It is true across all diverse industries that in order to stay competitive, organizations must be able to utilize the various tools that technology has to offer. Technological factors have been of growing importance, particularly in recent years and a major factor involved in these technology issues is the use of the Internet, the arrival of mobile technologies such as PDAs and 3G mobile phones, the World Wide Web as well as interactive television which has now given many businesses access to the mass market at an affordable price.
the basics of marketing is still the same, which creates a strategy to deliver the right messages to the right people, what has changed is the number of options that is now available.
The traditional marketing methods, such as advertising, direct mail and PR has now been revolutionized with e-marketing which adds a whole new element to the marketing mix and many businesses are producing great results with e-marketing and its flexible and cost-effective nature makes it particularly suitable for small businesses.
E marketing can simply as be defined as achieving marketing objectives through use of electronic communications technology Chaffey (2006). The potential market that the Internet provides has little or no restrictions by either geography or time, and therefore poses a huge impact on any organisation considering E- marketing in its strategic marketing formulation. Specific benefits of e-marketing include;
• 24-hour marketing – Customers are able to access your products any time of the day even after office hours and with a good website, enquires can be left and contacts with the relevant department can be made during official hours.
• Trackable, measurable results - marketing by email or banner advertising makes it easier to know how effective your campaign has been. It also enables detailed information about customers' responses to your advertising.
Together, all of these aspects of e-marketing have the potential to add up to more sales. An example of a case study of a successful business that employed the use of e marketing as a medium of marketing and advertising is The SAK.
THE SAK’s biggest marketing challenge was time. In the fashion accessory industry, trends change overnight, and direct mail marketing campaigns take six to eight weeks to create and deliver to customers.
After researching countless marketing strategies, they decided on email marketing strategy because of its features which includes, ease-of-use, immediate download, and cost and the software’s personalization features
According to Steve(Director of e-commerce), “email marketing (with Campaign software) lets us put the right product in front of the right customer at the right time. Few other methods of communication exist that give us the ability to communicate with our customers at a very low cost, delivering an immediate impact to both customer satisfaction and company revenues.”
Campaign enabled THE SAK to reach its customers more quickly and with less expense than other marketing channels. Steve Henderson stated, “We are able to design, produce, and send out an email within just a few hours, and Campaign has given us the ability to maintain a high speed-to-market with zero sacrifice on quality of message, creative, or service standards. Email marketing has been extremely successful for us in introducing new products to our customers, moving inventory, and introducing our lifestyle brand. “also, “roughly 25% of our total annual online sales are driven directly by email marketing sent through Campaign Enterprise. This produces our single most positive return on investment.”
There are, however many views that Internet advertising will not gain distinctive popularity because of the difficulty in assessing it effectiveness (Ottman, 1996 cited Johns, R.,). While Strauss, J. Frost, R. (1999) believes that advertising on the Internet helps reach its revenue objectives, Johns, R. (1996) suggests that Internet advertising is full of clutter, and therefore proves difficult to gain the attention of the target market.
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11 years ago
9 comments:
You have given a very good example of putting e-marketing into practice!
Consumers' needs are constantly changing. Therefore, the shorter time for them to be met = better performance of the company itself.
I was thinking, which other attributes of a service / product could be considered as a necessity for a company to establish e-marketing as a complementary part to the traditional marketing?
Thank you!
I think that e-marketing is especially good for SMEs because they dispose of less profits or lower revenue figures and using this mean of communication they save costs and they get much more people then if they would choose others like tv, radio, press and other. Maybe is not very good to stick only to this method since nowadays there are a lot of spams and fake site and the customers are more reluctant when it comes to sites.. but for the beginning I think e-marketing is very good for tackling the market and get an idea of what customers what from you
"Johns, R. (1996) suggests that Internet advertising is full of clutter, and therefore proves difficult to gain the attention of the target market."
Isn't this why market research has to be the foundation of all marketing activities? Based on the results the SME can target their customers and provide the needed info.
Also, when the company's objectives are aligned with the obtained results and their communication, the clutter vanishes.
Do you think the E-marketing is more use for the '' coomunication'' strategy or aspect. e.g.: To have a better brand image, to promote more the brand, easier to be view by internet. Than to have a new distribution channel...
Thank you,
cedric
SMEs should not use the excuse that internet advertising is full of clutter and therefore loose its popularity. Instead, statistics has shown that over the last 5 years, the popularity of internet advertising is increasing mainly dominated by search, display banners, rich media and digital video (Erickson 2009). Research in this area also concluded that steps can be taken to reduce the forced exposure effect of online ads that created negative behavior among consumers. Instead, Ads that are positively relates to informativeness and be entertaining (rich media with sound, motion and interactivity) can have positive effect impact on businesses (Ying 2009).
References:
Erickson, H. (2009) 'Internet Advertising Statistics 2009: US Internet Revenue Declines' [online] available from http://blog.7touchgroup.com/tag/internet-advertising-statistics-2009/ [26 February 2010]
Ying, L. and Korneliussen, T. (2009) 'The Effect of Ad Value, Ad Placement and Ad Execution on the Perceived Intrusiveness of Web Advertisements'. International Journal of Advertising 28(4), 623-638
Posted by Chen Wei Phing
thank you for your comments. however i do disagree with John R because i do feel that specific ads online are directed to a specific target online therefore positioning is key.Betting ads for example is not clutter its placed for its target in areas of the web that it will reach its audience. there are some ads that cluttered for the specific reason that it is the best way to get its target market. this for many companies will would help generate brand awareness which will lead to brand loyalty of a large population. however, it is costly and marketing online has very little control so could hurt a companies PR if something goes wrong.
good article
I was just wondering about the return on investment for small companies (with for instance around 10 to 15 employees), who want to integrate E-marketing into their business? The building of a decent website soon ads up to about 4000£. This doesn't include the additional services, E- training of employees,...
in my own i would say it depends on the type of company and its location.i say this because a sandwich shop at the corner of the road on a limited budget would obviously not want to spend money on a website and would obviously use social networks like facebook and myspace as a form of advertising.
in a company employing up to about 10- 15 employees would be on a budget and could be able to afford to have a website. if this is too costly there are other alternatives of e-marketing as a medium of advertising.
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