So What Exactly is Internet Marketing?

internet marketing, also known as e-marketing, web marketing, or online marketing, is basically marking products and/or services online/over the internet.

The internet is a very powerful leveraging platforms that really leveled the playing field between the big players and the smaller, niche players. Benefits of the internet includes very low costs of product/services distribution, but what I like is really its effectiveness and efficiency, for it runs 24/7, every day, unless of course if the server is down. It allows instant response and provides more digital media such as internet direct, email, wireless media.

Internet marketing blends creative and technicalities in the internet, using a combination of design, development, advertising and sales strategies. It is not just building or promoting a website, or just placing banners or PPC ads here and there... but really effect internet marketing requires a solid business strategy that couples a company's business model and sales plans with website functionality and look, with focused target market through a proper choice of advertising media, type and design.

Internet marketing also points to media placement along different stages of customer engagement cycle (sales funnel process) through search engine marketing (SEM), search engine optimisation (SEO), banner ads, email marketing and web 2.0 strategies. With the growth of the internet marketing industry, more and more individuals and private corporations have ventured into this field within their niche areas such as service provision of SEM, SEO, email marketing strategies etc. More 'hidden' companies do not provide such services but are the internet marketers of their given/chosen niches.