It’s time to take a step back and look at the many venues available for marketing your product. I talk a lot about marketing strategies, approaches, philosophies and industries – and while the information I discuss touches upon many areas, it doesn’t even begin to cover the diverse range of topics that fall under product marketing.

When researching how to market your product, you will find that there’s never been a better time to be a marketer than the decade in which we now live. There exists a plethora of venues for outreach, a wide range of models for advertising, and a myriad of ways to communicate and distribute information. The internet, and the subsequent search engine and mobile revolutions, have completely remodeled how our communication, media consumption and perception work – for the better.

That being said, it can be a bit overwhelming to determine which marketing channels are really viable for your specific product, and which channels just won’t work. Let’s take a moment to look at some of the various, time-tested marketing methodologies in this new digital climate.

PPC One of the most popular marketing strategies, ushered in by the internet revolution, is PPC, or pay per click advertising/marketing. This is a popular system because it is quick, benefits multiple participants and is easy to set up. Website owners who host ads profit from hosting them – earning a certain amount of money per view or per click. Advertisers benefit by having a large platform through which to reach users and render their services. Marketers also benefit from this ‘outreach platform’ by reaching a multitude of users.

PPC is great, but like all marketing strategies, it does have its downsides. PPC campaigns, such as banners and interstitials from websites, often annoy users, so much so, that they install very powerful ad blocking systems to eliminate them.  Despite this handicap, there are many patient users who tolerate advertisements, and many more who will actually click on them.  At the end of the day, PPC is still widely used because it works.

SEO Another use of digital media for marketing outreach is SEO, or Search Engine Optimization. This is basically the strategic placement of repeated, trending, search keywords into blogs, website content and other textual items – that have been indexed by the search engines as the ‘most relevant’. The greater the density of keywords, the higher the results will be ranked. It’s a passive way to make your site and product very visible. The downside with SEO is that some people abuse the system. Abuse is so rampant, that a certain percentage of users can spot it a mile away and avoid your site altogether. Search engines can also spot abuse, punishing sites who misuse keywords.

All this being said, when SEO is used properly, it is very effective.

Social Media Finally, one of the most sought after approaches to marketing is the use of social media. Once predicted to be a fad, social media continues to prove that it’s here to stay. Tools, such as Twitter, enable you to be proactive behind the computer screen.  You can  watch for mention of your products and services, and respond positively, directly and immediately. You can also make yourself available to customers; this more personal approach garners a more human bond for both sides.

Other social avenues such as Tumblr, Pinterest and Facebook are equally powerful. People check in on these social channels multiple times a day, often every hour, and often for a couple minutes at a time. . Just about anyone in an internet-enabled country has a presence in the social network spheres, and have become accustomed to be open and receptive to this channel. This means that the users who block ads and dodge SEO can still be reached via social media.

Ultimately, if you want to know how to market your product, there is no single-solution.  The answer lies in using all of these tools in an intuitive way;  Balance your time and efforts between SEO, PPC, and social media in order to successfully market your product online.

This digital millennium is a wonderful time to be in business.