The 3 Most Important Types of Media for Digital Marketing

Attempting to build a successful business without marketing is like attempting to drive a car without gas. Marketing is an essential component of business success, and with increased online competition and 4.1 billion internet users worldwide, the decision to create a digital marketing strategy for your business is a no-brainer. 

Digital marketing as a whole includes a variety of different digital platforms, but regardless of which ones your business decides to employ as part of your marketing strategy, an important aspect of digital marketing is understanding the three types of digital media and how to leverage each type to build your business.

Owned Media.

Owned media includes platforms that you “own” and control such as social media profiles, websites, email lists, and blogs. This type of media is important in building brand awareness for your business and creating client or customer loyalty for your brand. An example would be a YouTube channel where your audience subscribes to watch videos that you share about your business and brand.

Earned Media.

Earned media involves your content being shared, promoted, and made via other forms of publicity that you did NOT pay for. Examples of earned media include when someone shares posts from your social media profiles to their profiles, features you on blogs, online news outlets, online magazines or podcasts, or writes articles about your business. 

Paid Media.

Paid media includes any type of media that involves you paying money in an attempt to ensure its exposure. Examples include Facebook ads, Google ads, and sponsored links to your website or blog.

In order for your digital marketing strategy to have a significant impact on your business growth, strategize using all three types of media so that they work together to get the faster, stronger results. For example, let’s assume you are a real estate agent. Your owned media would include a blog where you consistently share tips for home buyers and sellers. 

Then let’s say you decide to use Google Ads to promote your blog using certain keywords related to real estate and home buying. Your ad is seen by an influencer who is doing a feature on real estate and he starts to follow your blog. The Google ad is your paid media. 

Now let’s assume that after following you for a few weeks, the influencer decides that he really likes the information you share about real estate. He then contacts you and asks if he can feature one of your blog posts on his website, which will expose your blog to an audience of more than 10k followers. The blog feature is your earned media. 

In this example, your blog, the paid ad, and the feature by the influencer have all worked together to gain exposure and generate leads for your real estate business. If there were no ad, the influencer may have never seen your blog and you would not have received the exposure to the large audience of leads. 

When you craft your digital marketing strategy, be sure to consider all the ways in which these three types of media can work together to reach your target audience and boost your business.