The History of Digital Marketing
It is fair to say that all marketing is digital now. Digital Marketing is almost everywhere in our lives. There are ads when we are watching videos online. We receive promotions on our phones. even in physical stores, employees always ask you to sign up an account with them digitally.
But, do you know that the first digital marketing tactic actually came up in the 1990s?
the first clickable digital banners came out on the internet in 1993. and at that time, most people did not have any experience shopping or even surfing on the internet.
In 1994, as the technology was improving, digital marketing started to play a big row on the internet and Yahoo came out at that time as well. One of the most famous bloggers online is “Jerry’s Guide to World Wide Web” And as the invent of search engine. Digital marketing started to become useful, acceptable, and affordable for companies needed. Especially for small businesses.
In 1996, Google was founded. At the same time, Microsoft also created the MSN search engine. and Yahoo brought its own search engine into the market. small search engines like HotBot, Alexa, and LookSmart were wiped out of the market. This push digital marketing into a new era. walking into the 2000s, web traffic became bigger and bigger. In 2006, it was reported than web traffic reached 6.4 billion in a single month. Digital marketing had become the most efficient way for more and more business.
The creation of social media platforms was the beginning of the new era of digital marketing. and which in my opinion, we should call it the modern digital marketing. Started with Facebook, people spend more time on social media than websites. and unlike searching something on the internet for specific purposes and tasks. It is easier for people to accept new things on social media platforms. at the same time, companies used cookies to track people’s shopping habits, their interests, and reach their target customers easier than ever.
Statistics collected by the Marketingtechblog for 2014 show that posting on social media is the top online activity in the US. The average American spends 37 minutes a day on social media. 99% of digital marketers use Facebook to market, 97% use Twitter, 69% use Pinterest and 59% use Instagram. 70% of B2C marketers have acquired customers through Facebook. 67% of Twitter users are far more likely to buy from brands that they follow on Twitter. 83.8% of luxury brands have a presence on Pinterest. The top three social networking sites used by marketers are LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. (Data from www.simplilearn.com)
Ads are not the only thing that works on social media. Influencers play a bigger row now. Influencers on social media especially on youtube, Instagram, and Tiktok. These platforms focus on video and photos which marketers believe now they have more effects on people’s minds.
As marketers, we should be sensitive to this fast-changing world. It was hard to imagine from 2000, that 10 years later almost everything in people’s life will be changed by the internet. We learned from history and the next second can become another future.
