The global digital advertising and marketing industry is expected to reach $786.2 billion by 2026. The reason? Digital marketing brings results. Both small and large-scale businesses are increasing their marketing budgets because it works. 

But not always. 

Old habits die hard, which is why many businesses are making the same digital marketing mistakes that are affecting their traffic, ROI, and brand perception. And with AI and changing algorithms, it is even easier to fall for bad advice. Let’s take a closer look at six digital marketing mistakes you need to avoid making at all costs.

Marketing Without Having Defined Audiences

So you have a killer ad copy and eye-catching graphics, but if it’s reaching the wrong audience, it won’t matter. Many businesses believe that casting a super wide net will help them get more conversions. This is a huge misconception. Digital marketing without knowing who your audience is leads to generic campaigns, which can damage your brand perception.

So what can you do? Start by building customer personas. It is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer with clearly defined key aspects like:

1. Demographics
2. Interests 
3. Pain points
4. Behaviors
5. Goals 
6. Motivations

Then, conduct thorough market research. Understand how the market has changed over time and what new trends are taking over. Engaging with your prospective customers through comment conversations, surveys, and forums can also help you narrow down your audience.

Overlooking Content Quality for Quantity

So you’re churning out hundreds of blog posts every month and posting videos on social media platforms almost every day, only to see little to no results. Sit back and ask yourself, Is my content providing value to the readers? Are the blog posts high-quality and written with a customer-centric approach? 

Remember that your audience is solely interested in solving their problems and pain points, not in your product. This is why prioritizing content quality is more important than ever.

High-quality content establishes your brand as an authority and encourages readers to interact. Above everything, search engines like Google prefer and rank customer-centric content. This is especially important if you wish to boost your SEO efforts. 

Write blog posts, informational guides, press releases, landing pages, and guest posts, and make sure they are:

1. Original
2. Well-researched
3. Clear and engaging

Ignoring Mobile Optimization

Your website is the central factor of your digital marketing strategy. If it’s not optimized for mobile users, you’re driving away thousands of visitors every day. Over 63% of web traffic comes from mobile phones. Moreover, nearly 53% users leave a site if it takes more than three seconds to load. 

Looking at the statistics, not optimizing your website for mobile phone users is a huge mistake that can affect your earning potential. Even Google has a mobile-first indexing, which means it judges the credibility of your site based on the page loading speed. 

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Make sure your site has a responsive design.
2. Make sure your site has a clean layout that can accommodate different screen sizes.
3. Optimize page load speed. You can compress images, use clean code, and reduce unnecessary redirects.

Periodically check your site pages across multiple devices and make sure everything is running smoothly.

Ignoring Ways to Bring Organic Traffic

You can’t run paid ads for every campaign, and you shouldn’t! There are numerous ways to bring organic traffic to your site. Here are some suggestions:

Consider On-Page Optimization

Optimizing your website’s structure, title tags, meta description, and headings can improve the readability of your web pages. It will also allow search engines to crawl through your site and rank it higher quickly.

Acquire Backlinks

Backlinks act as a vote of confidence from one website to another. They signal search engines that your content is credible and should be ranked higher. One of the best ways to acquire backlinks is through guest posting. You can write guest posts for other reputable websites in your niche, place a do-follow link, and reach a wider audience. 

Build a Social Media Presence

Posting on social media platforms, such as Facebook and Instagram, can help direct traffic to your site. It will also boost your brand’s visibility and user engagement rates, leading to long-term success. 

Consider working with a reputable digital marketing agency, such as Globex Outreach, to bring organic traffic and lay the foundation for long-term success. 

Taking a Superficial Approach to SEO

With nearly 7.5 million blog posts being posted every day, standing out is difficult. Businesses are heavily focusing on optimizing their content and approach for search engine optimization (SEO). 

However, many businesses take a superficial approach to SEO, focusing on short-term wins and ignoring sustainability. Many end up using black hat SEO techniques, such as keyword stuffing, cloaking, or hidden text.

This is why it’s important to follow time-tested SEO techniques that bring long-term results. Here’s what you can do:

1. Aim to rank for both short-tail and long-tail keywords. Always check the keyword difficulty and search volume to set realistic expectations.
2. Add visual elements to your content to boost engagement rates and acquire conversions.
3. Optimize images.
4. Use short and clear URLs with a primary keyword to rank higher.

Focusing Too Much on Paid Ads

Many businesses and website owners believe that spending recklessly on paid ads will get them results. The reality? Only 25% of the money spent on paid digital ads reaches the right people. 

Pay-per-click marketing platforms, such as Facebook and Google AdWords, can be extremely rewarding. But worshipping at the altar of paid ads is not right. For one, you could end up losing a lot of money if you don’t have a solid strategy.

So what can you do? Research, research, and research. Understand your target audience and everything about them like a private detective. Then, run A/B testing to try out several ad campaigns with different formats. Leverage content marketing, email marketing, and more.

Lastly, set a realistic paid ads budget and stick to it. By realistic, we mean an amount that doesn’t break your bank.