The Impact Digital Marketing is having on Traditional Marketing

If you have been on the internet in the past five years, you probably have noticed an increase in advertising.  Every page you visit and every app you install has ads.  But what kind of impact is digital marketing having on “traditional marketing”?

A great metric to look at is the Super Bowl.  Companies have been dishing out millions of dollars to run a 30 second ad during the Super Bowl for years.  2017 saw record prices for commercials, coming in at an average of $5 million for a 30 second ad, and that does not even factor in production costs.  But with the rise of digital marketing, companies are deciding to spend their money elsewhere.  For the first time in 10 years, Doritos, who always had highly anticipated Super Bowl ads, did not advertise during the big game. And they are not alone. Mountain Dew, Taco Bell, Butterfinger, and Heinz all opted out of this year’s Super Bowl as well.  So what does this mean?

The Internet is Changing the Marketing Game

The rise of the internet and all its features has really changed how everyone interacts with media of all kinds.  Long gone are the days of people buying a newspaper to see what is happening in the world. They just log online to their favorite news site or social media.  Facebook has an average of 1.15 billion mobile active user’s everyday!  Advertisers are aware of this and are using the digital world to put themselves in front of their market.  

With the changing times, people are also becoming more aware of the environment. The “paperless” trend is becoming a more widely adopted practice in many industries, and marketing is no different. It is rare that companies mass distribute flyers or other paper products to promote their business, as many people frown upon the wastefulness.  The digital marketing sphere gives businesses the option to mass promote products and services in an eco-friendly manner.

By going paperless, companies are realizing all of the added benefits that digital marketing has to offer.  One great benefit to going digital is the ability to track in real time how your ads are performing.  You can quickly see if your audience is responding positively or negatively to your ads, and you are able to quickly change your ad to better attract your audience.  With digital marketing, the ability to split test is much easier.  Two different ads can be running at the same time, and you are able to compare the two to see which performs better, which enables you to create better ads.  With traditional marketing, that level of feedback is not available the same way it is with digital marketing.  Companies can run focus groups or offer certain promotions, but they don’t always know for sure if their ad is leading to a conversion.

Marketing on Social Media

As people start spending more and more time on their devices, advertisers want to find ways to be in front of their audience as often as they can.  With social media marketing booming, it is easy to see why companies want to spend their money on these platforms instead of a 30 second Super Bowl commercial.  Social media marketing has the ability to advertise to more targeted audience.  In addition to the more qualified traffic, the cost associated is much less.  Companies can spend $5 million on their TV commercial for 30 seconds of airtime or spend much less on a platform such as Facebook and receive the same amount of engagements on your site, and likely an increase in conversions.  Think about how much further that $5 million dollars would go on a platform like Facebook that is way more targeted and easily tracked.  The return on ad spend value is much higher on digital marketing platforms.

Putting it into Prospective

With traditional marketing, there is little control over the audience that will see your ad.  For example, let’s say you sell running shoes and want to run a TV commercial.  Advertising running shoes on the cooking network won’t do very well. If you run the ad on ESPN, there is a better chance those viewers will find your ad relevant, but there is still no guarantee that those people will actually buy running shoes.  But now let’s say you run a digital marketing ad on Facebook. You are able to target people who have expressed interest in running or other fitness activities.  You can even make separate ads for men and women, advertising different shoes for each gender.  If you have a budget of $1000, who would you rather advertise to? A group of people who have expressed interest in running, or those who you have little to no data on?

Every marketing campaign has different objectives.  If your objective is brand awareness then TV marketing may be the best option for your campaign.  If your objective is to make sales, however, then putting a digital ad in front of your target market on social media might be the best way to go.

In an ever changing world advertisers need to keep up with what consumers are doing.  They need to know their target audience and how to best reach them. Hive Digital has a team ready to get your company started on their digital marketing.