Over the last three years, the number of constant internet users, who rely on the internet for getting their news and interacting with their friends, has increased by more than five percent.

The aim of digital marketing is to connect businesses with these kinds of internet users in the right way and at the right time. Digital marketing as such includes many different business outreach strategies that take place online: search engine optimization, paid search, email marketing campaigns, inbound marketing, and social media marketing. One thing that binds all of these different manifestations of online marketing together is great content marketing.

Taking inbound marketing as an exemplar of what makes online marketing so effective, inbound marketing is a online marketing strategy that uses content marketing and search engine optimization in order to draw customers to your business.

Inbound marketing is a newer form of online marketing that surpasses traditional outbound marketing (e.g., direct mail campaigns) insofar as content can be constantly reused and updated to attract new and old customers at their respective points in the buyer’s journey.

Nearly $100 billion is spent globally every year on paid search, which gives you some idea of the scope and effectiveness behind this form of online marketing.

How does paid search work, though? Search engines like Bing and Google cater to advertisers that wish to display ads on these search engines results pages, also known as SERPs. Most customers find out about local businesses through major search engines like Google; paid search is perfectly positioned as an online marketing tool to connect businesses and customers like never before.

The ROI-promoting aspect of paid search for small and medium-sized businesses is the fact that businesses don’t pay a cent until the ad is clicked on. Hence the name, paid search. Paid search is much more measurable and malleable than other forms of online marketing, and paid search is light years ahead of traditional outbound marketing in its ability to allow you to quickly change up your message to suit a new marketing direction.

Paid search is malleable in another way – paid search allows you to use text ads that display at the bottom or top of organic search results on major search engines like Google or, alternatively, paid search ads may feature on major search engines like Bing and Google as shopping ads.

Both content marketing and responsive website design are cornerstones for online marketing because all of your efforts will be enhanced or stymied by great content and effective website design. Websites should load quickly across multiple devices but remain easily navigable on desktops and laptops.

WordPress is very ease to use for businesses as well. Because WordPress is browser-based, you’ll be able to apply updates from virtually any computer that has an internet connection. Companies also like using WordPress because it’s an autonomous interface that doesn’t require business owners and their staff learn file transfer protocol (FTP) or HTML editing.

The best part is that search engines like Google like to boost websites that are designed by WordPress because the backend code is to clean and manageable. Websites can be easily indexed by search engines, in other words.

Contact a Seattle SEO consultant like SEOGoddess in Seattle, Washington for online marketing, paid search, and WordPress website design. SEOGoddess in Seattle can help.