Two Key Differences Between Traditional and Online Marketing

From hiring someone to wave a sign at a street corner to posting special customer discounts on Facebook, there are many different marketing tactics out there. While most small business owners are familiar with traditional marketing, promoting your business online is critical for modern day success.

After all, while traditional marketing is still relevant for reaching some customers, the internet is an increasingly important tool for marketing to a growing online audience.

Indeed, every business needs to update its marketing techniques. According to Demand Metric, content marketing not only costs 62% less than traditional marketing tactics, but also generates three times as many leads.

To get started, here is an overview on two main differences between traditional marketing and online marketing.

Tactics and Strategies

Unlike online marketing, traditional marketing tends to involve a greater range of mediums. For example, advertising around town using fliers, signs, and billboards is a common method, while large campaigns often involve getting your business ads to be shown on TV or published in a major newspaper.

Person to person and paper distribution methods are also key to traditional marketing, whether that involves handing out business cards or speaking at trade shows, conferences, and seminars.

In comparison, online marketing tactics take advantage of the fact that most customers are constantly connected to the internet via their computers, smartphones, and other devices.

Business websites and blogs are a must-have, while common tactics involve click-through ads, online coupons, and email subscriptions.

Online marketing also incorporates social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, and often includes videos, viral campaigns, and other strategies.

Upfront Investment

Since traditional and online marketing tactics vary widely, it makes sense that the upfront investment costs of using these methods also show a major difference.

Traditional marketing tends to rely heavily on printed material and man power, both of which have a sizable upfront cost. Print fees can be expensive since they typically scale depending on the quality and quantity of brochures or flyers needed.

For in-person tactics like hosting a conference or class, the cost of training an employee or inviting an experienced lecturer can likewise add up. In addition, traditional marketing is also more time intensive, as it takes a while for marketing material to be developed, aired, published, and/or distributed.

On the other hand, online marketing is known for being much less costly. For example, compared to renting a brick-and-mortar storefront there is very little setup and maintenance cost to having a business website.

Likewise, creating a social media page for your business is not only free and can be easily done at home, it also allows you to quickly grow a network of customers.

Online marketing is also associated with greater efficiency and better ROI. After all, there are fewer steps involved when it comes to publishing and updating content online.

The monetary effectiveness of online marketing tactics is also much easier to observe and quantify, as most online platforms have built in tracking mechanisms for web traffic, sales, inbound links, and other important data points.

Still have questions? Please leave a comment below and we’ll get back to you.

To you success!
Ken Partain