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From tools to strategy to tactics, digital marketing meets many disciplines, so the field feels all over the map if you are not familiar with it.

However, understanding digital marketing isn’t just about knowing certain areas of adtech or platforms like email or social media – it’s about having an idea of ​​how all of these things fit together on a broader basis.

With the bigger picture of marketing as the target post, here are 17 terms you are likely to come across while working as a digital marketer, especially in associations.

1. Brand security

Protecting a brand from dangerous affiliations, such as questionable content on the Internet. As a particular concern after the 2016 election, brand safety may lead to the use of black or white lists to ensure that digital advertisements only appear on certain websites with approved content.

2. Content Marketing

An approach to digital marketing with targeted content, often for search engines or social media channels, that promotes concepts related to a brand’s goals or messages. There are many different theories about best practices in this form of content outreach, but many agree that it has far outstripped the press release as the most important branding marketing tool on the internet.

3. Cost per Thousand (CPM)

The price of the advertisement, calculated according to the number of impressions (“mille” is a French and Italian term for “thousand”). Often used in advertising campaigns, CPM became an important metric on the web because it could be directly tracked, whereas in the past it was usually implied (through methods such as broadcast or print advertising).

This term has a number of variations, e.g. B. Cost-per-impression.

4. Creator economy

A microcosm of individuals such as video producers, social media personalities, and newsletter writers who have developed their own approach to media creation outside the context of corporate media.

Creator Economy participants can use tools like Patreon or Substack to promote their work. They are considered part of influencer marketing, a major trend in social media.

(Vadym Petronenko / iStock / Getty Images Plus)

5. Cookie

A piece of digital data originally used in the days of the early web that stores identifiable information about specific users. Cookies have been shown to be a fundamental element of advertising technology for decades, but their use, especially across servers, has gained a controversial reputation. As a result, some web browsers (like Apple’s Safari) limit their use completely.

Although the cookie has faced numerous reputational damage over the years, it has largely survived in the absence of a better tool. A new Google attempt called Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC) has struggled to garner broad support. Because of this, Google has postponed its plan to stop using cookies.

6. funnel

Used in both marketing and sales, this term refers to a potential customer’s or member’s position in the marketing process. Content marketing is often tied directly to the funnel.

Introductory information is at the top of the funnel, while more in-depth information is aimed at those who are more engaged, or “mid-funnel”. The lower part of the funnel represents the final stage of the purchase or membership process.

A competing approach is lifecycle marketing, a more sophisticated version of the funnel that ties the marketing process to experience.

7th impression

A view of a particular marketing or promotional item on the Internet. Generally, as Investopedia notes, this term is an attempt to quantify the impact of online marketing.

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8. Influence Marketing

Using a high profile persona to promote a product or service – an increasingly popular model in the age of social media. A classic example is Casey Neistat, a popular video artist who has used his large audience to promote products for companies like Nike in unexpected ways.

A related term is microinfluencer, which refers to an influencer who may not be well known but has a cult of popularity in a niche area like an association. A micro-influencer has between 10,000 and 50,000 followers on social media, according to the Association of National Advertisers.

9. JavaScript

A programming language that is widely used for basic marketing technologies such as analytics and retargeting. These use cases are fundamental to many marketing approaches, but they can pose privacy and security issues – and also place a burden on the website. Many users take steps to block these scripts with an ad blocker.

10. Key Performance Indicator (KPI)

A primary identifier for how a marketing initiative works, based on goals set by the organization when it launched a particular initiative. As Investopedia notes, KPIs are often tied to metrics such as profit, engagement, and overall operating performance.

11. Marketing automation

Various sophisticated technical tools that enable the automatic execution of marketing strategies so that staff can manage campaigns from a higher level. Two examples of marketing automation: a drip campaign and social media management software.

(Rudzhan Nagiev / iStock / Getty Images Plus)

12. Open rate

The percentage of users who have opened a particular email. This longtime tool, which has been the primary email engagement tracker for years, has faced challenges in recent months due to Mail Privacy Protection, a setting available in iOS that restricts marketers’ ability to use email follow.

A related term, click-to-open rate, refers to the click rate of links among those who opened the email.

13. Pay per click (PPC)

A form of advertising often associated with search engines and banner advertising, where an advertiser is based on how many people click on a link rather than paying a flat fee. This was a revolutionary concept in the early internet age as it often allowed for bespoke campaigns than would have been possible through billboards and television advertising.

14. Programmatic advertising

Advertising that is placed on a website without human intervention based on a set of predefined rules. This basic concept can be customized in a number of ways so that advertisers can target specific types of users and set basic rules for how advertising should or should not appear on the Internet.

15. Actions tab

A Gmail tab that is often dominated by marketing emails. This is a controversial place for many marketers who often believe that if it ends up in a location other than the primary inbox, people will see the message a lot less.

But it’s not all bad, as Campaign Monitor notes: “Read rates drop slightly when you switch from the Inbox to the Advertising tab, but the Advertising tab has about half of the spam complaints than the main one. Tab.”

16. Retargeting

Ads that target a specific user more than once, often based on a prior sign of engagement. This technique – although somewhat controversial on platforms like Facebook – is useful to many advertisers as it enables them to grab the attention of users who are most likely interested in using or buying promoted tools.

17. Tracking pixels

An image, usually a blank or monochrome image, that is placed on a web page to analyze who is visiting the site. This is one of the main ways marketers use to track impressions or clicks. It’s more flexible than using a tool like a script or a cookie because it can be used in places like email marketing, although it’s less interactive than a script.

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