What Is Digital Marketing—and What Does It Include?
Digital marketing uses online channels, content, and experiences to reach, engage, and convert an audience. It can include everything from Google Ads and social media to websites, video, email, SEO and AI search.
But effective digital marketing isn't simply about using more digital channels.
It's about making the right channels work together around a clear objective.
What Does Digital Marketing Include?
Digital marketing includes several disciplines.
01
Search Marketing
SEO, local search, and paid search help businesses connect with people actively looking for information, products, or services.
02
Digital Advertising
Google Ads, paid social, display, video, and remarketing can help businesses build awareness, capture demand, and bring audiences back.
03
Content & Social Media
Articles, photography, video and social content help businesses demonstrate expertise, tell stories and stay visible.
04
Websites & Landing Pages
Most digital marketing eventually leads somewhere. A strong website or landing page turns attention into the next step—an inquiry, appointment, quote, purchase or other action.
05
E-commerce
For businesses selling online, digital marketing connects customer acquisition directly with the shopping and purchase experience.
06
AI Search & Discovery
People increasingly use AI-powered platforms to research questions, compare options, and discover businesses. That makes clear, useful and well-structured digital information increasingly important.
How Do the Pieces Work Together?
Consider a potential customer who:
01
Sees a video
02
Searches for the business
03
Visits the website
04
Reads an article
05
Leaves
06
Sees a remarketing ad
07
Returns
08
Makes an inquiry
No single channel necessarily created that customer.
The combination did.
That's why PLAY approaches digital marketing as a connected system, not a collection of individual tactics.
Paid, Owned and Search
A simple way to understand the digital ecosystem is to divide it into three areas.
Paid
Advertising you pay to distribute:
Owned
Digital assets your business controls:
Search & Discovery
The ways people discover your information when they're actively looking for answers:
The strongest digital strategies often use a combination.
Digital Marketing Should Have a Job to Do.
Before choosing channels, start with the objective. Are you trying to:
The answer should influence everything that follows. The objective determines the strategy. The strategy determines the channels.
What Comes Next?
Understanding the digital marketing landscape is the first step.
The next question is how to turn those channels and opportunities into an actual plan.
How Do I Build a Digital Marketing Strategy?
A strong digital strategy connects the business objective, audience, customer journey, message, channels and measurement before deciding where to spend.
Make Digital Marketing Work as One System.
PLAY brings strategy, advertising, content, search, digital and web together so each part of your marketing has a clear role to play.
Question chain
01
What Is Digital Marketing—and What Does It Include?
03
Which Digital Marketing Channels Should I Use?
04
Should I Invest in Paid Advertising or Organic Marketing?
05
How Do I Get More of the Right People to My Website?
06
Why Is My Website Getting Traffic but Not Generating Leads?
07
Which Digital Marketing Metrics Actually Matter?
08
How Do I Improve Digital Marketing Performance?