Web (Online) marketing communication

 Written by Kannan Balaram

Introduction:

Web (Online) has created a new type of market for customers and companies, and has become a serious alternative to traditional markets. The Internet as a marketing communication tool is something that businesses must consider (Paul 1996). While businesses rush into the Internet market, the successful operation of this medium requires selecting an appropriate strategy and designing an effective website. Since websites are the main interface between companies and their customers in the Internet market, a company's website should reflect its policies and strategy. The effective adoption and implementation of policies on websites require an understanding regarding how the website elements may influence customers' beliefs and behaviour. Good web marketing could be achieved by creating an integrated approach to strategy and implementation for operating in the web (online) market. Marketing development is given to the real-time connections, communication, and exchange of information with the use of high-tech gadgets and devices (White 2010). Internet is a powerful, fast and flexible way of communication, and the communication principles that we use in everyday life nowadays can be applied in mobile and web marketing communications. That is where digital marketing takes place (Eisenberg & Eisenberg 2006).

Definition and characteristics of web marketing:

Addressability: Digital media provides companies with an ability to distinguish the potential customers before the actual marketing activities implementation. This is what addressability is about. The basic principles of obtaining the information on the target audience could be registration on a website where the user should put some background data, like age, city of origin, sex. (Pride & Ferrell 2011).

Connectivity: Social networking as a process of Internet users’ interaction and communication on special social media platforms has its key feature in connectivity. (Pride & Ferrell 2011).

Interactivity: Inter-activity is expressed in the customers’ ability to express their needs, desires, and demands directly to companies, also give feedbacks and comments on entities’ operations (Pride & Ferrell 2011).

Accessibility: Accessibility represents customers’ capacity to obtain the information on Internet easy and to determine the most useful and valuable data that is in user’s interest. (Pride & Ferrell 2011).

Control: Consumer control of contact means that consumers are more willing to participate in some e-marketing communication activities as they feel a sense of control over them. Meanwhile consumer control of content is about the interactive way of information creation and spreading. (Blythe 2006).

 

 Internet: The Internet is a global network of networks. Any computer connected to the Internet can communicate with any server in the system. (Zinkhan 2002). Organizations are increasingly using the Internet to market products and services to customers, transact with suppliers and intermediaries, communicate with employees, deal with government and inform investors.

Intranet: The intranet is especially well suited for communication with “internal customers” such as employees (Zinkhan, 2002). Companies use intranets to build relationships with internal stakeholders and primarily employees.

Extranet: “Extranet” can be used in other areas like purchasing where approved suppliers or approved tenderness have access to stock level, job specifications, purchase order numbers. (Smith, 1998). An extranet connects the intranets of an organization with its trading partners, suppliers, distributors and customers.

(Kippenberger 2000).

Source: The Internet as a medium for marketing communication (from internet.)

Web marketing vs. Traditional marketing communication channels:

In identifying Internet market strategies, it is important to distinguish between two types of markets in general: traditional and Internet markets (Strader and Shaw 1997). We define traditional markets as those in which buyers and sellers do not use the Internet for public, market-related activities. By contrast, in the Internet market, buyers and sellers rely on the Internet to conduct market-related activities. The first question is whether these two types of market are different, and if so, what are the possible strategies for choosing a market to operate in. We can differentiate the Internet and traditional markets in three dimensions: access, competition, and information. 

Source: The evolution of Marketing Communications (Tuten & Solomon 2013).

Web (Online) marketing communication channels:

In the book by Chaffey et al. (2009) digital media channels are defined as online communication tools that are applied to obtain brand awareness and to impact purchases by the digital media users, who visit websites and get engaged with the marketed brands or commodities. It is important not to mix up digital and Internet marketing communications that include only those communication tools used via Internet.

Source: Online communication tools (Chaffey 2009).

Banners: A banner is a graphic display that is used for advertising on a Web page. There are several types of banners. Keyword banners appear when a predetermined word is queried from a search engine. They are effective for companies that want to narrow their target audience. (Turban 2004) Banners can be static or interactive. (Janal 1997).  Static banners are always on the Web page and Pop-up banners appear when least expected (Turban 2004). Banner ads are small advertisement that companies buy and place on other companies' advertising vehicles, such as search engines, chat rooms, online magazines, and web pages.

Gamification:  The basic tenet of gamification in marketing considers the utilization of game play mechanics for non-game applications especially on consumer-oriented web and mobile sites. The objective of this process is to motivate and encourage people to accept the applications and to make them aware of the marketed product or brand.

Pop-Up and Similar Ads: A pop-up ad, also known as ad spawning, is the automatic launching of new browser windows with an ad when a visitor enters or exits a site, on delay, or on other triggers. (Turban 2004).

Interstitials: An interstitial is a page or box that appears after a user clicks on a link these ads remain while content is loading. An interstitial may be an initial Web page or a portion of one that is used to capture the user's attention for a short time. (Turban 2004).

Social media marketing: Over a short period of time social media has become one of the most usable and popular Internet communication platforms, and it is possible to notice the same tendency in marketing – involvement of social media in marketing campaigns has become extremely huge. Social media plays an incredibly huge role in current branding and if applied in a right way, it may boost business operations. It is a radical shift in the way people communicate and companies lead their marketing activities. (Qualman 2009). The social networking that allows the quick and easy dissemination of information is in part a product of changes in online communication channels. In fact, online marketing means focusing on the use of Internet for promotion where both pull (a banner, search engine result pages) and push (e-mailing, instant messaging) strategies can be applied (Kitchenman 2010).

Source: Steps to achieve a social media success (Underhill & Kurit 2009).

E-mail and Mailing lists: A popular way to advertise on the Internet is to send company or product information to people or companies listed in mailing lists via electronic mail - e-mail. (Turban 2004). According to Chaffey (2003), e-mail is a significant communications medium since it is widely used. E-mail advertising is the online equivalent of direct mail advertising and e-mail ads often direct visitors to Web sites using hyperlinks. (Strauss & Frost, 1999). The advantages of the e-mail advertising approach are its low cost and the ability to reach a wide variety of targeted audience. Also, e-mail is an interactive medium, and it can combine advertising and customer service. (Turban 2004).

Online press releases: The popularity of this marketing communication channel is determined by the customers’ want to be aware of selling company’s operations, production processes, quality of services and products presented on the market. They are targeted directly at potential buyers and include redirections to a company’s website, as many Internet marketing communications do (Scott 2011).

Newspaper-Like Standardized Ads: These standardized ads are larger and more noticeable than banner ads. They look like the ads in a newspaper or magazine. The ads appear on Web sites in columns or boxes. One of the most popular of the standardized ads is a full-column-deep ad called a skyscraper ad. Some of these ads are interactive; users can click on a link inside the ad for more information about a product or service.

URLs: Most search engines allow companies to submit their Internet addresses, called URLs (Universal Resource Locators), for free so that these URLs can be searched electronically (Turban 2004). The major advantage of using URLs as an advertising tool is that it is free.

Advertising in Chat Rooms: A chat room can be used for advertising. The main difference between an advertisement that appears on a static Web page and one that comes through a chat room is that the latter allows advertisers to cycle through messages and target the chatters again and again. Also, advertising can become more thematic in a chat

Video marketing: Video marketing is able to promote the effectiveness. It enables the company to create an emotional connection with its target audience, as it not only provides people with valuable information, but also presents audio and visual effects.

Video Conferencing: Video conferencing enable marketers to create a relationship with a customer, provide support, and distribute sales information at the customer's convenience for the cost of a local phone call to the Internet service provider (ISP). A possible advantage of the online conference is that all people can participate.

Virtual Exhibitions: Virtual exhibitions bring suppliers, competitors and customers under one virtual roof without leaving their office, or home, customers can reduce the exhausting medium of massive exhibitions by visiting specific shows at any time of day or night. They can go to the virtual stands, examine products and services and leave their details for future quotations. (Smith, 1998).

Online sponsorships: Sponsorships are blooming on the Web as banner rises and as more firms build synergistic partnerships to provide useful content. Sponsorships are particularly well suited for the Web because in many ways the commercial side of the Web is simply a series of firms clamoring after similar targets. (Strauss & Frost 1999).

Blog marketing: There are two ways of implementing blog marketing online: creation of the corporate blog and the usage of a third-party blog for promotional and advertising purposes. The main advantages of blogging that make it so popular these days are its capacity to generate traffic to company’s website, diversifying its content, influencing SEO and other media channels effectiveness, enhancing brand image, and demonstrating in-formative expertise to the readers. (Miller 2012).

Article marketing: This marketing communication tool is highly significant for online promotion, especially in the combination with several other channels, like social media. It brings the awareness of target groups and contributes to the online visibility of a company. Usually articles are not posted on one social media platform, but are spread all over the Internet - on blogs, forums, websites, via e-mails. (Taylor & Riklan 2011).

Other forms of advertising: Smart cell phones are dominating day by day in web marking. These devices are more handy and easy to customers to access seller. So, companies also target more and more in this area.

Web (Online) marketing Advantages:

The Internet is the least expensive marketing communication tool as well as the most cost-effective. People from around the world can create a business relationship for a fraction of the cost of any other marketing method. (Janal 1997).♣ The Internet offers a new, additional marketing communications channel to inform customers of the benefits of a product and assist in the buying decision. (Chaffey 2003). ♣ The Internet offers marketers the ability to make available full-colour virtual catalogues, provide on-screen order form, offer on-line customer support, announce and even distribute certain products easily, and to elicit customer feedback. (Pitt 1996). The Web provides an efficient channel for advertising, marketing and even direct distribution of certain goods and information services. ♣ The Internet and websites have become extremely important avenues for firms in many industries to interact with their customers and other stakeholders. (Merwe & Bekker 2003). ♣ The open-market nature of the Internet increases the bargaining power of buyers by increasing their ability to search for the best price, which may make the Internet more competitive than a traditional market. ♣ The global accessibility of the Internet provides a higher degree of cultural, social, and preference diversities, demanding different business approaches to product design, marketing, and other related business activities.

Web (Online) marketing disadvantages:

1. A reliance of an entity on the customer’s interactivity and activity online

2. Vulnerability of company’s image concerning feedback on forums, blogs and discussions

3. Lack of security of information

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