What Is Internet Marketing?

Internet marketing simply means using the World Wide Web to market. Even though many people association this with only advertising, the word marketing actually refers to much more. It may also include pricing and distribution. Indeed, the web is a good tool for many marketing activities from advertising to ordering goods to researching customer behavior and expectations.

Of course, advertising is a big part of the picture. It is probably impossible to browse around on the Internet for long without coming across a variety of advertisements. Some of these are pretty obvious banner and text advertisements. Some are more subtly disguised ads contained with articles or even videos.

Some companies may display advertising for their own products and services on the company website. At other times, other website owners get paid to display advertising for third parties. Many people run and build up sites so they can earn income by displaying third party advertisements with no intention of ever selling their own products. This is one of the common types of Internet marketing.

The net is also a great source of information about consumer's expectations and behavior. In fact, there has probably never been a better way to gauge the habits of a large number of people. It is easy to adjust prices, advertising tactics, and products to test out which combinations yield the best returns.

It is also to test performance. This is true if you are selling a product or service or advertising for another company. You can tell exactly which advertisements tend to draw clicks from visitors. After that, you can even add scripts to see which of these users make a purchase. By being able to find patterns in this behavior, it is much easier to figure out what works in the long run. 

Of course, it is impossible to forget out the distribution chain. Some companies are almost entirely operated online with very little offline handling. This means that everything from product orders for inventory and supplies to customer orders for retail products is done online. This can be a very efficient and effective way of running a business if it is properly constructed.

Not all Internet marketing is done from a website either. Some is conducted through email marketing campaigns. These days, a lot of online marketing is done through social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook. It is important to test different platforms, advertising methods, and much more in order to maximize your own web marketing and advertising dollars.

Does your business already engage in Internet Marketing? Most companies need to sell, connect, or distribute through the web these days in order to stay competitive. This can be true of local businesses and professionals and of global ones.

While online advertising has become one of the largest businesses in the US, it is still possible to begin with a fairly small investment. If you would like to advertise, distribute, or connect with customers more effectively, it is time to learn more about Internet Marketing.