The Tool of Modernity: Digital Marketing

In today’s day and age, Digital Marketing has become an intrinsic part of everybody’s life. Right from personal use to professional use, Digital marketing is a playground for people to keep their lives updated as well as to network with potential clients which will help their business grow.

India is the second largest country with over 462 million internet users. With a massive internet, population comes the opportunity for business owners to network with potential customers. This is one huge reason why Digital Marketing has emerged as one of the most sought-after profession not only in India but globally as well.

Customers are often researching online and then buying in stores and also browsing in stores and then searching for other options online. Online customer research into products is particularly popular for higher-priced items as well as consumable goods like groceries and makeup. Consumers are increasingly using the Internet to look up product information, compare prices, and search for deals and promotions.

Objectives

Objective 1: To know the changes made in the modern marketing system.

Objective 2: To understand the new technology how it has been making the speed marketing of the product?

Objective 3: To facilitate the comparison between offline marketing and online marketing.

Objective 4: To know the current situation of the market.

In order to accomplish the above objectives, an attempt has been made to study the importance of digital marketing in business. For the research work, the statistical data was collected from the secondary sources like published and unpublished data collected from different organizations, agencies, and websites. Reputed journals were also used for collecting relevant information.

Digital marketing's development since the 1990s and 2000s has changed the way brands and businesses use technology for marketing. As digital platforms are increasingly incorporated into marketing plans and everyday life, and as people use digital devices instead of visiting physical shops, digital marketing campaigns are becoming more prevalent and efficient.

Digital marketing methods such as search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), content marketing, influencer marketing, content automation, campaign marketing, data-driven marketing, e-commerce marketing, social media marketing, social media optimization, e-mail direct marketing, display advertising, e-books, and optical disks and games are becoming more common in our advancing technology. In fact, digital marketing now extends to non-Internet channels that provide digital media, such as mobile phones (SMS and MMS), callback, and on-hold mobile ringtones

Digital marketing is the marketing of products or services using digital technologies, mainly on the Internet, but also including mobile phones, display advertising, and any other digital medium.

Digital marketing, the promotion of products or brands via one or more forms of electronic media, differs from traditional marketing in that it uses channels and methods that enable an organization to analyze marketing campaigns and understand what is working and what isn’t – typically in real time.

Digital marketers monitor things like what is being viewed, how often and for how long, sales conversions, what content works and doesn’t work, etc. While the Internet is, perhaps, the channel most closely associated with digital marketing, others include wireless text messaging, mobile instant messaging, mobile apps, podcasts, electronic billboards, digital television and radio channels, etc.

Digital media is so pervasive that consumers have access to information any time and any place they want it. Gone are the days when the messages people got about your products or services came from you and consisted of only what you wanted them to know. Digital media is an ever-growing source of entertainment, news, shopping and social interaction, and consumers are now exposed not just to what your company says about your brand, but what the media, friends, relatives, peers, etc., are saying as well. And they are more likely to believe them than you. People want brands they can trust, companies that know them, communications that are personalized and relevant, and offers tailored to their needs and preferences.

Three keys to digital marketing success:

What does it take to do digital marketing right? Here are three keys to digital marketing success:

Manage complex customer relationships across a variety of channels – both digital and traditional. Respond to and initiate dynamic customer interactions. Extract value from big data to make better decisions faster.

History:

The term digital marketing was first coined in the 1990s, In 2000, a survey in the United Kingdom found that most retailers had not registered their own domain address.
Digital marketing became more sophisticated in the 2000s and the 2010s when the proliferation of devices' capable of accessing digital media led to sudden growth.[ Statistics produced in 2012 and 2013 showed that digital marketing was still growing.

Digital marketing is also referred to as 'online marketing', 'internet marketing' or 'web marketing'. The term digital marketing has grown in popularity over time. In the USA online marketing is still a popular term. In Italy, digital marketing is referred to as web marketing. Worldwide digital marketing has become the most common term, especially after the year 2013.

Digital media growth was estimated at 4.5 trillion online ads served annually with digital media spend at 48% growth in 2010. An increasing portion of advertising stems from businesses employing Online Behavioural Advertising (OBA) to tailor advertising for internet users, but OBA raises the concern about consumer privacy and data protection.

One of the major changes that occurred in traditional marketing was the "emergence of digital marketing" (Patrutiu Baltes, Loredana, 2015), this led to the reinvention of marketing strategies in order to adapt to this major change in traditional marketing (Patrutiu Baltes, Loredana, 2015).

As digital marketing is dependent on technology which is ever-evolving and fast-changing, the same features should be expected from digital marketing developments and strategies. This portion is an attempt to qualify or segregate the notable highlights existing and being used as of press time.

1. Segmentation: more focus has been placed on segmentation within digital marketing, in order to target specific markets in both business-to-business and business-to-consumer sectors.

2. Influencer marketing: Important nodes are identified within related communities, known as influencers. This is becoming an important concept in digital targeting. It is possible to reach influencers via paid advertising, such as Facebook Advertising or Google Adwords campaigns, or through sophisticated scam (social customer relationship management) software, such as SAP C4C, Microsoft Dynamics, Sage CRM and Salesforce CRM. Many universities now focus, at Masters level, on engagement strategies for influencers.

To summarize, Pull digital marketing is characterized by consumers actively seeking marketing content while Push digital marketing occurs when marketers send messages without that content being actively sought by the recipients.

1. Online behavioral advertising is the practice of collecting information about a user's online activity over time, "on a particular device and across different, unrelated websites, in order to deliver advertisements tailored to that user's interests and preferences
2. Collaborative Environment: A collaborative environment can be set up between the organization, the technology service provider, and the digital agencies to optimize effort, resource sharing, reusability, and communications. Additionally, organizations are inviting their customers to help them better understand how to service them. This source of data is called User Generated Content. Much of this is acquired via company websites where the organization invites people to share ideas that are then evaluated by other users of the site. The most popular ideas are evaluated and implemented in some form. Using this method of acquiring data and developing new products can foster the organization's relationship with their customer as well as spawn ideas that would otherwise be overlooked. UGC is low-cost advertising as it is directly from the consumers and can save advertising costs for the organization.
3. Data-driven advertising: Users generate a lot of data in every step they take on the path of customer journey and Brands can now use that data to activate their known audience with data-driven programmatic media buying. Without exposing customers' privacy, users' Data can be collected from digital channels (e.g.: when customer visits a website, reads an e-mail, or launches and interact with brand's mobile app), brands can also collect data from real-world customer interactions, such as brick and mortar stores visits and from CRM and Sales engines datasets. Also known as People-based marketing or addressable media, Data-driven advertising is empowering brands to find their loyal customers in their audience and deliver in real time a much more personal communication, highly relevant to each customers' moment and actions. An important consideration today while deciding on a strategy is that the digital tools have democratized the promotional landscape.
4. Remarketing: Remarketing plays a major role in digital marketing. This tactic allows marketers to publish targeted ads in front of an interest category or a defined audience, generally called searchers in web speaks, they have either searched for particular products or services or visited a website for some purpose.
5. Game advertising: Game ads are advertisements that exist within a computer or video games. One of the most common examples of in-game advertising is billboards appearing in sports games. In-game ads also might appear as brand-name products like guns, cars, or clothing that exist as gaming status symbols. The new digital era has enabled brands to selectively target their customers that may potentially be interested in their brand or based on previous browsing interests. Businesses can now use social media to select the age range, location, gender and interests of whom they would like their targeted post to be seen by. Furthermore, based on a customer's recent search history they can be ‘followed’ on the internet so they see advertisements from similar brands, products, and services, This allows businesses to target the specific customers that they know and feel will most benefit from their product or service, something that had limited capabilities up until the digital era.

A strategy that is linked to the effectiveness of digital marketing is content marketing. Content marketing can be briefly described as "delivering the content that your audience is seeking in the places that they are searching for it".It is found that content marketing is highly present in digital marketing and becomes highly successful when content marketing is involved. This is due to content marketing making your brand more relevant to the target consumers, as well as more visible to the target consumer.

Marketers also find email an effective strategy when it comes to digital marketing as it is another way to build a long-term relationship with the consumer. Listed below are some aspects that need to be considered to have an effective digital media campaign and aspects that help create an effective email system.

Interesting mail titles differentiate one advertisement from the other. This separates advertisements from the clutter. Differentiation is one factor that can make an advertisement successful in digital marketing because consumers are drawn to it and are more likely to view the advertisement.

Establishment of customer exclusivity: A list of customers and customer's details should be kept on a database for follow up and selected customers can be sent selected offers and promotions of deals related to the customer's previous buyer behavior. This is effective in digital marketing as it allows organizations to build up loyalty over email
Low Technical Requirements: In order to get the full use out of digital marketing it is useful to make your advertising campaigns have low technical requirements. This prevents some consumers not being able to understand or view the advertising campaign.

Rewards: The lucrative offers would always help in making your digital campaign a success. Give some reward at the end of the campaign. This would definitely invite more engagement and word of mouth publicity

Digital marketing activity is still growing across the world according to the headline global marketing index. Digital media continues to rapidly grow; while the marketing budgets are expanding, traditional media is declining (World Economics, 2015). Digital media helps brands reach consumers to engage with their product or service in a personalized way. Five areas, which are outlined as current industry practices that are often ineffective are prioritizing clicks, balancing search and display, understanding mobiles, targeting, viewability, brand safety and invalid traffic, and cross-platform measurement (Whiteside, 2016).[37] Why these practices are ineffective and some ways around making these aspects effective are discussed surrounding the following points.

Digital marketing is facilitated by multiple channels, As an advertiser one's core objective is to find channels which result in maximum two-way communication and a better overall ROI for the brand. There are multiple online marketing channels available namely;

Affiliate marketing - Affiliate marketing is perceived to not be considered a safe, reliable and easy means of marketing through an online platform. This is due to a lack of reliability in terms of affiliates that can produce the demanded number of new customers. As a result of this risk and bad affiliates, it leaves the brand prone to exploitation in terms of claiming commission that isn’t honestly acquired. Legal means may offer some protection against this, yet there are limitations in recovering any losses or investment.

Display advertising - As the term infers, Online Display Advertisement deals with showcasing promotional messages or ideas to the consumer on the internet. This includes a wide range of advertisements like advertising blogs, networks, interstitial ads, contextual data, ads on the search engines, classified or dynamic advertisement etc
Email marketing - Email marketing in comparison to other forms of digital marketing is considered cheap; it is also a way to rapidly communicate a message such as their value proposition to existing or potential customers.

Social Media Marketing - The term 'Digital Marketing' has a number of marketing facets as it supports different channels used in and among these, comes the Social Media. When we use social media channels ( Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+, etc.) To market a product or service, the strategy is called Social Media Marketing.

• Social Networking
• Game advertising - In-Game advertising is defined as "inclusion of products or brands within a digital game." The game allows brands or products to place ads within their game, either in a subtle manner or in the form of an advertisement banner.
• Online PR

Digital marketing system

Digital marketing planning is a term used in marketing management. It describes the first stage of forming a digital marketing strategy for the wider digital marketing system. The difference between digital and traditional marketing planning is that it uses digitally based communication tools and technology such as Social, Web, Mobile, Scannable Surface. Nevertheless, both are aligned with the vision, the mission of the company and the overarching business strategy.

Stages of planning

Using Dr. Dave Chaffey’s approach, the Digital Marketing Planning (DMP) has three main stages; Opportunity, Strategy, and Action. He suggests that any business looking to implement a successful digital marketing strategy must structure their plan by looking at opportunity, strategy, and action. This generic strategic approach often has phases of situation review, goal setting, strategy formulation, resource allocation and monitoring.

1) Opportunity

To create an effective DMP a business first needs to review the marketplace and set ‘SMART’ (Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Relevant and Time-Bound) objectives. They can set SMART objectives by reviewing the current benchmarks and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of the company and competitors. It is pertinent that the analytics used for the KPIs be customized to the type, objectives, mission, and vision of the company.

Companies can scan for marketing and sales opportunities by reviewing their own outreach as well as influencer outreach. This means they have a competitive advantage because they are able to analyze their co-marketers influence and brand associations.[60]

To cease opportunity, the firm should summarize their current customers’ personas and purchase journey from this they are able to deduce their digital marketing capability. This means they need to form a clear picture of where they are currently and how many resources they can allocate for their digital marketing strategy i.e. Labour, time etc. By summarizing the purchase journey, they can also recognize gaps and growth for future marketing opportunities that will either meet objectives or propose new objectives and increase profit.

2) Strategy

To create a planned digital strategy, the company must review their digital proposition (what you are offering to consumers) and communicate it using digital customer targeting techniques. So, they must define the online value proposition (OVP), this means the company must express clearly what they are offering customers online e.g. Brand positioning.
The company should also (re)select target market segments and personas and define digital targeting approaches.

After doing this effectively, it is important to review the marketing mix for online options. The marketing mix comprises the 4Ps - Product, Price, Promotion, and Place. Some academics have added three additional elements to the traditional 4Ps of marketing Process, Place and Physical appearance making it 7Ps of marketing.[63]

3) Action

The third and final stage requires the firm to set a budget and management systems; these must be measurable touchpoints, such as audience reached across all digital platforms. Furthermore, marketers must ensure the budget and management systems are integrating the paid, owned and earned media of the company. The Action and final stage of planning also require the company to set in place measurable content creation e.g. Oral, visual or written online media.

After confirming the digital marketing plan, a scheduled format of digital communications (e.g. Gantt Chart) should be encoded throughout the internal operations of the company. This ensures that all platforms used to fall in line and complement each other for the succeeding stages of digital marketing strategy.

Innovations:

That being said, there is always space for improvement, and just like getting writing help online, we are bound to witness the next step in digital marketing next year. What are some of the most influential and groundbreaking changes we can anticipate in 2018 when it comes to digital marketing?

a) Social media customer engagement

The most popular social media platforms have been known to implement new experimental features into their systems faster than anyone else. Such was the implementation of live feeds and hashtags in Facebook once it acquired Instagram and started its path towards transformation.

Customer engagement has always been an issue when it comes to social media, with managers who don’t know how to go about communicating with their customers effectively. Looking for college term papers for you has always been a matter of luck on social media and that is about to change. In 2018, we can look forward to a more refined system of public communication between businesses and customers, with updated business pages and specialized groups available to anyone interested in communication.

b) Support automation through Big Data

Being available for clients and customers 24/7 can be difficult, especially for small firms and startups. That is why big data is going to change the way we engage customers through support in a big way. Automation is nothing new to the marketing scene, with chatbots being present on major sites throughout the internet, custom paper writing sites included.

What makes big data implementation so different from regular chatbots is the fact that these algorithms will learn from the company’s data servers in order to learn and evolve over time. This process is more commonly known as machine learning, and it will allow companies to fully automate their customer support sectors with only supervisors being needed for the management of said services.

c) Wearable digital apparel

Digital watches, hearing devices, and pacemakers are something we are accustomed to seeing in today’s age. However, with the advent of 2018, we will see smart devices implemented in our everyday apparel and styling.

These devices already exist in the form of Apple and Android watches which allow for augmented reality features in our day-to-day activities. These include heart rate and pacing monitors, online news feeds, looking for college paper help, email notifications as well as Google search capabilities. This is possible through a synchronization process with the main device we keep in our pockets, mostly in the form of a mobile phone that pairs up with the apparel item.

d) Mobile marketing development

Mobile devices are coming to the forefront when it comes to marketing, application development, and overall customer experience attention. This will allow companies to develop specialized marketing strategies aimed specifically at the mobile market, which is considerably larger than the desktop user market.

The reason for this is that everyone has some form of a smartphone in their pocket nowadays, with a writing service or similar professional service within reach. Serving curated marketing content designed specifically for mobile applications is becoming easier than ever before thanks to this fact and the market are only bound to grow in the coming year.

e) Interactive marketing content

Lastly, it will no longer be enough to serve up content to the potential customers and hope for the best. With the recent rise of VR and AR technologies not only in games and applications but also in term paper help and similar online services, people are expecting more care and attention in their content. Live to stream, Ask Me Anything (AMA) sessions, as well as any kind of live textual and visual interaction with your customer base, does provide the needed interactive experience.