Introduction to Digital Marketing Section 2

Evolution of Digital Marketing    (Section1 Section 3  Section 4 )

1990: The term ”Digital Marketing” was first used. In that particular year, ‘Archie” first search engine was launched. (Alan Emtage) 

1993: In this year first clickable web-ad banner was introduced.

1994: There was the launch of Yahoo (search engine/web browser) and the first e-commerce transaction, over Net Market.

1996: In this year small search engines were introduced i.e. Hotbot, Looksmart, and Alexa.

1997: There was the launch of the first social media site which is SixDegree.com. (Kevin Bacon) 

1998: This year was the changing year where there was the birth of Google, Microsoft launched MSN, (Microsoft Network) and Yahoo! Introduced Yahoo! Web search.

2000: During this year Internet bubble burst, (a quick decrease in value, or a contraction, that is sometimes referred to as a "crash" or a "bubble burst.") SixDegree.com shut down, and also smaller search engines were wiped out.

2001: This year’s first mobile marketing campaign (a plan to do a number of things in order to achieve a special aim) was introduced i.e. Universal Music.

2002: This year is the birth year of LinkedIn. (Reid Hoffman) 

2003: In this year WordPress was introduced and launched myspace

2004: This year was changing year when Gmail was launched, (Paul Buchheit) Google (Sergey Brin and Larry Page) goes public and Facebook goes live.

2005: YouTube was introduced in this particular year. (Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim) 

2006: Microsft launches MS Live Search, In this year Twitter (Jack Patrick Dorsey)  was launched, moreover Amazon’s (Jeffrey Preston Bezos) e-commerce sales crossed $10 billion.

2007: Tumblr is a microblogging website that allows you to create and follow blogs. (David Karp), Web streaming service: Hulu,(Bruce Campbell, Peter Chernin, JB Perrette, Mike Lang) and iPhone were launched. (the activity of listening to or watching sound or video directly from the internet)

2008: This year China take over America in terms of the number of users and even Spotify (Daniel Ek) was introduced to listen to online songs

2009: Google (Larry Page and Sergey Brin) launches Instant for real-time search engine results

2010: In this year Whatsapp ( Brian Acton and Jan Koum) was introduced to make communication easier.

2011: In this year Google Buzz shut down and also web overtake the TV viewership among the youth generation.

2012: There was a progressive increment in Social Media Budget that is up to 64%.

2013: Yahoo acquired Tumblr in this particular year.

2014: In this year so many things happened like Mobile exceeds PC internet usage.

2015: In this era, Snapchat (Evan Thomas Spiegel) was launched and also there was the rise of predictive analytics.

2016 – 2017: The Rise of Social Media Influencers and Influencer Marketing

2018 – 2020: Where Content Becomes the Key of Brand Management

2021 And the Future of Digital Marketing

Section 2

 

Importance and Benefits of Digital Marketing

Digital marketing allows you to reach your target audience online, in a variety of ways, on a variety of platforms. Digital marketing includes methods like social media marketing, content marketing, SEO, PPC, web design, and more.

It includes strategies that allow you to target your exact audience online — allowing you to make more sales, drive more traffic to your website, and increase your revenue year over year. By using tactics like social media marketing, content marketing, SEO, and PPC, businesses can use digital marketing to engage, convert, and retain their target audience.

1. Better Growth Options for Small business

The importance of digital marketing for business lies in the option to select your method of marketing as per your budget and reach a wider audience at a lesser cost. Even a decade back getting your product marketed especially for a small business was a task in itself. They had to resort to small level methods where the guarantee of success was close to negligible.

2. Higher Conversion Rate

The businesses that are opting for digital marketing are able to measure the conversion rate through real-time using a simple method. (priority-based and include a sense of real physical time to pass information from one system to another) That is identifying the percentage of viewers who get converted into leads and then subscribers and in the end finally purchasing the service or product. SEO, Social media marketing and Email marketing are methods which have a high conversion rate as they are able to generate a quick and effective communication channel with the consumer

Surprisingly all the traffic that you may get on your website may not be fruitful hence digital marketing lets you reach out to only those who have the need for your kind of service hence offering better lead conversions.

3. Establishing Brand Reputation

For any business to survive the one thing that they really need to work upon is establishing a reputation that is impeccable. In the past few years, it has become evident that customers will always prefer a company that does not have any scandals associated with it. The importance of Digital marketing today lies in offering you multiple ways to establish a personal rapport with your customer base.

4. Solving Customers Problems

Be it email marketing or social media you can always offer the customer solutions to their problems and make them relate to your product by even providing live chat access. Your website and social media page can easily be converted into a place where the consumer can ask queries, give suggestions and hence take the association with you on a positive level.

An example of how customer grievance (complaint) was addressed using social media

5. Engagement With Mobile Customers

After Google mobile-first update nearly almost all the websites these days are made in a manner that they are easily viewable on the mobile as well. This is because almost all customers have access to a smartphone and most of them even look for products on the same.

6. Expansion of Faith in Your Brand

The presence of your brand and service on multiple platforms gives the option to customers to rate your services as per their level of experience. A positive and favourable review left by a satisfied customer causes the new ones to immediately convert. This, in turn, leads to the building up of the strong image of the brand in the minds of the new consumers hence leading to more conversions.

7. Better ROI for your Investment

While earlier budget allocations were done individually to handle each kind of marketing medium the situation becomes more progressive now. Even a small level of investment done in a mode of email marketing has the potential to deliver results in terms of customer engagement. Using web analytics (the systematic computational analysis of data or statistics) helps the business owners know whether your website is providing optimal ROI.

8. Digital marketing is Cost-Effective

A small business needs to save up on its resources before it finally goes into the green zone and starts making profits. Digital marketing gives you the scope to reach out to many customers at the same time and that too within your budget. You can plan your marketing strategy such that you only use modes that lie in your budget. If there is a budget constraint then you should always target your niche (comfortable) audiences.

9. Potential to Earn Higher Revenues (the capacity to develop into something)

Since the amount of money invested is less and the ROI is more the scope to make money is much higher. As per a study conducted by IPSOS (multinational market research and consulting firm) Hong Kong in accordance with Google has shown that compared to traditional methods, digital marketing is known to generate 2.8 times more revenue.

10. Computable Form of Marketing

It is very difficult to track record of success from traditional marketing but with the use of digital marketing tactics, every step of success is measurable. Digital Marketing works in real-time as it shows the success of each and every tactic that has been used. Through this, you may choose the best tactics that show the best results. After that, you can easily make changes in your campaigns to achieve greater success. (Real-time systems are designed to process data in real-time, as soon as it is generated. These systems typically have strict timing constraints and must be able to respond to events in a timely manner. Examples of real-time systems include control systems for manufacturing plants, traffic control systems, and flight control systems.)

11. Expanding Audience Reach

The most important benefits of digital marketing are reaching your audience to the fullest. Under traditional marketing, you are being bounded by the scope and size of your audience and print media limits you to certain places and markets.

Targeted Audience Approach:

Digital marketing benefits you to target your audience. There are higher chances that your audience is spending time on social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, etc. where you can publish an advertisement to gain more engagement with your audience.

12. Easy Adapting of Tactics and Strategies (an action)

Another major advantage of online marketing is that they are very easy to understand. You can easily understand through the result of tactics which one is giving you results and which one is not. Strategies that are implemented in online marketing gives you results on a real-time basis.

For example, if you want to promote your blog page then you can simply share your blogs on various social media platforms. With the help of content marketing, you can increase your engagement with your audience very soon and very accurate.

13. Can Start with A Small Budget as Well

Everyone has a budget problem in life therefore many businesses didn’t promote themselves. But Digital marketing gives you another advantage of promoting your business with a very small amount. Online marketing benefits small businesses on a large scale with a small investment amount.

Research Study by Marketing Profs: (Professional)

According to the Marketing profs the data has been shared below that how digital marketing platforms helps various small-scale business.

Marketing Profs

For instance, if you are the manufacture of handmade handicrafts but you don’t have money to promote your business then online marketing would play a significant role as with an amount of 10,000 (ten thousand) you can publish your content over social media with a budget of 300 per day. Through this, you can promote your business for a period of one month especially to your targeted audience.

14. Go Beyond your Boundaries:

Using digital marketing for the promotion of your business is very unique in nature. You need to come out of your comfort zone and have to put some effort into it. Digital Marketing benefits you only if you are taking an active part in it. The role of digital marketing is very fast as it includes SEO, SMO, SME, and various other processes.

(Section1 Section 3  Section 4 )