Digital Marketing

Introduction

Digital marketing has emerged as a very innovative approach in the 21st century. It can be defined as marketing of products and services with the help of digital media such as online advertisements pay per click, instant messages, emails, blogging, creating videos, etc. Forms such as TV and radio are not considered as a part of digital marketing. This helps companies to improve and increase the no. of responded plus it has now became one of the most efficient and effective tools for marketing. With the introduction of double click strategy of Goggle for internet, digital marketing has become more powerful. It has linked the world very closely and conveniently. It has also emerged as a very cost effective and convenient tool for promoting goods and services. Technology in digital marketing helps companies to calculate the accurate number of visitors, respondents and people who viewed the advertisements of company. With the help of this fast end technology, it has become much easier and convenient for companies to promote products and services. Digital marketing also assist businesses to achieve the marketing goals and profitability in long run. Further, the improvements which have been observed in digital marketing are Wi-Fi networks, broadband internet and internet on mobile phones. The number of user is increasing at a very good pace which has merged as the only reason that firms are spending huge amount of their financial resources for promoting and advertising on digital media.

Situation Analysis

Macro environmental factors affecting social media marketing

Political factors

The government of country has a great impact on social media marketing and it can also block activities of social media. For example in countries like Iran, North Korea and Vietnam, Facebook has been banned. Use of Twitter is strictly prohibited in some countries. It simply means that promotional cannot be done using social media in those countries. A firm can consider other local alternatives available instead of Facebook and Twitter.

Economic factors

Along with the emergence of internet, many pricing options have been developed. The main challenges that business faces are related to prices’ comparison websites where the prices are compared in situation that is not always accurate (Alavi, Ahuja and Medury 2001). In the coming era, the delivery charges will also get eliminated as free delivery will become mandatory.

Social factors

Companies are now in a better situation to understand what is accepted by society and within a particular culture. It has also created better opportunities and new markets. Now, people are getting messages and greeting on their birthdays and special occasions.

You may also like this sample: Factors Influencing Digital Marketing of HSBC Bank

Other socio-cultural factors

Internet access – At present, there are many people in the world who do not have access to internet. People in under-developed countries and low income group come in this category.

Acceptance – now youth is diverting there interest from Facebook to what app.

Technological factors

Following are the technological factors that affect the activities of business:

1. Size of screen where the internet would be accessed (Dann, 2010 ).
2. How to enhance user experiences
3. The 7 P’s in marketing will likely to be changed in digital marketing.

Technological factors

Technological factors also make impact on the social media marketing as due to increase in advancement of technology, the chances of hacking and unethical access of data has increased. But on the other side up-gradation of technology also has influence the companies to use some digital and graphical promotional advertisements.

Legal factors

There are certain factors that companies need to take care of while using digital marketing which are mentioned below as:

1. Selling the data of customer.
2. Product placement including verbal mentions during editorial content .
3. Stealing images from other websites (copyright infringement)
4. Using well-known brand names on your own website (passing off – common tort)

Environmental

Environmental consideration is a fast growing consideration in marketing. The biggest impact has been in packaging and waste (Charlesworth, 2009). Companies are needing to re-think packaging in some countries, where carrier bags are a chargeable item at the point of sale.

Micro environmental analysis of digital marketing

Strengths

• Digital marketing is a very cost effective sources of marketing
• With the help of digital marketing companies are able to reach wide range of customers. Weakness
• Still there are certain people who do not have access to internet.
• Some countries have banned social medial sites so this from of marketing cannot be used in those countries.

Opportunities

1. Digital marketing is not so popular so companies can use it and have competitive edge.
2. Upcoming changes in marketing world. Threats
3. It is seen as a risk rather than opportunity so nothing happens especially in conservative industries such as financial services(Lee and Lin, 2005).
4. Digital marketing is sometimes not able to target right audience.

Objectives

Objectives of digital media marketing

1. Increase traffic at website- By increasing the no of visitors with the help of various tools available in digital marketing.
2. Increase the online visibility - Companies with the helps of tools available can increase its popularity and visibility. As in internet world companies which cannot be seen does not exists in the mind of people.
3. Established companies brand in social media- By developing effective search engine optimizer companies can establish themselves as a brand in social media.
4. Online reputation management- Company also use digital marketing in order to develop their reputation and emerged as a brand in online world. Proper plans and strategies are develop which determines how to deal with negative comments on social media, how to build good reputation of company in font of people who are posting negative and inappropriate comments.

Social media has altered the marketing strategies and plans of marketers. With the maximum opportunities available on social media, marketers can use multiple mediums to increase their visibility. More visibility gives access to more consumers and generates awareness about the brand. Higher social media engagement helps in gaining high customer loyalty. Moreover a consumer first searches a brand on social media to judge its credibility. Other than this, social media interaction is also a way marketers gain high conversion rates. The inclusion of humanization element with the users through the internet mediums felt like consumers are dealing with human and not with companies. Organizations are also increasingly using social media to increase inbound traffic. Users familiar with the brand will be able to gain new opportunities provided on social media sites.

The increasing use of social media strategies will eventually reduce the marketing cost of the companies. As evident from the research that only six hours on weekly basis is enough to be spent on social media. This means that only an hour per day is required to invest in social media channels. With the low cost of paid advertising, even small marketers can start with few tools and generate awareness among the public.

Aim of development Contemporary issues in digital marketing

Key contemporary issues

The key issues tat demand the change in digital marketing is increasing use of internet mediums that offers ease and conveniences of use for the users. With the time constraint many consumers prefer to use social media to keep track of daily news and marketing offers instead of consideration TV channel to view offer which may not be relevant.
With time, many brands have moved their outlet from physical brick and mortar to online shopping. This again demand change in the marketing options.

Growth of Smartphone and tablets

In the past few years there have been significant growth rate observed in the use of Smartphone’s and tablets. The use of Smartphone’s is tablets identify how a person uses internet. Mobile and tablets are influencing the buyer behaviours and purchased decision of people. Many challenges are faced by manufactures and retailers due to technological dislocation. For retailers the downside is “showrooming,” the phenomenon of consumers visiting a physical store to research (e.g. to “touch and feel”) products but then using their Smartphone or tablet in-store to compare prices in order to shop which often subsequent in them buying the product online.

Social media

The no. of people using social media is increasing rapidly and the competition between marketers has become so intense that now it has become a very tough task for them to effectively utilize the channel of social medial in order to communicate with customers. Marketers are not only using social media as a advertisement platform, but now they are seeking social media as a source of customers insight which will replace the use of customers surveys in next five years.

Justification

Objectives of digital marketing will help P&G to achieve better sustainable growth. Further the use of digital media in order to promote and advertise products and services will assist P&G to cover increase its market share and have cover more customers (Dann, 2010.). There are certain areas which are still unexplored by P&G so digital marketing will help to identify and explore those areas. P&G can also have a situation of competitive edge by adopting tools and techniques provided in digital marketing in order to market products and services.

Target market

Target market for P&G can be those areas which are still unexplored by Unilever. There are some under developed and developing counties in the world are having adequate access to internet and highly potential market (Alavi, Ahuja and Medury, 2011). So these markets can be target by P&G which will help organization to increase its market share and becoming more popular brand in the FMCG sector. There are many under developed and developing countries in the world in which have ample amount of internet users so the from of digital media marketing can emerged as very effective tools for marketing and exploring theses areas. P&G can target household consumer which are active on discussion forums on internet. In present time, many consumers use recommendations and suggestions through social sites before final purchase. So targeting specific forums would be helpful.

P&G is a FMCG brand that provides customers with consumer goods. People whom company would influence can be generally household peoples. Variety of products that are offered by P&G can be very helpful top household as company provided very high quality products at very affordable prices. In many households daily use consumer goods are purchased by housewife. To increase sales, the brand required to post comments and ads that generate interest among the females. It is must that comments should be relevant, understandable and attractive so that it catches attention at the first view.

Control and evaluation

Future

Every company needs to ensure that the tools and techniques they are using for digital marketing are satisfying the objectives of company or not. Companies’ needs to consider the techniques of digital marketing are helping company to cover and reach the market share or not.
Digital marketing is emerging as a biggest tool for marketing and advertising in 21st century and it can be very effective. But what company needs to ensure is that it should be used in a very effective and efficient manner so that company can achieve objectives, goals and profitably in long run.

Future predictions of digital marketing

Other digital marketing methods

Website Design - The design and landing pages of the website is of highest importance as it creates a first impression on the user experience. With the development and introduction of tools and creativity, there lies no reason for any excuse. Moreover the intensity of competition has reached to such a level that users took not time to shift to other providers.

Ranking Metrics - Almost all sites are following the age old methods of content and keywords to score higher ranking in the Google search results. But the focus needs to be changed towards generating quality of context, website interaction and social interaction with the user.

Questionnaire

Questionnaire can be effective tool for evaluating particulate process or situation. Questionnaires can take many forms including checklists, multiple choice questions, open and closed questions, etc. Successful questionnaires tend to include a combination of formats, with the opportunity to answer questions in a variety of styles.

Can be used when initially planning an evaluation in order to create an evaluation plan and to help decide which tools or techniques will be most appropriate to generate the most meaningful results depending on the target audience. It further includes who is your audience, what are you evaluating, will the finding have any benefit and what is most appropriate.

You can also read: Marketing in Travel and Tourism

References

• Baker, M., and Hart, S., 2008. The marketing book. Routledge.
• Charlesworth, A., 2009. Internet marketing: a practical approach. Routledge.
• Chen, Y., Fay, S., and Wang, Q., 2011. The role of marketing in social media: How online consumer reviews evolve. Journal of Interactive Marketing.
• Dann, S., 2010. Redefining social marketing with contemporary commercial marketing definitions. Journal of Business Research.
• Grover, R., and Vriens, M., 2006. The handbook of marketing research: uses, misuses, and future advances. Sage Publications.
• Kim, Y. M., and Hawamdeh, S., 2008. Leveraging customer knowledge: a comparative study of eCRM functionality and its use in e-commerce websites. International Journal of Electronic Customer Relationship Management.
• Lee, G. G., and Lin, H. F., 2005. Customer perceptions of e-service quality in online shopping. International Journal of Retail and Distribution Management.
• Prasad, V. K., Ramamurthy, K., and Naidu, G. M., 2001. The influence of internet-marketing integration on marketing competencies and export performance. Journal of International Marketing.
• Weinberg, T., 2009. The new community rules: Marketing on the social web. Sebastopol, CA: O'Reilly.

UPTO56%

Avail The Benefit Today!

To View this & another 50000+ free

Enter Email

Submit