Marketing is a very important part of business and career. Success may be partly dependent on how you market yourself, your business, your product, or your service. Previously, the only means to market something is through offline marketing. Usually, this would include commercial ads, print ads, and the likes. However, with the advent of technology, a new means of marketing existed and this is through online marketing. This is quite similar to offline marketing. However, this one is seen mostly on the internet. It can be through blogs, search ads, video ads, and more. With that said, which among the two would generate a quicker ROI or Return on Investment?

Online Marketing Reveals Better ROI than Offline Marketing

The answer to this may come a little too noticeable. Many surveys, tests, and studies show that online marketing produces better ROI compared to offline marketing. Here are some facts to support this.

According to MarketingSherpa Search Benchmark Guide, email marketing offers the highest ROI among these marketing programs:

  • Email offers 25% ROI
  • SEO provides 18%
  • Paid search offers 16%
  • Direct Mailing offers 12%
  • Public Relations (PR) provides 12%
  • Print Ads provides 4%
  • Online Ads and Banners offers 3%

Based on Marketing Sherpa B to B Demand Generation Summit, the lowest cost per meeting offering a higher ROI would be Paid Search for $250, then Email for $700, followed by White Paper for $900, and then Trade shows for $2,500.

In terms of inbound vs. outbound cost per lead generated, inbound outplayed outbound means. According to HubSpot, outbound means such as direct mail, trade shows, TV, radio, and print ads cost about $255 per lead generated, while inbound means like SEO, social media, blogging, RSS, and PR cost only $45 per lead generated.

In terms of the most famous online venues, 80% of the tech buyers would claim that they are the ones who found the product, vendor, or service, while the remaining 20% claimed that the vendor is the one who found them. In this light, 83% came from search engines specifically Google, 26% came from the vendors’ site, 21% came from online publications, 20% from online directories, 19% from online communities, and 13% from analyst sites.

These alone would say that online marketing could bring in higher and quicker ROI compared to the traditional offline marketing methods. Moreover, many people, young and old, go online every day to communicate, socialize, as well as search for different items and services. This means that the new venue for marketing lies heavily through online means.