Business Needs
AutiPal is a project that was created to raise public awareness about autism and foster acceptance and understanding of the diagnosis and people who live with it. One of the major goals AutiPal has concerns establishing a safe and supportive environment for people with autism that will help them unleash their potential and talents (Autipal, n.d.). Unfortunately, people who were born with autism are still rejected by society in many ways because not everyone is eager to communicate with them and give them opportunities to study or work. That is why AutiPal was created – to show that autism is negatively stigmatized and people who live with it are not different from those who do not have it.
Content Marketing
The major business need for the AutiPal project may be formulated in the following way: with the help of digital marketing tools, promote the project online so more people find out about it. The project’s promotion through social media will help more people with autism know about it and engage in it, and the educational content the project posts will raise public awareness of autism. Since social media today are the main way of business promotion, it becomes quite hard for narrowly focused projects such as AutiPal to attract the general audience’s attention. That is why before starting the promotion process, it is necessary to establish the target audience and its conscious and unconscious needs the project may fulfill. This strategy is called content marketing, and its primary focus lies in establishing solid relations with customers through content (7 digital marketing strategies, n.d.). The content published on social media should show the brand’s values and align with its mission and positioning.
The main thing about content marketing the specialists should understand concerns the fact that texts in content marketing should not presume explicit sales but be informational. The content should form people’s loyalty and trust in the brand. Content marketing tools and strategies are applied to form a reliable image of the brand in the media since it is impossible to get rid of the negative stigmatization of autism without a reputation. It is also far more convenient to build up communication with the audience with the texts and other types of content that may be published on social media (7 digital marketing strategies, n.d.) When speaking about the AutiPal project, the possible topics for further articles may concern the commentaries from healthcare professionals on autism, its nature, and its manifestations. Moreover, since the project seems to have a community of people with autism, the marketing specialist may add a rubric in which they will talk about their lives or the difficulties they encounter.
The basic tools of content marketing are the analysis of the existing and desired audience, its explicit and implicit needs, and clearly established values of the brand. Marketing specialists with the representatives of the brand’s culture should also define the brand’s mission and openly show it in the media together with the values (7 digital marketing strategies, n.d.) Then the marketing specialist, with the SMM manager, will develop the content plan for a month or less and will create the content relying on it.
SEO
One more digital marketing tool may be effective for promoting the AutiPal project in the media, especially if we speak about its website. The tool is called SEO or search engine optimization. It may be used in combination with content marketing or separately. SEO is broadly applied in digital marketing, and some specialists even call it the most effective marketing initiative. SEO is a process of website improvement that will help it rank highly in the search engine (7 digital marketing strategies, n.d.) It is aimed at directing more members of the project’s target audience to the website with the help of keyword ranking. For the AutiPal project, the keywords may be a community of people with autism or autism awareness and acceptance. SEO may be used for these word combinations to increase the ranking in search results so that AutiPal will be among the first in the search request.
Differences between Content Marketing and SEO
The main difference between SEO and content marketing lies in the fact that the latter is not always oriented toward increasing search results. Content marketing is more about the value transmission and building up the customers’ loyalty to the brand. SEO may even be called an automatic process that helps increase traffic to a particular website (7 digital marketing strategies, n.d.). However, the differences between these two strategies do not mean that they cannot be used together. Moreover, the adequate application of SEO tools combined with the rightly formulated and transmitted content mission and values may increase the project’s popularity and the level of people’s credit to it.
Other Problems That May Emerge in the Promotion Process
Apart from the digital marketing strategies, there exist other factors that influence the promotion process. They are GDPR, ethics, and competition with international business. Unfortunately, the problem of autism is still banned by many societies, and that is why the AutiPal project will likely experience almost no competition with international business. Moreover, it may even get support from other countries that follow the AutiPal example and start speaking openly about autism. When it comes to the GDPR, it is necessary to mention that AutiPal values its users and do not use their personal data for illegal or unethical purposes and guards the data they transmit. The company respects ethical norms and applies them in communication with the clients. The project itself is strongly connected with ethics since public awareness and acceptance of people with autism one-hundred percent rely on ethics.
Personal Reflection on Skills Needed in Digital Marketing
When speaking about the digital marketing skills and experience I should possess, I think that the university program gave me all the necessary knowledge on content marketing. I can adequately and with respect communicate with the audience to find out its needs and analyze the brand’s policy to establish its values and formulate its mission. I also can write good texts for the different needs of the brand and develop content plans. However, I may need additional training on SEO since this tool is more about ICT technologies, and it may be hard for me to increase the traffic for particular keywords. I will do my best to gain all the needed knowledge to help the AutiPal project become popular in the media and to raise public awareness and acceptance of autism.
References
AutiPal (n.d.). Creating autism awareness and acceptance. AutiPal. Web.
7 digital marketing strategies for your campaign. (n.d.). WebFX. Web.