76 A COMPARATIVE STUDY BETWEEN TRADITIONAL MARKETING AND DIGITAL
MARKETING WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO COVID-19 Nishi Nagar
BBA student, Daly College of Business Management, Indore Dr. Sonal Sisodia
Principal, Daly College of Business Management, Indore
Abstract: The field of marketing has gone through a quantum leap since the emergence of digital ways of marketing a product. The COVID-19 crisis has considerably affected the digital marketing sphere. This transformation is driven by the boundless potential and far- reaching spread of technology powered by the period of the pandemic which has nudged the influence of digital marketing. This radical change towards digitalization has eliminated some traditional methods of marketing. The purpose of this paper is to study the difference between conventional marketing and digital marketing. In conceptual form, this paper addresses how digital marketing had affected the traditional ways of marketing. The paper is based on secondary data. It shows that marketing professionals are convinced that changes in how organisations’ marketing must be made, which also implies an increase in the work volumes. This will allow taking down the harmful effects of the corona virus pandemic, stabilizing sales, and quickly returning to pre-quarantine business performance indicators. The pandemic has compelled businesses to transition online to showcase their products and services. This, in turn, has prompted brands to create content that is contextual and relevant in order to garner a larger mindshare from their customer base.
Keywords: Digital Marketing, Traditional Marketing, pandemic, Consumer Behavior Introduction
1 INTRODUCTION
The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic had upended the projections of every business and digital marketing is no exception. The health scare factor accelerated the need to shift gears. The transition to remote work prompted by the social distancing measures has created the need for virtual marketing of brands, customer interactions and basically conducting overall business. The crippling impacts in the early couple of months during the first wave of the pandemic have been long-lasting and potentially permanent in case of certain businesses. This transformation is driven by the boundless potential and far- reaching spread of technology powered by the period of the pandemic which has nudged the influence of digital marketing. This radical change towards digitalization has eliminated some traditional methods of marketing (Sonagara, 2020).In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses are scrambling to pivot their strategies to adjust to changing consumer behaviors, trends, and needs; and digital marketing is the rising star for business pandemic survival (Esposito, 2020)
2 NEED OF THE STUDY
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, brands can no longer create their real-time ambiance for their products or services. They had to shift focus to digital marketing for creating the luxury of their brand for selling products as well as services. Digital marketing got a boost after this pandemic and it will be the future of marketing when compare to the traditional marketing. The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of digital media and identify whether it is an imperative tool for consumers and marketers. Secondly, Internet & social media will only gain strength in the upcoming years, so this is a crucial topic for every organization to discuss the appropriate method of marketing while formulating its marketing strategies,
77 3 Objectives:
To study customer’s and seller’s behavior in regards to different modes of shopping in times of pandemic
To explore the various methods of digital marketing and traditional marketing.
Methodology
The paper is based on secondary data & information has been analyzed before preparing this paper extensively. The secondary data and information has been collected from different scholars and researchers, published e-books, articles published in different journals, periodicals, and conference papers. The survey-related data and information are used, which is available publicly on the websites of the company.
4 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
With the fiercely increasing competition, the importance of marketing is also increasing leading to a shoot up in the marketing budgets by leaps and bounds. This reinforces the responsibilities of the marketing executives to opt for the most suitable marketing method to promote and earn an edge over their competitors. These methods can be broadly categorized into two main categories - Traditional Marketing and Digital Marketing.
1.1 Traditional Marketing
Traditional Marketing encompasses the methods that have been here for decades and can be used without the internet. These methods are used ever since the concept of branding and advertising came into existence. It includes more familiar and physical ways of connecting with the consumer such as –
Print Media Marketing
Marketing through print media involves advertising products and services in newspapers, magazines, and media. Print marketing has the advantage of reaching a wide range of potential customers, which makes it considered as a bulk marketing method.
Broadcast Media
Broadcast media can facilitate audio and visual presentation of the products thus marketers can make much more impactful and creative commercials using television, radio, and various other forms of broadcast media.
OOH Marketing
Out-of-home marketing or OOH marketing is a tool to reach out to customers outside their homes. OOH marketing primarily focuses on visual impacts therefore they use billboards, bus stops, etc.
Face to Face Interaction
Sales staff use methods like cold calling, telemarketing, one on one interaction which are much more personal and much more impactful in the process of building trust with the potential customer and retention of existing ones.
Event Marketing
Event marketing is a highly effective tool as it’s a direct method of reaching out to prospects and create a buzz by providing a memorable experience. Events like contests, shows, celebrations, fairs, etc. can be organized brands to attract new customers and interact with the old ones
78 Traditional marketing has been eclipsed by the emergence of digital marketing in many industries, but it is still effective in building your brand as –
The traditional marketing channel can be very effective in reaching an older demographic. According to Globe Newswire, viewers aged 50+ spend almost twice as much time reading newspapers and watching television as younger audiences.
A marketing strategy such as this usually works best for businesses looking to build a large local audience.
The television or radio advertisements will play multiple times and remind customers of your company and help them retain it
1. 2 DIGITAL MARKETING
The term "digital marketing" refers to the marketing of products or services using digital technologies, primarily the Internet, but also including display advertising, and other forms of digital marketing. Digital marketing facilitates brands to communicate with their customers online, targeting them more directly as compared to traditional marketing.
It will help brands define specific e-marketing objectives and develop strategies to take advantage of the marketing opportunities provided by the Internet.
Following are the methods through which brands can reach out to their target audience and increase their brand awareness while their customers are sitting at the comfort of their home -
4 SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION
SEO or Search Engines Optimisation is the process of improving your website to be more visible when people search for products and services related to your business on search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. Search results impact how likely you are to attract new and existing customers to your business. The higher your visibility is in search results, the better chances you have of attracting attention.
•Content Marketing
This is a strategic marketing approach that drives profitable customer action by creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to reach out to and retain customers. These can include info graphics, videos, podcasts etc.
•Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing involves connecting with your audience through social media platforms to build your brand, increase sales, and drive traffic to your website. This involves posting creative content on your social media profiles, engaging with your followers, and running social media advertisements.
•Pay per click Marketing
Pay-per-click or PPC is an advertising method through which advertisers place ads on an advertisement platform or pages and pay the host when their ad is clicked by a user. The purpose of the ad is to lead the user who clicked on the ad to the advertiser’s website or app
•Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is the process of earning money (commissions) by promoting a company's products or services and driving sales. Similar to a sales representative who gets paid commission-only, you only make money when you make a sale.
•Email Marketing
Email marketing is a way to make your customers who are on your email list aware of new products, discounts, and other services. A softer sale could also be executed to educate your audience about the value of your brand.
79 It can be seen that Digital marketing strategies are always evolving with new technology and trends like regional language voice search and social media features such as reels.
Following are the points where digital marketing has an edge over traditional marketing
•One can segment the audience and personalize messaging for each segment based on what they need. Organisations can target audiences on a national, local, or international scale.
•It is possible to determine how visitors arrive at organisations’ website by using analytics tools. Identifying which sites generate leads can help better define the target market and discover new markets too.
•Compared to traditional marketing strategies, digital marketing incurs significantly fewer costs.
2. Emergence of Digital Marketing during the period of pandemic
In the wake of Covid-19's spread around the world, people are learning new ways to live.
The pandemic presented an unprecedented challenge and for many businesses, it has proven to be an unmitigated disaster, whereas hundreds of others took the situation in their stride. This lead to companies pivoting towards digital marketing. Online sales in India has increased by nearly 100 percent during this period, hence entrepreneurs and businesses are beginning to understand the power of this shift
Print Media’s Makeover With a pause in the delivery of newspapers at our doorstep, companies have stopped spending on print media. The newspaper industry wasn't prepared for the accelerated digitization resulting from the pandemic hence they saw a 76% drop in advertisement revenue. But they had digital platforms for their rescue. The KPMG report of September 2020 tells us that digital platforms of both English and other local language newspapers saw their unique visitors double after newspaper delivery was blocked. It is expected that 50-60% of this gain will be sustained even after Covid-19's threat subsides.
OOH media face the “NOT TO BE OUT-OF-HOME” situation
The battle against COVID-19 starts with staying at home, and the type of media which had to face the obvious effect was Out-Of-Home media. As per exchange4media, the industry saw a 6 percent drop in overall spending as compared to 2019.
Ascent in the importance of Search Engine Optimization
With accelerated engagement rates during the lockdown period, Brands began to realize the power of organic reach. Search engine optimization and content marketing shot to prominence, and they will remain vital once the lockdown ends.
OTT platforms were over the top after witnessing their surge
Over the course of the lockdown, the subscriber base of OTT platforms in India increased by 80 percent (Forbes) and brands took no time to seize this opportunity to leverage OTT’s customizable advertising medium.
Rousing social media presence of brands
After observing a steep decline of 21% in ad spends, It has now become apparent to marketers that only digital advances are their only savior. Digital has now become the best medium for advertisers to reach their end-users. Companies have now shifted their spending from the traditional means of promotions like newspaper ads, hoardings, etc., to digital and social platforms which include social media like YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter and also digital OTT platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Spotify, Hotstart, Zee 5 etc. Even in these tough times, Digital platforms enabled brands to stay connected with their audiences and create awareness in various creative ways.
Increased Influence of Influencers
Around 72% of the marketers believed that influencer marketing is the fastest-growing online customer acquisition method (Buzzoka’s outlook). Influencers play a key role in
80 propagating viral trends. With an increase in the average time spent online on social media platforms, there is also a steady increase in the number of influencers on the internet.
Boost in Website traffic
As per Deloitte, Website traffic grew by 13% in Q1 2020 compared to Q1 2019. Desktop and Social Surge in Traffic - In addition to the rise in digital commerce and traffic. During the Covid-19 pandemic, 65% of respondents agreed that marketing is becoming more important as a function due to the increase in digital marketing activities for customer acquisition.
55% of marketers confirmed that they will allocate more spends on social media, content marketing, paid video and retail websites/apps advertising. As per a report by Deloitte, there was an 18% increase in the digital sales growth in the first quarter of 2020 compared to the first quarter of 2019 for the companies that shifted to digital marketing (www.
exchanage4media)
3. Future of Digital Marketing
The impact of experiential marketing can last longer for almost any brand or industry as it is all about immersing consumers in live experiences whether it is through a website, webinar, or landing page. In digital marketing, marketers have to match consumer preferences and trends. But a year into COVID, businesses should take a pause and reconsider their next steps. The ripple effect of these changes will be felt for years to come.
When it comes to brand presence on social media, companies need to keep their foothold even if covid-19 comes to an end, since it may be harder to recover later if they lose momentum. The pandemic has permanently changed consumer behavior. As a result, people are getting comfortable with doing things online, whether it is shopping, ordering food or medicines, or conducting banking transactions. In addition to this, it is important to keep in mind that the next generation will be part of the already digital world and will be used to everything being online. Hence, companies need to take steps today to be able to offer services to their future consumers
Here are six reasons why focusing on digital marketing is important for the business’ health during the pandemic (Esposito, 2020).
1. Consumers are Spending More Time Online Than Ever: Digital marketing strategies place the sellers right there with their audience ,via ads on the websites they visit daily, branded social media content that appears in their feeds, and search engine optimization (SEO) practices that place the website front and center when they’re doing online research. During the pandemic, when a brand won’t remain top of mind without an online presence. And with more brands ramping up their digital presence, you’ll need a strong digital marketing strategy in order to stand out amid the crowd.
2. Consumer Shopping Behavior is changing: With high levels of unemployment and many families operating with a reduced income, consumers are more financially conservative during the pandemic. We are also seeing a significant drop in visits to brick-and-mortar businesses, due to stay-at-home guidelines.
3. It helps to gain Access to More Consumer Data: Digital marketing will help sellers to understand their consumers’ current habits, how their behaviors have changed (or not) during the pandemic, and their current interests and challenges. This can be leveraged to personalize the marketing, advertising, and customer service to best meet audience’s needs right now.
4. Beingadaptable amid changing circumstances is the key: During a pandemic, consumer emotions, concerns, and life circumstances change week to week — and that means businesses must be able to pivot quickly to survive in the ever- fluctuating landscape.
5. Digital marketing provides an opportunity to get an edge on Competition:
Some businesses are recognizing the growth potential of a strong online presence during the pandemic, but others are significantly cutting their marketing and
81 advertising spend in an effort to make ends meet. The competitive advantages that digital marketing provides are multiplied if the competitors are lagging in their digital presence.
6. Instrumental in future success post-pandemic: Digital marketing is the way of the future. The current pandemic presents a host of good reasons to invest in digital marketing immediately — but even better, the digital strategies sellers put in place now will pay off in both the short and long term.
Conclusions
In a matter of months, lifestyle and perspective have shifted so dramatically for everyone, and accordingly, brands have had to shift their content to ensure that their message remains relevant and well-received. For a brand or a company, the relevance of online presence has never been more important, and with Covid-19 the strategies that the companies were using to strive through the market were no longer feasible to function. They had to come up with plans and strategies in a short period of time to design the roadmap ahead. Digitalization has changed the world. Due to the growth of the digital age, marketers need to start investing in digital campaigns. The traditional market still has its market, but it is decreasing due to digital progressions. It is now essential to have a digital presence and use the internet to engage with audience. So, businesses should continue their traditional marketing, while also ensuring that they are digitally accessible and are expanding their presence online. Digital and traditional marketing both provide a variety of benefits to both companies and consumers. Both come with extensive lists of benefits and drawbacks, but the main difference between them is the cost. Using digital marketing will help you reach a particular audience while keeping costs low. In addition, collected audience demographics will also help you create marketing campaigns that are even more effective. Although traditional marketing has been obscured by digital marketing in many industries, it is still effective in boosting brands’ presence. For older audiences or local audiences, traditional marketing methods may work better and stand out more than digital marketing methods. If digital marketing is here to stay, then traditional marketing is still here for a reason too.
When considering which marketing strategy is the most appropriate for the business, companies should consider the following factors such as cost-effective, demographics of your audience, improved accessibility and scope of higher visibility. The bottom line is that companies need to fully understand their business and the audience in order to choose the right strategy. The post-pandemic landscape is likely to feature more business taking place online, higher demand for shopping experiences that are accessible from the convenience of home, and increased time spent on the internet and social media platforms for both work and fun. The businesses who aren’t investing in digital marketing and fine-tuning their practices now will find themselves trailing behind the pack in the aftermath of the pandemic. So now turning on digital marketing is the way which every business need and has to adopt to sustain and grow their business.
FURTHER RESEARCH
This study can be further extended to the comparison of different digital marketing techniques for different types of businesses.
References
1. Esposito (2020), ―6 Reasons Why Digital Marketing is Important During the Pandemic‖www.800.com/blog
2. Sonagara Abhijeet (2020), Effects of Covid-19 on digital marketing, www.yourstory.com
3. www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Conferences/GSR/2020/Documents/GSR-20_Impact- COVID-19-on-digital-economy_DiscussionPaper.pdf
4. https://deloitte.wsj.com/cmo/2020/07/24/survey-covid-19-and-the-state, accessed June 24, 2020
