IS DIGITAL MARKETING AN EVOLUTION OR REVOLUTION PRACTICE?
From a professional perspective, it is not doubted that digital platforms and online capabilities have introduced evolution to marketing. One form of digital marketing that has contributed to the evolution of marketing is social media digital marketing. In terms of definition, digital marketing is the component of current marketing that exploits the use of the internet and online-based digital technologies (Humphreys, 2016). It involves the use of desktops, mobile phones, and any other digital platforms that aid in the promotion of products and services of a company. Digital marketing began development in the 1990s and the 2000s (Humphreys 2016, p.23). Since its beginning, it has evolved marketing in several ways. Some of the means of which digital marketing has evolved marketing is through one of its standard form, which is social media marketing. Social media marketing is the use of social media platforms, for example, the major social media platform Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube to connect with a company’s audience to build a brand, increase sales and move forward the website traffic (Lindgren, 2017, P.34). In this essay, the focus is to evaluate the process of revolution of marketing spearheaded by social media marketing as a form of digital marketing. The case study used is the word of mouth marketing procedure over the years in the Uber Company.
Brand Engagement
Social media has improved word of mouth marketing through brand engagement. Brand engagement in the previous years before social media marketing prefered word of mouth marketing. This method has been essential for Uber, but with the introduction of social media, it has evolved into new levels. In previous times marketing was carried out through movers and shakers within the industries advocating for the brand, which is one-way communication and had to believe. In the year 2008, during the introduction of Uber, marketing concepts by the Coca Cola corporation was initiated by the Silicon Valley information technology company which was continually looking for new products which were then Uber. They would afterwards recommend it to customers by putting the advertisements online. The ad often covered the entire page of the advertisement blog. Each of the products meant to be introduced to the audience appeared in matters of the most importance. Uber is a brand that was a small enterprise at that time; it would get half-page of the Silicon Valley blog (Assimakopoulos et al., 2017, p.172). Bloggs was considered a practical kind of marketing platform. In terms of interaction, there was not any feedback; there was an assumption from the marketing department of Silicon Valley movers and Shakers that those who read this papers with colourful picture was attractive enough to make the clients and customers order for Uber rides and consider using them for transport
The early adopter advocacy marketing strategy, which is a form of word of mouth marketing assumed that viewers of the blog would accept the information and trust the blog site because of how it is enormous. Market profiling and online blog site before the indulgence of digital media by the Uber Corporation was the only way that marketing would be unique on matters branding. The existence of digital marketing has caused the evolution of word of mouth marketing strategy. It is only through social media marketing that brand engagement takes place, thereby strengthening word of mouth marketing strategy, which is an upgrade of the initial word of mouth marketing strategy.
In market profiling, there is no direct engagement of the audience of the Uber brand (Ananda et al., 2016, p.175). All that occurs in market profiling is an assumption. Social media is an evolution built around the community that uses the brand in service. Social media only thrives through users interacting on a one on one platform with their favourite brands. Social media marketing is a popular source of information for users which make the word of mouth marketing easier and better for the Uber Corporation. Once the company invested in social media platforms, for example, Facebook things changed. One client who pressed the like button communicated to a million others who are most likely looking for taxi services. The social media platform has revolutionised the word of mouth marketing by raising its levels to a referral.
Provision of Customers’ Service
A second evaluation which is proof that digital marketing has upgraded word of mouth marketing is through the provision of customer service. Social media marketing has revolutionised marketing into customer service helpline. Before the existence of digital media marketing friends and family are the only ones who created the platform for interaction. The presence of family and friends enhanced word of mouth marketing, but its limitation was that it was only for a few people. The attraction of spoken words and trust from family made it easier for marketers to advertise products and so they could not resist. From the Case study of Uber, they ran a lot of free rides and events to enhance the campaign. As a company, these events created highly proficient target marketing as a scientific discipline (Keegan and Rowley, 2017, p.1334). The marketing departments of the company in the year 2008 spend about more than fifty thousand U.S. dollars on a complex market research project and events. These projects were supposed to help spread the word across the target audience that the Uber ride was very comfortable. The effectiveness of these entire research projects stalled until the introduction of social media which enhanced customer service processes thereby improving word of mouth
The evolution of Uber began in the year 2008 with the early years of the internet (Teixeira and Brown, 2016, p.17). The evolution becomes more influential in the year 2010 when Uber Corporation decided to open social media accounts linking its customers and observing its request. The market research that the company spends billions of money on was not successful because there was not any engagement of the customers on the kind of products and help that they needed. All the marketing strategy was chosen based on trial and error. However, the existence of social media marketing there was a clickable banner linking marketers directly to their customers. The company can now serve their customers based on their customer needs and the kind of feedback that is received. Users of the taxi brand can now contact their services via social media channels to get their questions on areas of concern answered. The former long process that involved emailing, and telephone calls for customer helpline was time-consuming, and most clients felt unsatisfied. On social media platforms, the reply to a customer by a company is an instance. The social media marketing platforms have made it more accessible and useful to get a response from a representative and resolve customer’s queries quickly and services.
According to Uber corporation borrowing information from their website, they take pride in their brand and reputation by being the company that serves its customer’s concerns within a short period on all their online platforms (Macarthy, 2018, p.89). Social media marketing and its evolution on word of mouth marketing have enhanced customer service, which has helped Uber build the brand that it is today. The taxi ride company has control over the kind of service that their customers are demanding. From the above explanations, it is clear that social media marketing as a form of digital marketing revolutionised marketing through the introduction of online customer services which were not there previously especially in the word of mouth marketing strategy. The above explanation gets support by analysing the case study of Uber, which supports the thesis statement that digital marketing is an evolution to marketing.
Monitoring of Advertisement through reviews
Another way in which social media marketing as one of the forms of digital marketing has upgraded marketing is through the control of advertisements through reviews. Publication since the development of media has been a marketing strategy exploited by many businesses and entrepreneurs (Helmond et al., 2019, p.124). All through the print media era to the mainstream media era advertisements were paid for by the company that needed the services. The ads that published in newspapers cost between sixty-three thousand U.S. dollars to eight million. Uber Corporation in the financial year 2008-2010 spent forty thousand U.S. dollars as payment to Silicon Valley movers and shakers to get them to advocate for the brand. (Teixeira and Brown, 2016, p.60). The amount is too expensive compared to social media implementation. Social media provided Uber with several marketing and advertisement opportunities that are free. Although social media platforms create paid advertisement opportunities, the cost spends on advertisement are reduced. The prices are reduced through exploiting open marketing opportunities. Through the creation of an online application, the company has saved a lot of money on advertisement. They are also able to monitor their customer ratings and driver ratings.
The second means of exploiting social media marketing is through providing a space for monitoring drivers and clients (Jenkins and Green, 2018, n.p). Uber marketing managers, now have time to tailor, refine and control the target audience to which they wish to administer their advertisement. From the Case Stud Uber Company previously did not dictate to the Silicon Valley the kind of advertising events that they needed to be displayed on-air (Teixeira and Brown, 2016, P.61). With the existence of social media, the company creates its videos based on the target audience, behaviour, interest, demographics and trends and posts it on social media platforms. The company then monitors the feedback. If the input is useful, they send the video to the mainstream media to reach another massive number of people. An example of Uber Corporation was a video that went viral moments before display on mainstream media. The footage captured in 2017 had a moment when an Uber was used to save the life of a pregnant woman. The video attracted more than ten million views on YouTube (Khetan et al., 2019, n.p). According to Uber, the footage was targeting millennials, but it over succeeded expectations (Khetan et al., 2019, n.p). It is through monitoring that Uber as a company was able to identify that their video strategy was doing exceptionally well. In the absence of social media marketing, Uber would not have the capacity to establish their targets and monitor feedback on word of mouth advertising as a marketing strategy. From the analysis above, it is related that social media marketing as a form of digital marketing has upgraded advertisements (Khetan et al., 2019, n.p).
The argument from the lecture
Social media digital marketing has upgraded advertisement through the provision of a more natural way of implementing word of mouth marketing. As noted in the lecture notes, publication and word of mouth marketing is a core element of the marketing strategy exploited by only a few companies. Furthermore, the analysis in this paragraph agrees with the statement on the notes that social media marketing has upgraded and created an evolution on word of mouth as a marketing strategy.
Conclusion
It is through the social media revolution that digital marketing has remained a central contributor to marketing strategy. Social media marketing has encouraged a platform for marketers who work in companies and businesses to stay creative. Social media marketing has revolutionised marketing elements that include customers’ services, monitoring and brand engagement for the case of Uber Corporation.
References
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Appendix
https://www.annexcloud.com/blog/ubers-marketing-strategy-in-7-steps-revisited/