The Best Online Marketing Strategies

Things move fast on the internet. One month, everyone’s on TikTok. The next month, it’s Reddit. Now, it’s Substack. It can be hard to keep up with the latest trend.

No matter which social media platform is en vogue, the most effective online marketing strategies still work. Master these online marketing strategies to stay consistently relevant to your audience and keep attracting new customers.

[Read more: 5 Small Business Owners Reveal Their Best Marketing Strategies]

Learn search engine optimization

Search engine optimization (SEO) is defined as “the process of maximizing the number of visitors to a particular website by ensuring that the site appears high on the list of results returned by a search engine.”

Google is constantly tinkering with its algorithms to deliver the best search results to its users. The rise of artificial intelligence has also changed SEO, with many internet users turning to ChatGPT, Gemini, and other AI agents to answer their questions.

While Google and AI companies consistently update the criteria used to rank websites or deliver answers via chatbots, some things never change. Google notes, “The best practices for SEO continue to be relevant because our generative AI features on Google Search are rooted in our core Search ranking and quality systems.”

Learning the basics of SEO can help customers find your website, improve your brand’s visibility, and ultimately help you sell more. Fortunately, SEO doesn’t necessarily involve any marketing budget. Unlike paying for ads, search traffic is free.

There are some easy steps you can take to set up your website so it is Google-friendly and helps improve your ranking. Check out this helpful blog post by webtool company Ahrefs to get started.

Invest in beautiful web design

Web design goes hand in hand with SEO. A beautifully designed website can not only help your website rank higher, but it can also provide a great user experience for your customers.

“It's important to think of design as communication. Like a conversation, design has the power to captivate the audience, convey information, and evoke emotions that will directly impact consumer decision-making,” Sara Mote, creative director of digital design agency Mote, told Shopify.

Even if you’re not selling through your website, make sure it’s clean, simple, and easy to navigate. Keep your business hours up to date, and add your location if you’re selling from a storefront. Many business owners benefit from an “About” page that shares more about their passion and why they started the business. It’s the little things that set you apart from a big-box competitor.

Consistently create content

While the most popular platform may change from month to month, one thing will never change: people love content. Videos, blog posts, images, podcasts, and social media posts are the vehicle through which you stay relevant to your customers. It’s important to know what content works best for your audience and to have an online marketing strategy for constantly creating that content.

One easy way to create a pipeline of good material is to work with others. Tap influencers, repeat customers, or members of your loyalty program to help you generate interesting videos or social media posts. Word-of-mouth marketing is one of the most powerful forms of marketing there is. The more your content can leverage others' opinions and validation, the better your online marketing will perform.

[Read more: Everything You Need to Know to Build a Content Strategy for Your Small Business]

Measure what works

One of the biggest benefits of digital marketing is that it’s easy to see what’s working and what isn’t. Unlike investing in a billboard or print ad, you can quickly quantify how many people have seen your latest video and track how many viewers clicked through to buy from you.

Track things like click-through rates and engagement on social media posts (not just likes and shares but saves and click-throughs), and set up a funnel to see which of your online marketing channels is performing the best. There are plenty of free tools that can help: Start with Google Analytics and go from there.

Build an email list

Email campaigns dominate in terms of digital marketing effectiveness. Email engagement rates are, on average, much higher than other forms of digital outreach (like social media, for instance).

By collecting customers' email addresses at checkout, you can build a direct marketing channel to an audience already familiar with your brand and proven to buy from you. And, as the famous statistic shows, return customers are more valuable than new ones. Email is one of the best ways of promoting your business to a captive audience who already appreciate what you have to offer.

Play with short-form video

Short-form video content, such as TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts, is a quick way to keep your audience engaged.

“Short-form videos have taken over social media because they provide the most information in the fastest possible way while using videos to capture your audience's attention,” wrote MailChimp.

Short-form video content is often easier and less expensive to produce, as it doesn’t require the same scale as a long-form video or more traditional media campaign. But these shorter videos can demand more time; it’s not enough to post one short-form video a month and expect to see results. Consistency is key.

“The most common challenges are creative fatigue, lack of consistency, and under-performing videos,” wrote the Digital Marketing Institute. Make sure that when using this type of content, you plan ahead. Creating a content calendar can help you execute regularly without having to constantly come up with new ideas.

Engage with social commerce

Social commerce lets social media users browse and buy products directly in the platform. It’s become a highly popular channel that retailers can’t ignore. In 2025, social commerce made up nearly 14% of all online sales.

The feed itself is now a storefront: Platforms like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Pinterest have built check-out directly into the browsing experience. Social commerce gives smaller brands access to international audiences without needing physical retail space, leveling the playing field against bigger competitors.

If you’re new to social commerce, start by choosing one or two platforms where your customers already spend time, set up native shopping features (tagged posts, a shop tab, live selling), and treat comments and direct messages as part of the check-out funnel, not just customer service.

Set up marketing automation 

Marketing automation tools can handle the more tedious and complex aspects of marketing, letting you and your team focus on big-picture tasks. Email drip campaigns, social media scheduling, and audience retargeting are all examples of marketing tasks that can be handled, and even improved, by automated platforms.

Success with marketing automation depends on your approach, data, and goals. Start simple; choose one area of marketing to implement automation and test your results before scaling.

This approach allows you to test your data. You need accurate contact information for most automation platforms to perform as promised. And, set clear goals so you can measure the results of your efforts and allocate resources accordingly.

How to measure ROI on each strategy

Every online marketing strategy is only as good as your ability to prove it’s working.

For SEO, watch organic traffic, keyword rankings, and how many visitors convert to leads or sales — Google Analytics and Google Search Console will get you started for free.

For web design, track the bounce rate and time on site. If visitors leave quickly or don’t make it to your contact or check-out page, that’s a sign something needs fixing.

Content creation is best measured by engagement (saves, shares, comments) and, over time, by whether it’s driving traffic back to your site or generating inbound inquiries. Short-form video return on investment (ROI) shows up in the view-through rate and follower growth. The number that matters most is click-throughs to your product or booking page — views alone don’t pay the bills.

Judge social commerce by the conversion rate from post to purchase and average order value within the platform, which most native shop tools report directly.

Email marketing has some of the clearest ROI of any channel: track open rates, click-through rates, and — most importantly — revenue generated per campaign, since most email platforms tie sends directly to sales.

And for marketing automation, measure the time saved by your team alongside the performance of the workflows themselves, like whether an automated retargeting sequence is recovering abandoned carts or turning cold leads into customers.

CO— aims to bring you inspiration from leading respected experts. However, before making any business decision, you should consult a professional who can advise you based on your individual situation.

CO—is committed to helping you start, run and grow your small business. Learn more about the benefits of small business membership in the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, here.