We define online marketing as the activity of researching the market for your product or service using the internet. It is not online advertising.

Online Marketing can be targeted geographically if desired - you do not have to be marketing or selling internationally to get involved in online marketing. So specific UK online marketing and specific Scotland online marketing campaigns are both possible. Indeed online marketing to Glasgow based customers or online marketing to Edinburgh prospects are also possible.

If your product is already selling then online marketing activities will help you assess what the customer thinks of the product, the service, your company and what they expect to get from you in the future.

You should consider drafting an online marketing strategy to help you arrive at an online marketing solution that helps your business grow.

If you are just beginning to consider your next product or service then get googling – find out what is out there that is the same or similar. Who makes it, how much they make, where they sell it, how they sell it. Is the market getting bigger or smaller. There is no excuse for not knowing other than this one -

“After 3 months googling for online market information I was knackered and forgot to turnover that last stone.”

That seems like a fair, honest and understandable excuse.

Online market research where you search for online information can be tiresome so you may want to engage a specific online marketing consultancy or online marketing agency. This can be costly - so get good references.

If your product is already available and you have not carried out any market research (online marketing or otherwise) then oops! The world is awash with products that failed because the inventors assumed that everyone else would see the benefits as quickly as they did when they came up with the idea.

However, all is not lost – yet.  Online marketing research can help you recover the position – with a lot of work and a fair bit of luck.

It’s a good idea to try to build a readership or online community by encouraging visitors to sign up and register. It provides you with a steadiliy increasing email list who have granted you an excuse to call or in this case email with news and information.