Digital Revolution
Beckons
Global Periscope
By Jones George
MBA, 2017
can help increase customer experience and
effectively target advertising campaigns. The
more you know about your users, the better
are your chances of them engaging with you.
Digital media has made possible personalised
communication and tailor made offers.
Consumer as master
Senior Manager with over 5 years of experience in the
financial services industry. In his last role, he implemented
marketing strategies and development of mutual funds at
Geojit BNP Paribas Financial Services.
The churning out of ever more powerful
information and communication devices,
programmes and their rapid spread into all
aspects of our life, by modern technology, has
created a digital marketing revolution. This
revolution, which has at present reached a
peak, has drawn into it businesses, markets,
consumers and created a new dynamic
environment that is fluid and characterised by
a blurring of distinctions between the players.
This phenomenon has become so pre-eminent
that no business or marketer can afford to not
embrace it.
For businesses and marketers, digital
technology has not only opened new
mediums to sell their products, but also to
offer personalised or custom-made solutions.
Various analytical tools are now available to
understand user behaviour across all online
platforms be it social media, web or mobile.
A brand needs to be on whichever channel
their consumers are on. Such information
14
AGSM
Yet it has also empowered the customer in
revolutionary ways. Customers are exposed
to high-quality information. Digital technology
has made the consumer the master which
forced corporations to offer products that
are competitive in prices, quality, value and
functionality. Digital media has empowered
consumers with the ability to gather information
unlike the old days when they would only have
access to information that you would want them
to know. Consumers are now exposed not just
to what a company says about its product but
also to what the online community is saying.
They like to associate with brands that can
understand them.
Oddly enough it was the recent global economic
recession that catalysed the change. During
an economic slowdown, it is common for any
organisation to trim its marketing budget.
According to industry researchers Veronis
Suhler Stevenson, the last crisis saw budget
cuts of at least 9 per cent which resulted in
advertising spend taking a 27 per cent dive
over two years. Yet even in a sluggish market
no business can afford to diminish its presence
in the customer’s mind, except at the risk of
losing market share later on. This meant that
corporations insisted that their marketing go
further online and get more bang for the buck
thereby forcing many marketing operations to
embrace the digital marketing revolution.