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What digital marketing actually is

16 min

Digital marketing is any marketing that happens through an internet channel: a page, a search result, an email, a social post, or an ad. The channel is not the goal. The goal is a decision you want someone to make, such as booking a call, buying a small product, or joining a list.

If you collect channels without a goal, you will stay busy and learn little. Pick one offer and one person. Then ask which channel helps that person take the next step. That is the whole map this course uses.

Three questions before any tactic

  • Who is this for, in one sentence you could say out loud?
  • What do they get if they say yes?
  • What is the single next step, such as a reply, a visit, or a purchase?

Watch HubSpot Marketing, "What is Digital Marketing: Tutorial for Beginners." Use that video as the channel map. This lesson turns it into one goal and one offer.

Three boxes labeled Goal, Offer, and Channel in a left to right row
Channels come after the goal and the offer, not before them.

Practice

Write those three answers for an offer you can actually market. If you cannot name the next step, you do not have a campaign yet. You have a topic.