Digital Marketing and Search Engine Optimization

32 Hours / Access Length: 180 Days / Delivery: Online, Self-Paced

Course Overview:

Learn about different marketing channels and tactics, and understand how to apply these skills and create a digital marketing strategy based on the needs of your brand. Gain the key skills to master one of digital marketing's most sought after skills, and learn how to apply your SEO knowledge in an overall digital marketing strategy.

Students will:
  • An understanding of all key digital marketing channels such as SEO, PPC, Social Media, Affiliate, Content and Email
  • How to define your target audience
  • Create paid campaigns for social and search engines
  • Create a digital strategy encompassing a variety of channels
  • Website and mobile usability best practices
  • Choose objectives and determine KPIs

Course Outline:

Module 1:
Lesson 1: Your Introduction to Digital Marketing

The first lesson in your Professional Diploma lays a solid foundation for what Digital Marketing and Performance Marketing is. You'll learn frequently used terms in the industry, understand what objectives and KPIs are and we go through a few examples of performance-focused channels for different common objectives.

Lesson 2: Tracking & Measuring Marketing Efforts            

This lesson walks you through various marketing funnels and provides helpful tools and tips to help ensure your own objectives are realistic. Before any marketing campaign or tactic can be launched, tracking needs to be in place, so you'll get an introduction to the incredible tool that is Google Analytics as well as learn about UTMs

Lesson 3: Reaching The Target Market   

Now that you have an understanding of digital marketing, your objectives and the tracking that needs to be in place, lesson 3 is focused on target markets. Who will buy your product / service? How do you conduct market analysis and what are customer journeys? These are just some of the questions we answer in this lesson.

Lesson 4: Content Development & Copywriting 

Content is still king! To create more effective content, we look at the psychology of sales and different sales triggers to incorporate in your message. We cover website content, writing for SEO, finding relevant content ideas and tips on blogging.

Lesson 5: Free Digital Marketing Options              

Not every business has a big budget to dedicate to paid marketing, increasing the need for their free marketing efforts to work as best as they can. This lesson shows you how to create various social media pages and gives a simple breakdown of SEO and how Google My Business pages assist this.

Lesson 6: The World Of Google Ads         

Google's suite of products enable you to target your market accurately and in most cases, cost-effectively. This lesson covers Search and Display campaigns as well as policies, ad creation, bid strategies and recommendations. A jam-packed lesson designed to give you confidence to create your own campaigns.

Lesson 7: Paid Social Media Marketing  

Social Media platforms dominate marketing strategies due to the sheer number of people you can reach on the multiple channels available. After this lesson, you'll understand how people and businesses use different channels, which Facebook and Instagram campaign options might suit you best, ad types and policies across these platforms and the basics of LinkedIn and Twitter.

Lesson 8: Creating A Digital Strategy       

The final lesson in this module combines the learning from the previous 7 lessons and shows you how to create a Digital Strategy. While going through B2C and B2B examples, you'll align target markets to channels, create a content plan, discuss budgeting and determine remarketing strategies.

Module 2:
Lesson 1: Fundamental SEO tools - Google Search Console

Did you know that organic clicks outnumber paid clicks 12 to 1? SEO is a skill set that is in high demand, and when implemented properly, it can offer a much better ROI than paid Search campaigns. You'll learn about the core functions of search engines, how a website is crawled and indexed, how to create a sitemap, and you'll get to know Google Search Console!

Lesson 2: Keyword research for SEO

Without keywords, search engines can't accurately determine what a website is about. If they don't understand this, then a website will either not be eligible to appear on the search results, or it will be displayed for queries you don't necessarily want to target. Learn the best practices for implementing keywords, equip yourself with a variety of keyword research tools, and get an introduction to another valuable platform for SEO analysis.

Lesson 3: URL structure and internal links             

Do you know how important a URL is? It is the first place a bot looks to determine the content on a website so they should be a priority. Understand how to structure URLs, implement effective internal links, and monitor those internal links with Google Search Console and Ahrefs.

Lesson 4: External link building: Part 1

Top SEOs believe that external links are the most important ranking factor in SEO, alongside quality content. A link from another source is considered a "vote" from that source, and search engines see a lot of value in this. Learn about link profiles and what is required to keep it healthy, get an introduction to some technical SEO techniques, and we start the process of link building from a variety of sources.

Lesson 5: External link building: Part 2

Continuing on from lesson 4, we look at Email Outreach, how to check the quality of potential link sources, the process of broken link building, and a link profile checklist to ensure you don't miss anything when building and managing a link profile.

Lesson 6: Lesson 6: Local SEO - Part 1

Google Ads is a bit of a beast. While certain elements are similar to Social campaigns, there are a lot more requirements and tricky optimizations to think about. This lesson takes you through all the steps when planning a Search campaign, recapping some elements from Module 1 but introducing new information like Quality Scores and Ad Rank. The first step to successful performance is planning!

Lesson 7: Local SEO - part 2

Lesson 7 is a continuation of local SEO where we cover nap citations, local optimization for websites and links, and optimizing CTR for organic traffic.

Lesson 8: Analyzing & Optimizing SEO Performance

The final lesson in Module 2 looks at technical SEO as we explore some of the key factors to work on. We recap and dive a little deeper into the concepts covered previously, particularly around keywords and keyword tools.

Module 3:
Lesson 1: The Importance of Mobile - The Dominant Device

Mobile and mobile marketing can’t be ignored as it takes over Desktop traffic more and more each year. In this lesson we will look at important mobile info, the difference between "responsive" and "mobile-friendly", tools to improve mobile speed and recommendations for an optimized mobile site.

Lesson 2: Video Content & Advertising

Video is the most consumed content format on the internet. Learn how video is consumed across different platforms and the targeting options available before moving on to the impact of ad blockers, recent video trends, generating content ideas and planning.

Lesson 3: Email Marketing

For many businesses, email marketing offers some of the highest return on investment of all their digital channels. Email marketing is affordable and can be used to achieve multiple business objectives, from increasing revenue to awareness and retention. After today's lesson you'll know the requirements and best practices for email design and content, how personalization works, and what to implement to avoid spam and email clipping.

Lesson 4: Influencer and Affiliate Marketing

Influencer Marketing is shedding its reputation as an expensive, immeasurable marketing tactic with the introduction of new measurement metrics and a more analytical approach to results. There are benefits and risks to this strategy but after this lesson you'll come to understand that the potential value it can create for brands boils down to thorough research. Affiliate and Influencer marketing are often closely linked, you'll understand the difference between them and how an affiliate program works. A more in-depth look at Affiliate Marketing awaits you in Lesson 2 of Module 4!

Lesson 5: Facebook Business Manager - Campaign creation

Advertising on Facebook & Instagram is a core part of being a Digital Marketer. This practical lesson recaps all the requirements for building a campaign within Facebook Business Manager before diving into a Demo of the actual creation.

Lesson 6: Planning a Google Search campaign

Google Ads is a bit of a beast. While certain elements are similar to Social campaigns, there are a lot more requirements and tricky optimization to think about. This lesson takes you through all the steps when planning a Search campaign, recapping some elements from Module 1 but introducing new information like Quality Scores and Ad Rank. The first step to successful performance is planning!

Lesson 7: Implementing a Google Search campaign - Part 1

Lesson 7 will take you through the Educator's example of a business requiring a Search campaign, from campaign targeting chosen to ad group structure, ad copy and extensions. You'll also learn some important info about position on SERPs, different keyword statuses you'll come to see in Google Ads, and Keyword Diagnosis.

Lesson 8: Implementing a Google Search campaign - Part 2

The final lesson in Module 3 is very practical, with a step-by-step demo of creating a Search campaign. Combining what was covered in the course so far to create a Search strategy, after creating the campaign you'll be taken through a useful Campaign checklist.

Module 4:
Lesson 1: Understanding Metrics

The first lesson of Module 4 kicks off with a deeper dive into metrics and their analyses. You'll learn what a PCA is and how to create one, before receiving a detailed breakdown of tasks to perform with Always-On campaigns.

Lesson 2: Brand Management

What does Brand Management entail? This lesson focuses on the intangible aspects of managing a Brand, such as reputation and perception. We'll also look at some Brand Lift Surveys and close off with the effects of Social Media on PR.

Lesson 3: Google Analytics - Part 1

Starting off the module's Analytics section, you'll understand Dimensions, Properties and Views in Google Analytics. We then cover some top reports that answer the top questions people have of their sites, and discuss setting up Goals and Events tracking.

Lesson 4: Google Analytics - Part 2

Lesson 4 concludes some of the top reports in Google Analytics and you will then learn how to create Audiences. With filters, you'll understand how to exclude internal traffic and spam from your reports, as these skew your data.

Lesson 5: Affiliate Marketing

Previous lessons covered this top from the Affiliate's POV, so this lesson focuses on the Merchant. Why do businesses choose Affiliate Marketing as a strategy? What is an Affiliate Program and how do you join or create a Network? This is what we explore in lesson 5.

Lesson 6: eCommerce - Part 1

eCommerce is an industry of exponential growth. This lesson will cover how people research a product, we'll look at website hosting and inventory management, website best practices and product feeds to enable shopping campaigns.

Lesson 7: eCommerce - Part 2

The final section of eCommerce in Module 4 looks at enhancing the eCommerce experience for the consumer, followed by multiple eCommerce marketing options and campaigns. We close off with eCommerce Analytics reports not covered in previous lessons.

Lesson 8: SEO Recap

Recapping our SEO module, we look at Algorithms, Quality Raters Guidelines and a recap of ranking factors. With back-links, you'll learn of a few more methods to increase them, and we look at how PPC & SEO work together.

All necessary course materials are included.

System Requirements:

Internet Connectivity Requirements:
  • Cable and DSL internet connections are recommended for the best experience.
Hardware Requirements:
  • CPU: 1 GHz or higher
  • RAM: 2 GB or higher
  • Resolution: 1280 x 720 or higher
  • Speakers / Headphones
  • Microphone (Webinar / Live Online sessions)
Operating System Requirements:
  • Microsoft Windows 7 or 10 (Home, Pro)
  • Mac OSX 10 or higher.
  • Latest Chrome OS
  • Latest Linux Distributions

NOTE: While we understand that our courses can be viewed on Android and iPhone devices, we do not recommend the use of these devices for our courses. The size of these devices do not provide a good learning environment for students taking online or live online based courses.

Web Browser Requirements:
  • Latest Google Chrome is recommended for the best experience.
  • Latest Mozilla FireFox
  • Latest Microsoft Edge
  • Latest Apple Safari
Basic Software Requirements (These are recommendations of software to use):
  • Office suite software (Microsoft Office, OpenOffice, or LibreOffice)
  • PDF reader program (Adobe Reader, FoxIt)
  • Courses may require other software that is denoted in the above course outline.