The Internet has become like a breath for our lives every day today. Like the Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age, we can call this ‘The Digital Age’ with about 59% of the world’s population having accessibility to the Internet. Just like the growth of the Internet, the competition has also increased drastically.

It becomes difficult when you want to grow your business only by the influence of people. We have to move our strategy along with the development of technology for marketing. That’s where digital marketing comes into play.

What is Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing is a marketing technique used by professionals to promote their businesses using social media, websites, etc. Digital marketing reduces all traditional marketing effects by replacing printed ads, physical marketing with online ads, websites, etc. “Easier said than done” is what you would have heard, but that’s not the case with digital marketing.

Digital marketing allows worldwide customers to reach out easily when posted on social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, etc. 

Digital marketing allows the promotion of business within the budget that you could afford. By digital marketing, it becomes easier to make posters, ads more creative, which in turn increases your SEO, instead of pushing the products forcibly to the customer as in traditional marketing. Knowing more about people’s feedback and requirement and making changes in it gives a hike in business.

Tracking the business status and updates of the same at a given interval are the most important advantages. This makes it more popular and more accessible. But to know more about this digitalization era’s future, it is essential to know its history.

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History of Digital Marketing

The concept of connectivity is what made the Internet famous. It all started with a connection called ARPANET or U.S. Advanced Research Projects Agency made between universities like Stanford University, University of California, Santa Barbara, and Los Angeles and Universe of Utah. In the ‘70s beginning, the Internet was used only for exchanging emails and information.

It was used widely in the military and universities only. Followed by the other two decades, they were also available for transferring data and information. This paved the way for personal computer users, along with the development of software networking.

By 1992, when the U.S. government lifted its constraint to use the commercial use such as selling and buying, the web interface called ‘Mosaic’ was used for the user-friendly browser with a graphical interface.

The Mosaic was later named as Netscape Navigator. In 1994, Netscape provided web advertising after creating a web browser, which was received broadly. The Internet then had a broad acceptance in the sales medium.

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Evolution of Digital Marketing

As days went by, search engines like Yahoo and Google were created with not just concentration on the mails by 1994 and 1995, respectively.

In 2000, Google became the most popular search engine. Then came the e-commercial sites like Amazon. This became a more significant revolution for internet users as they could directly search for the information or product they desire to buy since all it takes is to search online.

Companies started their marketing by increasing by adding keywords, tagging, and links to generate high trafficking. This started to push the server faster. That’s the time when digital marketing made its grand entry.

Milestones of Digital Marketing

Up until the year 2000, there were many websites just like IBM, IBM Corp followed by any other little startups, which also failed in the mid-way. Google then offered many marketers a service to advertise its products and has gained revenue of 134.81 billion US Dollars as of 2019, topping the world’s largest search engine.

A study in 2000 also found that digital information was the rapidly growing information type. This information is known as “big data.” This was also called ‘Web 2.0’ because this information was replaced with all the physical properties like film, CDs, and paper.

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The Era of Big Data

Every information was somewhat shifting to ‘big data’ since discoveries for data storage was found. A more significant effect was found due to the information sharing and user-friendly collaborations between people online.

This allowed the user also to produce content by themselves. Examples of more significant effects can be seen by introducing apps like WordPress, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter, where people started sharing personal information online and the interaction between each other or more.

Big data made it possible to track patterns and human behavior, which was useful to increase marketing strategy. This is also known as data-driven marketing. Data-driven marketing allowed companies to harness their technology, seeing their specialization.

Some large companies like Optimove do their marketing using predictive analysis. In this, big data is used to acquire emotional intelligence to connect with the customers effectively. This had brought a significant change in the customer relationship.

In the 1970s, the cellphones of the 1970s and 1980s were mainly meant for use in cars while attempts never made it. The first true modern smartphone was produced in 2003 and produced email, text messaging, calls, etc.

But in 2007, the iPhone made a groundbreaking effect in the smartphone world. After this came the massive revolution of smartphones with Pinterest, Whatsapp, Instagram, and Google.

Personalization in the apps or websites made the rapport with the customers more intimate. This gave the product’s marketing strategy, making them more popular because of the engagement.

Cookie provided the advertisers with the way to provide customers with the most searched and accessed things according to the user’s time on the Internet. Cookies nowadays are used to collect user data through code to the marketer.

One other marketing technique is called the agile marketing technique, mostly used in social media applications like Facebook and Twitter. This marketing technique is used by capturing the opportunity of the current affairs and creating online content. The impact of such content has more significant since it mostly captivates the people’s attention by adding the terms of tone and voice depending upon the brands.

This type of marketing allows the marketer to feel in relevance with the audience. They provide a user-brand relationship easily. It also allows new brands and marketers to make a good step for advertising.

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Conclusion

On the whole, digital marketing has come a long way in its development. Digital marketing and its effects are increasing rapidly with the technology change, waking up so many challenges along its way.

If you wish to explore and become an expert in Digital Marketing, check out MICA and upGrad’s Digital Marketing Certificate Program. Become an expert in social media marketing, content marketing, branding, marketing analysis, and PR.

If you are curious to get into the world of digital marketing, check out upGrad & MICA’s Advanced Certificate in Digital Marketing & Communication.

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