we are only joking. It is pretty straightforward… but there is a catch. According to Start Up Loans, start-ups and businesses under five years old may need to spend 12 – 20% of their revenue on their overall marketing budget, whereas more established companies may only need to spend 6 – 12% to yield similar results.

That is food for thought! Research has also found that the average business spends around 9.5% of its revenue on marketing. Small businesses allocate around 8 – 10% of their revenue to marketing efforts, and new businesses invest around 10 – 15% during their first year.

Online Marketing Services

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

What Is It?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation, and it is the method used to optimise your search engine ranking (i.e. improve the quality and quantity of visitors coming to your website). This means SEO helps your business attract new customers and the RIGHT customers. Therefore, making SEO a core part of your marketing plan is crucial.

To summarise, by embracing SEO practices, your business can expand its reach, become more visible online, and grow steadily within the online world by improving your online content and your website’s technical aspects, such as HTML tags, meta descriptions, and so much more!

What Does It Cost?

The costs involved will depend on the size and complexity of your website, the competitiveness of your industry, the type of services you require, and the experience and expertise needed from your SEO provider.

Other important factors that could affect the cost of your SEO pricing are your business’s location, your target audience, and the goals you had in mind for your SEO campaign.

Does SEO Work?

SEO is widely acknowledged as a cost-effective alternative to paid ads, allowing brands to achieve comparable traffic levels at a fraction of the cost. When executed correctly (and updated regularly), SEO can significantly impact your business’s success.

SEO can drive a 14.6% conversion rate compared to traditional strategies like print ads and direct mail, which only drive about 1.7%. Not to mention, search engines are believed to drive about 10 times more traffic to websites than social media does, and with a staggering 75% of users who do not even scroll past the first page of their Google search results, being at the top of those search engine results is now more important than ever before.

According to Forbes: “Estimates are that businesses in the US are spending more than $80 billion on SEO services”. Let us just repeat that: $80 billion! So yes. SEO works, SEO is important, and SEO can help catapult your business to a prime Google location!

And chances are, as long as people use search engines, SEO will be an investment worth making.

How Long Before I See Results?

The timeframe can vary widely depending on various factors mentioned above. Still, generally, it can take anywhere from 4 months to a year to start yielding results. Businesses can expect an average of a 2.8% increase in revenue after investing in SEO after 6 months.

Pay Per Click Advertising

What Is It?

Pay-per-click advertising, also

known as PPC, is a very effective way to advertise your products or services, test new products, and drive extra sales over a short period.

The most popular PPC channels are, of course, Google Ads and Bing Ads, which allow your business to typically start making sales just a few days after starting your advertising campaign. It also provides a ton of data on which keywords people are searching for.

Why do these keywords matter? Because of how PPC works. Advertisers/digital marketers need to bid on keywords for website clicks. Therefore, knowing and using the correct keyword is liquid gold.

What Does It Cost?

Even though you only PAY PER CLICK, you could end up paying for every click without yielding proper results (i.e. people clicking in your ads who have zero intention of booking an appointment).

Thus, roping in an expert to help is always advised, as PPC experts help you plan and create effective strategies that target your ideal audience and their searches and utilise PPC ads correctly.

Here is some interesting information regarding PPC advertising: according to Google, the average ROI across all industries for Google Ads campaigns is 200%. This means that for every £1 spent on Google Ads, businesses would expect to earn £2 in revenue. That is pretty amazing.

Does PPC Work?

When set up correctly, PPC marketing does work incredibly well. It can drive targeted traffic to your website, help increase your brand visibility, and generate leads or sales for your business.

Bear in mind that its effectiveness depends on the quality of your ad copy, targeting parameters, bidding strategy, the relevance of your landing page, and the continuous optimisation and monitoring efforts put in.

How Long Before I See Results?

You can practically start seeing results overnight, but most businesses need to wait a few weeks to properly evaluate the results from their PPC campaigns.

Social Media Marketing

What Is It?

Social media marketing is a dynamic and multifaceted strategy that harnesses the power of popular social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn to allow businesses to engage with their followers (potential customers and existing customers), bolster their brand presence, boost sales, and direct traffic to their websites.

This approach leverages social media’s expansive reach and interactive nature to help build meaningful connections. These connections help create opportunities for your business to share content, promotions, and updates in a manner that resonates with your audience and inevitably entices them to book an appointment and walk through your clinic doors.

What Does It Cost?

On average, companies tend to allocate around 9% of their marketing budgets to social media marketing, reflecting the growing recognition of its efficacy in reaching and engaging with audiences in an increasingly digital-centric world.

Does Social Media Marketing Work?

Yes, social media marketing indeed works, and there is no denying it is a powerful marketing tool that helps businesses connect with their target audience, build brand awareness, drive website traffic, and ultimately increase sales.

With billions of active social media users across various platforms, social media provides businesses with unparalleled access to a diverse and engaged audience. Remember, most of your followers actively choose to follow your account, meaning they WANT to know what your business is up to.

Therefore, through strategic content creation, targeted advertising, influencer collaborations, and community engagement, your business can effectively communicate its offerings to a lot of potential customers!

Here are some stats to consider:

1. Facebook is responsible for 80% of social media referral traffic (i.e. visits to your site from links that appear on a different site, in this case, Facebook).
2.  Social media sharing has a 31.5% impact on the overall weight of search engine rankings.
3. Around 51% of retailers say social media drives at least 10% of their website traffic.
4. And in 2021, the average social media conversion rate was 9.3%!

How Long Before I See Results?

Social media marketing may not provide immediate results, as with all relationships; building trust takes time, but it does offer significant long-term advantages for your business.

You can expect significant results over several weeks to a few months. The speed at which you succeed on social media hinges on your capability to produce compelling content, establish a loyal following, and efficiently use advertising tools.

Web Design

What Is It?

Web design involves a variety of skills and practices used in creating and maintaining websites. These include web graphic design, user interface design, coding using standardised or proprietary software, user experience design, and search engine optimisation.

In a nutshell, web design goes FAR beyond pretty pictures. A GREAT web design will ensure your website looks good, works fast, is easy to use and find online, and is perfectly set up for conversion!

What Does It Cost?

The cost of a web design can vary significantly depending on various factors, such as the complexity of your website, the level of customisation required, the features and functionalities needed, the experience and expertise of the web designer or agency, and the geographic location of your business.

Additionally, factors like ongoing maintenance, updates, and additional services can also influence the overall cost, and yes, websites do need to be updated regularly.

Does Web Design Work?

Yes. It does work, and your web design matters. It is crucial to understand that your web design directly influences user experience. In the very wise words of Google’s co-founder Larry Page, “Your competition is one click away”! That means if your website does not resonate with your ideal client, is slow, difficult to use, or looks terrible … you WILL lose that potential customer within seconds to one of your competitors. Facts.

Here are important statistics to soak in: 94% of first impressions regarding your business and brand are related to your website design, about 75% of users judge a business’s credibility based on its website design, and 38.5% of web designers say an outdated web design is one of the top reasons for site abandonment!

Full circle: does web design work? Yes, a strategically thought-out web design makes a HUGE difference.

How Long Before I See Results?

The physical changes will be immediate as soon as your new website goes live/is updated, however, experts say that a website takes an average of six months to gain an increase in visitors. Moreover, you must follow up with further marketing activities to ensure continuous growth.

Why Choose Digital Aesthetics To Catapult Your Clinic To Online Success?

Simply put, we deliver results, love what we do, and have over 17 years of marketing experience in the health and beauty industry!

Digital Aesthetics is a full marketing service agency, and our team has helped aesthetic clinics, doctors, dentists, acupuncturists, spas, and cosmetic brands show up and grow online.

Whether you want to transform your website or grow your client base, get in touch with us.