The History and Evolution of Digital Marketing
With the advancement of the world, there have been many changes in consumer behavior and communication pattern in the market. Digitalization in marketing has made it easier to reach out to a business's target audience; however, it has also made it challenging for them to keep up with the industry trends and maintain an outflow of creative content.
In an age where more than 170 million people use social media daily, almost every working professional must understand at least the fundamentals of Digital Marketing, making it an essential component for every business. Digital marketing uses multiple online channels to promote or market a business's products and services to specific consumers. In simple terms, Digital Marketing promotes goods and services over the internet or any form of electronic media.
There are several advantages of Digital Marketing. Unlike conventional marketing, digital marketing is more affordable. Every individual has started to consume digital content daily; this will soon eradicate traditional marketing platforms and make digital sources the only platform remaining. In this blog, we have attempted to decipher the history and evolution of Digital Marketing, its benefits, and more.
What is Digital Marketing?
Marketing done using any digital channels by a business or company to promote its products and services to consumers is called digital marketing. Different mobile devices, websites, search engines, social media, and other channels fall under digital marketing.
How successful is Digital Marketing?
With Digitalization, it has been evident that consumer behavior has changed drastically in terms of shopping for a product. Walk-in markets are on the verge of gradually decreasing, and it is observed that more and more people are shifting to online shopping to make purchases for themselves and their families. Hence, there are multiple advantages to promoting a business online to reach the right audience.
Benefits of Digital Marketing
Technological advancements have significantly lost traditional marketing companies' and departments' customer base. You can contact a more significant number of people in less time. Consumers have shifted to phones, tablets, and laptops, where digital marketers have made the most progress.
History of Digital Marketing
The phrase "Digital Marketing" initially appeared in the 1990s. The internet and the creation of the Web 1.0 platform ushered in the digital age. Marketers worldwide were still wary of the digital platform up until that point. They were still determining whether their techniques would work because the internet needed to be widely deployed. The Web 1.0 platform allowed users to locate the information they were looking for but did not allow them to share it with others.
HotWired, in 1993, was the first to purchase a few banner ads after the first clickable banner went live. This marked the beginning of the marketing transfer to the digital era. As a result of this gradual shift, new technologies entered the digital marketplace in 1994. Yahoo was founded in the same year.
Yahoo, also called "Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web" because of its founder Jerry Yang, garnered around one million hits in its first year. This resulted in significant changes in digital marketing, with businesses optimizing their websites to achieve higher search engine ranks. HotBot, LookSmart, and Alexa were the new search engines and tools introduced in 1996.
Google was established in 1998. Microsoft introduced the MSN search engine, and Yahoo introduced the Yahoo web search. The internet bubble burst, and the smaller search engines were either left behind or killed out, making room for the industry's behemoths in the next two years. The digital marketing world had its first significant boom in 2006 when search engine traffic was believed to have increased to over 6.4 billion monthly. Not wanting to be left behind, Microsoft shelved MSN and established Live Search to compete with Google and Yahoo.
Then came Web 2.0, which encouraged individuals to participate more actively than passive users. Web 2.0 enabled people to communicate with one another and with businesses. This resulted in information flow volumes - including channels used by digital marketers - rising dramatically, and by 2004, internet advertising and marketing in the United States alone generated over $2.9 billion. The internet came to be labeled as a "super information highway."
Social networking sites appeared soon after. MySpace was the first social networking site, and Facebook quickly followed it. Several businesses saw that the influx of new websites opened new avenues for marketing their products and brands. It opened up new business opportunities and marked the beginning of a new chapter in business. They required new techniques to market their companies and leverage the social networking platform now that they had new resources.
Another significant milestone in the digital marketing business was the biscuit. Marketers began to explore alternative methods to capitalize on the new technology. One such strategy was to track frequent internet users' surfing activities and usage patterns to personalize promotions and marketing collateral to their preferences. The first biscuit was created to track user habits. The cookie's use has evolved, and cookies are now coded to provide advertisers with several ways to capture literal user data.
Customers can now access digitally advertised products at any time. According to Marketingtechblog data for 2014, social media posting is the most popular online activity in the United States. Every day, the average American spends 37 minutes on social media. 99% of digital marketers market on Facebook, 69% on Pinterest, 97% on Twitter, and 59% on Instagram.
Marketers utilize Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook as the top three social networking sites. Facebook has been used by 70% of B2C marketers to acquire consumers. 67% of Twitter users are considerably more likely to purchase a brand they follow on Twitter. On Pinterest, 83.8% of luxury businesses have a presence.
Evolution of Digital Marketing - The Timeline
The 90s
Many websites still in use today were discovered in the 1990s, including Google and Yahoo's web search, both of which debuted in 1998. The first search engine, Archie, launched in the early 1990s, announcing the beginning of Search. SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, was soon after. In 1994, the first clickable web ad banners were introduced. The first identified social media network, with 3.5 million subscribers, was founded in 1997.
The Millenial Generation
In the new millennium, a massive economic bubble formed. Mobile text message marketing grew in popularity in the early 2000s. Unfortunately, the peak and bust of the bubble between 2000 and 2002 hurt numerous enterprises. When the economy recovered from the boom, many new sites were launched in the 2000s, including the start of LinkedIn in 2002, Myspace and WordPress in 2003, and Facebook in 2004.
The Mobile Era
In the second half of the decade, marketing and sales increased, with Amazon's e-commerce revenues exceeding $10 billion. Mobile app culture grew with the advent of Instagram, Whatsapp, and Snapchat to the digital world over the next few years.
The Present
With many new advancements and improvements in this fascinating business, digital marketing will flourish in the future. A mobile device accounts for 65% of an individual's digital media time. The digital advertising market is roughly $200 billion, with Google Ad Words accounting for 96% of income. Social networking has spearheaded the digital marketing revolution, with an estimated 3.1 billion internet users. The emergence of bloggers and Instagram has resulted in a $1 billion influencer economy, which is expected to grow.
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