Digital marketing essentials module 4

Digital Marketing and Essentials (DME)
Module – IV
Fundamentals of Digital Marketing
Prepared by
Prof. (Dr) Datrika Venkata Madhusudan Rao
MBA, MPhil, PhD, MSc(Psyc), UGC-NET, AP SET, PGD FTM, PGD IPR, MCIM (UK), Affi.CIPD (UK) …
madhusudan@jainuniversity.ac.in.

References
• Shivani, Karwal. (2015). Digital Marketing Handbook, Create space.
• Strauss. Judy, Frost. Raymond, and Sinha. Nilanjana. (2014). E-Marketing. 7th
Intl. ed, Pearson, Greta Britain
• Gay. Richard, Charlesworth. Alan, and Esen, Rita. (2014). Online Marketing –
A Customer–led approach. Oxford, New Delhi, India

Case Study References
• https://hbsp.harvard.edu/cases/
• https://adscholars.com/blog/digital-marketing-trends-2020/
• https://colorwhistle.com/digital-marketing-case-studies/
• https://apollodigital.io/blog/digital-marketing-case-studies
• https://www.davechaffey.com/digital-marketing-strategy/case-studies-of-digital-marketing-
strategies-and-campaigns/
• https://trafficradius.com.au/digital-marketing-case-studies/
• https://digiperform.com/top-8-indian-digital-marketing-case-studies-every-marketer-can-learn-
from/
• https://www.digitalvidya.com/blog/digital-marketing-case-studies/
• https://www.cardinaldigitalmarketing.com/case-studies/
• https://www.soravjain.com/best-indian-digital-marketing-case-studies-2017/
• https://www.mediavisioninteractive.com/case-studies/
• https://www.garrisoneverest.com/case-study/digital-marketing-case-studies/
• https://blog.hellostepchange.com/blog/5-leading-digital-marketing-strategy-case-studies-to-
inspire-your-next-step-change

COURSE OUTCOME
• CO4: To analyse characteristics of digital marketing

Digital Marketing & Essentials
Learning objectives:
After reading this module, you should be able to:
Describe the following points in Fundamentals of Digital Marketing
• What is the new economy like?
• What are the tasks of marketing?
• What are the major concepts , channels and tools of Digital marketing?
• Differentiation between digital to traditional techniques viz., Mass Vs. Niche; Push Vs. Pull strategies;
Inbound Vs. Outbound marketing; Digital promotion,
• What is Permission marketing?
• Flexibility of digital marketing – Customer expectations Marketing Mix in Digital space
• Describe 5-forces of digital strategy marketing and segmentation process for digital marketing
• What orientations do companies exhibit in the marketplace?
• How are companies responding to the new challenges?

Old Economy Vs New Economy
The old economy is based on the Industrial Revolution and on managing
manufacturing industries
WHILE …
The new economy is based on the Digital Revolution and the management of
information.

The New Economy placed the following capabilities in
the hands of consumer:
 Substantial increase in buying power
 Greater variety of available goods and services
 Great amount of information about practically
anything
 Greater ease in interacting and placing and receiving
orders
 An ability to compare notes on products and
services

AND placed the following capabilities in the hands of
companies:
Operate powerful new information and sales channels
 Collect richer information about markets, customers,
prospects, and competitors
 Speed up internal communication among employees
 Have two-way communications with customers and
prospects
 Send promotional tools easily and quickly
 Able to customize offerings
 Improve purchasing, recruiting, training and internal
and external communication.
 Maintain cost saving while improving accuracy and
service quality.

Selling is only the tip of the iceberg
1-9
“There will always be need for
some selling. But the aim of marketing is to make
selling superfluous. The aim of marketing is to know
and understand the customer so well that the product
or service fits him and sells itself. Ideally, marketing
should result in a customer who is ready to buy. All
that should be needed is to make the product or
service available.”
Peter Drucker

What is Exchanged in Marketing?
1-10
Goods
Services
Events & Experiences
Persons
Places & Properties
Organizations
Information
Ideas

Traditional Vs. Digital Marketing
Impactful and easy to understand
Printed marketing materials are more permanent
More memorable…..
More difficult to measure campaigns
Often expensive
No direct interaction with the consumer
More options for engagement
Easy to measure your campaigns
Makes clever targeting possible….
Digital ads can be deemed as annoying
Less permanent
Constantly evolves

4.1 Digital marketing = ‘online‘, ‗internet‘ or ‗web‘
• Digital marketing is the component of marketing that
utilizes internet and online based digital technologies such as desktop
computers, mobile phones and other digital media and platforms to promote
products and services.
• Digital marketing campaigns employing combinations of search engine
optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), content
marketing, influencer marketing, content automation, campaign
marketing, data-driven marketing, e-commerce marketing, social media
marketing, social media optimization, e-mail direct marketing, Paid
search/contextual advertising, display advertising, e–books, and optical
disks and games have become commonplace.
• Digital marketing extends to non-Internet channels that provide digital
media, such as television, mobile phones (SMS and MMS), callback, and
on-hold mobile ring tones. The extension to non-Internet channels
differentiates digital marketing from online marketing.

• Internet marketing includes advertising and sales efforts conducted over the Internet, including:
• Search engine optimization (SEO). Techniques and strategies used to achieve a high ranking in the search
engines results.
• Pay per click (PPC). Search engine-based advertising that directs web traffic to a website. Websites pay the
search engines each time an ad is clicked.
• Email marketing. Manual or automated messaging that targets specific groups of people who want to stay in
touch with your business.
• Blogs. Writing about industry-specific information to keep your customers informed.
• Social media. Reaching out to customer profiles via Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram, and
more.
• Content marketing. Publishing unique, compelling, and engaging content like infographics to capture the
attention of customers.
• Video marketing. Creating short, informational videos to benefit an audience and uploading them to
popular video sites like YouTube.
• Location-based marketing. Establishing a local presence via Google Places and including relevant, local
information on your website, like a phone number or address.
• Regardless of the type of Internet marketing you choose for your business, you’re making yourself more
visible and accessible by putting yourself out there. The best part is that you can start small with just a few
focused objectives and then grow to optimize your site in other ways, especially since most of these
strategies only require an investment of time.

Search engine optimization (SEO)
• Search engine optimization techniques may be used to improve the visibility of business websites
and brand-related content for common industry-related search queries.
• The importance of SEO to increasing brand awareness is said to correlate with the growing
influence of search results and search features like featured snippets, knowledge panels and local
SEO on customer behavior.
Search engine marketing (SEM)
• SEM, also known as PPC advertising, involves the purchase of ad space in prominent, visible
positions atop search results pages and websites. Search ads have been shown to have a positive
impact on brand recognition, awareness and conversions.
• 33% of searchers who click on paid ads do so because they directly respond to their particular
search query.
Social media marketing
• 70% of marketers list increasing brand awareness as their number one goal for marketing on social
media platforms. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube are listed as the top platforms
currently used by social media marketing teams.

Content marketing
• 56% of marketers believe personalized content – brand-centered blogs,
articles, social updates, videos, landing pages – improves brand recall
and engagement.
• According to Mentionlytics, an active and consistent content strategy
that incorporates elements of interactive content creation, social
posting and guest blogging can improve brand awareness and loyalty
by 88%.
Segmentation
• More focus has been placed on segmentation within digital marketing,
in order to target specific markets in both business-to-business and
business-to-consumer sectors.

Influencer marketing
• Important nodes are identified within related communities, known as
influencers. This is becoming an important concept in digital targeting.
Influencers allow brands to take advantage of social media and the
large audiences available on many of these platforms. It is possible to
reach influencers via paid advertising, such as Facebook Advertising
or Google Adwords campaigns, or through sophisticated sCRM (social
customer relationship management) software, such as SAP C4C,
Microsoft Dynamics, Sage CRM and Salesforce CRM. Many
universities now focus, at Masters level, on engagement strategies for
influencers

 Remarketing: Remarketing plays a major role in digital marketing.
This tactic allows marketers to publish targeted ads in front of an
interest category or a defined audience, generally called searchers in
web speak, they have either searched for particular products or
services or visited a website for some purpose.
 Game advertising: Game ads are advertisements that exist within
computer or video games. One of the most common examples of in-
game advertising is billboards appearing in sports games. In-game ads
also might appear as brand-name products like guns, cars, or clothing
that exist as gaming status symbols.

Benefits to consumers
1. It keeps consumers current
2. It offers convenience and quick service
3. It helps build a better relationship
4. It provides 24/7 access
5. It creates a personalized experience
6. It provides your audience with options
7. It allows for comparison shopping
8. Obtain quality content
9. It helps you reach a global audience
10. It provides clear product information

20
What is a Marketing Channel?
A marketing channel system is the particular
set of interdependent organizations involved
in the process of making a product or service
available for use or consumption.
1/3/2013

Marketing Flows
in the Marketing Channel
211/3/2013

Consumer Marketing Channels
1/3/2013 22

23
Industrial Marketing Channels
1/3/2013

24
Increasing Efficiency
1/3/2013

4 Types of Markets
1. Consumer Market: (consumption)
2. Business Markets: (saving/resell)
3. Global Markets: (different offering mix)
4. Nonprofit and Governmental Market: (bids)
1-25

Categories of Buyers
• Habitual shoppers—purchase from the same places in the same manner over
time
• High value deal seekers—know their needs and “channel surf” a great deal
before buying at the lowest possible price
• Variety-loving shoppers—gather information in many channels, regardless of
price
• High-involvement shoppers—gather information in all channels, make their
purchases in a low-cost channel, but takes advantage of customer support from a
high-touch channel
261/3/2013

Channels and Marketing Decisions
• A Push strategy uses the manufacturer’s sales force, trade promotion
money, and other means to induce intermediaries to carry, promote, and sell
the product to end users
Application: It is appropriate for low-brand loyalty products, impulse items,
brand choice is made in stores products and products benefits are well
understood.
• A Pull strategy uses advertising, promotion, and other forms of
communication to persuade consumers to demand the product from
intermediaries
Application: It is appropriate for high brand loyalty and high involvement
products, consumers are able perceive differences between brands and
when they choose the brand before they go to the store.
271/3/2013

4.2 Digital Marketing Channels
• Digital Marketing Channels are systems based on the
Internet that can create, accelerate, and transmit
product value from producer to a consumer terminal,
through digital networks. Digital marketing is
facilitated by multiple Digital Marketing channels, As
an advertiser one's core objective is to find channels
which result in maximum two-way communication
and a better overall ROI for the brand. There are
multiple digital marketing channels available namely;

• Affiliate marketing - Affiliate marketing is perceived to not be considered a safe,
reliable and easy means of marketing through online platform. This is due to a
lack of reliability in terms of affiliates that can produce the demanded number of
new customers. As a result of this risk and bad affiliates it leaves the brand prone
to exploitation in terms of claiming commission that isn't honestly acquired. Legal
means may offer some protection against this, yet there are limitations in
recovering any losses or investment. Despite this, affiliate marketing allows the
brand to market towards smaller publishers, and websites with smaller traffic.
Brands that choose to use this marketing often should beware of such risks
involved and look to associate with affiliates in which rules are laid down
between the parties involved to assure and minimize the risk involved
• Display advertising - As the term implies, online display advertising deals with
showcasing promotional messages or ideas to the consumer on the internet. This
includes a wide range of advertisements like advertising blogs, networks,
interstitial ads, contextual data, ads on the search engines, classified or dynamic
advertisement etc. The method can target specific audience tuning in from
different types of locals to view a particular advertisement, the variations can be
found as the most productive element of this method.

• Email marketing - Email marketing in comparison to other forms of digital marketing is
considered cheap; it is also a way to rapidly communicate a message such as their value
proposition to existing or potential customers. Yet this channel of communication may be
perceived by recipients to be bothersome and irritating especially to new or potential
customers, therefore the success of email marketing is reliant on the language and visual
appeal applied. In terms of visual appeal, there are indications that using graphics/visuals
that are relevant to the message which is attempting to be sent, yet less visual graphics to
be applied with initial emails are more effective in-turn creating a relatively personal feel
to the email. In terms of language, the style is the main factor in determining how
captivating the email is. Using casual tone invokes a warmer and gentle and inviting feel
to the email in comparison to a formal style. For combinations; it's suggested that to
maximize effectiveness; using no graphics/visual alongside casual language. In contrast
using no visual appeal and a formal language style is seen as the least effective method.
• Search engine marketing - Search engine marketing (SEM) is a form of Internet
marketing that involves the promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in search
engine results pages (SERPs) primarily through paid advertising. SEM may
incorporate Search engine optimization, which adjusts or rewrites website content and site
architecture to achieve a higher ranking in search engine results pages to enhance pay per
click (PPC) listings.

• Social Media Marketing - The term 'Digital Marketing' has a number of marketing facets as it
supports different channels used in and among these, comes the Social Media. When we use social
media channels ( Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+, etc.) to market a product or
service, the strategy is called Social Media Marketing. It is a procedure wherein strategies are made
and executed to draw in traffic for a website or to gain attention of buyers over the web using
different social media platforms.
• Social networking service - A social networking service is an online platform which people use to
build social networks or social relations with other people who share similar personal or career
interests, activities, backgrounds or real-life connections
• In-game advertising - In-Game advertising is defined as "inclusion of products or brands within a
digital game. The game allows brands or products to place ads within their game, either in a subtle
manner or in the form of an advertisement banner. There are many factors that exist in whether
brands are successful in their advertising of their brand/product, these being: Type of game,
technical platform, 3-D and 4-D technology, game genre, congruity of brand and game, prominence
of advertising within the game. Individual factors consist of attitudes towards placement
advertisements, game involvement, product involvement, flow or entertainment. The attitude
towards the advertising also takes into account not only the message shown but also the attitude
towards the game. Dependent of how enjoyable the game is will determine how the brand is
perceived, meaning if the game isn't very enjoyable the consumer may subconsciously have a
negative attitude towards the brand/product being advertised. In terms of Integrated Marketing
Communication "integration of advertising in digital games into the general advertising,
communication, and marketing strategy of the firm" is an important as it results in a more clarity
about the brand/product and creates a larger overall effect.

Online public relations
• Video advertising - This type of advertising in terms of digital/online means are advertisements that
play on online videos e.g. YouTube videos. This type of marketing has seen an increase in popularity
over time. Online Video Advertising usually consists of three types: Pre-Roll advertisements which
play before the video is watched, Mid-Roll advertisements which play during the video, or Post-Roll
advertisements which play after the video is watched. Post-roll advertisements were shown to have
better brand recognition in relation to the other types, where-as "ad-context congruity/incongruity
plays an important role in reinforcing ad memorability". Due to selective attention from viewers,
there is the likelihood that the message may not be received. The main advantage of video
advertising is that it disrupts the viewing experience of the video and therefore there is a difficulty in
attempting to avoid them. How a consumer interacts with online video advertising can come down to
three stages: Pre attention, attention, and behavioural decision. These online advertisements give the
brand/business options and choices. These consist of length, position, adjacent video content which
all directly affect the effectiveness of the produced advertisement time, therefore manipulating these
variables will yield different results. Length of the advertisement has shown to affect memorability
where-as longer duration resulted in increased brand recognition. Sharing these videos can be
equated to the online version of word by mouth marketing, extending number of people
reached. Sharing videos creates six different outcomes: these being "pleasure, affection, inclusion,
escape, relaxation, and control". As well, videos that have entertainment value are more likely to be
shared, yet pleasure is the strongest motivator to pass videos on. Creating a ‗viral‘ trend from mass
amount of a brands advertisement can maximize the outcome of an online video advert whether it be
positive or a negative outcome.

• Native Advertising- involves the placement of paid content that replicates
the look, feel, and oftentimes, voice of a platform's existing content. It is
most effective when used on digital platforms like websites, newsletters,
and social media. Can be somewhat controversial as some critics feel it
intentionally deceives consumers.
• Content Marketing- an approach to marketing that focuses on gaining and
retaining customers through offering helpful content to customers that
improves the buying experience and creates brand awareness. A brand may
use this approach to hold a customer‘s attention with the goal of influencing
potential purchase decisions.
• Sponsored Content- content created and paid for by a brand to promote a
specific product or service.
• Inbound Marketing- a market strategy that involves using content as a
means to attract customers to a brand or product. Requires extensive
research into the behaviors, interests, and habits of the brand's target market.

Benefits of social media marketing
• Allows companies to promote themselves to large, diverse audiences that
could not be reached through traditional marketing such as phone and email
based advertising.
• Marketing on most social media platforms comes at little to no cost- making
it accessible to virtually any size business.
• Accommodates personalized and direct marketing that targets specific
demographics and markets.
• Companies can engage with customers directly, allowing them to obtain
feedback and resolve issues almost immediately.
• Ideal environment for a company to conduct market research.
• Can be used as a means of obtaining information about competitors and
boost competitive advantage.
• Social platforms can be used to promote brand events, deals, and news.
• Platforms can also be used to offer incentives in the form of loyalty points and
discounts.
• Self-regulation

• Relationship marketing - developing and maintaining long-term, cost-
effective exchange relationships with partners.
• Consumers enter into relationships only if there is some benefit to them.

• Lower costs and higher profits for the business.
• Efficient targeting of best customers increases the lifetime value of a customer.
• Stronger relationships with business partners and opportunities to combine capabilities and resources to
better accomplish goals.

• 80/20 principle: Frequent customers have a higher lifetime value, so businesses allocate resources
accordingly.
• Frequency marketing: reward purchasers with cash, rebates, and other premiums.
• Affinity programs: solicit involvement based on common interest.
• Comarketing: businesses jointly market each others’ products.
• Cobranding: firms link their names in a single product.

Customizing products and marketing and rapidly delivering goods.
Customer relationship management software
helps companies gather, sort, and interpret data
about specific customers.

39
Buyer Expectations for Channel Integration
• Ability to order a product online and
pick it up at a convenient retail
location
• Ability to return an online-ordered
product to a nearby store
• Right to receive discounts based on
total online and offline purchases
1/3/2013

4.3 Digital Tools in digital format
Digital tools and resources:
• An interactive whiteboard
• Word processing documents.
• Slide presentation software.
• Electronic reference materials.
• Tablet and cellphone apps
Digital Marketing Tools by Strategy:
• Organic Social Media.
• Paid Social Media.
• Email Marketing.
• Display Retargeting.
• Programmatic Advertising.
• Website Testing.
• Video Hosting.
• Content Creation.

Visual Content
The significance of Visual Content
1. Numbers never lie:
• Eyes can process 36,000 visual messages per hour.
• The sense of a visual scene can be felt in less than 1/10 of a second.
• 90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual.
• Brain process visuals 60,000X faster than any text.
2. Triggers Reaction: There is no denying the fact that visuals are processed better, and they produce much faster as well as a stronger
reaction than any other type of content. Scientifically speaking, visual stimuli, and emotional response - such as surprise, shock, happy,
inspired, confused - are linked together in the brain, which leads to making memories.
3. Increases Engagement: A picture is worth a thousand words. Nothing works for humans like telling them a story. Remember how our
grandmas used to create one? Quite similarly, businesses must come up with a story that is relevant to your brand, engaging and sticks to
your marketing objectives.
Visual content types:
• Images/comics/memes
• Videos
• Infographics
• GIFs
• Presentations Ex: Target‘s Pinterest strategy is a good example of using visual content in the right way. Target is a brand that serves as
the best example by using sites like Pinterest to stand out. It has numerous Pinterest boards and uses different strategies for each board.

Text-based concept
• Website copy
• Blog content
• Web Articles
• Sales Letters
• Email Campaigns
• Press Releases
• Cold-Call Scripts
• Sales Letters
• White Papers

Crowdsourcing
• Differences between crowdsourcing and outsourcing. Crowdsourcing comes from a less-specific,
more public group, whereas outsourcing is commissioned from a specific, named group, and
includes a mix of bottom-up and top-down processes. Advantages of using crowdsourcing may
include improved costs, speed, quality, flexibility, scalability, or diversity.
• Crowdsourcing is the act of involving your audience in the process of digital content creation. It‘s
an effective way to drum up interest in your digital posts and drive the results you want from your
posts and was coined in 2006. As a mode of sourcing, crowdsourcing existed prior to the digital
age (i.e. "offline").
• When businesses crowdsource, they ask the public for ideas, information, and opinions to help
them craft better products and services. By crowdsourcing, companies can tap into a huge group of
people's expertise and skill sets, ensuring diversity of thought, expedited production, and cost-
cutting, since they don't need to hire new, in-house employees. Ex: Airbnb, PepsiCo, website
99designs, Wikipedia , GitHub
• Crowd sourcing sites: Fiverr, Upwork, CrowdSource, Contently, Skyword, Patreon,
Thoughtexchange, Fundable (business crowdfunding), Indiegogo (product crowdfunding),
Kickstarter (project crowdfunding), GoFundMe (cause crowdfunding)
• Companies who crowdsource usually break massive projects into individual tasks, which allows
them to assign hundreds or thousands of people small jobs that they can work on by themselves.
Common categories of crowdsourcing can be used effectively in the commercial world, including
crowdvoting, crowdsolving, crowdfunding, microwork, creative crowdsourcing, crowdsource
workforce management, and inducement prize contests.

Jobs
Marketing
• Writing
• Videography
• Design
• Photography
• Animation
• Web development
• Mobile development
Editing Jobs
• Copy editing
• Content evaluation
• Content moderation
• Proofreading
Administrative
• Virtual assistant
• Customer service
• Usability testing
• Audio transcription
• Social media post
categorization
• Image and video processing
• Image categorization
Data Jobs
• Data entry
• Data research
• Data categorization
• Data processing
• Data verification and clean up
Research Jobs
• Information gathering
• Price checking
• Product display checking
• Business location verification
• Web research
• Google searching
• Odd Jobs
• Making deliveries
• Cleaning
• Dog walking
• Survey taking

Airbnb
• Airbnb is a popular travel website that acts as a broker for
vacation rentals. In fact, 2 million people stay in an Airbnb
every night. Its entire business model is based on
crowdsourcing.
• Anyone who wants to rent out a room or their entire
apartment or house, can put up a listing on Airbnb. Then,
people who are looking for a place to stay can go online and
choose a rental from the listings.
• All of the listings on Airbnb are crowdsourced from its
audience. Without individuals who rent out their homes,
there'd be no site.

PepsiCo
• "Do Us a Flavor" campaign by PepsiCo for its Lay's brand. In fact,
starting in 2012, PepsiCo has held a "Do Us a Flavor" contest in
numerous countries every few years.
• With this contest, consumers can suggest ideas for new chip flavors.
The brand has received millions of ideas for the contest throughout
the years.
• To promote the contest, Lay's will use social media to gather
submissions and garner votes from the public. This contest has
resulted in flavors such as "Cheesy Garlic Bread," "Kettle Cooked
Wasabi Ginger," and "Southern Biscuits and Gravy."

Guidelines to start with Crowdsourcing
• Determine your goal – It‘s crucial to figure out what your ultimate goal is
before crowdsourcing your next big social media post. You‘ll need to
determine who you want to reach out to and how to do it.
• Understand your chosen crowd – After determining the goal of your
crowdsourcing post, it‘s time to start refining your crowd. It‘s important to
understand your crowd – including their interests, where they
source their information from and where they spend most of their time
online.
• Create a reach-out strategy – To execute a crowdsourcing strategy
effectively it‘s important to actually connect with your chosen
crowd. You‘ll need to do some research to find out what interests them
enough to respond to your post.
• Create and post – Keeping in mind the content gained from your
crowdsourcing interaction you are now ready to promote to the
masses. Using your feedback, you are ready to post, remember to include
your list as they will likely share it among their networks as well.

Limitations and Controversies
• Impact of crowdsourcing on product quality
• Entrepreneurs contribute less capital themselves
• Increased number of funded ideas
• The value and impact of the work received from the crowd
• The ethical implications of low wages paid to crowdworkers
• Trustworthiness and informed decision making

• 594 BCE – Solon requires that all citizens swear to uphold his laws, which among other things, strengthens citizen inclusion and involvement in the governance of Ancient Athens, the earliest
example of democratic government for which reliable documentation exists
• 618–907 – Tang dynasty introduces the Joint-Stock Company the earliest form of crowdfunding
• 1714 – The longitude rewards: When the British government was trying to find a way to measure a ship's longitudinal position, they offered the public a monetary prize to whomever came up
with the best solution.
• 1783 – King Louis XVI offered an award to the person who could "make the alkali" by decomposing sea salt by the "simplest and most economic method".[22]
• 1848 – Matthew Fontaine Maury distributed 5000 copies of his Wind and Current Charts free of charge on the condition that sailors returned a standardized log of their voyage to the U.S.
Naval Observatory. By 1861, he had distributed 200,000 copies free of charge, on the same conditions
• 1849 – A network of some 150 volunteer weather observers all over the USA was set up as a part of the Smithsonian Institution's Meteorological Project started by the Smithsonian's first
Secretary, Joseph Henry, who used the telegraph to gather volunteers' data and create a large weather map, making new information available to the public daily. For instance, volunteers
tracked a tornado passing through Wisconsin and sent the findings via telegraph to the Smithsonian. Henry's project is considered the origin of what later became the National Weather Service.
Within a decade, the project had more than 600 volunteer observers and had spread to Canada, Mexico, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
• 1884 – Publication of the Oxford English Dictionary: 800 volunteers catalogued words to create the first fascicle of the OED
• 1916 – Planters Peanuts contest: The Mr. Peanut logo was designed by a 14-year-old boy who won the Planter Peanuts logo contest.
• 1957 – Jørn Utzon, winner of the design competition for the Sydney Opera House
• 1970 – French amateur photo contest C'était Paris en 1970 ("This Was Paris in 1970") sponsored by the city of Paris, France-Inter radio, and the Fnac: 14,000 photographers produced 70,000
black-and-white prints and 30,000 color slides of the French capital to document the architectural changes of Paris. Photographs were donated to the Bibliothèque historique de la ville de Paris.
• 1991 – Linus Torvalds begins work on the Linux operating system, inviting programmers around the world to contribute code
• 1996 – The Hollywood Stock Exchange was founded: Allowed for the buying and selling of shares
• 1997 – British rock band Marillion raised $60,000 from their fans to help finance their U.S. tour.
• 1999 – SETI@home was launched by the University of California, Berkeley. Volunteers can contribute to searching for signals that might come from extraterrestrial intelligence by installing a
program that uses idle computer time for analyzing chunks of data recorded by radio telescopes involved in the SERENDIP program.
• 2000 – JustGiving established: This online platform allows the public to help raise money for charities.
• 2000 – UNV Online Volunteering service launched: Connecting people who commit their time and skills over the Internet to help organizations address development challenges
• 2000 – iStockPhoto was founded: The free stock imagery website allows the public to contribute to and receive commission for their contributions.
• 2001 – Launch of Wikipedia: "Free-access, free content Internet encyclopedia"
• 2001 – Foundation of Topcoder – crowdsourcing software development company.
• 2004 – OpenStreetMap, a collaborative project to create a free editable map of the world, is launched.
• 2004 – Toyota's first "Dream car art" contest: Children were asked globally to draw their "dream car of the future".
• 2005 – Kodak's "Go for the Gold" contest: Kodak asked anyone to submit a picture of a personal victory.
• 2006 – Jeff Howe coined the term crowdsourcing in Wired.
• 2009 – Waze, a community-oriented GPS app, allows for users to submit road info and route data based on location, such as reports of car accidents or traffic, and integrates that data into its
routing algorithms for all users of the app
• 2011 – Casting of Flavours (Do us a flavor in the USA) – a campaign launched by PepsiCo's Lay's in Spain. The campaign was about a contest that was held for initiating a flavor for the
snack.

Crowdvoting
• Crowdvoting occurs when a website gathers a large group's opinions and judgments on a
certain topic. The Iowa Electronic Market is a prediction market that gathers crowds' views
on politics and tries to ensure accuracy by having participants pay money to buy and sell
contracts based on political outcomes.
• Most famous use of social media channels: Domino's Pizza, Coca-Cola, Heineken, and Sam
Adams have thus crowdsourced a new pizza, bottle design, beer, and song,
respectively. Threadless.com selects the T-shirts it sells by having users provide designs and
vote on the ones they like, which are then printed and available for purchase.
• Crowdvoting's value in the movie industry was shown when in 2009 a crowd accurately
predicting the success or failure of a movie based on its trailer, a feat that was replicated in
2013 by Google.

Crowdsolving
• Crowdsolving is a collaborative, yet holistic, way of solving a problem
using many people, communities, groups, or resources. It is a type of
crowdsourcing with focus on complex and intellectually demanding
problems requiring considerable effort, and quality/ uniqueness of
contribution.
• Chicago-based startup Crowdfind, formerly "crowdfynd", uses a
version of crowdsourcing best termed as crowdsearching, which
differs from microwork in that no payment for taking part in the
search is made. Their platform, through geographic location
anchoring, builds a virtual search party of smartphone and Internet
users to find lost items, pets, or persons, as well as returning them.
• TrackR uses a system they call "crowd GPS" to load Bluetooth
identities to a central server to track lost or stolen items.

Crowdfunding
• Crowdfunding is the process of funding projects by a multitude of people
contributing a small amount to attain a certain monetary goal, typically via the
Internet. Crowdfunding has been used for both commercial and charitable
purposes. Instead of looking for investors to fund a project, crowdfunding allows
people to raise money through an online platform. A person might make a video
describing the project they want to fund and post a link to that video on a social
media site. If all goes well, that person‘s contacts will not only give money but
also share the link to the video, encouraging their contacts to give money as well.
• The crowdfunding model that has been around the longest is rewards-based
crowdfunding. This model is where people can prepurchase products, buy
experiences, or simply donate. While this funding may in some cases go towards
helping a business, funders are not allowed to invest and become shareholders via
rewards-based crowdfunding.
• They connect to the greater purpose of the campaign, such as being a part of an
entrepreneurial community and supporting an innovative idea or product.
• They connect to a physical aspect of the campaign like rewards and gains from
investment.
• They connect to the creative display of the campaign's presentation.
• They want to see new products before the public.

Types of Crowdfunding
• Rewards crowdfunding: entrepreneurs presell a product or service to
launch a business concept without incurring debt or sacrificing
equity/shares.
Ex: motion picture promotion, free software development, inventions
development, scientific research, and civic projects.
• Equity crowdfunding: the backer receives shares of a company,
usually in its early stages, in exchange for the money pledged.
• Ex: Syndicates
• Crowdfunding is expected to reach US$1 trillion in 2025.

Benefits
Beyond the strict financial gains and non financial benefits of crowdfunding:
• Profile – a compelling project can raise a producer's profile and provide a boost to their reputation.
• Marketing – project initiators can show there are an audience and market for their project. In the
case of an unsuccessful campaign, it provides good market feedback.
• Audience engagement – crowdfunding creates a forum where project initiators can engage with
their audiences. An audience can engage in the production process by the following progress
through updates from the creators and sharing feedback via comment features on the project's
crowdfunding page.
• Feedback – offering pre-release access to content or the opportunity to beta-test content to project
backers as a part of the funding incentives provides the project initiators with instant access to
good market testing feedback.
• There are also financial benefits to the creator. For one, crowdfunding allows creators to attain
low-cost capital. Traditionally, a creator would need to look at "personal savings, home equity
loans, personal credit cards, friends and family members, angel investors, and venture capitalists."
With crowdfunding, creators can find funders from around the world, sell both their product and
equity, and benefit from increased information flow. Additionally, crowdfunding that supports pre-
buying allows creators to obtain early feedback on the product Another potential positive effect is
the propensity of groups to "produce an accurate aggregate prediction" about market outcomes as
identified by the author James Surowiecki in his book The Wisdom of Crowds, thereby placing
financial backing behind ventures likely to succeed.

Risks for Creators & Investors
• Reputation – failure to meet campaign goals or to generate interest results in a public failure. Reaching financial goals
and successfully gathering substantial public support but being unable to deliver on a project for some reason can
severely negatively impact one's reputation.
• Intellectual property (IP) protection – many Interactive Digital Media developers and content producers are reluctant
to publicly announce the details of a project before production due to concerns about idea theft and protecting their IP
from plagiarism. Creators who engage in crowdfunding are required to release their product to the public in early
stages of funding and development, exposing themselves to the risk of copy by competitors.
• Donor exhaustion – there is a risk that if the same network of supporters is reached out to multiple times, that
network will eventually cease to supply necessary support.
• Public fear of abuse – concern among supporters that without a regulatory framework, the likelihood of a scam or an
abuse of funds is high. The concern may become a barrier to public engagement.
• Lack of participation - It is seen that some stories are more likely to get picked up than others based on the story. It is
easy to get support if you "just tell a story."
Some research in social psychology indicates that, like in all investments, people don't always do their due diligence to
determine if it is a sound investment before investing, which leads to making investment decisions based on emotion
rather than financial logic. By using crowdfunding, creators also forgo potential support and value that a single angel
investor or venture capitalist might offer. Likewise, crowdfunding requires that creators manage their investors. This can
be time-consuming and financially burdensome as the number of investors in the crowd rises. Crowdfunding draws a
crowd: investors and other interested observers who follow the progress, or lack of progress, of a project. Sometimes it
proves easier to raise the money for a project than to make the project a success. Managing communications with many
possibly disappointed investors and supporters can be a substantial, and potentially diverting, task.

India's Top 10 Crowdfunding Platforms
• Rang De. Co-founders: Smita Ram and Ram N. ...
• Faircent. Co-founders: Rajat Gandhi, Vinay Matthews, Nitin Gupta. ...
• Ketto. Co-founders: Kunal Kapoor, Varun Sheth and Zaheer Adenwala.
• Wishberry. Co-founders: Priyanka Agarwal, Anshulika Dubey. ...
• FuelADream. Founder: Ranganath Thota. ...
• Catapooolt. Founder: Satish Kataria. ...
• Bitgiving. ...
• Crowdera.
CovidMaps is a crowdsourced platform with information regarding the stores near you, list
of things available, operational timings and more.
• A group of over 20 Bengaluru techies worked on the project as a not for profit initiative.
India is now the world’s second-largest internet market with more than 342 million mobile
users and online payment options that make it easy to give money, says Bloomberg.

Macrowork & Microwork
• Macrowork tasks typically have these characteristics: they can be done independently,
they take a fixed amount of time, and they require special skills. Macrotasks could be part
of specialized projects or could be part of a large, visible project where workers pitch in
wherever they have the required skills. The key distinguishing factors are that macrowork
requires specialized skills and typically takes longer, while microwork requires no
specialized skills.
• Microwork/microtask is exactly what it sounds like. You take a big task and break it up
into a bunch of small tasks, which you then assign to a crowd. For example, if you have
5,000 photos that need captions, you can tell the crowd that you want each person to
create one caption for each photo, and you can offer to pay them a certain amount of
dollars, or cents, per caption.
• Amazon's popular Mechanical Turk has created many different projects for users to
participate in, where each task requires very little time and offers a very small amount in
payment. The Chinese versions of this, commonly called Witkey, are similar and include
such sites as Taskcn.com and k68.cn. When choosing tasks, since only certain users
―win‖, users learn to submit later and pick less popular tasks to increase the likelihood of
getting their work chosen. An example of a Mechanical Turk project is when users
searched satellite images for a boat to find lost researcher Jim Gray. Based on an elaborate
survey of participants in a microtask crowdsourcing platform, Gadiraju et al. have
proposed a taxonomy of different types of microtasks that are crowdsourced. Two
important questions in microtask crowdsourcing are dynamic task allocation and answer
aggregation.

Microtasking
• Microtasking is the process of splitting a large job into small tasks that can
be distributed, over the Internet, to many people. Since the inception of
microwork, many online services have been developed that specialize in
different types of microtasking. Most of them rely on a large, voluntary
workforce composed of Internet users from around the world.
• Typical tasks offered are repetitive but not so simple that they can be
automated. Good candidates for microtasks have the following
characteristics:
• They are large volume tasks
• They can be broken down into tasks that are done independently
• They require human judgement
• It may also be known as ubiquitous human computing or human-based
computation when focused on computational tasks that are too complex
for distributed computing.

Simple & Complex projects
• Simple projects are those that require a large amount of time and skills
compared to micro and macrowork. While an example of macrowork
would be writing survey feedback, simple projects rather include activities
like writing a basic line of code or programming a database, which both
require a larger time commitment and skill level. These projects are usually
not found on sites like Amazon Mechanical Turk, and are rather posted on
platforms like Upwork that call for a specific expertise.
• Complex projects generally take the most time, have higher stakes, and call
for people with very specific skills. These are generally "one-off" projects
that are difficult to accomplish and can include projects like designing a
new product that a company hopes to patent. Tasks like that would be
"complex" because design is a meticulous process that requires a large
amount of time to perfect, and also people doing these projects must have
specialized training in design to effectively complete the project. These
projects usually pay the highest, yet are rarely offered.

Inducement prize contests
• Web-based idea competitions or inducement prize contests often consist of generic ideas, cash prizes, and an Internet-based platform to
facilitate easy idea generation and discussion. An example of these competitions includes an event like IBM's 2006 "Innovation Jam",
attended by over 140,000 international participants and yielding around 46,000 ideas. Another example is the Netflix Prize in 2009. The
idea was to ask the crowd to come up with a recommendation algorithm more accurate than Netflix's own algorithm. It had a grand prize
of US$1,000,000, and it was given to the BellKor's Pragmatic Chaos team which bested Netflix's own algorithm for predicting ratings, by
10.06%.
• Another example of competition-based crowdsourcing is the 2009 DARPA balloon experiment, where DARPA placed 10 balloon markers
across the United States and challenged teams to compete to be the first to report the location of all the balloons. A collaboration of efforts
was required to complete the challenge quickly and in addition to the competitive motivation of the contest as a whole, the winning team
(MIT, in less than nine hours) established its own "collaborapetitive" environment to generate participation in their team. A similar
challenge was the Tag Challenge, funded by the US State Department, which required locating and photographing individuals in five cities
in the US and Europe within 12 hours based only on a single photograph. The winning team managed to locate three suspects by
mobilizing volunteers worldwide using a similar incentive scheme to the one used in the balloon challenge
• Open innovation platforms are a very effective way of crowdsourcing people's thoughts and ideas to do research and development. The
company InnoCentive is a crowdsourcing platform for corporate research and development where difficult scientific problems are posted
for crowds of solvers to discover the answer and win a cash prize, which can range from $10,000 to $100,000 per challenge. InnoCentive,
of Waltham, Massachusetts and London, England provides access to millions of scientific and technical experts from around the world.
The company claims a success rate of 50% in providing successful solutions to previously unsolved scientific and technical problems.
IdeaConnection.com challenges people to come up with new inventions and innovations and Ninesigma.com connects clients with experts
in various fields. The X Prize Foundation creates and runs incentive competitions offering between $1 million and $30 million for solving
challenges. Local Motors is another example of crowdsourcing. A community of 20,000 automotive engineers, designers, and enthusiasts
competes to build off-road rally trucks.
• Crowdcontests. Lets say you need a design logo for your company, or you want to create a blog featuring short stories. You can invite
people such as writers or designers to participate in a contest. The contestants will work on the project and send you their submissions.
You decide which submission is the best and compensate the winner accordingly.

Implicit crowdsourcing
• Implicit crowdsourcing is less obvious because users do not necessarily know
they are contributing, yet can still be very effective in completing certain tasks.
Rather than users actively participating in solving a problem or providing
information, implicit crowdsourcing involves users doing another task entirely
where a third party gains information for another topic based on the user's actions.
• A good example of implicit crowdsourcing is the ESP game, where users guess
what images are and then these labels are used to tag Google images. Another
popular use of implicit crowdsourcing is through reCAPTCHA, which asks people
to solve CAPTCHAs to prove they are human, and then provides CAPTCHAs
from old books that cannot be deciphered by computers, to digitize them for the
web. Like many tasks solved using the Mechanical Turk, CAPTCHAs are simple
for humans, but often very difficult for computers.
• Piggyback crowdsourcing can be seen most frequently by websites such as Google
that data-mine a user's search history and websites to discover keywords for ads,
spelling corrections, and finding synonyms. In this way, users are unintentionally
helping to modify existing systems, such as Google's AdWords.

Benefits
• Flexibility
Microtaskers take on small tasks that cannot yet be automated, and are distributed over the internet to microtaskers all over the world.
Microtasking is often seen in a similar light to other forms of gig work — as a way to work flexible hours or fill in salary gaps. The beauty
of microtasking is its flexibility in almost every area. In fact, all that is needed is a good internet connection. The rest is for the microtasker
to decide — he can set up his own work environment wherever he wishes to, create his own working hours, select the tasks he would like to
complete, and work as often or as little as he likes. He gets paid per task and everything can be completed in the comfort of his own home.
This means that even in the scenario of a nationwide lockdown, work still continues. It would now also be possible for a stay-home parent to
earn an income while taking care of his or her children.
• Low barriers to entry
The internet has a huge range of microtask websites, which caters to the skills and abilities of every microtasker in the market. Such
websites include Amazon Mechanical Turk, Fiverr and Clickworker, just to name a few. The tasks offered include taking surveys, watching
videos, creating logo designs, copyediting, testing apps, amidst a wide range of skills. No matter the gender, race, socio-economic status,
age, anyone is able to contribute based on their interests and skills. With each task just being at the fingertip of the microtasker, these low
barriers to entry make it easy for anyone to participate. With the wide ranges of opportunities to choose from, the only consideration on the
part of the microtasker is choosing which task to take.
• Wide range of opportunities
With the growth in the microtasking economy, there are now many opportunities for career paths which were previously limited in capacity.
Microtaskers have a new way to get their foot in the door by first starting out as a microtasker, as a way to bootstrap new skills. They can
increase their skill sets by completing a varied range of micro tasks, or choose to specialise and become an expert in one specific area. Gone
are the days of a frantic scurry to find a job if the traditional employment falls through. Not only do microtaskers have a wider range of
options, they are also exposed to higher quality tasks. The rise in these on-demand, microtasking style employment helps to take some stress
out of job hunting, by providing microtaskers with a sustainable source of income and allowing them the space and time to find the best fit
of employment for themselves.
• Ex: Vodi x

Microtasking examples
• Amazon Mechanical Turk allows workers to choose and perform simple tasks online, reporting directly through the platform to receive
payments in exchange. A task can be as complex as algorithm writing or as simple as labelling photos or videos, describing products, or
transcribing scanned documents. Employers submit tasks and set their own payments, which are often pennies for each task.
This crowdsourcing project was initiated by Amazon as a way for users to find duplicate webpages, and soon it became a service for
individuals to contract computer programmers and other individuals to finish tasks that computers are unable to accomplish. Since then
this project has expanded from its original form; nowadays, there are people who will complete various Mechanical Turk projects as extra
income on the side.
• LiveOps uses a distributed network of people to run a "Cloud Call Center", a virtual call center or contact center: contracted workers can
answer calls and provide other call center facilities without the need for the physical building or equipment of a traditional call center.
The Red Cross used this system successfully during Hurricane Katrina in 2005, to process 17,000+ calls without having to open or hire
staff for a call center.[8]
• A similar model is used by text message question-answering services like 63336. Researchers connect with the service at home and
receive questions as they are submitted.
• InnoCentive allows businesses to post problems and offer payment for answers. These questions are often far less simple than tasks
posted on services like Mechanical Turk, and the payments are accordingly higher. For example: "Think you can find a way to prevent
orange juice stored in see-through bottles from turning brown? There may be $20,000 in it for you."[8]
• Samasource is a non-profit organization that allows people living in poverty the opportunity to complete microwork for a living wage. The
service specializes in online content moderation, digital transcription, and data gathering and promotion.[9]
• Galaxy Zoo is a scientific effort to use online crowdsourcing to classify a very large number of galaxies from astronomical images.
• In 2010, the company Internet Eyes launched a service where in return for a potential reward, home viewers would watch
live CCTV streams and alert shop owners of potential theft in progress.

Uses
• Most uses of microtasking services involve processing data, especially online. These
include driving traffic to websites, gathering data like email addresses or, and labelling or
tagging data online. They are also used to accurately translate or transcribe audio clips
and pictures, since these are activities that are better suited to humans than computers.
These are used both for practical data conversion purposes, but also to improve upon
and test the fidelity of machine learning algorithms. Identification of pictures by humans
has been used to help in missing persons searches, though to little effect
• Other than the manipulation of data, these services are also a good platform for reaching
a large population for social studies and surveys since they make it easy to offer
monetary incentives.
• Companies can also outsource projects to specialists on whom they otherwise would
have expended more resources hiring and screening. This method of pay per task is
attractive to employers; therefore, companies like Microsoft, AT&T, Yahoo! are currently
crowdsourcing some of their work through CrowdFlower, a company that specializes in
allocating jobs for foreign and local crowd workers. CrowdFlower alone has completed
450 million completed human intelligence tasks between 2007 and 2012. CrowdFlower
operates differently than Amazon Mechanical Turk. Jobs are taken in by the company;
then in turn they are allocated to the right workers through a range of channels. They
implemented a system called Virtual Play, which allows the users to play free games that
would in turn accomplish useful tasks for the company.

4.4 Mass Marketing
• Mass marketing is an undifferentiated marketing strategy in which a firm decides to ignore market segment differences and appeal the
whole market with one offer or one strategy, which supports the idea of broadcasting a message that will reach the largest number of
people possible. Traditionally mass marketing focuses on Social Media, Magazines, Email Marketing, radio, television and newspapers as
the media used to reach this broad audience. By reaching the largest audience possible, exposure to the product is maximized, and in
theory this would directly correlate with a larger number of sales or buys into the product, that incorporates mass media and the huge
distribution.
• Mass marketing is the opposite of niche marketing, as it focuses on high sales and low prices and aims to obtain maximum exposure to
products and services that will appeal to the whole market.
• Mass marketing is very effective in advertising products that are rendered as necessities and are guaranteed that people will shop for it
anyway. Mass marketing products have some common elements which include:
• Product Development: Usually mass marketing is associated with general purpose products that have an appeal to a broad base of
customers.
• Designing: Designs in mass marketing strategy intends to be highly accessible.
• Pricing: Pricing element involves affordable options for a very broad customer base.
• Promotion: Broadcasting media is usually associated with mass marketing as it can reach a wider range of audience.
Some core features of mass marketing are:
• It generally focuses upon a big portion of the audience.
• The objective includes the scattergun approach. Companies need to hit as many people as possible to get some return.
• Mass media is used to spread the undifferentiated message of the product.
• Majority of companies use this strategy to create a brand image and branding recall efforts or to introduce new products in the market.
Examples
• Several FMCG products like soaps and detergents use mass marketing. Body deodorants, as well as many personal hygiene products, use
this marketing strategy as they are used by a big market segment. Coca-Cola, telecom operators, body deodorants , as well as many
personal hygiene products

Benefits of mass marketing
• Since the target audience is broad, the number of successful hits is high despite the low
probability of a single person turning up, and if all the efforts in one particular area goes in
vain, the eventual loss is less compared to one in a narrowly focused area. Production costs
per unit are low on account of having one production run for homogeneous product, and
marketing research/advertising costs are also relatively low as well, which, as a whole,
leads to higher potentials of sales volume and efficiency of scale in a much larger market.
Drawbacks of mass marketing
• Due to increased competition and the complexity of consumers’ wants and needs in
today's society, Bennett and Strydom (2001) suggest that mass marketing campaigns are
less likely to be successful; as consumers have a range of specific tastes and requirements
that they would more likely find in alternative products.
There are some slogans everyone recognizes:
• “Expect more. Pay less.”
• “The ultimate driving machine.”
• “It’s everywhere you want to be.”
• “When you’re here, you’re family.”
(Target, BMW, Visa, and Olive Garden, respectively.)

Disadvantages
• Despite having many advantages to it, mass marketing also holds some weaknesses
for businesses. Undifferentiated marketing strategy allows putting all eggs in one
basket. This makes them inherently vulnerable to the changes that occur in
the marketing environment.
• Alongside this customers are unable to develop loyalty to brands that are spread
through mass marketing. This leads to margins as the cost needs to be maintained
at a lower level so as to prevent customers from switching brands.
• Another disadvantage may be that companies that aim at satisfying everyone in the
market with a single product can be easily challenged by competitors which have
their focus on serving a smaller market segment.
Conclusion
• Mass marketing strategy can be very effective for new products or to create a
brand image. The demand for the product should be determined so as to get the
maximum returns by marketing to the masses. Along with being a cost-effective
way to market products, this strategy also holds back some disadvantages which
have an impact on the returns.

Niche / Focused Marketing
• A niche market is a segment of a bigger market that can be defined by its
own unique preferences, needs, or identity that makes it different from the
market at large.
• Almost every market can be further divided, or refined, by the explicit
needs and preferences of its constituents. Below are the most common
ways to define a niche are depend on:
• Demographics (gender, age, education level, income level)
• Price (e.g. moderate, luxury, discount)
• Level of quality (premium, economical, handmade)
• Psychographics (values, interests, attitudes)
• Geographics (residents of a certain country, city, or even neighborhood)
• Selecting to focus on a niche is a strategic business decision to serve a
certain customer base better than competitors who target the larger
market.

Advantages/ Problems of niche marketing
• Higher ROI /profits/ Goodwill. ...
• Better customer relations/loyalty, brand loyalty. ...
• Less investment/ less risks/ less competition. ...
• Smaller market = limited growth. ...
• A higher ROI isn't guaranteed. ...
• Less competitors = lost opportunity to improve. ...
Channels that can help niche marketing. ...
• SEO, PPC (pay per click)
Problems in Niche Marketing:
1. The niche marketing strategy may not be suitable for long-term marketing,
as niches may not give adequate business
2. The niche markets may be invaded by large companies, and small
marketers may find it difficult to compete.
3. A firm’s survival chances may decrease if it depends solely on niche.

• For example, within the market for women's shoes are many
different segments or niches. Shoes for vegan women would be
a niche market, as would shoes for plus-sized women, shoes for
nurses, and shoes for transgendered people. These are all niche
markets within the larger market for women's shoes.
8 niche market examples (and niche products you can sell)
• Conscious consumers.
• Pet owners.
• The LGBTQ+ community.
• Travelers.
• Gamers.
• Homeowners.
• Remote workers.
• Locals.

Ways to evaluate your niche market idea
• Build your audience first
• Kickstarter campaigns create a buzz about products before they’re even been prepared.
While this might be not your way, you can still launch your idea and gain followers before the
idea come into action through social media campaigns, email opt-in pages, and other online
strategies. This way, you’ll need an engaged group of potential customers ready.
• Test before you invest
• Initiate with a small bunch of products and run a campaign to your targeted audience. Get
feedback from customers who’ve made the first purchases, or send a couple of to influencers
and ask them what they believe. It’s significant to get feedback as soon as possible,
particularly if you’re creating a new product, so you can improve it before it goes out to the
rest of the world.
• Dig deeper into your niche
• You already did the keyword research to define your niche market, however, you can go in-
depth. Analyze social media, influencers, blogs, and other key areas in your niche to get
insights.
• Research consumer trends in your market
• It’s vital to be up-to-date with what’s happening in your selected niche. Some of the
resources like Think with Google, Facebook IQ, and Nielsen consumer research will allow you
to understand consumer desires, pain points, and breakout ecommerce trends.

Indian Niche examples
• The best example of one such niche product is the brand called "Meera" shampoo, manufactured
and marketed by Cavinkare in the sachet segment. It has the traditional shihakkai base and is a
hugely herbal product. It is advertised for the special shihakkai context, that lends the hair a very
shiny look. This product is very famous in Tamil Nadu, and in Kerala, as rural folks still like to have
the lake bath and then a shampoo which is traditional in nature. It is not available in this form in
most parts of North India, as people out there, do not prefer the herbal variant. The same
company also has a super duper hit product "Nyle" with the traditional chemical base for North
Indian markets.
Raymonds suitings is a high-end, premium product, meant for the upper middle classes and the
rich. It remains a product that is only for the rich and the sophisticated as it is a very costly range.
Nano car is a niche product, as the family car is rather small and serves particular class of buyers.
Lux, the beauty soap is a niche product. In Mysore, the "madhur vada"is a huge niche product.
The special sweet called "palgova" which is made of pure ghee and sugar is made through a
special process and is sold from a small town called Srivilliputhur in South Tamil Nadu.
Ditto for the "iruttu kadai halwa", which refers to a particular brand of halwa made in a very dark
room, in the town of Tirunelveli, once again from South Tamil Nadu. This "niche"product is even
exported abroad, but the chemistry of making it is a trade secret. There are hundreds of other
shops in the same town, and all over Tamil Nadu. But none can equal this in terms of taste. The
skills are not so easy to acquire.
The Tanjore painting is another niche product that is not at all available everywhere or purchased
by everybody.
• Rolls Royce, Rolex Watches, Nike, Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble,

Differences
BASED ON NICHE MARKETING MASS MARKETING
Definition A marketing strategy that targets a specific market. A marketing strategy that targets whole market.
Objective Develop the value proportion Increase the value share with customers
Consumer Type
Homogeneous Buyers, who are intended to buy the
products for a long time Heterogeneous Buyers, who keeps on changing.
Marketing Type Intensive marketing by Internet and magazines Extensive marketing by Television media
Advertising by
They use easy medium such as attractive websites,
informative and relevant content and through emails
They use heavy medium by spending a huge amount
such as TV and media advertising.
Product variety There is usually a single product with a specific group.
There is a group of different products which groups in
society
Competition It is relatively low as company has a value for its product High because there are several other competitors

Promotion and Reliability of Niche products
• Niche products or services are promoted very aggressively. Even today, Lux is advertised as a
beauty soap. Hamam is hugely advertised as a health soap, for the fearless individuals.
• These days, personal mails are also sent to customers. The print media for promotion is also a
very viable option. They are also advertised in the National newspapers in English. The
promotion is always an ongoing process. Certain new innovations may be made in terms of
packaging, but the core attributes remain the same.
• For example, years ago, when the State of Kerala was advertised as "God's Own Country" and
the memorable campaign showed acres of lovely lands and coconut trees and the backwaters
of the place called Alleppey, millions of tourists from across the world got to experience the
taste of Kerala in total.
They were simply astonished to find the State so beautiful in so many respects. Since then,
Kerala has always occupied a special place in Indian Tourism. Several case studies have been
made on Kerala's efforts to promote it as a tourist paradise.
• The KPN brand of buses vs. TNRTC; Raymonds,Bata. Conclusion
Conclusion: Niche products and services will go on for ever. In India, there will be hundreds of niche
products that will occupy the shelves in the years to come. This will never change. The customers of such
niche products will always be a very happy lot. For that marketers need to keep customers wants as first
priority.

Identifying micromarketing opportunities
1. Identify your strengths and interests.
• Start by considering what you offer and what you’re good at. The best niche
marketing strategies play into your brand’s unique strengths and perspectives. So
reflect on the special and exceptional qualities of your brand, team, and offerings.
• What specific problems do you solve?
• What problems can you solve better than your competitors?
• Where do you especially excel?
• What do you know a lot about?
• Who do you and your team like to serve?
2. Do industry research.
• Once you have an idea about the type of niche marketing you want to do,
validate that it is a reasonable idea. Do a competitive analysis to see if there are
competitors in this space and if there are, what those brands are already doing.
• Also look to see if any openings in your target market may have been missed and
if there is legitimate demand in the vertical.

3. Get to know your ideal customer.
• Another way to gain insight and spark inspiration for niche marketing is to look
closely at your target audience and identify what they really want and need.
Getting to know your ideal customer can help you offer them a better product,
service, or message.
• To research your ideal audience, use Alexa’s Audience Overlap Tool. Enter your
site or a site that has an audience you would like to reach. The tool will help
you find similar websites that share the audience and explore them in an
interactive visualization. From here, you can look for trends that tell you what
else the audience might be interested in. You can identify ways to focus in on
your ideal customer’s needs and find opportunities to market what you offer.
• For example, a yoga studio might enter mindbodyonline.com (an online
scheduling site for fitness and wellness classes) and see that audiences also
frequently visit potterybarn.com, anthropologie.com, and urbanoutfitters.com.
Because those sites are all boutique-style shops with unique clothes, decor, and
gifts, the yoga studio might see this as an opportunity for creating a specialty
product shop or campaign just for yoga enthusiasts.

4. Choose, test, adjust, and repeat.
• Like most marketing strategies, you can’t just set up a niche marketing campaign and
assume it will achieve the results you want. You must test your initial idea, review
the results, and continue to adjust accordingly.
• You may find that your first idea for niche marketing didn’t work, but that a simple
tweak could hit a sweet spot that draws in audiences and leads to lifelong customers.
Perhaps a full boutique shop for yoga enthusiasts didn’t catch attention, but you
noticed more than half of the shoppers you had bought artwork. You may then want
to test and see if artwork for yogis is an idea worth exploring.
Target and Reach Your Niche Market
• If you haven’t engaged in niche marketing, it might be time to explore this tactic as a
means to connect with a smaller, but more loyal subset of customers. Use the tips
and examples in this post, as well as the techniques in our niche marketing pdf, to
help you develop a strategy for identifying an underserved and valuable ---customer
segment you can focus on.

Benefits of Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Competitive Advantage
• Why do you buy Coke over Pepsi? Why will you spend $80 on a pair of a certain
brand of sneakers? The answer lies in competitive advantage, that is a set of
unique features of a company and its products that are perceived by the target
market as significant and superior to the competition. It is the reason
behind brand loyalty, and why you prefer one product or service over another.
There are three different types of competitive advantages that companies can
actually use. They are cost, product/service differentiation, and niche strategies.
• Cost competitive advantage is when a company is able to utilize its skilled
workforce, inexpensive raw materials, controlled costs, and efficient operations
to create maximum value to consumers. Walmart uses the cost advantage
strategy by providing a very large selection and low prices via its retailer strength
and size. Costs can be kept at a minimum in many different ways. Ex: Nissan,
Ryanair and Companies receiving government subsidies.
• Product design (BMW, Lexus, Boeing, and Intel) and reengineering (Apple) and
new delivery method for their product or service, resulting in large cost savings
that they can share with their customers (self-check-in kiosks by airlines and self-
checkout lanes by supermarkets).

Product/service differentiation. If a company's product or service has a
valuable, unique offering for its consumers, then loyalty and
product/service differentiation can occur. Cost competitive advantages
can easily disappear with the introduction of a new competitor or new
technology. If a company offers a unique product or service, it is harder
to maintain an edge in the market based on price alone. The company
must offer something to the consumer besides just a low price.
Niche Marketing Strategies
1. Word-of-Mouth Campaigns
2. Targeted Collateral Campaigns
3. Trusted-Messenger/Endorsement Campaigns

Push marketing: As the name suggests, trying to
“push” a particular product on your target
audience. Businesses use push marketing:
• When launching a new product
• When operating in a niche market
Pull marketing: Customers know what they are
looking for, and the benefits themselves. The
user engages much more with the product pre-
purchase, and goes out and searches
information actively. Ex: car dealers, lawyers,
and household appliances, beds, computer
screens, etc. Businesses use pull marketing:
• When the user knows what he or she is
looking for
• When branding is of great importance

To summarize, Pull digital marketing is characterized by consumers actively
seeking marketing content while Push digital marketing occurs when
marketers send messages without that content being actively sought by the
recipients. Pull or Push tactics also referred to as inbound or outbound
marketing as well.
Ex: Pull digital marketing include search engines, email newsletters, text
messaging, while push digital marketing consists of opt-
in subscription services.
Inbound marketing is a methodology that uses digital marketing assets to
attract, engage, and delight customers online. Digital marketing, on the other
hand, is simply an umbrella term to describe online marketing tactics of any
kind, regardless of whether they're considered inbound or outbound.

• Outbound marketing examples, TV and radio ads, telemarketing,
banner and display ads, billboards, newspaper and magazine ads, cold
calling, pop-ups and pop-unders, and contextual ads.
• Inbound marketing called content marketing, involves creating blog
posts, social media, remarketing, infographics, white papers, email
newsletters, and other content that people actually want to read. Search
engine optimization paid discovery, and paid search help people find
marketers‘ content. increasing their engagement with the brand.

4.5 Permission Marketing
Traditional methods of marketing often revolve around the idea of interruption –
whether it is a television advertisement that cuts into a TV show, or an internet pop-
up that interferes with a website. According to Godin, such methods (often referred
to as ―Interruption marketing‖), have become less effective in the modern world,
where consumers are overloaded with information.
Interruption marketing is essentially a competition to win people‘s attention. In
today‘s world of mass-marketing, people are overloaded with advertisements that
compete for their limited time and attention span
Permission marketing is a non-traditional form of marketing whereby marketers
request their audiences’ permission to send them marketing material. This is
usually done by means of a double opt-in subscription.
Marketing strategies should be based on the following elements:
Anticipated: people will anticipate the service/product information from the
company.
Personal: the marketing information explicitly relates to the customer.
Relevant: the marketing information is something that the consumer is interested
in.
These elements were combined to define permission marketing, first publicized in
Godin‘s book, ―Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers into Friends and Friends
into Customers‖, published on May 6, 1999.

Benefits
• Permission marketing allows consumers to choose whether or not to be subjected to marketing.
This choice can result in better engagement. For example, consumers are more likely to open
an email marketing message if they "double opt in" compared to a regular "single opt in". By
targeting volunteers, permission marketing improves the odds that consumers pay more
attention to the marketing message. Permission marketing thus encourages consumers to
engage in a long-standing, cooperative marketing campaign.
• Cost-efficiency: Permission marketing employs low cost online tools – social media, search
engine optimization, e-mails, etc. Furthermore, by only marketing to consumers who have
expressed an interest, businesses can lower their marketing costs.
• High conversion rate: As the targeting audience are those who have expressed an interest to
the product, it is easier to convert the leads into sales.
• Personalization: Permission marketing allows businesses to run personalized campaigns; it
allows them to target specific audiences according to their age, gender, geographical location,
etc.
• Long-term relationships with customer: Through the usage of social media and e-mails,
businesses can interact and build long-term relationships with the customers.
• Marketing reputation: Permission marketing only sends information to those who are
anticipating the information. Therefore, prospects who receive the information feel less
discomfort.

Levels
There are 5 levels of permission in permission marketing. These "levels" measure the degree of
permission a consumer has granted to a specific business. At each successive level of the
permission framework, the business achieves a higher efficiency state, with a decrease in
marketing cost. Thus, businesses usually aim to achieve the ―intravenous permission‖ level.
However, the 5 levels of permission should not be considered as a necessary sequential process, as
more than one level could apply simultaneously depending on the nature of the business.
• Situational permission: The prospect permits the business to come into contact by providing their
personal information.
• Brand trust: The prospect permits the business to continue supplying their needs.
• Personal relationship: The prospect‘s permission is granted because of a personal relationship
that he/she has with someone in the provider organization.
• Points permission: At this stage, the customer has agreed to receive goods or services and has
allowed the business to collect their personal data. This is usually because they are provided with
incentives, such as exchangeable points or an opportunity to earn a prize.
• Intravenous permission: The supplier has now taken over the supply function for a specific good
or a service; the customer is completely dependent on the business. This is the highest level of
permission. The marketer, who has taken over the intravenous permission will be making the
buying decisions on behalf of their Customers.

Examples• Facebook is a prime example – whether it is to post, share, or amplify, the marketer would have to send a friend request
(or a permission) to the potential prospects.
• Opt-in email is an example of permission marketing, where Internet users request to receive information about a certain
product or a service.[18] Supporters of permission marketing claim it to be effective, as the potential client would be more
interested in information that was requested in advance. It is also more cost-efficient in comparison to traditional
marketing methods, as businesses only need to target consumers who have expressed an interest in their product.
• Huffington Post is an American online news aggregator and blog which offers original content including the areas
including politics, business, entertainment, environment, technology, etc. The Huffington Post has a clear permission
marketing-based approach: the readers will be required to register on the site using their social media (such as Facebook,
Twitter, etc.). The registration implies that readers have given the permission for Huffington Post to send them marketing
information, such as newsletters.
• YouTube is a video-sharing website which enables its users to upload, view, and share videos. Many firms utilize
YouTube as part of their social media marketing strategy to promote their products and services. Firms specifically make
use of the ―subscribing‖ feature to establish a permission-based relationship with their customers. Subscription would
imply that viewers have given permission for the business to market them with updated information, campaign, etc.
• Permission marketing is not only sending emails sent to subscribers, but it offers a great incentive for them to buy: a
promo code.
• RSS feeds : Really simple syndication, or RSS, feeds are a great way of employing permission marketing. This is a way
of letting your subscribers about your latest promotion or content by way of sending them a notification.
• Loyalty cards are another great way of putting permission marketing into action. In signing up for your loyalty program,
subscribers give you their information and give you permission to use that information to send them promotional material
• Sundance Vacations is a travel company that allows customers to buy vacations in bulk. The company employs a method
of permission marketing by attending sporting events, shows and more and getting people to sign up to win their annual
sweepstakes. The entry forms that are filled out contain an agreement that says the company is allowed to contact the
person filling the form at the methods provided by the entrant. The potential client's signature is considered a form of
consent to contact them, which allows the company to then email and phone market to entrants.

Major Online Distribution Channels
• Search Engines
• Organic search results (e.g. Google and Bing)
• Paid/sponsored listings (e.g. Google and Bing)
• Display Ads
• Banner Ads
• Interactive Ads
• Social Media (posts and Ads)
• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• Pinterest
• Digital word-of-mouth
• Forums (e.g. Reddit)
• Wikis
• Influencers (e.g. bloggers)
• Business listing (e.g. Yelp)

4.6 Flexibility in Digital Marketing
• Why is flexibility important for a digital marketing strategy?
• Doing Flexible Digital Marketing Strategy Right
When you approach flexibility from the right angle, your strategy becomes
adaptable and ready to respond to any eventuality. No one gets too hung up on the
details of what they want to see; instead they emphasize what actually works.
• Flexibility in branding
• Dynamic logos
• Fast-moving media
• Evolving user experience
• Balancing consistency & flexibility in your marketing strategy

Customer Expectations
• Customer expectation encompasses everything that a customer expects from a
product, service or organisation. Customer expectations are created in the minds of
customers based upon their individual experiences and what they have learned,
combined with their pre-existing experience and knowledge.
• Customers in today‘s market have high expectations and, if your company can‘t
satisfy them, they‘ll churn and move on to the next company that can.
1. Inform the Customer
2. Provide a Relevant Customer Journey
3. Guide the Customer
4. Instant Gratification (Responsive Service)
5. Enterprise-Wide Approach, Consistency
6. Keeping it Human
7. Expect Innovation
8. Expect Data Protection and Privacy

• Customer expectations are difficult
to meet.
• 66% of customers cannot remember
the last time a brand exceeded their
expectations!
• 80% of companies believe they are
providing a superior customer service
experience. But, only 8% of
customers agree. Are you providing a
superior service?
• The customer is firmly in the driving
seat. So, how are you meeting and
exceeding customer service
expectations in 2020?
1. Quality first, Speed second
2. Connect with Your Customers
3. Go the Extra Mile
4. Openly discuss solutions
5. Provide clear timelines
6. Be transparent and honest
7. Remain optimistic, but realistic
8. Follow up regularly

Marketing mix
• The term “marketing mix” was created by Neil H. Borden who was an
American Marketing Association president in 1953.
• In 1960 E. Jerome McCarthy formed the 4 Ps in Marketing.
• The Comprehend and Conquer approach has reanalyzed the 4Ps as –
Philosophy, Process, Positioning and Promotion.
• In 1967, Philip Kotler defined the famous model of the 4 Ps: Product,
Price, Place (distribution) and Promotion. The marketing mix in the
digital era has evolved from 4Ps to 4Cs; 7Ps to 7Cs.; 8Ds.
• The marketing mix in the digital era indicates that business success is
based on: content, context, connexion and community.
• From the 4Cs to the 4Vs: Validity, Value, Virtual Place, and Virality.

7Ps & 7Cs
The 7 Ps The 7 Cs
Organisation Facing Customer Facing
Product = Customer/ Consumer
Price = Cost
Place = Convenience
Promotion = Communication
People = Caring
Processes = Co-ordinated
Physical Evidence = Confirmation

4.7 5-Forces theory
1. Competitive rivalry
2. Threat of substitute products
3. Bargaining power of buyers
4. Threat of new entrants
5. Bargaining power of
suppliers

Recession Period
Competitive rivalry
• These include estate agents, web design, and office stationery. Many competitors often buy on price. There are
many providers of very similar products, meaning that differences should be highlighted, and prices must be
competitive.
Threat of substitute products
• The substitute for all services is DIY. For example, anyone can cut their own hair or write their own will, but
many people spend money to enlist the services of an experienced professional to deliver a level of service
greater than they can provide themselves. Focus on expertise, customer service and added value your company
can use to distinguish itself.
Bargaining power of buyers
• An example is the grocery sector since supermarkets tend to retain power over suppliers due to volume and
price of contracts. They dictate terms, set prices and can end agreements at any time.
Threat of new entrants
• An example is web design, as there are independents in every location. This is an easy market to enter with few
requirements, other than skills, initiative and relevant hardware and software. This does mean there are many
new entrants!
Bargaining power of suppliers
• Some sectors have monopolistic (one) or oligopolistic (few) suppliers, such as utility companies. Sometimes
customers have little choice i.e. where to buy domestic water suppliers, though this is changing. In the jewellery
sector, diamond suppliers often hold the power and can set prices, withhold supply and restrict sales.

Positioning through marketing mix strategies
Selecting market to target
Determining market segmentation
Identify markets with unfulfilled needs
Selecting a target market(s)
Determining market segmentation
Identifying markets with unfulfilled needs
4.7 Steps in Market Segmentation, Targeting, and Positioning
© 2007 McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., McGraw-Hill/Irwin

Selecting & Relating to Customers
• Identify factors to segment
market
• Determine potential of each
segment
Objective: identify & understand
customer characteristics
Segmentation

Identifying Markets
•What is a market? PEOPLE
BUT - not just ANY people, they have to have
• Willingness to buy
• Purchasing power (money)
• Authority to buy, a specific product
•Consumer Markets and Industrial Markets

Bases for Market Segmentation
107

• Criteria for selection
• Segment strategy
Objective: Selecting customers &
allocating resources
108
Segmentation
Target Marketing

Selecting a Target Market
Determining which segments to target
•Sales potential
•Growth opportunities
•Competition
•Ability to serve the segment
109

Intensive
Selective
Intensive
Selective
No. of Intermediaries: Strategies
= number of
outletsExclusive
Market
Exposure
Strategies
1101/3/2013

Target Marketing Strategies
• Mass Market
• One size fits all
111
 Well defined mkts
 Different approach for each
 Single mkt
 One approach
Undifferentiated Differentiated Concentrated

• Understand customers
• Determine image
Objective: Establish positive image
relative to competitors
112
Segmentation
Target Marketing
Positioning

Positioning
Creating a product image or identity
in the minds of their target market
relative to competitive products.
113

Develop Product Positioning
114

Simple Preparation
Involved Preparation
Healthy Unhealthy
Beef
Pork
Tuna
Chicken
Turkey
Fresh Fish
Bacon
Hot Dogs
Develop Product Positioning contd...
115

116How do these ads demonstrate that the companies understand the customer?

Which segmentation variable is
employed in this ad?
Within that variable, which category
does the ad target.

Developing the Marketing Mix Program
• Product
• Price
• Place (Marketing Channels)
• Promotion
Selecting the target market and designing the marketing mix go hand-in-hand
119

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