Creating a marketing budget for ecommerce is an essential step that every business should take into consideration. Whether you are running a startup or an established business, a marketing budget can help you to allocate your resources optimally and present the best results.
The cost of marketing can range according to the kind of business you run. It is recommended that you should allocate a certain amount of your budget for marketing and develop a robust online marketing strategy. You should incorporate analytics to ascertain those marketing strategies that are giving you the most return on investment (ROI) so that the money you spend on marketing is adequately used.
We have brought you the tips through which you can determine your expenses and create a marketing budget. Here you go:
Common Marketing Expenses
1. Brand Development
When you are running a startup or new business, your primary focus of marketing should be associated with the establishment of your brand. You will need to have a domain name. You will need a website hosting platform as well. You can end up spending some amount on the logo design but if you are on Shopify, you will be provided a free logo generator. For domain name & web hosting you need to spend some amount on buying domain name from domain registrar companies & web hosting platforms respectively. Some examples of the best web hosting and domain registrar companies are GoDaddy, HostGator, Bluehost, Nexcess, Namecheap, Hover, 1&1 & more.
2. Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a concurrent method which is highly important for your business as it will help you in reaching out to the customers in organic search on search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. Ensure that you maintain the quality of effort. You can also outsource the work to an SEO consultant who can help you immensely.
3. Social Media Marketing
Among the various positive aspects, the free of cost promotion of your business is the best thing about social media marketing. However, if you are running ads, then you will have to pay. But if you want to use the most out of it, you should run various marketing pursuits such as creating your social profiles, regularly updating them with new and attractive content, build and engage the audience. You can also take the help of social media analytics tools. If you are a new or small business and have limited marketing budget, you can use the built-in analytics that most of the leading social networks for business profiles and pages provide.
4. Pay Per Click
PPC advertising options are presented by search engines as well as social media networks. However, the money you spend on PPC will vary on the number of new customers you wish to reach, in what manner, and how great your advertising campaigns for conversions are optimized.
5. Content Marketing
Content marketing is also a continuous method where the generation of new content is the key to connect with the new customers. The expenses may differ from the sort of content you want to have. You can create your content in-house but you also have the option of hiring freelancers or agencies. In order to push the content to new customers through advertising on search engines and social media, it is advisable to spend more on PPC. You can run retargeting ads to monetize the blog content to customers who come to visit your blog posts. Also if you want get your content published on high authority sites, you need to hire contributors of such sites.
6. Email Marketing
Email marketing is a surefire way to reach current and potential customers who have shared their email address with you when making a purchase or subscribing to future updates on your website.
One of the main costs of maintaining an email marketing campaign is the email marketing service you choose to maintain your email list and help you send regular email marketing messages to that list.
7. Freelancers and Employees
In order to have expert assistance with marketing, you can either hire freelancers or hire long-term and full-time employees for help. If you have a new business, then hiring freelancers is the right choice. However, if you are hiring an employee in-house to take care of all the marketing requirements of the business, then you can pay them according to their education, experience and specializations.
Creating a Marketing Budget
Once you know the kinds of costs that are required to be incorporated in the marketing budget, you should then create the marketing budget. Using Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel spreadsheet is the easiest and simplest manner for a new or small business to do so. Always keep in mind that the budget differs from every brand and niche.
By having a marketing budget in hand, it becomes easy to follow the marketing plan in uniformity and enable adjustments in the budget for enhanced results. Make sure to remember the aforementioned tips while creating a marketing budget for your ecommerce business.