Implications of Online Marketing and Social Media Use on Marketing Initiatives

The entirety of communication across online platforms often has tiny intricate parts that work together in a unified front for advertising, public relations, direct sales, promotional activities, and internet marketing to realize the most impact benefits for both the target audience and the company. Research conducted by William Stanton established that communication on internet platforms contributes to a business marketing mix utilized for notifying, convincing, and reminding the target audience of the existence of the business organization and the products or services it comprises. This form of communication unifies numerous promotional tools alongside advertising and marketing to derive the most profits. A business organization utilizing online platforms achieves synchronized operations when they advocate for familiarity with prospective customers that ultimately induce affinity for the company.

Introduction The internet provides resources that enhance electronic commerce by giving platforms for selling and marketing products and services. Facets of Marketing Advertisement- is a business activity that grants a business organization the most influential messages to an appropriate client while incurring the least expenses. Kotler advocated a different definition by establishing that advertising refers to a paid means for non-personal presentation and promotion with the help of media such as newspapers, magazines, television, or radio by a business organization. Sales promotion- is a marketing activity that aims at arousing demand from prospective customers and ultimately increases the sales levels for products or services. Such promotional activities comprise of advertisement campaigns, intensified public relations activities, free sampling campaigns, gifts, demonstrations, and exhibitions, competitions that attract prizes, momentary price reductions, door-to-door sales, telemarketing, and the use of personal letters.

Public relations- refer to choreographed communication efforts instigated by a business organization to tweak the attitudes or opinions of the public in favor of a business organization and its products or services. Merits of Marketing Communication Despite the existence of many intricacies in marketing communication, the activities involved reap benefits for a business organization by generating competitive advantages, increasing sales and profits while at the same reducing costs, time resources and stress reduction. Communication in the context of marketing ensures all business activities center on the customers causing a seamless transition through the processes involved in purchasing a product or service from a business organization. A business institution consolidates its brand while indulging in marketing communication by creating a dialogue with prospective and existent customers and nurturing a healthy relationship that can only provide customer affinity.

All organization communication endears to create a relationship market model that strengthens customer affinity for company products or services, which would steer the business in the face of stiff competition. The ability by a business to maintain the customers in the face of competition provides a reliable competitive advantage for the business. This study identifies that most business organizations comprise of internal ways and therefore such conflicts may affect communication channels in light of utilizing the internet for communication with clients. However, with advancements in technology specifically with the internet, marketing communication has experienced numerous and immense revolutions by integrating interactive media which permit two-way communication channels with customers in contrast to the traditional sense of one-way communication. Introduction to Online Marketing Online marketing has become an essential facet of marketing in every competent business sector to implement multi-channel strategies.

Business organizations use the internet to convey promotional marketing messages to potential and existent clients. The types of online marketing comprise of email marketing, search engine marketing, social media marketing and display advertisements. Interstitial advertisement emerge when a webpage user before permitting a webpage user to access requested content and in some instances when a user waits for requested information to appear. This is special kind of interruption marketing. Text advertisement refers to advertisement displays that rely on text-based hyper links. Programmers of such forms of advertisements may exhibit the advertisements on separate web pages main content or they may opt to entrench the individual texts or phrases via hyperlinks on the advertisement website. A business may deliver the same with the help of email marketing or text message.

Other forms of mobile advertisement may comprise of short message service, multimedia messaging service advertising, mobile search advertisement, promotional activities through mobile websites, or encasing advertisements in mobile applications or games. Email advertising refers to copies of advertisements comprised in emails or parts of an email. Senders of such forms of advertisements often provide customers with the chance to turn down the opportunities to receive such advertisements or the sender may request for the consent of the recipient of the sender prior to sending. Merits of Online Marketing The internet provides a wide access to plenty of potential customers. Billions of people are using the internet and therefore access to such an immense number of people only takes place through the internet.

The second demerit lies in the preference by customers to have physical access to products for instance customers may prefer to view the specifications of an electronic device on the webpage but still prefer to have physical access to the same device before making a decision to purchase. Thirdly, the world comprises of people who remain ignorant of internet marketing schemes because of their personal preferences. Businesses stand the chance to lose such customers if they are not careful n their marketing strategies. Business must constantly attend to the constant changes that happen on internet marketing by ensuring that their marketing strategies are up to date. One of the biggest disadvantages of utilizing the internet for marketing purposes lie in the potential for fraudulent activities with a growing number of websites that resemble original website but offer questionable products or services or simply scam.

Affiliate marketing- this marketing tool utilizes a third party and indulges pay per click. Blog Marketing- this involves the generation of information and assessments about products or business institutions to raise the awareness levels of customers and talk. Really Simple Synchronization Marketing (RSS) - this marketing tool permits website users to acquire automatic updates from websites without necessarily logging into the website. Social network marketing- these are platforms that permit users to customize groups or communities that comprise of like-minded individuals and even generate advertising banners that promote the business or social agendas of the groups 6. E-mail Marketing- this form of marketing involves an individual who sends out marketing information to potential customer’s mailboxes. Marketers identify the act of paying for leads or surveys as the pay per lead.

Lai Barak et al (2003) provided details regarding the actions of pay per lead, pay per action, and identified the circumstances that one derives benefits over the other. This publication identified that pay per lead is superior to pay per action specifically whenever the merchant and the affiliate have detached deals with one another and therefore the merchant negotiates the deal. In such cases, pay per conversion is not favored as it results in suboptimal pricing by the merchant. Moreover, pay per lead comprises less profitability than pay per conversion for the merchant when they work with numerous affiliates especially when all affiliates work under the same conditions. Actions involved in direct affiliate marketing Action 1: Business organization > Creation of product links/ survey forms and/or banners > submission to affiliates Action 2: Affiliates process the submission > product link/ survey forms/ banner/clicks> issuance back to the company Step 3: Companies > Commission > affiliates Advantages of affiliate marketing Both merchants and affiliate companies accrue some benefits from direct affiliate marketing.

This section will primarily focus on the advantages achieved by the merchant. The fundamental costs incurred by the merchant during such a digital marketing campaign is a percentage commission the business organization pays the affiliate and the business organization pays when they have made a tangible sale. Direct affiliate marketing differs significantly from banner advertising and click based advertising where a business organization makes payments regardless of whether or not the business organization makes sales. Banner advertisements involve costs per 1000 views. The affiliate companies also act as junctions and offer banners to other organizations and track the same down. Affiliate companies share such banners in a bid to generate traffic and distribute revenues with other affiliates that provide leads or sales.

Search Engine Marketing There are numerous actions involved search engine marketing that comprise of different targets. Business organizations indulge in search engine marketing to augment the rankings for specific keywords in search engine results by tweaking some aspects of a website in terms of structure or the content. On the other hand, pay per click utilizes sponsored listings whereby business organizations bid for search terms and the search engines grades the advertisements according to specified decisive factors. Therefore, the main aim of the research is to comprehend the immense involvement of online marketing in marketing communication and to appreciate its efforts in conducting promotional activities and identify challenges that exist while implementing online marketing as a strategy for integrating communication with operations.

To achieve the research objectives, the methodology will comprise of descriptive research design. The researcher collected data from secondary and primary sources. The secondary sources of information gave the research an appropriate theoretical framework by relying on published and unpublished works. The researcher collected primary data from surveys by implementing questionnaires as the main research equipment. An intense research would provide details on the reaction of companies to web mavens and those companies that do not react to the same. Information on the perception of web mavens would establish credibility on the same. Aldridge Alicia et al (1997) in a comprehensive report provided details for consideration by companies when partaking in an internet commerce space. Based on the report findings, companies can achieve optimum success in digital marketing when they consider the diversity of consumer markets, indulging direct communication with consumers, the need to face direct competition, allotting control to users, the importance of authenticity, and the need to protect consumer privacy.

The report provides important points that numerous roles in establishing digital marketing, moreover, the researchers contemplate strategies that companies may utilize in establishing digital marketing such as targeting, promotional strategies, product strategies or placement, and the distribution techniques. Kim while considering all these findings, established that reduced fares was the primary driver for most customers, however, the research failed to consider efforts by airliners to conduct direct marketing for contrast effects considering that airline companies may get the nudge to advertise new products in contrast to the travel agencies. These comparisons would have augmented conclusions made by Kim to determine whether fair alone the motivating factor for customers to select particular airline agencies was. If this report compared and contrasted such incentives, the research would ascertain the particular driving factors on customers to select a specific airline.

This research gives details for businesses that issue their services via the internet. According to the services delivered by the company, one of the factors would stand out than other factors and therefore for financial institutions, security stands out as a prominent factor. Timely deliveries ensure augmented relationships with male customers with the business and strengthen the purchasing intentions. Moreover, friendliness for an online store for female visitors would increase the number of visits to the digital market. Chiu suggested that to achieve the desired levels of friendliness, a business organization should ensure a virtual interaction that is engaging with background music while providing demonstrations on how to utilize products in a fashionable manner. A business organization may also engage the female visitors by visual effects to kindle positive attitudes and raise their purchasing intentions.

Female customers consider the customization of website because it enhances the levels of consumer freedom and accessibility of required items or information. The research design helps the researcher to answer the numerous questions asked during the research. Once the researcher collects the necessary data, they proceed to drawing conclusions and inferences from observable characteristics. When the researcher interprets the provided information, they explore relationships, processes, and correlations that elaborate the findings and conclusions. Interpretation refers to the process of making inferences from the collected data following an analytical research. The methodology will give the other sections of the study broad meaning therefore contributing immensely to the research findings. Survey types of research consist of large sample sizes and concentrates on the relationships elaborated by specific conditions, opinions, and processes that take place to cause specific trends.

Therefore, in surveys, researchers seek to examine variables that exist, have occurred, or are evident. Data Collection Data collection is the process of collecting information relevant for a subject matter from the foundation of the research. Primary data are empirical observations made by an examiner for the first time for the study and utilized for the statistical analysis. Research provides the following techniques for collecting primary data: I. In this study, the researcher collected the necessary data with the aid of sample survey that used a structured questionnaire. Considering that customer preference, for online marketing is the principle focus of the research, the researcher constructed a well structured and close ended questionnaire that customers would use. The questionnaire comprised of questions specific to the customer’s inclinations in the case of business organizations that use online platforms for conducting their transactions and the knowledge of traditional strategies of marketing to assess the different brands and processes of making purchase decisions.

Considering that the administration of questionnaires is a tool for collecting data, cases of non-response and partial responses were high. However, the researcher conducted proper follow up to ensure that they acquire all the necessary data. Specific data came from information published by the IMC, which is an online marketing platform that gives information on the extent of online marketing and the implications of the same. Other important sources of information comprised of research journals, books, business-related magazines, and websites that generate content. Sampling method Researcher conducts sampling to determine the suitability of a method that would suit generalizations for an entire population. With the help of the census enquiry, the research enumerates all the tools in the population and with the sampling techniques; the researcher optimizes the appropriate respondents to save time and costs.

The sample design helps the researcher to acquire a sample from the total population. The sample size: 200 respondents to increase variability of data. The respondents will consist of people from different religious, social, and racial backgrounds 2. The area covered- social media websites like facebook, twitter, instagram, and whatsapp, 3. Sample frame- educational institutions and business offices Data analysis tools implemented for the research The researcher utilized the statistical software SPSS to scrutinize the information from structured questionnaires and Ms-Excel. The statistical methods utilized consisted of mean, median, mode, standard deviation, skewness, and kurtosis. Ltd. , 2002, pg. no. 3 Philip Kotler & Kevin Lane Keller, Marketing Management, New Delhi, Pearson Education, 2006, pg. no. , Omnipress, Madison, Wl. 1993, pg. no. Abed Abedniya, Sahar Sabbaghi Mahmouei, The Impact of Social Networking Websites to Facilitate the Effectiveness of Viral Marketing, December 2010, International Journal of Advanced Computer Science and Applications, Vol.