Digital marketing has become a true must-have in almost every business. This means that there’s a lot to know and understand. When it comes to marketing in the digital space there are three (3) media categories take into account: Paid, Earned, and Owned Media. Some even refer to them as the Digital Marketing Trifecta (titangrowth.com).

Why are these important? What’s the difference between them and how can you use them? Let’s break it down.

Paid Media

Used to primarily promote content, paid media helps bring the traffic to your owned media and can increase your earned media as well. When it comes to paid media, the main focus is getting attention moving toward the introduction and/or re-establishment of the brand, products, services, etc. to your target audience.

With paid media, you have a little more flexibility when it comes to selected who you want to reach, how often you want to reach them, and opening the door to reach more than just your current market.

Paid media has a typical path of showing an ad à taking a customer to the landing page à leading to the goal of a conversion (purchase or action from the user). There are many paid media options to choose from, depending on what is the best fit for what you are promoting. Here are a few:

  • Display Ads
  • Social Media Ads
  • Search Ads
  • Retargeting
  • Sponsored content

Some terms to remember:

  • Clickthrough Rate (CTR): This shows the percent of people who clicked the ad
  • Clicks: The amount of clicks on an ad or link
  • Impressions: The amount of times an ad was displayed/seen

Earned Media

This is when you can truly see the impact your brand is making within desired communities. Are you reach the audience you want to reach? What are you doing right? What can be improved with your content or communication from your brand? Are your likes/shares/comments/direct and indirect communication and reviews reflected your goals for the brand?

Earned media is all about getting the online word-of-mouth going and maintaining it. So in so many words, earned media is just that: EARNED. With a strong content strategy and consistent engagement, your earned media is the key to more organic opportunities, exposure, and communications for your brand.

Owned Media

Owned media are the digital spaces you control yourself for your brand. This could be anything along the lines of a website, a blog, social channels, and any kind of platform you/your business use strictly for the purposes of the brand.

When it comes to your owned media, particularly your website, blog, or anything your users will have to use to connect with your brand, User-Centric Design and User Experience (UX) are important to consider for the usability of your owned media spaces. Remember, when accessing a site of any kind, all users have an objective and in order to meet this objective, their interactions with a website or company matter.

Think about these questions when designing your owned media:

  • What value does the content add and communicate to the user?
  • Is it easy to navigate through: getting to different pages, going back, finding what they were looking for?
  • Does the actual look and feel suit the brand and its purpose? Does it encompass how the brand want their customers to fell when using the site?
  • Is the platform secure? Do users know/feel any information they provide is safe?
  • And are you meeting your users’ objectives with your owned media? Are you giving them content/information that they want?

It’s also necessary to have ways where you can utilize combinations of paid, earned, and owned media. The ultimate goal is having the ability to balance all 3 media when creating your content and marketing strategies in a way that works best for your brand and business strategies.

Sources:

Discover the Difference Between Earned, Owned & Paid Media

Building Earned Media vs. Paid Media vs. Owned Media (image)