Evolution and Impact of Digital Marketing – A Comprehensive Overview from Inception to Modern Strategies

Table of Content

1. Introduction
2. Traditional Marketing versus Digital Marketing
3. Importance of Digital Marketing Strategies Over Traditional Marketing Strategies
4. Digital Marketing Strategies

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1. Introduction

Digital marketing may be defined as a form of direct marketing technique that makes use of interactive technologies such as e-mails, websites, online communication channels, online forums, third party applications operable through the world wide web to build a bridge between marketers and customers. It is used for promotion of brands to connect with various customers using different forms of digital communication as emails, Social media texts, multimedia messages, etc. Digital marketing  encompassing different online marketing strategies crucial for all business houses is an evolving concept in order to achieve ground-breaking developments.

The term digital marketing first promulgated in the year 1990 after the development of World Wide Web (WWW) platform 1.0, which allowed users to search for an array of information available over the digital chest but still lacked the feature of sharing the same with various other users over the digital platforms. Till 1990, digital marketing was in the infancy stage as digital marketers were quite sceptical about using various digital marketing strategies in order to reach the multitude of the population through online platforms as the major chunk of the population was not aware of digital marketing platforms for making purchasing decisions with respect to goods and services and the primary reason for the same can be attributed towards lack of adequate knowledge on operating the various digital equipments as personal Computers (PCs), Laptops, etc.

The liminal phase from traditional marketing to digital marketing started in the year 1993 when the first clickable banner ad was launched by a company named “Hotwired” which purchased many online banner ads for advertising their products on the digital platform. Subsequently, the year 1994 marked the advent of various crucial developments in the world of digital marketing. Acing the race of developments was the rollout of the most significant and popular search engine of the era “Yahoo”. Yahoo was popularly referred to as Jerry’s Guide to the world as this has paved the way for various online users to search an indefinite range of products using Yahoo as their most favoured search engine website. Soon after the introduction of Yahoo, various digital marketers started looking for ways to optimise their businesses as well as brands in order to gain the highest ranking on the said search engine. In 1998, Google made headway as the most popular search engine of the 21st century and has been extensively used till current time.

During the period 1998-2006, various small search engines almost got whipped out by the three most successful search engines namely Google, MSN and Yahoo. Furthermore, by 2006 the total number of users on various search engines reached more than 6.4 billion which was the highest in almost a decade. Google as well as Amazon went ahead and worked on pushing the limits of digital marketing for business on their search engines thereby introducing new products like Ad Words which allowed the companies to advertise a product using a three-line ad that showed up right at the top of the search engine mostly when a user typed a specific keyword within the Google search box.

Another significant development that took place in the year 2006 was the launch of the new version of the web which was called web 2.0. The key reason behind the launch of web 2.0 was to ensure that more volume of data could be handled effectively. Another key factor behind the launch of web 2.0 was that online users had become much more active on E-Commerce as well as similar search engine websites as compared to previous times when they were just passive users. Therefore, digital marketers started making use of enhanced technologies to reach their target consumers more effectively than before.

Giving a Philip to the same, social media websites also came into existence around the year 2008, and the first one which was launched within the world of the internet was Myspace, after the advent of the said website, there was an influx of new social media websites like Orkut, Facebook, Twitter and various others. Furthermore, most digital marketers recognized the significance of such social media platforms and found a great opportunity to reach out to consumers using various social media marketing strategies through digital marketing platforms. Marketers used brand collaborations, influencer-paid partnerships and online paid banner ads to advertise their products to the target market more effectively through predefined demographic ad filters available on various social media platforms as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, etc. Another facet that widened the scope of digital marketing was the launch of cookies by the creators of the World Wide Web thus adding stars to the galaxy.

Through cookies, brands were able to detect the browsing habits as well as usage patterns of their consumers by simply tracking their activities on their official websites. Henceforth, cookies provide digital marketers with requisite information about what is preferred the most by consumers and on the basis of these habits as well as browsing patterns, the marketers are able to customise promotions for such consumers and accordingly reach out to them in a much more effective as well as focused manner as compared to the traditional mass media marketing strategies, which failed in providing a focused marketing strategy.

Therefore, in the current scenario, digital marketing platforms are used by various marketers to ensure that they could advertise products effectively through various online channels and therefore gain attention of customers as more than 90% of the population around the world is present on social media and various other digital marketing platforms. The ambit of digital marketing platforms has widened over the years as reflected through the recent report of marketintech.com, which shows that social media platforms are the most preferred mode of channel used by various digital marketers to reach out to consumers. Further, as per insights from the eMarketer, 2021 digital ad spending has risen many fold over the years (Fig. 1.1).

The Digital Ad Spending across worldwide has increased from $335.60 Bn in 2019 to $529.31 Bn in 2022 and is expected to reach $645.80 Bn in 2024.

What could be a more illustrative example of undeterred growth achieved through a digital platform other than case of a giant player Zomato!

Initiated in 2008 by two IIT graduates – Deepinder Goyal and Pankaj Chaddah who thought of converting the traditional restaurant menus into a digital app known as foodiebay.com later rebranded as Zomato in 2011 (Fig. 1.2). They have effectively utilised various digital marketing strategies to hold their presence in the market. Presently, they cater to an average monthly traffic of 20 million visitors per month wherein the average time spent by any visitor is around 3 minutes 28 seconds (Fig. 1.3)

2. Traditional Marketing versus Digital Marketing

Traditional marketing also referred to as mass media marketing is concerned with the conventional mode of promotion which has been followed by most of the marketers to advertise or promote their products offline. Henceforth, below are the various modes through which marketers advertise a product using offline or mass media or traditional marketing channels:

• TV advertisements
• Newspaper advertisements
• Billboard advertisements
• Pamphlet ads
• Weekly magazine advertisements
• Radio advertisements

Before the advent of digital marketing, these traditional marketing channels were extensively used by marketers to advertise their products to the target market. However, after the inception of Digital marketing (also called online marketing or E-marketing), marketers made global presence in cost and time effective manner. With the advancement in technology, digital marketers are now accessible at the doorstep of their consumers using various digital marketing modes available on the World Wide Web. Various digital marketing platforms which are used rigorously by digital marketers have been discussed in detail below:

• Search Engine optimisation for enhancing the quality and quantity of website traffic of a webpage using search engine.
• Use of various social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube etc., to advertise the products and services globally using the paid advertisements option available on various websites including third party applications.
• Highly efficient business networking opportunities on LinkedIn are used by digital marketers to reach out to wholesalers, retailers as well as sellers of their products online.
• Promotions through email marketing software as well as newsletters are the next most used online digital marketing strategy, to boost the effectiveness of a brand by reaching out to the target consumers on a one-to-one basis.
• Paid pop-up ads or banner advertisements using Google advertisement promotion services.
• Paid partnership with bloggers, influencers and celebrities to gain more user visibility.
• Creating products related viral content through clickbait.

The various channels used by digital marketers to promote their products online are more focused as compared to traditional media marketing as traditional media emphasise more on advertisement of the brand product before the masses whereas a digital marketing strategy focus on advertising the product before such audience who are their target segments rather than following a general appeal.

As represented in Figure 1.4, the above-mentioned features delineate the starking differences between digital and traditional marketing. Thus, it becomes crucial to understand the reasons behind the adoption of digital marketing services by marketers over the traditional marketing strategies.

3. Importance of Digital Marketing Strategies Over Traditional Marketing Strategies

• Cost Effectiveness: Traditional marketing channels like TV, newspaper or radio are extremely costlier for marketing the products of various brands as compared to online marketing channels as social media marketing which is economical for the majority of marketers. Advertisements on various websites are affordable in nature as they require a minimal investment of funds. Therefore, digital marketing channels allow marketers to reach out to a wider pool of consumers globally at a comparatively lower price in comparison to mass media advertisement channels.
• Quick and Effective Results: Traditional marketing channels as TV, newspaper advertisements, etc. at times may take as long as a month for the consumers to notice the advertisements, however when it comes to digital marketing strategies, a focused platform is provided to the marketers for reaching the target market, thus, leading to quick results for marketers through instant consumer response to online consumer-targeted advertisements of specific brands. Digital marketing strategies allow the marketers to observe the insights of each and every advertisement, as well as promotion on social media websites with the help of the insight tab, through which the marketer can analyse how many visits the ad had. Apart from this, interaction rate can also be tracked on various social media platforms as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. in case of paid advertisements.
• Wider Platform for Advertisement: Digital marketing in comparison to traditional marketing provides a wider platform to advertise products and services. On the cusp of reality, in the case of traditional marketing marketers can only avail a specific newspaper column or a few second ads on TV. Therefore, digital marketing strategies provide a dedicated site for marketers to extensively advertise their products and brands.
• Specific and Focused Promotional Exposure: When a product is advertised through a traditional marketing channel like a newspaper or TV then the option of choosing a specific target segment is not available to the marketers but in the case of digital marketing through effective utilisation of various filters and apt usage of Search Engine Optimization, the marketers can actually decide beforehand the specific target market to reach out by applying suitable filters such as age, gender, income, hobbies, etc.
• Better and Enhanced Customer Engagement: Traditional marketing does not provide any user interface to marketers to interact with their customers or the target market directly thus limiting the reach. Digital marketing, on the other hand, provide marketers with an active channel through which they can communicate with their target customers directly using various digital media platforms, third party applications, tracking, browsing cookies, etc..
• Continuous and Uninterrupted Ads: Digital marketing platforms allow a user to either see or skip an advertisement at his/her own discretion, however, when it comes to mass media advertisement, then the consumers may not be able to skip the advertisement and therefore majority of the TV advertisements shown to the consumers are for just a few seconds and sometimes remains unnoticed. When it comes to Billboard advertisements then it is subject to the attention of the consumer towards his or her surroundings. Henceforth, social media or digital marketing strategies are much more effective in terms of being an uninterrupted as well as continuous advertisement channel, as compared to a traditional or mass media marketing strategy.
• Suitable for all Small and Big Brands of Companies: Digital marketing strategies are suitable for all sorts of brand businesses as well as companies, irrespective of them being large or small in size. Presently, almost all brands advertise their products through digital marketing channels because of flexible online advertisement rates but when it comes to traditional marketing then the same is only used by large brands to advertise their products or promote them through TV, billboard or newspaper advertisements because they are both costly and time-consuming in comparison to digital marketing channels.
• Easy as well as effective Analytics: Through Google Analytics, a marketing manager can easily detect consumer traffic rate, profitability as well as general trending keywords which are buzzwords for consumers. However, in the case of traditional marketing strategies, there is barely any availability of analytics and at times, it becomes a mammoth task for the marketers to effectively analyse or record the results of a particular promotional advertisement channel like TV, Newspaper or Billboards.

Therefore, it is dovetailed that digital marketing strategies are much more effective in comparison to traditional marketing strategies to reach out to the target market of a brand because the former is always in conformity with the latest technological advancements in the field of marketing whereas mass media traditional marketing techniques are majorly used decades ago and are currently considered to be obsolete and ineffective within the world of marketing. They are required to be revamped in order to withstand in the race against digital techniques and technologies.

4. Digital Marketing Strategies

Digital marketing and its role in the present era has expanded to a great extent and this is all due to the heated competition that is present within the digital marketplace. In order to cope with this rising tide of competition, marketers are using mobile marketing/social media marketing techniques as their most preferred mode of communication in order to establish communication links with the consumers as it helps in reaching out to the consumer more efficiently and effectively. Considering the fact that the majority of the consumers belong to the clan of social media users, therefore, it becomes easy to reach out to them by making use of digital media platforms.

Social media marketing to some extent is also considered intrusive to some new set of consumers but presently with access to advanced features in all the social media applications, users are mostly shown only those sorts of advertisements which are as per their interests and preferences. Therefore, social media marketing techniques help brands in reaping millions of consumers in a cost-effective manner with the help of selected filters used with respect to demographic characteristics that help in extending the reach to target segments using focused communication modes such as paid advertisements on websites and social media platforms as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, etc.

Communication through Digital marketing helps to reach the vast segment of the targeted consumers using various online marketing strategies therefore, it is utmost crucial that appropriate strategies should be followed by brands. Some of the effective strategies are outlined as under:

• Creating Extensive Presence Online: The first and foremost step is that a brand needs to maximise its online presence, by creating a verified social media account on all the major social media platforms and update its audience through dedicated emails, forum letters, etc.
• Paid Social Media Reach: It is important for the brands to not only create social media accounts, but also create their unique presence through attractive social media coupons and offers, which could attract the attention of the target market, and this can be done by advertising such deals through paid banner advertisements as well as Facebook ad-videos.
• Consumer Engagement: Engaging the consumers through a digital marketplace can be another noted way to communicate with them and this can be done by encouraging the consumers to give feedback on the verified social media accounts of the brand in return each customer should be provided with a special feedback discount or coupon on posting such reviews. Furthermore, another way to create consumer engagement through digital media is by involving the consumers through exciting contests an illustrious example of the same is a website called ‘club factory’ that arranges interactive contests for the consumers to ensure that they always remain involved in buying the products of the brand.
• Search Engine Optimization: SEO is the most important marketing strategy which is used by most of the digital marketers to reach their customers through search-related keywords on Google or Yahoo or similar search engines. Therefore, in the case of SEO, the name of the brand usually pops up on the topmost search result and this will ensure that the customer will be able to see the brand and its advertisement first, before any other search result on such websites. However, it shall be noted that Search Engine Optimization is not the primary strategy in digital marketing that is followed by marketers and this is because social media, as well as other similar marketing strategies, are considered the primary digital marketing strategies utilised by digital marketers extensively. As represented in Figure 1.5, Nykaa has employed a comprehensive search engine optimization strategy to ensure that its website is easily found by potential customers. This includes optimizing website content for relevant keywords, creating backlinks and thus increasing and improving the website speed and usability. SEO helps various platforms as Nykaa to rank higher in search engine results page and reach more potential customers.