While customers today are a lot more comfortable purchasing both products and services from complete and total (not to mention usually faceless) strangers over the internet these days, that doesn’t mean that they are going to trust anyone and everyone may come across online.

As digital marketers it’s really important that you understand that there’s going to be some initial hurdles that have to be cleared if you’re going to win the trust of your market, particularly if you’re looking to sell products and services to “cold traffic”.

The term branding gets thrown around a lot when it comes to digital and internet marketing. But today’s consumer is a lot more sophisticated and significantly more savvy when it comes to spotting marketers and traditional salespeople, and if you aren’t completely authentic with your branding you’re going to end up turning off a decent amount of your potential customers – handicapping your business along the way.

We live in the middle of the most competitive business environment that has ever existed in human history.

The internet has completely and totally changed the rules of business from top to bottom. It’s now possible to start a global business serving potentially hundreds of millions, if not billions, of customers all over the planet with nothing more than a laptop, $50 for a website, and an internet connection.

At the same time, all of the same opportunities exist for billions of potential entrepreneurs around the world – many of which are beginning to build their own businesses up, crowding marketplaces and cluttering industries while competing for the same customers.

To have any chance of success you need to separate yourself from the rest of the pack. And that means building a rock solid internet marketing foundation to grow your business on top of.

In case you haven’t realized, the internet has taken over the world, and if your company doesn’t have a social media presence, you will never get ahead of your competition. Yes, there are some people who still prefer to do things the old-fashioned way, but those numbers are few and far between. So if you want to get ahead of your competition, social media marketing should also be a part of your internet marketing campaign. Here are some of the benefits of social media marketing and how you can use it to annihilate your competition.

Becoming a digital marketer these days is almost effortless.

But becoming a top digital marketer, a marketer that makes the registers ring, a marketer that generates business almost out of thin air online these days is anything but effortless.

There’s no easy road to success when you’re competing against literally millions and millions of entrepreneurs all over the world, with more entering the fray on a daily basis. The old walls and barriers of building a business have fallen by the wayside thanks to the power and reach of the internet and if you’re going to succeed these days you have to know how to win – and you need the skills to make those wins possible.

That’s why we created this quick guide.

Traffic is an essential ingredient in any business. Conversion rates do matter, but they only come after adequate traffic is delivered to your website. Now, sure you can pay to get this traffic. That’s great and all but, keep in mind there’s plenty of other options to get quality traffic to your website.

The fact is that organic SEO traffic can convert ten-thirteen times more than paid traffic. The people viewing your website or product out of their own whim, are much more likely to purchase what you are selling or follow your content. Reason being, Google is a powerful authority in people’s eyes.

Whether its high volume paid traffic or smaller organic traffic you are going for, you must first learn the overall layout. Understanding it intellectually is one thing, but being able to take action and learn the practicality of it is another.