Digital Marketing In Nigeria: 5 Things You Should Know As A Business Owner

Are you a business owner looking to get customers?

Then you can’t ignore this because I’m about to show you what separates the business that keeps getting customers from the ones that close down due to lack of sales.

Read along to find out 5 things you must know about digital marketing in Nigeria to get more customers, make more sales, and expand your business.

Overview of Digital Marketing In Nigeria

Digital marketing is the modern way of attracting customers to your business.

Years ago, before the internet and social media became part of our everyday lives, getting customers for a new business wasn’t easy. You either had to go from door to door in your neighborhood, advertise on radio and television, set up huge banners in public spaces, or pray that some sort of magic happens. It was difficult, and people couldn’t dream of creating a business that will grow beyond their locality, talk less of growing nationally or globally.

 

Then the internet and social media came, perhaps the magic people prayed for, and with it, the power to build a business that can reach people from anywhere.

 

Currently, over 5 billion people use the internet and social media.  That means nearly 70% of the world is gathered in one place. You no longer have to spend millions like the biggest companies before getting customers. You don’t have to walk from door to door. You can build a nationwide business from the comfort of your home. All you need is your business, a website, social media accounts, and some effort.

 

Now let’s go into the 5 most important things you should know about digital marketing in Nigeria.

 

1. What Is Digital Marketing

Digital marketing is simply using digital channels like the Internet, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and the like, to reach, attract, and convince customers to buy from you.

The basic idea is to go where many people are gathered online, and attract those who need your product or service.

 

Digital marketing is either organic or paid.

 

Organic digital marketing

When you don’t pay the owner of the digital platform, it’s said to be organic marketing. 

For example, let’s say you sell clothes and you decide to market your business online. If you open an Instagram account and start sharing pictures of your clothes, with engaging posts, and eventually get people to buy from you, then you’ve done organic marketing.

You didn’t pay Instagram any money to reach those customers. You did it organically.

 

Paid digital marketing

On the other hand, if you pay the channel to help you reach customers through advertisements, then it’s paid digital marketing.

Both organic and paid digital marketing have their advantages and disadvantages.

 

[See this post to learn more about organic vs paid digital marketing]

 

2. What are the types of digital marketing in Nigeria

Digital marketing is separated into different types, based on the channel or tactics used. There are 4 major types of digital marketing in Nigeria

1. Search Engine Marketing
2. Social Media Marketing
3. Paid advertising
4. Content Marketing

 

Search engine marketing

People use search engines to find things online. Everyday, 8.5 billion searches are made on Google. If you position your website well, the people who need what you offer will come to you.

With search engine marketing, business owners can attract people who are looking for answers, products, or services.

The process of making your website show up first when people search for the products or services you sell is called search engine optimization.

 

Social media marketing

Social media marketing is one of the most used types of digital marketing in Nigeria.

From Facebook, to Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and even WhatsApp. Business owners set up accounts on these platforms and share content that attracts customers.

 

Every platform is unique, so it is important to understand your customers and their needs, and create content that they will love.

 

[See this post to learn more about social media marketing in Nigeria]

 

Paid advertising

As I said earlier, you can pay for popular platforms to help you reach more customers. When you do that, it’s called paid advertising or digital advertising. Some platforms you can advertise on include Google Search, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. No matter the platform you choose, the process is basically the same. You set up an advertising account, pay money into it, and set your campaign. You can select the target audience you want to reach e.g. by location, age group, and interests.

 

A little warning though, if you don’t understand how it works you could spend huge sums of money without getting any customer.

 

[See this post to learn more about paid advertising]

 

Content marketing

Content marketing is an important aspect of digital marketing. Social media marketing and search engine marketing depend on it. Whether you choose to use social media or search engines to reach your customers, you’ll need to create valuable content that solves their problems or meet any other need they may have. Marketing can’t survive without content because it is what attracts and keeps customers engaged.

 

You visit your favourite websites because they have content in the form of blog posts or articles. You follow your favourite celebrities or social media pages because they either have engaging content that entertains you, or valuable content that helps you solve problems you may have.

 

Likewise, if you want to attract customers, you need to create content that they’ll find useful.

Popular content types include

• Blog posts
• Articles
• Videos
• Infographics
• Reels
• Carousels

 

Other types of digital marketing in Nigeria

There are other types of digital marketing in Nigeria that are less popular.

 

Email marketing

Business owners can build an email list and market to them through emails from time to time.

 

Video marketing

Videos are fast becoming the most preferred type of content. Business owners can take advantage of this by creating engaging videos to attract their target audience across popular social media platforms.

You can also create a YouTube channel to share educational videos and attract customers by giving tips that will help them solve their problems, then introduce your product or business to them.

 

3. Benefits Of Digital Marketing In Nigeria

Just as you can’t live without oxygen, your business can’t survive without sales. You need marketing if you want to keep getting new customers and doing business repeatedly with old customers.

Some benefits of digital marketing are:

 

Wider reach

Thanks to the internet and social media, the whole world is gathered in one place. That means you have the potential of reaching more people who need what you offer. You’re not limited by your physical location. You can run a successful business from anywhere in the world.

 

Targeted advertising

With digital marketing you can reach your exact customers. Unlike radio or TV ads that just send your message to the whole community including people who would never buy from you, you can customize your ads to only target the people who are a perfect fit for your business.

 

Less spending

Certainly you’ll have to spend money at some point if you want to get the best results from digital marketing. Still, it is cheaper and brings better returns.

 

4. How To Succeed With Digital Marketing In Nigeria

For you to succeed in your digital marketing efforts and get customers online, you need a winning digital marketing strategy.

 

Some business owners hear about digital marketing, and then squeeze out time out of their busy schedules to try it. After they get a website, social media pages, and perhaps even spend on ads, they get frustrated that they’re not seeing any results. The customers they dreamt of don’t come, sales don’t improve, and they find out that they’ve wasted close to a million naira. They then conclude that digital marketing doesn’t work in Nigeria.

 

But the truth is that they went in blindly. They didn’t have a digital marketing strategy and were just doing things randomly. They ignored the foundation that makes any digital marketing campaign successful.

 

To successfully attract customers online, there are 5 important things you need to have in place.

1. Market research
2. Understand your audience
3. SMART goals
4. Marketing plan
5. Consistent action and monitoring.

 

Market research

Imagine trying to sell make-up to elderly men. Or selling rain boots in the desert. 

Sounds crazy right? Yet that is what many business owners do. They go into a business without doing proper market research. They don’t even know how many people in a particular location need what they sell, they don’t know who their competitors are, and they have no unique selling point. They just jump in because they see others making money from the business and feel they can do it too.

But without market research, your digital marketing will rely on luck. You’ll find that to get it right, you have to go back and do proper market research.

 

Understand your audience

This is the most important factor when it comes to digital marketing. You may ignore market research and get lucky. But if you don’t know your audience, if you don’t understand their needs and how they think, it will take something supernatural to succeed.

You must research your audience, the people who need and can afford what you sell, and record what you find as a buyer persona.

 

You also have to map out their journey and note the steps they take from when they know nothing about you, to when they finally buy from you.

Every other aspect of your digital marketing strategy will depend on your target customers. They will determine the marketing channel you choose, the type of content you create, and the type of advertisements you run.

 

SMART goals

SMART stands for specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.

After you’ve done market research and audience research, you need to set goals that will guide you. SMART goals will help you know whether you’re making progress in your digital marketing efforts, or whether you’re falling behind.

Your goals should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.

For example, you don’t just say your goal is to “get more customers.” That goal isn’t SMART. What does more customers mean? How many customers will count as more? When do you want to get them? Is it 100 years from now?

 

A SMART goal could be – “I want to get 5 customers in 3 weeks.” As you can see, it’s specific and measurable. If you don’t get 5 customers, it means you didn’t meet your goal. It’s also achievable (some people say they want 1000 customers in 3 days when the entire market for their business isn’t even up to 20 customers. That’s not achievable). Finally, there’s a time frame attached to it.

 

Marketing plan

After you’ve set SMART goals, the next thing you need is to create a marketing plan.

The important question you should ask yourself here is “how can I achieve the goal I’ve set?” You might decide to create content on a particular social media platform, pay for ads, or do search engine optimization.

Good market analysis, audience research, and SMART goals will help you create a winning marketing plan.

 

Consistent action and monitoring

This is the second most important thing you must do if you want to successfully attract people to your business.

 

A wise man once said that 1 action is better than 10,000 plans.

You’ve done all that is required up to this point. You know about your market and you understand your audience. You have SMART goals and a marketing plan in place. But if you don’t put that into action, you’ll not see any results.

 

Furthermore, you need to stay consistent and monitor your work. You may not see any results in the first few weeks to months, but that doesn’t mean your efforts are wasted. Look at your analytics from time to time. Which posts are performing better? Which ads are converting? What is your audience responding to? Notice the patterns and do more of what works.

 

5. How To Start Reaching Your Customers In Nigeria Through Digital Marketing

You have two major options. You can either try it yourself, or hire a digital marketing agency to do it for you.

The benefit of doing it yourself is that you’ll save money. But it’s going to cost you time and energy. If you don’t gain the needed knowledge before trying it yourself, you can even end up losing more than you’re trying to save.

My advice for you if you decide to do it yourself is to start small. Make use of the free resources available, and spend time learning about the type of digital marketing you want to do before you go in. 

 

Here at THE SEO GENIUS we share our knowledge as blog posts on our website, and videos on our YouTube channel to help you get customers and grow your business. 

 

Conclusion

Now you know the 5 most important things about digital marketing in Nigeria, nothing should stop you from getting customers and making the sales that can take your business to the next level.

 

Need someone to handle your digital marketing for you? Send us a message.