Can Digital Marketing Be a Side Hustle? Before Digital Marketing, there was a time, when selling and purchasing products face-to-face used to be a huge thing, which was often called traditional marketing. But as soon as the digital era took place, people started understanding the advantages of these gadgets and started using them as a marketing strategy.
Whether it was a Television or simply a radio, people understood the simple trick of “reaching more people is more promotion of the product!”. Since this evolvement, not only the growth of gadgets increased but also the growth of marketing saw a vertical rise. That isDigital Marketing!
So, YES. Digital Marketing CAN be your side hustle! But before starting your side hustle, first, you should know about it correctly. Many times, more than giving a lot of effort you should know what you are putting your efforts into. So, let’s first understand some basic things about digital marketing.
What is Digital Marketing?
Digital Marketing is nothing but a widely used marketing technique to promote products and services using different digital platforms. Whether it is social apps, websites, or emails, people use these digital platforms to attract a suitable audience for their products.
These platforms not just help them to promote their product on a huge scale but also gives them Idea about customers’ likes and dislikes. Because of Digital Marketing, now businesses can know their consumer’s personal choices, can suggest the same on their feed using different platforms, and attract more & more customers.
Also, Digital Marketing is not anymore limited to the platforms that require the internet. People who don’t have any big accounts on social media, use techniques like SMS and MMS,digital display advertising, orsearch engine marketing. In short Digital Marketing has something for everyone! From this, you can guess how fast this web of Digital Marketing is spreading across the globe!
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What is a Side Hustle and How much Can You Make from it?
Before understanding a Digital Marketing side hustle, let’s first understand how this side hustle works.A side hustle is something you work on side by side with your main job. It is a great approach to make some side money. It includes many physical part-time jobs.
In the digital world, you can see many people with their full-time job has YouTube channel like cooking, yoga or gaming or maybe a local business website to sale handmade things they make side by side. Whether to earn extra money or to bloom your passion in the real world, a side hustle is always a great way to balance life!
From 500 to 10k per month, a digital marketing side hustle can do wonders for your finance. But before approaching this method one must understand that a side hustle is a slow process. With limited time and efforts come limited funds.
Unlike the main job, it might not come with positive results from the very first month. But, with a good amount of work, consistency, and patience one can make side money as good as their main job, sometimes even more than that! And Digital Marketing plays a huge role in this process.
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How being a Digital Marketing Side Hustler brings advantages to your customers?
1. Product and service updates
In today’s digital world, people are strongly dependent on the internet. They expect time-to-time updates on their product and digital marketing provides this need easily. Whether it is through Emailing or messaging, a company can always stay connected with people.
2. Strong and Consistent Engagement.
Digital marketing makes it efficient to visit the website of any company and get the information instantly. People can read reviews, try demos and ask queries all at the same place and at the same time.
For example, take a view of the website ofIIM SKILLS
3. Clarity and Transparency.
Unlike traditional marketing, digital marketing does not give space for false rumors or misinterpretation of the information people get from somewhere. Customers can always come to the official website and check the information. It builds trust and loyalty between the seller and consumer.
4. Makes the comparison easy!
It’s not new that competition in the marketing companies is a crazy race. People have been making use of the “comparison and then buy” technique for a long time now. But digital marketing makes this method far more flexible. Digital marketing allows people to compare products and services side by side!
5. In your help 24/7!
Like old times you don’t have to wait till the weekend to go and visit the market. Digital marketing allows the services to be available at any time.
For example,Amazon.
6. Advantage of sharing.
Digital marketing makes it feasible to share content on every platform. Customers can share the whole information of a product before actually buying it.
7. Visible prices.
Because of digital marketing, companies can show the prices, sales, and updates in the pricing at any time. It makes the shopping more convenient for the customers, as they can view, compare and buy any product.
8. Instant purchases, Cancellations, and many more.
Digital marketing allows customers to save and add a product to their cart. They can purchase any product instantly. It is also a convenient way for people to buy and cancel their orders easily.
How to make Digital Marketing Side Hustle for yourself?
If someone is having the biggest advantage by being a side hustler in digital marketing then it is entrepreneurs all over the world! It doesn’t matter if you are a beginner or starting with having one job on the other hand. Digital marketing is a golden key to boost the business if being used in the right way.
One needs to remember that just like the main job, a side hustle will need your time and planning too. Many times, people are passionate and expert in whatever product they are willing to sell or the service they are willing to provide. But when it comes to marketing or promoting the product, they don’t know where to start.
Here are some beginner’s steps to give your Digital Marketing journey a good start.
Once you know your product, make sure you go through these steps before start marketing them.
1. Choosing the Digital Platform.
The first thing is choosing your platform. Nowadays people choose all the platforms that are available there to start or promote their content. For example, Shopify, Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook are blooming in this field.
2. Knowing the Trends.
Before starting the implementation of your Idea, do some research and know about its demand in the outer world. Digital marketing is a competitive place. Make sure your product or service is keeping up with the trends that are going on outside your business.
3. The right use of Digital Marketing.
Even if you are ready with your product, only marketing it everywhere will not be useful if you are not meeting the client’s need or expectations. Rather than running behind many people, gain the trust of your audience, even if there are few at the beginning. These added values will help your company to get long-term customers. Remember, one customer, observes other customers.
4. Proper implementation on Digital Platforms.
Give equal importance to the procedure of promoting the product as the product itself! Whatever site you use, make sure it has a neat format, is less crowded with ads, and more user-friendly. Also, we live in an impatient world, make sure your site has a good loading capacity and you will not lose the customers unnecessarily.
After knowing the base, let’s see some of the most effective ways a Digital Marketing Side Hustlers will use to grow the business!
Here are Top 7 elements of Digital Marketing to consider when you make it your side hustle!
1. Online Advertising
Online advertising is also known as internet advertising, where you can promote your product through different ads on different websites. You need to provide clear information about your product on your own website and effectively advertise it on relevant platforms. For example, an advertisem*nt of your clothing brand would be relevant and suitable on any other clothing website.
2. Email Marketing
Email Marketing is a widely used strategy in digital marketing. It is the best way to stay connected with your consumers. Email marketing promotes your product information, gives updates about the product, and helps to build trust between your website and the customer. It also costs relatively less than advertising on other digital platforms. Adding attractive writing, graphics and links will be useful to grab customer’s attention.
3. Social Media
Social media has taken the place of traditional marketing. You can use different social platforms to adopt different marketing approaches. For example, Google+, Facebook, Instagram, Linked In, or Twitter, all these platforms use different techniques to promote your product and services. You can take advantage of this by interacting and communicating with people on different sites, by knowing the advertising technique on a different level, and by adopting different styles of promotion each time.
4. Text Messaging
Text messaging is a very old digital marketing technique. Even today it has not faded away completely. You can use this type of marketing to inform product delivery updates to your customers, you can ask for customer feedback and provide links to visit your website. It is one of the safe and easy digital marketing techniques which also takes less time.
5. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing serves you based on your performance. It is one more hugely popular digital marketing technique you can see on every platform. You can use this method either by offering your company’s program to others or by becoming part of another’s business affiliate. In the first approach, your product will be advertised through platforms that have a large following and a suitable audience whereas on the second approach you can promote ads and brands and get a commission each time that company gets profit through your site.
6. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
This digital marketing technique works like a charm once your website starts to grow. SEO helps your website in terms of visibility in search engines. The more your website gets higher rank, the more visible it becomes, leading to large traffic on the website. SEO works in all “search” aspects like images, videos or academic search, news search, etc.
7. Pay Per Click (PPC)
Pay Per Click is a preferable digital marketing technique to advertise your website with the help of a search engine. This method will bring you more visitors by generating more clicks. This is an effective way for grabbing people’s attention and increase their engagement with your website at a low cost.
How To Overcome Challenges In A Digital Marketing Side Hustle?
Digital marketing has gone through tremendous amounts of changes over the past decade. Whether it is an economic or social or any global change, one can not deny that it is a rapidly changing and growing industry. Because of these uncertainties, even successful companies face tough challenges sometimes. Having said that, you might feel underconfident at the beginning. But preparing yourself prior will not only help you tackle them easily but also give you a healthy mindset to start your journey.
Here are some tips to overcome challenges that you might/will face as a digital marketing side hustler.
1. Increased Competition
When you step into a digital marketing world, it can be overwhelming to see big brands and companies getting responses from customers and growing faster. But even these companies have seen the beginning somewhere and the present is nothing but a result of their consistency. Besides, when you choose digital marketing as a side hustle, you need to use it to balance your life and to become a part of healthy competition and not a hectic one.
2. Constant Pressure.
When you are in the service of customers all the time, you try to impress and attract them constantly. At this rate, it’s easy to feel pressure on you and your website when even a tiny thing goes wrong. For example, not on-time delivery or any bad reviews. Yet, we all know facing such setbacks once in a while is a part of any process. But without giving up and losing your confidence if you move forward patiently, you can tackle any highs and lows coming to your website!
3. Changing Times.
Where there is technology, there will be constant changes. Nowadays every other month comes up with a new update in some kind of technology. Digital marketing is no exception. At first, you might find yourself new to handle all of this digital stuff.
Even if you are best at it, rapid changes in information and multimedia technologies can lower your confidence. But remember, experience is the key! The more you dig your capabilities, the more confident you become to use them in your work. Besides, there are many courses that offer you the best knowledge about digital marketing.
For example, one of the best institutes in India is IIM Skills. It not only prepares you in this particular field but also offers hands-on experience through their internships. Check out the Content Writing Master Course and Digital Marketing Course in India for more information. Also, these courses come with affordable prices and some of the best real-life experiences in the digital world to give your journey a good and confident start!
You can also check out this article on the5 Best Digital Marketing Courses to Take Your Career to the Next Level.
Conclusion
In today’s world, Digital Marketing works like salt in a company’s perfect dish! Without it, a company simply can not stand out in the market easily. It is not a long time away when digital marketing will completely take over traditional marketing and there will be an entrepreneur in every other home.
Because people are understanding the importance of choosing the right platform to build their business, they are adopting digital marketing as their side hustle rapidly. And not only that, but it has become a great support for people all around the world to get the courage to start something of their own and show it in front of the world. In the end, one must understand that digital marketing is not a destination. It is a constant process, where you start, fail, and evolve with time.
When your marketing skills and your passion for the service are ready to walk hand in hand, you no longer need to second-guess the power of digital marketing as a side hustle!
