research paper on effectiveness of digital marketing

How digital technologies reshape marketing: evidence from a qualitative investigation

• Original Article
• Open access
• Published: 17 January 2023
• Volume 2023 , pages 27–58, ( 2023 )

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• Federica Pascucci   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-7326-6067 1 ,
• Elisabetta Savelli   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2785-0403 2 &
• Giacomo Gistri   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2988-9758 3  

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Digital technologies are now imperative for markets and society, and digital transformation is becoming a key area of business innovation. However, digital transformation is complex, and firms still lack the abilities to fully grasp and exploit its opportunities. This study investigates how digital technologies are currently implemented by companies. In particular, since digital transformation can reshape the traditional process of value creation in which marketing is primarily involved, the article analyses the impact of digital transformation on traditional marketing, including its role, organisation, and instruments. The study conducted qualitative research in the form of in-depth interviews with managers working for companies operating in different Italian industries. The results show that digital technologies are widely used by firms, although they often belong to the category of traditional tools, and companies are more ‘digitalised’ than ‘digitally transformed’. Digital technologies impact marketing by improving the abilities of market analytics, pricing, and channel management and helping to build relationships with clients to achieve value co-creation. Professional skills are variously augmented, while organisational processes are becoming more effective and flexible through the use of multiple knowledge and cross-functional experiences. Research and managerial implications are discussed in light of the main barriers and risks involved in the implementation of digital transformation.

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1 Introduction

Society is undergoing a constant technological transformation that involves changes in all areas – from the economy to culture and politics. The business world is profoundly influenced by this transformation, which is occurring across industries, albeit at varying intensities. Data from the most recent report by Anitec-Assinform (2021) indicate that TLC & media, industry, and banking are the three sectors in Italy that reveal the highest investments in absolute value totalling €8.815, €7.909, and €7.989 million, respectively. In this context, some technologies can be considered already mature, such as mobile business, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things (IoT), whereas other technologies seem to be emergent, including blockchain and artificial intelligence. In the industrial sector, the digital investment mainly aims to improve customer engagement, enhance relationships with employees, reduce time-to-market through agile manufacturing and supply chain management, promote operational efficiency, and advance data exploitation.

In light of this evolution, there is growing interest in the topic of digital transformation (DT). Both academics and practitioners have proposed several definitions of DT, which has thus become a ‘hype’ or ‘buzzword’; however, not enough attention has been paid to what DT is and how it can be conceptualised (Gong & Ribiere, 2021 ; Hausberg et al., 2019 ). Scholars agreed that the implications of DT are profound and manifold. Moreover, DT extends beyond the adoption of one or more digital technologies, as it entails rethinking the market approach and value proposition, changing organisational processes and structures, and, in some cases, innovating the business model, thus involving a plurality of internal and external actors (Broekhuizen et al., 2021 ).

In this context, marketing can play a fundamental role, considering its important function of connecting firms and the market. It can help a company adapt to the constantly changing needs and trends coming from the external environment. However, to address the challenges of DT, marketing theory has to be enriched with new concepts, logic, and tools that are in line with the ongoing evolution (De Luca et al., 2020 ). According to Kumar et al., ( 2021 ), the future of marketing lies in firms’ efforts to acquire a holistic understanding of their customers’ needs and behaviours across platforms, devices, and varied products and services. To this end, it is fundamental to investigate the impact of new digital technologies on marketing strategies both to understand how they are currently being leveraged and to identify potential areas that merit deeper exploration.

To answer these calls, the present study explores how DT is currently perceived and implemented by companies and how it affects marketing by influencing its role, organisation, and internal processes. The main objective is to understand the complex relationship between DT and marketing by investigating (i) how DT can be leveraged by marketing processes and resources; and (ii) how DT can improve the value creation process in which the marketing function is involved. Existing literature on this topic is quite fragmented, as studies have considered one single marketing activity or decision, and the findings have often been discordant. Thus, further analyses are recommended.

Specifically, the contribution of this exploratory analysis is twofold. First, unlike existing studies, the present research considers marketing as a whole strategy and process, thus generating a holistic view of DT implications. In this respect, the findings reveal some important changes concerning the role and organisation of marketing and the management of its activities. Second, the study identifies potential risks and barriers to DT encountered by the firms and how companies are trying to overcome them. From these risks and barriers, we derive some useful recommendations for managers and policymakers.

The paper is structured as follows. Following this introduction, Sect.  2 describes the theoretical background of the study and establishes four research questions. Section  3 sets the methodology, and Sect.  4 presents the findings of the multiple interviews. Section  5 discusses the implications for theory and practice, and Sect.  6 concludes the paper by highlighting both the limitations of the study and future research directions.

2 Theoretical background

2.1 digital transformation.

The term ‘digital transformation’ has entered the agendas and debates of both scholars and practitioners, and the concept is currently a ‘hot topic’. Conceptual and empirical research on DT has grown enormously in recent years in different fields, and many literature reviews have been published (Krishen et al., 2021 ). In the Scopus database, the number of articles, conference papers, books, and book chapters containing ‘digital transformation’ in the title, keywords, and abstract increased from 2 to 3,109 between 2000 and 2021.

The topic of DT can be investigated from two key perspectives: that of the firm which adopts digital technologies or that of the customers at whom the company’s actions are directed. This paper focuses on the first perspective, which recognises the multidisciplinary nature of the phenomenon in involving changes in strategy, organisation, technologies, supply chains, and marketing (Verhoef et al., 2021 ). For companies, digital technologies may enhance operational efficiency and the effectiveness of existing processes (Pascucci, 2017 ). Moreover, they can provide new opportunities to enable business model innovations (Ancillai et al., 2022 ), such as digital servitisation (Frank et al., 2019 ; Gebauer et al., 2021 ; Grandinetti et al., 2020 ).

According to this dual nature of DT implications, it is possible to distinguish three stages of DT (Verhoef et al., 2021 ): digitisation, which is the encoding of analog information into a digital format; digitalisation, which is the adoption of digital technologies to improve existing business processes; and DT, which is the development of a new business model based on digital technologies. In line with this conceptualisation, DT is the most pervasive and complex stage of transformation (Gong & Ribiere, 2021 ), and most firms, especially SMEs, are still in the second stage. Each stage places specific demands on firms’ digital resources, organisational structure, growth strategy, and metrics. As a result, DT can have different levels of maturity as a changing process and there is not ‘one best way’ to implement DT; rather, each firm needs to devise its approach (Checchinato et al., 2021 ).

Although the growing number of studies on DT, some authors have argued that the phenomenon remains under-investigated (Fernandez-Ravira et al., 2021 ), and there is still a need to understand the true nature of change and transformation (Gong & Riviere, 2021 ). Moreover, despite the opportunities presented by technological progress, it seems that firms are not yet fully exploiting the potential of digital technologies, as many companies have failed to obtain the expected results. Thus, DT represents ‘a substantial problem of practice’ (Hinterhuber et al., 2021 , p. 3). In this regard, Gebauer et al., ( 2020 ) have highlighted a ‘digitalisation paradox’ in which ‘companies invest in digitalisation but struggle to earn the expected revenue growth’ (p. 315). In light of this, our first research question (RQ1) is as follows:

How do firms conceive of DT? In particular, how and why do they leverage digital technologies for it?

2.2 Marketing in the age of DT

Marketing is one business area witnessing DT on an intense scale and experimenting with new technologies, such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, and the IoT (Grewal et al., 2020 ; Kumar et al., 2021 ). Digitalisation has radically transformed the customer journey since individuals are now constantly connected. Moreover, the era of digital technologies features exceptional growth in customer empowerment. Because of the abundance of information and interaction opportunities, consumers no longer accept the role of passive recipients of firms’ messages (Auh et al., 2019 ; Akhavannasab et al., 2018 ). This change requires innovative approaches to marketing communication and forces brands to interact with individual customers quickly, openly, and continuously.

All of these trends have led companies to adopt a customer-centric approach, which prioritises the customer first and foremost in their organisational strategies (Shah et al., 2006 ). Consequently, relationships between firms and their customers are evolving, and firms should invest in building stronger, closer, and longer-lasting customer relationships in both B2B and B2C markets. Digital technologies have helped firms in pursuing this aim. For instance, with CRM technologies, companies can gather customer information through many touchpoints and share the needed information across the company to align marketing decisions with customers’ needs and values, identify more profitable customers, guide investment decisions, quickly respond to customer requests, and deliver customised offerings and experiences (Nasir, 2015 ).

Customer data form the basis of a customer-centric organisation. Data are assuming an increasingly central role in marketing as a fundamental resource for building and maintaining customer relationships, personalising products, services, and the marketing mix, and automating marketing processes in real-time. Nowadays, firms operate in ‘data-rich environments’ (Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ), such as web and social media, which have brought an explosion of real-time data, especially unstructured ones, that can reshape the management of marketing activities and thereby afford new business opportunities.

The combination of data proliferation, algorithmic advancement (artificial intelligence), and more powerful computing and storage capabilities supports the transformation of data into business insights, decisions, and actions, thus allowing for the development of a marketing ‘data-driven approach’ (Anderson, 2008 ; Pascucci et al., 2022 ), which helps companies to customise products and optimise marketing decisions for customers on a real-time basis (Wirtz et al., 2017 ).

Because of the growing relevance of data-driven decisions, marketing analytics has become central to modern organisations and now represents a new frontier in marketing research (Sheth, 2021 ). However, the increased volume and variety of data remain mostly untapped by firms, and many organisations have failed to incorporate the data effectively in their decision-making processes (Tabesh et al., 2019 ). Thus, many firms have not effectively realised their ‘big data dreams’ (Mazzei & Noble, 2017 ). Previous research has identified a shortage of organisational resources (e.g. infrastructure, human resources, and competencies) and cultural and technological barriers (Tabesh et al., 2019 ) as the main reasons for this failure. Organisations that aim to profit from (big) data analytics, indeed, should have the following elements: first, a culture and leaders that recognise the importance of data, analytics, and data-driven decision making; second, a governance structure that prevents silos and facilitates the integration of data and analytics into the organisation’s overall strategy and processes; and third, a critical mass of marketing analysts who collectively provide sufficiently deep expertise in analytics as well as substantive marketing knowledge (Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ).

Anyway, this evolution is transforming the way marketing strategies are developed and implemented, and produces an overall reshaping of the marketing mix management (Caliskan et al., 2021 ). As a result, a new marketing approach (i.e., Digital Marketing: Krishen et al., 2021 ), organisation, and skills are required. Notably, scholars have developed the new ‘Marketing 4.0’ (Kartajaya et al., 2016 ; Jara et al., 2012 ), which is based on the assumption that customers are not only looking for products and services to satisfy their needs but also demanding to be part of the production process. This aspect calls for a shift towards a more collaborative, interactive, and inclusive approach, which Marketing 4.0 tries to enable to improve brand and customer relationships (Dash et al., 2021 ).

For marketing policies, the rise of social media has dramatically changed how firms manage their brands. Consumers have become ‘pivotal authors’ of brand stories, and firms need to pay attention to such consumer-generated content and coordinate firm-generated content accordingly (Gensler et al., 2013 ).

The participatory role of customers is also at play in the product customisation enabled by digital technologies, such as virtual, augmented, or mixed reality, that have the potential to not only increase customer participation in the new product design (Mourtzis & Doukas, 2012 ) – but also to create new types of improved customer experiences in all steps of the customer journey (Hoyer et al., 2020 ; Flaviàn et al., 2019 ). Notably, heterogeneity exists in consumer demand for customisation, and a better understanding of these differences is vital for brand managers to effectively develop and deliver customisation opportunities for consumers (Pallant et al., 2020 ).

Digital transformation also impacts pricing decisions. The growing availability of data and pricing algorithms is enabling personalised and dynamic pricing, in which prices can change by the day, every hour, or for each customer according to the data that are collected and analysed. This widespread practice is especially prevalent in the service sector (Abrate et al., 2012 ).

Finally, DT allows consumers to utilise and move seamlessly across multiple channels in their customer journey (Hansen & Sia, 2015 ). Along with these developments, ‘omnichannel management’ is increasingly emerging as a new strategic approach – in contrast to ‘multichannel management’ – to manage the simultaneous and synergetic interplay between channels and thus provide the seamless customer experience that customers expect (Verhoef et al., 2015 ).

In the wake of all of these evolution trends, digital marketing studies have increased substantially over the past 20 years. Nevertheless, digital marketing is still growing and has not yet reached maturity (Krishen et al., 2021 ). In addition, the existing literature is quite fragmented as previous research is mainly focused on specific marketing activities, and findings have often been discordant. Therefore, our second research question (RQ2) is as follows:

what are the impacts that DT is currently having on marketing activities and firm-customer relationships?

While digital changes present numerous opportunities, they undoubtedly pose some challenges as well. Leeflang et al., ( 2014 ) have already identified three main challenges for digital marketers: the ability to generate and leverage deep customer insights, the management of brand reputation in a marketing environment where user-generated content is predominant, and the assessment of the effectiveness of digital marketing. The issue of human resources and capabilities remains a particularly prominent topic, as there is a widening gap between the accelerating complexity of markets and technologies and the evolution of firms’ digital marketing capabilities. Increased data complexity creates a ‘digital talent gap’ (Leeflang et al., 2014 ) that is aggravated by the difficulty of finding employees who are capable of combining quantitative and analytics skills with marketing skills. In this regard, Herhausen et al. ( 2021 ) have identified two marketing capability gaps: the ‘practice gap’, concerning the deficit between managers’ current practices and their ideal digital marketing capabilities; and the ‘knowledge gap’, which is the divide between the digital marketing transformation and the extant scholarly knowledge that underpins it. Matarazzo et al., ( 2021 ) have found that dynamic capabilities, especially sensing and learning capabilities, are generally fundamental facilitators of DT in SMEs. According to these authors, DT is a learning process, as it requires new human resources and some changes to organisational structure, which demonstrates the relevance of the ‘soft’ dimension of DT as opposed to the technological dimension. Likewise, Eller et al., ( 2020 ) have determined that the recruitment of employees with the required skills is a significant barrier to successful digitalisation among SMEs, and a digital strategy with concrete key performance indicators and actions to monitor the process is a fundamental driver of digitalisation. In particular, there is a need to more closely align marketing and information technology (IT) in terms of knowledge and capabilities (Graesch et al., 2021 ).

Authors have largely agreed that scarce attention has been given to the related competencies that firms need to fully exploit the potential of digital technologies. It could be interesting and useful to investigate the reason for this gap, study how digital technologies are being leveraged, and identify the most critical areas. Thus, our third research question (RQ3) is as follows:

What is impact of DT on marketing organization and competences?

A further debate in the marketing literature concerns the implications of DT for the role and relevance of marketing within the company. According to some scholars, marketing is losing its influence and has become marginalised, as marketing decisions have moved to other departments (Homburg et al., 2015 ; Verhoef & Leeflang, 2009 ). In the same vein, Quinn et al., ( 2016 ) have stated that evolution ‘has precipitated a managerial sense of crisis for marketing, triggering a transformation that has repercussions for the future of the discipline and its practice’ (p. 2104). In contrast, other authors have posited that technological evolution has contributed over time to the role and scope of marketing within organisations expanding from primarily involving the development and management of creative communication to now including the implementation of data-driven and technology-enabled marketing practices that are not only relevant to firms and customers but also financially accountable (Shah & Murthi, 2021 ). Based on this discussion, it is interesting to explore how DT may have changed the function of marketing and the main implications of this evolution. Therefore, our fourth research question (RQ4) is as follows:

How might DT have changed the overall role and importance of marketing within firms?

3 Methodology

This research employed a multiple case study methodology to perform an exploratory analysis of DT in 11 Italian firms operating in different industries. Considering the novelty and complexity of DT, the case study approach is particularly suitable, as it emphasises the richness of the phenomenon and deeply grounds the findings in the varied empirical evidence that is collected (Eisenhardt, 1989 ). Case studies are particularly useful for providing in-depth answers to ‘how’ and ‘why’ research questions, thus supporting a holistic, comprehensive, and realistic understanding of a certain phenomenon. Moreover, Hausberg et al., ( 2019 ) have directly called for more case studies that describe the benefits, values, and weaknesses of DT implementations.

The research team conducted in-depth and semi-structured interviews (n = 20) based on face-to-face and online meetings with individuals who had key-roles in DT, including those of chief officer (CO), chief digital officer (CDO), or chief marketing officer (CMO). Semi-structured interviews suited the study’s explorative aim because they allow researchers to follow a structured approach while also leaving space for interviewees to freely talk about their experiences and opinions (Yin, 2009 ). Each interview lasted nearly two hours, was conducted in Italian, and was audio-recorded, transcribed, and analysed. The number of interviews, within each company, has been determined in line with the principle of theoretical saturation, thus interviews have been conducted till the information gathered has been considered sufficient for the scope of the analysis and no further relevant information could have been added by additional interviews (Strauss & Corbin, 1990 ).

The interview guide was aimed at exploring DT in terms of four aspects: first, the implemented technologies (technological macrotrends); second, the implications of technology adoption for marketing processes; third, the implications of technology adoption for human resources and organisation; and fourth, the implications of technology adoption for customer relationships. The interview guide was carefully designed based on the previously analysed literature on DT and marketing.

In addition to the primary data from the interviews, secondary data were gathered from newspaper and magazine articles, corporate presentations, companies’ reports, and their own websites. These allowed for the triangulation of data, which provides greater depth to the study of a phenomenon from different perspectives (Denzin, 1984 ).

Figure  1 depicts the overall framework that guided the case study development and analysis.

Framework of analysis

As for the sample, a purposeful procedure (Patton, 2005 ) was used to select firms from the Marche region. This area has n.145.609 firms (2021), which represents the 2.8% of all Italian firms. Manufacturing and commerce are the main sectors. Marche’s entrepreneurial density (i.e., number of firms per inhabitant) is higher than the Italian one (97 firms per 1000 inhabitants vs. 87, https://statistica.regione.marche.it ). Such entrepreneurial vocation makes Marche Region an interesting context to investigate the phenomenon of firms’ digital transformation.

Companies have been selected to represent the principal industries of this area and to provide a clear picture of the current situation while considering different sectors, as well as different needs and criticalities from the perspective of the DT phenomenon. Thus, because the intention was to get a broad variety of DT cases, the sample covers various industries and sizes (see Table  1 ). Moreover, we selected only incumbent firms, as their legacy ensures that they have experience with DT challenges and barriers and must navigate conflicts and trade-offs between existing and new ways of conducting business (Verhoef et al., 2021 ). Finally, considering our research objective, all the selected firms must be involved in some form of DT, being aware of the importance to invest in new technologies.

Although the analysis has been conducted at a regional level, the findings are significant as Marche is one of the most industrialised regions in Italy, and the distribution of its industries is quite similar to the Italian one, with a prelevance of small and medium sized firms.

The collected data have been examined following Eisenhardt’s ( 1989 ) guidelines for within-case and cross-case analyses. Each case was thoroughly studied to obtain insights into the relationship between DT and marketing. Then, the cases were compared to analyse similarities and differences and gain a richer understanding of the DT phenomenon.

4.1 Intra-case analysis

DT is an ongoing process in the analysed companies that was variously perceived and implemented. Table  2 shortly depicts the current status of DT within each company, by showing the main technologies adopted and relative business areas of application.

Algam EKO operates in the musical instruments industry. The company employs digital technologies mostly to interact with customers and suppliers. Specifically, it has been using mobile technology/smart apps since 2016 and is active on social media since 2009, especially on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram. AI applications are in progress, intending to bring online the experience that is lived in physical retail, by creating ad hoc videos in collaboration with retailers. Algam EKO doesn’t use IoT or Blockchain technologies yet.

Ariston Thermo works in the thermal comfort, burners, and components sectors. Since it is a multinational company that grew up through many acquisitions, digital technologies have been used to create greater harmonization within the group. They started with assistance services. Having sensors inside the boilers the company would be able to know if there is a malfunction and, therefore, intervene earlier, sometimes solving the problem completely remotely without going to customers’ homes. This brought a very different customer service model and also important business insights with data collection, storage, and utilization. About AI and IoT the company is at its beginning. The integration between IoT and Blockchain remains an objective of the near future. Also for digital communications, Ariston Thermo is in its infancy. It is present on social media platforms but it needs to find its soul, as it is still very jagged because social media are not managed centrally and strategically. As the Chief Digital Officer said:

Everyone does his own so we are still at the stage of trying to understand who is doing and what to bring it back to a trend . (Ariston Thermo Spa)

Biesse operates in the mechatronics industry. The company launched “Sophia” in 2016, an Industrial Internet of things (IIoT) platform based on sensors connected to machinery, which monitor the activities of customers and generate real-time information. Sophia allows cloud computing for data management in open systems; big data analytics for the optimization of products and services as well as production processes; IIoT as multidirectional communication between products and customers’ processes. The advent of new digital technologies had a positive impact also on the branding strategy of the Group, involving a greater presence of the brand in digital channels such as social media platforms, which contributed to redefining the brand as more innovative, digital, clear, and simple.

Diansen owns the construction industry. Recently, an increasing number of customers have begun to adopt social media, especially Instagram, to find specific content once asked by professionals. Customers have become increasingly active and started to interact with the company through these channels so, since 2017, the company has decided to increase its presence on social media, by enriching the content offer, the level of interaction, and the users’ engagement. DT pushed the company to be more effective in digital marketing by using tools such as email marketing platforms, digital content platforms, and CRM software. Diansen didn’t start using more sophisticated applications such as Big Data, AI, or Blockchain yet, even if they consider AI potentially useful for production processes.

Doucal’s works in the footwear industry. Digitization was driven primarily by the evolution of the external context. In Doucal’s, DT started from production and then came to marketing, as a result of the original company’s orientation on the product. Marketing has always meant communication and, recently, social media communication (since 2015). Doucal’s did not introduce AI, Blockchain systems, IoT, or mobile technologies yet but it has been using Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software since 2018 to automate and manage core business processes. Considering production, artisans involved in cutting, wear smart glasses with a micro camera to capture the actions in real-time. Filming is carried out on anonymous workstations and divided according to both the shoe model and the specific processing. In this way, the intangible assets become explicit and usable even at a distance and on different platforms for example for the training of new personnel.

Eden Viaggi – Alpitour is a tour operator. In July 2016, it has been released the app “My Alpitour World” to be the personal travel assistant of customers at every stage of their journey, from booking to their return, to offering personalized services during their holidays. To find and interact with customers Eden Viaggi – Alpitour mostly used social media, since 2010. In particular Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. So far, the company looked at AI with skepticism in its industry, especially considering the use of chatbots to interact with customers and the marketing director remarked that it is difficult to have questions that can be so standardized as to have an adequate answer from a machine or an algorithm. Since 2019, the company is also using Big Data and analytics to develop customized forecasts and commercial proposals. While IoT technologies did not have been implemented, they are experiencing Blockchain and an NFT is being developed within the hotel division.

Go World is another tour operator. The company considers AI, IoT, and Blockchain technologies more suitable for larger players in the sector where decision-making and control processes are more complex. In the same way, Go World did not implement mobile technology/smart apps because they think are more appropriate in B2C contexts than in B2B, where most of the company business is located. On the other hand, the company uses social media to interact with its customers and in 2019 it started to plan a new e-commerce platform that uses Big data and analytics to commercialize customized products. Besides, an e-learning platform has been used for travel agent training.

IT Consult works in the knowledge management industry. Specifically, it develops software for document management using the “Josh platform”. The company is therefore fully involved in the dynamics of digital transformation. The main challenge concerned the definition of digital marketing activities and their integration with other established commercial actions. IT Consult did not practice IoT, Blockchain, or AI but it uses social media to communicate and interact with its customers, mainly YouTube, LinkedIn, and Facebook. The company also habits marketing automation tools in mailing such as “MailChimp” and Microsoft Dynamic for CRM.

Magazzini Gabrielli is a big retailer operating in the large-scale distribution industry. Digitalization involved particularly communication activities, which were usually based on distinct physical and digital channels. Most of the endeavors went to the need for integration following the omnichannel trend. The company also used Big data and analytics to plan marketing actions along the customer journey. To communicate and send promotions, Magazzini Gabrielli started in 2020 using social media platforms, specifically Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. In 2021 it has been launched also the OasiTigre app that operates as a kind of digital fidelity card. The company did not use AI, Blockchain, or IoT technologies yet.

Salumificio Ciriaci operates in the food industry. It was founded in 1937 with the idea of producing quality, healthy, and genuine products processed with traditional methods. Recently, there was a generational and managerial change and it has been launched a rebranding strategy to link the quality of the product to the quality of the territory enhancing the supply chain. In this regard, it has been implemented a communication strategy through social media. In 2020 the company also introduced a cold room monitoring system with an app. However, till now, it didn’t employ IoT, AI, or Blockchain technologies.

Finally, Simonelli Group owns the mechanical industry. The company doesn’t have used Blockchain technology yet. There is an ongoing project about IoT to support product preventive maintenance. They are also experiencing Big Data applied to CRM. The company uses social media and started to develop an app system related to products. It is a system made up of a connected machine and two platforms: the former is more technical while the latter is more oriented to the coffee culture that supports customers and service connoisseurs. So DT has helped in offering a system package to the customers, rather than a chain between distributors and customers.

4.2 Cross-cases analysis

4.2.1 how dt has been conceived and performed in business practice.

The above analysis depicts a very fragmented scenario, characterised by the adoption of several technologies by the analysed companies, according to different aims and business purposes.

Overall, social media emerged as the most widely used digital technology that companies employ to both communicate and interact with customers, based on a different product or channel page. Despite the social media presence has been usually established for less than five years, the growing investment in such technologies reflects an increasing interest in their current and future adoption. Moderate interest was found in mobile technologies and smart applications. As seen before, Salumificio Ciriaci recently launched an application allowing for automated monitoring of the cold rooms, while Go World anticipated the launch of a multimedia application catalog in 2022 based on high-resolution photographs describing tourism offerings to the final customers. More advanced technologies, such as artificial intelligence applied to production or preventive maintenance, Big Data processing software, blockchain systems, and IoT applications were still under-employed, especially among the smallest firms. Notably, only some companies in the mechanical sector (i.e. Biesse and Simonelli Group) used digital automation and simulation software between machines to improve the overall efficiency of production processes. On the other hand, some respondents highlighted the use of ERP software connected to CRM strategies and tools applied to both customers and sales management (i.e., Doucal’s Srl; Magazzini Gabrielli Spa).

The heterogeneous (and sometimes sparse) adoption of digital technologies by companies is due to several factors, which have been recognised as potential facilitators of or barriers to the digitalisation process. The main facilitators emerging from the interviews can be grouped according to their internal or external origin. Meanwhile, the barriers can be categorised into cultural factors, change management obstacles, or perceived risks associated with DT. Table  3 provides a brief description of such variables.

The above factors influenced the way companies invested in digital technologies and implemented digital tools within the organisation as well as the different impacts of DT on firms’ activities and processes, especially the marketing function.

4.2.2 The role of DT in supporting customer/firms relationships

The increasing use of digital technologies radically changed customer behavior and journey.

The investigated companies recognized that the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a growing willingness on the part of the demand to use digital means to inform themselves, learn about and make purchases, and communicate in both B2B and B2C contexts. Customers have become particularly focused on the digital presence of companies with which they wish to engage, with particular attention to websites and social media pages:

Today, the first point of contact is online, and if we miss the opportunity to make a good impression on the buyer, we risk losing his interest. It is useless to have the best product in the world if you do not know how to present yourself. (Salumificio Ciriaci Srl)

Some companies (e.g., Algam EKO Srl, Ariston Thermo Spa, and Biesse Spa) noted how the digital revolution has led to a sort of ‘hybridisation’ between the customer journey of B2B and B2C customers:

Compared to the past, we have to completely rethink the way we interact with our customers. Today, our customers are looking for new machines online in the same way a consumer is looking for a new smartphone. We are still biased towards B2B logic, but we will have to evolve towards B2B models with B2C logic. (Biesse Spa)

Similarly, Ariston Thermo, while recognizing different types of key-customers (i.e., end-user, installer, technical assistance center, designer, and distributor) considered the importance of DT to define a shared vision among them. Digital technologies, indeed, allowed the company to better interact with the different actors, thus improving its overall customer-centric approach and ability to provide customer-based solutions:

It is necessary to develop a clearer vision of the final purchase process: ‘which digital outlet is contacted?’ ‘How did the customer come into contact with the company?’ ‘How is it possible to bring him on board?’ ‘How can we keep him engaged?’ ‘How can we measure his satisfaction?’ ‘How can we support him?’ To date, the answers to these questions are almost everywhere in the company, but they have never been seen with a customer-centric approach. Once this reasoning has been finalised, hybrid solutions can be developed for other customers in the B2B and B2C contexts. (Ariston Thermo Spa)

Hence, digital technologies usually evolved the customer journey into a more dynamic and interactive process, based on multiple touchpoints through which customers can meet companies and their brands, inform themselves about products and easily specify their needs, expectations, experiences, and (dis)satisfaction. As a result, the investigated companies recognised a greater ability – and propensity – of their customers to collaborate in the value creation process, to achieve tailor-made solutions. Doucal’s Srl, for example, noted that customers today are much more focused on data than in the past and are willing to share data with the company:

We collaborate much more to understand the needs and expectations of the final consumer. Thanks to the amount of data that can be collected online, new prospects for collaboration with the retail world are opening up. (Doucal’s Srl)

Similarly, Eden Viaggi - Alpitour recognised that interactive communication on social media has enabled customers to learn about a travel experience before undertaking it:

Customers are increasingly used to moving between channels at different stages of their customer journey. Many begin to inquire online and then complete the purchase at the agency. (Eden Viaggi - Alpitour Spa)

In this way, customers can increasingly contribute to the co-planning and co-creation of their trip, thus increasing the possibility to achieve more modular packages and make travel changes with greater ease and speed.

The above changes in consumer behavior and the customer journey influenced the firms-customers relationships and how companies manage them. Overall, relationships were intensified as digital technologies allow customers to be reached online, have their technical problems resolved through video-remote assistance, shop online, and enjoy faster and more streamlined interactions with suppliers.

From a technological standpoint, the main tool companies used to manage customer relationships is CRM, which has been recently strengthened to better predict demand, optimise the effectiveness of the sales team, manage contacts, and provide after-sales assistance. Through CRM, companies can benefit from a constantly updated customer history, which they can use as a basis for planning more targeted and timely marketing actions. In many cases, CRM is conceived of as a sort of ‘facilitator’ which was introduced to satisfy the need to track the customer journey more systematically and to interact with the end-user. Furthermore, CRM was used to reduce information asymmetry, simplify the purchasing process by enabling companies to offer customers the most relevant content and products for their needs, and make the sales process more flexible, as the continuous evolution of sales portals allows for selecting or building customized packages and products. Relationships with customers could only benefit from these technological advances.

However, relationship management has also benefited from a different way of managing traditional marketing activities, under the effect of DT. First of all, DT has improved the overall market knowledge and companies’ ability to understand market trends, opportunities, and threats, thus enhancing current and future strategic awareness. Specifically, the increased application of digital tools resulted in significant improvement in customer knowledge thanks to the introduction of specific software, which improved the sales control, as well as the use of social media insights or web analytics enhancing the firms’ ability to address customer expectations and provide targeted marketing proposals:

We do a lot of analysis related to social network insights; we work a lot on web analytics by connecting them with many other data sources. This allows us to analyse in-depth our current and potential customers as well as the customers of our competitors. We are also experimenting with the use of portals that allow complex data analysis, such as Hubspot. (Simonelli Group Srl)

The management of marketing policies has been adapted consequently.

In terms of product, the increasing market knowledge and the possibility to interact with the demand, combined with the adoption of specific software and digital technologies, improved the companies’ ability to provide more innovative and customized solutions. Advanced design software and product lifecycle management platforms have been considered critical tools enabling product simulations and better time-to-market performance (e.g., Ariston Thermo Spa). In some cases, the adoption of virtual reality applications (e.g., Ariston Thermo Spa, Biesse Spa) reduced the need for field tests, resulting in cost savings and shorter lead times. Besides innovation, companies recognized that DT enhances product value enrichment by means of digital sensors that make the product easily connected and more functional. Even in cases where digitalisation mainly concerned service components, companies perceived an increase in their overall value offering due to enrichment of the product’s intangible components. In this regard, the Biesse experience has been emblematic, trough the launch of the ‘Sophia project’, which allowed to provide a new generation of services, including the monitoring of machines’ production, the preventive maintenance, the improvement of customer assistance for maintenance activities, and the overall reduction of delivery times - which avoid downtime and production interruptions. Even in other companies having a more traditional production concept compared to Biesse Spa, it was explicitly stated that digital applications were introduced to support the service offering. For example, Diasen Srl had recently added a Chatbot to the company website, aimed at delivering real-time support in the early stages of the customer journey. Similarly, Algam Eko had developed ad hoc software (i.e. Epoint) that creates a sort of ‘conversational marketing’ with consumers. Even if consumers are unable to find information from retailers, they can use the software to contact the company directly and in real-time via a chat.

Besides product and service innovation, some respondents particularly stressed the role of DT in enhancing the opportunities for product/service customization, as underlined in the tourism sector:

The Travel Template software allows you to create very tailored solutions, by offering an editable technological infrastructure to the final customer. (Eden Viaggi - Alpitour Spa)

Of course, the possibility to provide customized product innovation, aligned with the demand’s expectations, and the increasing ability to engage customers in the firm’s value creation process influenced firms-customers relationships, making them more stable, profitable, and beneficial to both.

Similar thoughts concern the communication policy. The use of digital tools for communication was widespread among the investigated companies. Eden Viaggi - Alpitour Spa reported devoting almost 70% of their communication expenditures on digital channels to date. According to the respondents, this trend has been strongly accelerated by the pandemic but it is likely to continue in the future, as digital technologies allow for quickly reaching the market worldwide with both standardised and targeted messages. Digital communication channels were perceived as effective for several reasons. First, they contribute to increase the brand visibility, giving companies the possibility to achieve new target markets and to align the brand identity with targets’ expectations:

The online presence has allowed for improving the target market, especially reaching the youngest consumers. (Doucal’s Srl) Digital technologies have allowed us to differentiate our branding strategy by cluster and community, which would have been difficult to achieve with traditional tools. Based on the above differentiation, we have developed different brands exploiting the potentiality of the digital presence. (Go World)

In this way, companies improved brand-costumer interactions, enhancing the customer’s engagement with the brand as well as the frequency of interactions with the company.

Digital communication channels also enabled more interactive and personalised communication based on customer needs and interests. Notably, in Diasen Srl, the implementation of CRM software and the use of platforms such as Hubspot made it possible to develop ad hoc and geolocalised promotional activities and to obtain highly detailed information about prospects and customers. Moreover, digital tools facilitated the enrichment of interactive and multimedia content, including informative webinars about product offerings or the introduction of a virtual showroom:

In times of pandemic, we had to adjust our communication strategy to always appear present and up to date in the eyes of customers. For this reason, we have developed new initiatives, such as the ‘Go World Emporium’ (an online shop with products from all over the world) and the ‘Go Europe’, which provides private flights aimed at high-spending targets, to show that we are active and there can be hope in the future, even if with different modalities from the classical tourism. In this period, moreover, there has been a lot of negative communication about travel; it was necessary to show that we can offer something new, especially enhancing local traditions and typical products of tourism destinations. (Go World)

Despite some respondents reported using external agencies specialised in digital communication to fill internal gaps – as DT requires new skills for integrating online communication with the traditional one and properly employing the relative KPIs – companies realized that building long-term customer relationships is, today, unacceptable without the use of modern communication technologies and digital communication channels have become imperative among the firms analysed to provide customers with timely, personalized and meaningful information that increase trust, image, customers’ intimacy and commitment towards the company itself.

Firms-customers relationship improvement further benefited from the digitalization of sales activities. In our study, the area of sales was one of the most influenced by the DT process, which produced an increasing use of digital channels (e.g., e-commerce) besides the traditional ones, as well as the moving towards an omnichannel approach integrating online and offline channels in order to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty. It is worthy of notice the case of Salumificio Ciriaci Srl, which was recently exploring a potential collaboration with an international player, the Asian e-commerce giant Alibaba. While this collaboration has not materialised due to several regulatory issues, it suggests that firms – including small-sized ones – are really open to digitalisation. Alongside the integration of channels, DT has encouraged the improvement of new services related to sales processes (e.g. click & collect, click & home, click & drive), which has been further accelerated by the pandemic. Meanwhile, some firms (e.g., Biesse Spa) explicitly highlighted that DT also required an extensive revision of sales force management, implying the development of training programs to boost salespeople’s abilities and willingness to sell the digital solutions:

Salespersons remained stuck in their product-oriented mindset. They considered machines selling more profitable and used digital services mainly to attract clients into buying extra products. The sales team showed a critical lack of motivation and did not comply with the new digital servitisation strategy until additional organisational measures (KPIs and training) were taken. (Biesse Spa)

Anyway, digital technologies were critical to redesigning the information flow of data along the marketing channels. Firm-salespersons relationships have been reinforced, by means of more interactive communication and the adoption of sales-related CRM software – which improved reporting activities and the interactions between marketing, sales departments, and the overall sales control management – and the firm/customers relationships were generally reinforced since digital channels and services allow companies to generate customer value by designing more customised solutions and distribution plans.

4.2.3 Competencies and culture required to implement DT effectively

Notwithstanding the increasing adoption of digital technologies and the overall awareness of the respondents about the opportunities to use them for marketing purposes and customer relationship management, several concerns and organizational issues still limit their current use and exploitation. For example, although firms recognized the potential of digital technologies to improve market knowledge, in certain companies (e.g. Ariston Thermo Spa, Salumificio Ciriaci Srl), the use of digital tools to this end has been only recently implemented and needs to be further strengthened. In some cases (e.g. Go World), digital tools such as social media were considered unreliable and ineffective, especially when operating with niche targets, while other interviewed have not yet felt the need to use digital technologies for market analysis since they operate in traditional and mature sectors, such as the construction industry.

Some concerns also emerged in relation to branding management in the digital context, since managers feared the potential risk of damaging their brand identity if it is not consistent with the specific nature of each digital channel and related target market. Moreover, they were worried about the need to manage several touchpoints in an integrated way. Indeed, such integration efforts could require substantial human and time resources, which would result in high costs and long-term investments.

Sometimes, DT has been discussed in terms of potential threat also for business-customer relationships. For instance, customers who are reluctant or unable to adopt digital solutions may perceive digitalisation as an obstacle (Biesse Spa). In the tourism sector, disintermediation between agents and customers could worsen the customer experience:

The journey begins when you buy, with the customers’ storytelling, which helps to choose and define the contents of the travel experience. The more one digitises, the more it becomes mass-produced and the more experience is lost, which is the heart of travel. (Go World)

Similarly, in the retailing context, a company interviewed – that was traditionally founded on offline channels – warned of the risk of being unable to grasp the full potential of digital technology by failing to offer customers a usable digital service (e.g. e-commerce, click & pay). It declared to prefer personal dynamics of human relationships and relegated technologies to the role of simplifying processes, such as those of contract acquisitions and the monitoring of sales activities (Magazzini Gabrielli).

Some constraints to DT implementation have been also related to product specificities, as emerged from the analysis of Diasen Srl. It observed how DT has changed the process of introducing customers to the product. In particular, in the first phases of the funnel, some professionals (i.e. architects and engineers) who are more digitally advanced than construction companies and applicators have become ‘influencers’ and gained more power; however, closing negotiations and taking charge of the order still follow traditional logic and channels, as the products are generally extremely complex from a technical point of view.

However, what emerged from this study was a general gap in human skills and firms’ culture, which limits the use of digital tools and the effective implementation of the DT process. The analysed companies are partially aware of it and are trying to find potential solutions.

In terms of human resources, the companies believed they had a gap in digitisation and were taking action to fill them, regardless of size and industry specificities. They considered human resources as a critical means within DT processes, hence they are investing in training programs, which are generally outsourced to external partners, such as consultancy agencies, universities, and specialised research centers. In this respect, traditional figures such as Product Specialist has been transformed into Product Marketing Specialist by learning commercial and digital skills alongside technical ones. Some companies also resorted to external recruitment of already trained figures to occupy certain top-level positions in the organisation, in which they would act as ‘guides’ and ‘incentivise’ change, even for the remaining internal staff:

For a change that affects the approach to work, and consequently the corporate culture, the seed must be grafted with already formed figures who bring that ‘spark’ also from the outside. (Ariston Thermo Spa)

As an example, Diasen Srl introduced the Digital Marketing Specialist, while Biesse Spa established the Digital Marketing Manager (having the role of connector between sales, services, IT, and marketing) and the Customer Journey Builder (who had the task of creating automated e-mail paths to inform customers about the status of the contracts purchased).

However, the best option was a mix of internal training and the acquisition of new resources. Indeed, competencies are new, and the required profiles for managing DT are very complex:

The knowledge and skills required concern the technological field to guide the progress of the platform, the business environment to obtain, analyse and interpret Big Data, and the organisational skills of control and management of change. (Biesse Spa) There is certainly a basic skill, which is IT, that does not change, but digital is not just IT, on the contrary. (Ariston Thermo Spa)

Therefore, both internal and external figures have been exposed to multidisciplinary training, which usually begins with an internal assessment of the organisation’s digital skills to both define a starting point and plan a series of training programmes that will be useful to lead the whole organisation to the next step.

Overall, the development of skills and capabilities integrating technological knowledge with the user experience, user interface, product, and service management implied the adoption of new organizational models for the marketing function as well as for the whole company, which shows increasing simplicity and openness of both internal and external borders. So, DT did not concern only the managerial sphere but also involved the whole organization and the training or acquisition of new resources has been closely linked to strategic planning.

Changes in human skills and structural models have been accompanied by process advances concerning the development of new ways to manage work in project teams as well as a widespread tendency (which, in some cases, is still a necessity) to review the cultural approach of the organisation to overcome the ‘culture of silos’ in favour of more organisational openness inspired by a data-driven orientation. As an expression of this cultural change, DT projects are often managed through a hybrid approach, where top-down leadership drives major changes, and bottom-up initiatives help to iron out the difficulties. This requires specific initiatives, as occurred in Biesse Spa, for instance, where a bi-weekly meeting between managers and employees was established to check on the progress of the DT roadmap. Such meetings allowed managers and employees to share their progress, doubts, and challenges and to effectively collaborate to solve problems.

4.2.4 The role of marketing in DT processes

The marketing function has been implemented in different ways within the companies. In some cases, it covered operational roles mainly related to communication and sales management (e.g., GoWorld); in others, it was a key-strategic function with advanced marketing intelligence and analytics tasks (e.g. Simonelli Group Spa). The increasing use of digital technologies usually changed the role and importance of marketing. Internal interactions with other departments have been substantially improved, thus enhancing the positive contamination of skills and knowledge:

Marketing activities are traditionally widespread within Biesse, as it is a B2B company. The marketing department has been developed over the last years from a specific function that mainly dealt with communication activities (e.g. fair management) to a more integrated and integrative department, coordinating sales, service, and IT processes. (Biesse Spa) The digitalization realized also internally by the company has facilitated the relationships and developed a sort of “business to employee” that has favoured the interchange and the development of knowledge between marketing and the other departments. (Algam EKO Srl)

As a result, marketing operators have acquired a richer knowledge, integrating traditional skills and competencies (e.g. communication skills) with different ones, concerning the use of IT, the production process, as well as sales management.

The marketing department has been developed over the last years from a specific function that mainly dealt with communication activities (e.g. fair management) to a more integrated and integrative department, coordinating sales, service, and IT processes. (Biesse Spa)

The continuous interaction with IT, service and sales functions, and other departments – based on both internal workgroups and the employment of new professional figures with a role of connector – demonstrated essential to develop marketing strategies more in line with the digital innovation process. As a consequence, the role of marketing has improved and become strategically relevant for the companies’ success, since it helps companies to better orient their efforts towards the demand and to provide value propositions aligned with customers’ needs and expectations:

Marketing coordinates the different activities both within the company and within the department itself. It performs communication activities and market analysis controls channels and sales management and plays as a supporter in the development/implementation of new projects. There is a central office that is organized in different subareas, based on their activity, but they usually work in teams, so there is a continuous and transversal exchange, and especially in the last 2 years the logic of connecting all touch points has been applied. (Simonelli Group Spa) The marketing assistant allows us to strengthen the overall company’s market orientation and digital culture, generating quicker and more effective responses to the market . (IT Consult)

Moreover, in some cases, marketing activities have become the catalyst of innovation, as they enhanced the overall understanding of customers, competitors, and market trends, which helps the management to define new products and service solutions. As the respondent of Magazzini Gabrielli stated:

Over the last two years, marketing has assumed an important role in service and driving innovation. (Magazzini Gabrielli)

Similarly, in Biesse Spa, the marketing department has been increasingly working as an enabler of innovative processes as it facilitates their spread and understanding both internally and towards customers. It actively responds to the firm’s need of creating a solid brand image and structure and to co-create value with customers.

Of course, some companies are still in the early stage of marketing development, as they operate in very traditional markets (e.g. Salumificio Ciriaci Srl) and, sometimes, they continue to confuse marketing with few operational activities such as communication (e.g. Doucal’s Srl, Diasen Srl). However, under the pressure of DT, all companies have recently increased their investment in marketing and it has been gradually involved in the strategic decision-making processes:

The company is approaching marketing in recent years, following the generational change and the introduction of digital technologies. Our logo has been redesigned according to the logic of brand repositioning. The site has been entirely remade, including an emotional video able to attract more customers. We have opened a social account intending to communicate the quality of our products and the basic values that characterize us. (Salumificio Ciriaci Srl)

Despite companies often entrusted to external agencies and expertises, as they have not yet developed the required marketing skills internally, DT helped them to acquire a solid awareness of the importance of marketing and of what this function can do for the long-term competitiveness of the company.

5 Discussion and implications

5.1 theoretical implications.

Our findings provide interesting and novel insights addressing the basic research questions underlying this study.

Regarding RQ1 ( How do firms conceive of DT? In particular, how and why they leverage digital technologies for it? ), our results confirm existing evidence that companies are facing heterogeneous paths of DT under the pressure of both exogenous and endogenous factors. They use a variety of digital technologies, some of which (e.g. AI, Big Data, blockchain systems, IoT) are still under-employed. In line with prior research (Gong & Ribiere, 2021 ; Verhoef et al., 2021 ), this finding suggests that DT is perceived and implemented by companies in different ways, but it is an ongoing process usually starting with digitisation and then arriving at the DT stage by way of the ‘digitalisation’ phase. The investigated companies that were using common technologies, such as social media and mobile and smart applications, were still in the intermediate step of ‘digitalisation’, which implies the encoding of analogic information into a digital format to improve existing business processes (Verhoef et al., 2021 ). Only few companies (e.g. Biesse and Simonelli Group) had nearly reached the ultimate stage of DT, which involves a strong adaptation of their internal procedures, organisation, and business model. Consistent with Hinterhuber et al., ( 2021 ), the interviewed companies are usually aware of the opportunities linked to digital technologies in terms of business process efficiency, professional ability improvements, and increases in the speed and control of processes. Yet, at the practical level, DT is not without pitfalls, as it implies important cultural and organisational changes. Moreover, managers tend to adopt a prudent attitude towards DT, as they recognise potential risks (e.g. loss of contact with customers, a potential digital divide within the company) that could negatively affect the long-term survival and competitiveness of the firm. The extant literature has mainly focused on motivators and triggering factors underlying DT. Thus, an original and novel contribution of the present study is its identification of such barriers to DT and the ways in which companies are trying to overcome them. As discussed later in this section, this contribution can inform practical suggestions and potentially useful interventions for companies undergoing a digitalisation process.

However, the most important contribution of this study is its overall investigation of the relationship between marketing and the DT phenomenon. Krishen et al., ( 2021 ) have recently noted that research on digital marketing is still growing, and more of these analyses are needed, as their findings have often been discordant. Moreover, the existing literature is quite fragmented, as studies have focused on single marketing activities or decisions, such as pricing (e.g. Abrate et al., 2012 ) or distribution (e.g. Hansen & Sia, 2015 ), rather than on marketing as a whole process and approach.

By contrast, this study investigated how digital technologies can reshape strategic and operational marketing activities, thus changing (i) the way firms/customers relationships are managed, (ii) how marketing skills and activities are organized, and (iii) the overall role and importance of marketing within the company.

As for the first issue (i.e. RQ2: what are the impacts that DT is currently having on marketing activities and firm-customer relationships?) , digital technologies offered companies an increasing amount of data and improved the ability to collect, store, process, and transmit information (Sheth, 2021 ; Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ). Such information can be easily conveyed and used to align offerings to a variety of demands by enhancing the coordination and synchronisation of production and distribution processes (i.e. the transfer from warehouses to distributors, order management, and related services). Overall, our results reveal that DT can improve a company’s responsiveness to customer needs, by promotingand new ways of managing the strategic and operational aspects of marketing processes. At the product level, for instance, the interviewed companies recognised that DT not only boosted simplicity in how customers learn about, find, purchase, and consume products and services but also increased efficacy in how products are conceived, realised, and tested. An example that was mentioned was the application of virtual reality to test products, which saved money and reduced lead time. At the communication level, digital channels received large attention by the investigated companies as they facilitate interactive and personalised communication. In line with prior studies (e.g., Zhang & Lin 2015 ) social media channels, for example, are currently employed by all the analysed firms, regardless of sector and firm-size, as they recognise the opportunity to allow customers to easily access to both products and information, which became particularly critical in times of pandemic crisis. Digital transformation also impacted the content of marketing messages, which nurtured brand strategies by focusing more on company values than on the technical features of products. At the same time, there was an awareness and concern regarding the need to manage many touchpoints in an integrated way. Concerning distribution, companies highlighted how DT encouraged an omnichannel approach to increasing customer satisfaction and loyalty. Furthermore, some companies observed that DT prompted an extension revision of sales management by uncovering the salient need for training programmes and new managerial positions. Finally, at the pricing level, DT enabled personalised offers and dynamic pricing. All this resulted in a more customized approach to the market, based on ongoing interaction with customers who can express their needs and participate in the value-creation process more easily and effectively than it was in the past. Besides that, the increasing amount of information can also impact the demand side by boosting consumer empowerment (Auh et al., 2019 ; Akhavannasab et al., 2018 ). The customer journey has been changed in both B2B and B2C contexts. Some of the bigger companies analysed talked about a ‘hybridisation’ of the customer journey because even in the B2B market, the huge availability of information pushes players to adopt typical paradigms of B2C environments. This hybridization imposes the organisation of marketing processes in a customer-centric way (Shah et al., 2006 ), even if it requires important investments. Notably, through CRM, customer knowledge can be constantly updated and diffused within a company, and marketing actions can be better targeted – often in real time. In this respect, CRM can be considered a kind of ‘facilitator’ to manage relationships and interact with customers at different stages of the customer journey (Nasir, 2015 ). Overall, in a DT context, the firm-customer relationships are usually strengthened, experiencing more stability and long-term satisfaction, as individual gratification is enhanced when people feel listened to (Collins, 2022 ).

The growing adoption of digital technologies also influenced how the marketing function is organised and its internal resources and capabilities are managed, providing empirical evidence answering our RQ3 ( What is impact of DT on marketing organization and competences? ). Enhancement of the strategic and analytical dimension of marketing tends to imply the need to improve cross-functional coordination between business units, which favours the adoption of informal integration mechanisms and a significant strengthening of coordination activities.

Consistent with Graesch et al., ( 2021 ), our findings reflect the importance of integrating marketing and IT areas to maintain a fair balance between digitisation and market objectives. If excessive weight is attributed to the technological dimension, there may be a risk of creating a value proposition that does not correspond to real customer needs. Hence, it is vital to improve communication between marketing and other corporate functions, especially those managing the digitisation process, to promote inter-functional coordination and the sharing of common objectives. This effort can sometimes require the introduction of new professional figures, the adaptation of existing skills through repeated training courses, or the development of a new approach to organisational problems based on overcoming ‘silo culture’ and opening up to flatter, flexible structures such that information can flow rapidly across the borders between marketing and other company departments. Over and above, to effectively realise DT, our study suggests an immense need for cultural change, as some scholars have remarked (Leeflang et al., 2014 ; Wedel & Kannan, 2016 ). In some cases among the analysed companies, the cultural inadequacy of management – mainly intended as a lack of culture of change that is necessary to reduce.

individual resistance to technology and related organizational changes – as proved to be a factor hindering the company’s ability to progress in the field of digital innovations. This finding underlines the need to start a process of acculturation for the internal staff of a company and the marketing area to promote the spread of a common culture, language, and way of thinking in compliance with the company’s innovative objectives.

Finally, the research findings recommend an overall improvement of the strategic role of marketing within the analysed companies, which provides evidence to address our RQ4 ( How might DT have changed the overall role and importance of marketing within firms? ). The interviews reflected a growing awareness of the strategic importance of marketing as a result of the recent pandemic crisis as well, which has made more evident the need to defend the competitive position with new and refined tools and methods (Savelli et al., 2021 ). However, under the pressure of DT, it further emerged that marketing no longer has the traditional role of aligning the variety allowed by technologies with consumers’ needs. Indeed, digital technologies are definitively replacing standardisation with customisation, thus improving opportunities to satisfy customers’ needs and wants. Hence, to some extent, digitalisation moderates the role of marketing as a ‘reducer’ of market complexity that increases the possibility of matching the production variance to diversified needs. Consequently, the role of marketing is changing to that of a creator of appropriate languages that allow for an effective interaction both between business functions and between firms and customers. Our findings suggest that marketing is increasingly becoming a connector of different skills and a strategic function for companies in strengthening the digital culture without losing sight of the market orientation and consumer culture (Shah & Murthi, 2021 ). When shifting the focus from the product to the language, the examined companies demonstrated a need to devote more attention to strategic marketing decisions (i.e. targeting and positioning) as well as achieve greater integration between marketing and other business units to increase collaboration and internal coordination. This perspective could imply that traditional marketing is in decline, which would leave space for a more interactive and less centralised approach in which customers (in both B2B and B2C settings) play an increasingly active role in the value creation process.

5.2 Practical implications

Potential barriers and risks associated with DT can delay digital evolution and sometimes limit its exploitation, especially among the smallest firms. Therefore, there is a need for proper interventions at both the firm level and the public/institutional level. Specifically, the present findings indicate the urgency of three paths of intervention occurring at the cultural, organisational, and relational levels.

Overcoming existing cultural barriers and employee resistance to collaboration in DT is the basic condition. It might be achieved through the use of initiatives, such as internal communication campaigns that reinforce employees’ awareness of digital technologies or ad hoc rewards that encourage the commitment and interest of personnel in digital innovation. Senior and top-level management should assume a key role. By endorsing cross-functional projects, they could enhance inter-function collaborations and knowledge sharing, thus fostering cultural empathy.

Besides the cultural domain, organisational changes are also necessary to properly exploit DT opportunities. Such changes are critical since they involve both structural and human dimensions. The interviewed companies were suffering from a lack of competencies and technological skills. Moreover, a few cases highlighted the matter of the managerial approach to DT, from which different suggestions derive. In this respect, internal training activities should be improved to raise engagement and understanding of digital technologies and enhance the ability and willingness of employees to properly use digital solutions. Companies should offer internal training courses and promote external training activities by private and public institutions (e.g. higher education, universities). Since the introduction of new expertise demands economic efforts and long-term investments, activating collaboration with an external supplier while building internal competencies and know-how was a valid solution among the analysed companies. As for the managerial approach, the companies varied from top-down to bottom-up approaches. Maybe there is no one solution that is best for every situation. However, the same managers recommended a mixed-leadership approach as an effective solution. Such approach combines a bottom-up orientation with a top-down one; in this way, top managers can maintain a strategic role in guiding the DT process and minimising resistance, while bottom-up initiatives can facilitate engagement and commitment. To this end, the use of regular measurements (e.g. reports, meetings) might be useful for making incremental DT progress visible.

Finally, because the successful realisation of DT depends on an increasing number of actors, all subjects must collaborate towards the same goal and act as partners in the same project. This partnership requires a positive attitude towards co-creation, the ability to work together, and, above all, a stable and trust-based relationship network that assists firms in accessing digital resources. Particularly, at the inter-organisational level, communication with dealers, suppliers, and final customers could be augmented by regular visits, rewards programs, and training initiatives aimed at encouraging collaboration and long-term relationships.

6 Conclusions, limitations, and future research directions

This study has investigated the complex relationship between DT and marketing through a multiple-case study approach. In summary, the contribution of this exploratory analysis is twofold. First, unlike existing studies, which have been fragmented and focused specifically on single activities or decisions, the present research considers marketing as a whole strategy and process, thus generating a holistic view of DT implications. The findings reveal some important changes concerning the role and organisation of marketing and the management of its activities. As part of a technologically intensive context in which both firm and customer behaviours are rapidly evolving, marketing should support the development of new business models and refine the traditional ones. Although marketing was implemented in varying ways among the investigated firms, DT enhanced its strategic role: marketing goals appeared less related to policy (i.e. 4P) management, the time horizon of decision-making became wider, analytical and control activities were carried out more systematically, and channel relationship management intensified. Moreover, organisational structures tended to flatten and be simplified, and the connections between marketing and other business functions become even more critical, which gestures to a systemic and customer-oriented approach as the most effective option. Overall, DT implies an improvement in the ability of marketing to more deeply and creatively understand the challenging trends of the society and the market. This change can enable a company to offer innovative products and services that meet the needs of the target demand, thus providing benefits to both customers and the company itself.

Second, the study has identified potential risks and barriers to DT encountered by the firms, especially the smallest ones. From these risks and barriers, we derive some useful recommendations for managers and policymakers. We particularly underline the need to intervene in three main dimensions: the cultural dimension to foster employees’ awareness and interest in digital technologies and inter-functional collaboration; the organisational dimension to fill gaps in competencies and technological skills and improve the managerial approach to DT, and the relational dimension to encourage collaboration and long-term relationships among the network of actors involved in DT.

Like any research, this study is subject to limitations, which can reveal fruitful opportunities for future research. First, the multiple case study research method presents some shortcomings. A main concern is the generalisation of results; while beyond the scope of our analysis, future research could seek to empirically validate the results with a larger sample. Moreover, this study considered 11 case studies within a single region, Marche, of a single country, Italy. Future studies could use a wider sample representing different geographical areas. Finally, it could be interesting for a future study to follow the transformation of investigated firms according to a longitudinal approach. Such research could illustrate the effects of the transformation in the medium to long term, including in terms of economic and competitive performance.

In conclusion, the findings of our research show that DT marks a new era of marketing evolution. The digital technological leap corresponds with increasing compliance between marketing theory and practice, especially among SMEs. It is well known that the predominance of SMEs has been a determining factor in the ‘ Marketing-non marketing all’italiana ’ (Varaldo et al., 2006 ), which features peculiar characteristics compared to the standard of managerial theory. Digital transformation seems to favour a realignment of the theoretical/conceptual and practical dimensions of marketing, which makes it easier and more practicable to conduct certain strategic activities, such as market analysis, market segmentation, and marketing mix customisation. This evolution has also highlighted the relevance of marketing for a firm’s competitiveness and success.

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Acknowledgements

The Authors would like to thank the participants at the research group: Andrea Perna, Valerio Temperini, Luca Marinelli, Chiara Ancillai, Pier Luigi Fraboni, Martina Pellegrino, Elisa Barbizzi, Silvia Gallegati (Università Politecnica delle Marche, AN, Italy); Tonino Pencarelli, Fabio Musso, Roberta Bocconcelli, Alessandro Pagano, Marco Cioppi, Barbara Francioni, Ilaria Curina, Emanuela Conti (University of Urbino Carlo Bo, PU, Italy); Elena Cedrola, Patrizia Silvestrelli (University of Macerata, MC, Italy).

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Pascucci, F., Savelli, E. & Gistri, G. How digital technologies reshape marketing: evidence from a qualitative investigation. Ital. J. Mark. 2023 , 27–58 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s43039-023-00063-6

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How digital marketing evolved over time: A bibliometric analysis on scopus database

Mohammad faruk.

a Department of Business Administration, Bangladesh Army International University of Science and Technology, Cumilla, Bangladesh

Mahfuzur Rahman

b Department of Marketing, Comilla University, Cumilla, Bangladesh

Shahedul Hasan

c East Delta University, Chattogram, Bangladesh

Associated Data

Data will be made available on request.

Nowadays, a large number of customers are spending their time on social and digital media for a variety of purposes ranging from information searching to the final purchase of products. Responding to this shift, marketers are spending a significant part of the advertising budget on digital marketing. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to review articles on digital marketing to identify top themes, determine the current status of research in digital marketing and indicate how influential works have shaped it. This research has reviewed 925 papers published between 2000 and 2019 in Scopus by applying bibliometrics analysis. These results show that on average 2.18 authors have contributed to every single paper on digital marketing and the collaboration index is 2.71. The top contributing countries in the digital marketing field are USA, India and UK. The study also identifies three dominant clusters in digital marketing research, e.g., 1) strategic planning with digital marketing 2) mobile marketing with apps development and 3) dealing with demographic profiles of customers.

Bibliometric analysis; Digital marketing; 4th industrial revolution; Scopus database.

1. Introduction

It is reported that, in December 1995, internet users were only 16 million. On the other hand, in June 2019, the number increased to 4,536 million which cover 58.8% of the total world population that amounting to 7.71 billion ( Busca and Bertrandias, 2020 ). It is estimated that everyday people spend, on average, 6 h and 42 min online and by 2021, 73% of e-commerce sales will be generated through the mobile platform ( Mandal, 2017 ). Moreover, the 4 th industrial revolution has begun with the invention of web 4.0, the internet of things (IoT), blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), big data analytics and 4g/5g internet speed ( Kerren, 2014 ). These technological inventions have significantly affected the lifestyle of consumers and the way marketers communicate with their customers. In 2004, Facebook came into the market, followed by many other social networking sites in later years. People had accepted these social media at an exponential rate affecting the way people communicated and interacted with each other.

After the induction of world wide web technology, people have become used to the virtual world. When people (e.g., customers) shifted to the internet or virtual marketplace, marketers focused their marketing attention on this market. Consumers are spending more time on social media for a variety of purposes ranging from brand information searching to the final purchase of products. Consumers’ shifting from traditional media to digital media enables marketers to reach, notify, engage, sell to, study about and provide services to the targeted audience more effectively and efficiently. Responding to this fundamental shifting of consumers from traditional to digital media, marketers are continuously trying to grab the opportunity by devising product, price, place and promotion strategies for this marketplace. Therefore, scholars have investigated different aspects of digital marketing (DM).

While reviewing the literature, it is noticed very few research studies were focused on identifying and analyzing the development of themes and clusters in this arena by applying bibliometric analysis ( Ghorbani et al., 2021 ; Kim et al., 2019 ; León-Castro et al., 2021 ). Ghorbani et al. (2021) conducted a bibliometric analysis to identify key trends and patterns in the field of DM by investigating 924 research articles published in the Scopus database. However, given the importance of digital marketing, more systematic literature reviews are necessary for this field. Kim et al. (2019) undertook a bibliometric analysis that was more focused on digital marketing communication (DMC) and hence, studies other than DMC were ignored. León-Castro et al. (2021) covered only a web of science database to run a bibliometric analysis on digital marketing, but the keywords focused on more specific aspects of DM such as “influencer”, “ewom”, “youtube”, “instagram” and “facebook”.

However, finding out how scholarly works on digital marketing practice and theory have been developed over time and contributed to DM literature is limited. Analyzing which journals, countries and authors are contributing more in the field of digital marketing was also nascent. The authors have exactly taken the endeavour to address these issues. Since this study will analyze all the major scholarly articles that are published in the Scopus database, it will pave the way for future researchers who intend to research digital marketing.

Considering the limitations of the past studies on DM, the study has been undertaken to serve several purposes such as a) to identify the evolution of DM literature over time by applying a bibliometric analysis; b) to assess and synthesize 925 Scopus papers and offer future research directions in the field of DM.

The significant contribution of this study includes identifying which are the journals and authors that contributed the most in the development of digital marketing. It also contributes by explaining the emergent themes in DM along with identifying the most cited journals in this sector. Moreover, the co-citation networks that exist between most cited researches and the schools of thought that exist in co-citation networks have also been investigated thoroughly.

This paper is organized into several parts. The following section contains a literature review followed by the research methodology. The next section includes results and discussion from the bibliometric analysis of the articles published in Scopus between 2000 and 2019. The final part of the paper includes the conclusion and implications from theoretical and practical perspectives along with limitations and future research directions.

2. Literature review

With the advent of social media and development in the web and mobile apps technologies, communication has become much easier than that of past decades ( Khomenko et al., 2020 ). Since modern customers are spending their time in digital media, marketers have also developed strategies and tactics to reach them through these media. Therefore, a significant amount of scholarly research had been conducted on different aspects such as search engine optimization, social media marketing, affiliate marketing, content marketing, video marketing and many others ( Jimenez, 2020 ). This study presents an intensive analysis of scholarly works done and published by scholars from different countries on this revolutionary field of marketing between 2000 to 2019. Digital marketing opens up new opportunities for reaching, informing, and engaging consumers, as well as providing and selling goods and services. Digital marketing is projected to remain at the forefront of the technological transition in the future ( Ko, 2019 ; Lamberton and Stephen, 2016 ; Martín-Consuegra et al., 2018 ). Millions of people's daily lives have been transformed by digital marketing through social and mobile media, which has expanded into popular social media practices and often leads to the formation of customer relationships ( Fujita et al., 2017 ; Han et al., 2016 ; Kim, 2018 ; Woodside and Mir, 2019 ).

As more marketing researchers and professionals have dedicated themselves to digital technologies, the speed of transition has quickened. The digital marketing model has changed from selling unique goods and services to marketing campaigns that are introduced across digital platforms to now make use of digital resources. Social media has existed for over the past decade for several different purposes such as blogging, video and photography/photo-sharing using mobile phones ( Fujita et al., 2017 ; Han et al., 2016 ; Kim, 2018 ). Virtual technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR), and virtual reality (VR) seem to be replacing traditional approaches to marketing suggesting new territory for marketing researchers to pursue ( Brodie and Juric, 2018 ; Guercini et al., 2018 ; Kim and Yang, 2018 , J. Kim et al., 2018 ; Taylor and Costello, 2017 ; Zhang and Dholakia, 2018 ).

Marketers soon noticed the networking advantages of social networks like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest, and LinkedIn, and invested $51.3 billion on global social network ads in 2017, up 55.4% from 2016 ( Cooper, 2020 ). The amount spent on digital ads is expected to rise 17.7% in 2018, accounting for $273 billion (44%) of the $629 billion spent on advertising globally ( McNair, 2018 ). In 2017, mobile ad spending rose by 39%, and it is projected to rise by another 27% in 2018, accounting for 55% of all digital ad spending ( Magna Global, 2017 ). The growing concentration of advertising dollars demonstrates digital marketing's effectiveness in targeting audiences and achieving growth goals such as increased revenue, brand recognition, consumer loyalty, lead generation, and lower customer acquisition and service costs ( Labrecque et al., 2013 ; Lamberton and Stephen, 2016 ; Tuten, 2020 ).

The way businesses market themselves is changing as a result of social media, posing new obstacles as well as opportunities ( Arora and Sanni, 2019 ; Dwivedi et al., 2015 , 2017 ; Hossain et al., 2019 ; Nisar et al., 2018 ; Wang and Herrando, 2019 ). Digital marketing, whether used inappropriately or by unskilled practitioners, may harm businesses ( Aswani et al., 2018 ). As a result, businesses must gain social media expertise ( Braojos-Gomez et al., 2015 ). Companies should focus on aligning their digital marketing strategies with their overall business goals ( Tafesse and Wien, 2018 ; Thorpe, 2018 ). When used strategically, social media marketing may lead to increased consumer satisfaction and perceived value ( Chen and Lin, 2019 ; Pacauskas et al., 2018 ), co-creation ( Kamboj et al., 2018 ; Zhang et al., 2017 ), brand loyalty ( Laroche et al., 2013 ; Shanahan et al., 2019 ) and positive attitude ( Laroche et al., 2013 ).

Furthermore, social media has opened up new avenues for marketers to obtain audience experience by researching online user-generated content, electronic word of mouth (eWOM) conversations ( Chang et al., 2019 ; Liu et al., 2019 ; Xu et al., 2017 ), and online communities ( Chang et al., 2019 ; Habibi et al., 2014 ; Liu et al., 2018 ). Consumer reviews are a large part of social media, and they throw up questions about content accuracy, credibility, usefulness, and validity ( Ismagilova et al., 2017 ; Kapoor et al., 2018 ; Singh et al., 2017 ). Consumer preferences and purchasing habits can be affected by online feedback, which can affect a company's results ( Ismagilova et al., 2020 ; Kawaf and Istanbulluoglu, 2019 ; Shareef et al., 2018 ; Yerasani et al., 2019 ).

A variety of factors can influence digital marketing activities and practices. Some research, for example, looked at the impact of new laws on digital marketing ( Hemsley, 2018 ; Sposit, 2019 ). Furthermore, social media marketing research has begun to concentrate on developing markets, where the adoption rate of social media marketing is lower than the developed countries ( Christino et al., 2019 ; Liu et al., 2019 ). Some businesses in these developing countries continue to rely on conventional media for product and service ads because they are more trustworthy than social media platforms ( Ali et al., 2016 ; Olanrewaju et al., 2020 ). Therefore, this article aims at assessing different paradigms of published articles on DM and finding out how these studies evolved. In addition, finding out what are the dominant themes in this area of research is also a concern of this paper.

3. Methodology

Bibliometric analysis along with a citation and co-citation analysis presents a powerful way to analyze the patterns and characteristics of already published papers in any scholarly field. It may also help to find out the school of thought, if any, in any specific area of study ( Mandal, 2017 ; Christie, 2008 ). The bibliometric analysis takes the objective philosophy and employs a quantitative investigation method on written documents (i.e., journals, books, websites). Citation and co-citation analysis focus on finding out the emergent themes in specific areas of study, the impact of different journals and different schools of thought ( Nyagadza, 2020 ). Going beyond merely counting and collating citations, previous studies have pointed out the nature and course of development of a discipline to assess which journals and authors have created value to other researchers by collaboration.

Bibliometric studies, such as citation and co-citation analyses, are useful for delving into the trends and characteristics of what has been written, making it easier to explore, organize, and articulate work done in a particular discipline ( Diodato, 1994 ; Ferreira et al., 2014 ). Bibliometric analyses can help to guide collection growth, define institutional scholarship strengths and citation/co-citation trends, and identify possible schools of thought in a discipline ( Lewis and Alpi, 2017 ). For a comprehensive investigation of written source documents (e.g., academic journal papers and books), bibliometric research uses citation and co-citation analyses as an analytical tool for inspecting part or the entirety of a scholarly discipline ( Diodato, 1994 ; Ferreira et al., 2014 ; Nerur et al., 2008 ; Ramos-Rodríguez and Ruíz-Navarro, 2004 ; Shafique, 2013 ).

The researchers have adopted objectivist research philosophy since it focuses on quantitative methods of analysis and bibliometric analysis is a powerful quantitative tool to analyze published documents in any scholarly area ( Diodato and Gellatly, 2013 ). The authors have mined the bibliometric data from the Scopus database with the keyword “Digital Marketing”. Digital marketing is the common keyword across different papers, however, articles with other related keywords such as “social networking online”, “social media sales”, “electronic commerce”, “data mining”, “information systems” were considered. Scopus database was selected by the authors since they had authorized access to this database only. Hence analysis on other prominent databases such as Web of Science can be considered in future research.

After loading the dataset, it is observed that it contains 935 articles in total starting from 1982. However, the authors have applied the “publication year” filtering strategy and kept the data from 2000 to 2019. This period is chosen since the proliferation of the internet began in the 21st century. In the case of “document type”, all types of documents (i.e., article, book, book chapter, conference paper, conference review, editorial, short survey, note review) were considered. All types of documents were considered since the author had applied only one keyword “digital marketing” for retrieving data and it only produced 935 articles. In addition, the authors wanted to investigate the theoretical and practical development of digital marketing throughout every scholarly research field and understand the relationship among them. Other studies also applied a similar technique to represent the whole DM research ( Ghorbani et al., 2021 ). About “total citation”, the full range of citations from 0 to 305 were considered since the authors wanted to consider both highly cited articles and lowly cited articles and this helps to identify the difference between good work and mediocre research work. In addition, about “source by Bradford Law Zones”, all the sources were considered. This filtration has produced 925 papers finally which are to be analyzed. After retrieving the data from the Scopus database, with the help of the bibliometrics package of R programming, the data were analyzed.

4. Results and discussion

4.1. summary statistics.

This chapter presents analysis and findings from bibliometric analysis of 925 documents related to digital marketing published between 2000 and 2019. Table 1 presents the summary findings from the analysis. The documents that were published in this period in the Scopus database received 5.076 citations on average. The higher average citations per document indicate a speedy growth of scholarly papers in the field of DM. The results also showed that 2015 unique authors have contributed to the digital marketing field in this period, who got impressions of 2359 times. In addition, single-author documents counted as 262. On average, 2.18 authors contributed to completing each document while every single author contributed to at least 0.459 documents. Documents per author counted to 0.459 while co-authors per document are 2.55. This signifies that in the development of digital marketing, a good amount of research studies are done in collaboration with other authors which is again confirmed in the collaboration index of 2.71. However, a significant amount of single-author articles are also undertaken.

Table 1

Summary statistics.

4.2. Performance analysis

Figure 1 showed the key trends in annual scientific production in the DM field. The timeline can be broadly divided into two main decades with varying trends in annual publications. Although research on digital marketing and related topics had begun as early as 2000, digital marketing studies were almost overlooked by the researchers during the first decade (2000–2010). Therefore, the actual proliferation commenced after 2010 meaning in the second decade (2010–2020) and as time passes, research in this domain has grown exponentially. This growth can be attributed to the increasing number of internet and social media users in the 2000s ( Ghorbani et al., 2021 ). When we see the research development from the perspective of Pareto's law, in only 4 years' time period (2016–2019), 70% (648) of the research papers were published in Scopus on digital marketing. Contemporary studies are found to focus more on marketing science issues accompanied by modern information technology tools and techniques such as artificial intelligence, big data, deep learning etc.

Annual scientific production in digital marketing.

4.3. Relationship between authors, keywords and sources

Figure 2 contained three field analyses showing the relationship between authors, keywords and sources where the left column contained the name of authors, the middle column contained keywords and the right column contained the journal name. This confirms that most of the authors have considered digital marketing as their keyword. However, “social media marketing”, “internet”, “machine learning”, “web 2.0”, “social networks”, “customer relationship management”, “Facebook”, “Twitter” and many others closely related keywords with digital marketing had also been used in different research articles. A new trend is represented by social media for companies that strive to communicate with their customers using both online and offline media. For example, popular social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and corporate blogs are increasingly used by the Fortune 500 companies in their marketing communication campaigns ( Markos-Kujbus and Gati, 2012 ). Previous researchers who used digital marketing as their keyword also found to include the above-listed keywords. But this is also clear from the data that focus on digital marketing is higher than any other keywords. The reason for this consideration can be justified with the proliferation of the use of digital marketing compared to other semantic terminologies which can also be used to mean the same thing. Almost every journal contributed equally, although some journals such as Journal of Direct, Data and Digital Marketing Practice, are pioneering the advancement in this field. Although mobile marketing is a powerfully dominant domain of digital marketing ( Cheng et al., 2013 ), this area is yet to be explored. Therefore, future researchers can contribute to this domain.

Three field analyses in digital marketing.

4.4. Performance of academic journals

To identify the most contributing journals, Figure 3 showed that the “Journal of Direct Data and Digital Marketing Practice” had the highest contribution in this domain. This journal solely published 46 research papers within the specified period amounted to almost 5% of the total publications. However, this journal of Springer has last published articles in June 2016 and till then it is not being published anymore. That means the top-most contributing journal is out of the market and thereby creating a gap in the field and providing other journals to fill the gap. “Journal of Digital and Social Media Marketing” has published 10 papers and “Journal of Marketing Education” has also contributed 10 papers in this domain. Moreover, another critical point to be noted here, the Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing is not on the top contributing list, although this journal is contributing significantly in the domain with its strong editorial board.

Most contributing journal in digital marketing.

4.5. Source growth of digital marketing over time

As we explained earlier in this paper, “Journal of Direct Data and Digital Marketing Practice” had contributed the most in the digital marketing research area. However, the contribution of this journal has decreased significantly in recent times (see Figure 4 ). On the contrary, the contribution of sources like the “International Journal of Recent Technology and Engineering” is increasing exponentially. Adobe Research, Amity University, Yonsei University are found to be the most contributing parties in the scholarly publications on digital marketing. However, other universities such as Chaoyang University of Technology, Jaypee Business School, and the University of Florida have also kept significant contributions in this domain.

Source growth of digital marketing over time.

4.6. Contribution by countries

In the case of the contribution of different countries in scholarly works on digital marketing, the bibliometric analysis found that the USA had contributed the most (223 papers). Surprisingly researchers from India have achieved the second position in contributing to this emerging field of study (187 papers). However, this is a powerful point that in the case of MCP or author collaboration with the authors from other countries, the USA ranked 1st while the UK ranked 2nd. India's authors have not secured the second position in this area. In addition, the UK has kept a significant amount of contribution and other countries such as Indonesia, Spain, Korea, Portugal, Brazil, and France's contributions are average.

As the contribution from the USA, UK and India are the most, theoretically, this is expected that collaboration among researchers in these countries would be the highest. This expectation is confirmed with this Figure 5 . As a country Australia does not have many contributions, however, different authors from this country have collaborated significantly with authors from other countries. From a continental analytical point of view, it is observed that North America and Europe contributed the most followed by Asia. However, South America and Africa are completely void of any kind of notable contribution. This can be attributed to the economic and demographic development of the countries. Most of the countries in South America and Africa are not developed as other contributing countries. Another interesting insight is also observed in this analysis, which is the “North-South gap”. Countries located north of the equator are observed to contribute more than the countries located south of the equator.

Authors' collaboration around the world.

4.7. Bibliographic links of academic journals

This bibliometric analysis identified 3 dominant research clusters in digital marketing, as illustrated in Figure 6 . Each cluster has a significant amount of difference from other clusters. As identified with the analysis, the biggest cluster in digital marketing is about strategic planning with digital marketing. Another dominant research domain in digital marketing focuses on mobile marketing with apps development. In addition, the third cluster on digital marketing concentrates especially on dealing with demographic profiles of customers along with website marketing metrics. In addition, the word-cloud analysis expresses which keyword was discussed the most in these 925 papers published from 2000 to 2019 in Scopus. Digital marketing is the central word which is accompanied by other dominant keywords such as commerce, marketing, social networking online, social media sales and internet. Another amazing insight generated from this cluster analysis, e.g., three clusters represents three different facets of marketing; the green-coloured cluster represents societal and humane aspects of marketing while the red- coloured cluster represents the fundamental philosophical and strategic aspects of marketing (i.e., consumer behaviour, strategic planning, information management, social media, public relations) and the blue coloured cluster represents the recent development of digital marketing because of the proliferation of extensive data generation (i.e., database management, data mining, artificial management). But here one inconsistency can be noticed that theoretically big data analytics should fall in the blue coloured cluster but here it falls in the red coloured cluster and the authors are unable to explain the reason for this which can also be considered as a limitation of the article. Although digital marketing has received its importance after the advent of social media after 2000, it is considered in the red coloured cluster. That means digital marketing must be considered as the fundamental part of marketing and it must be given its due importance from the implicational aspect while the theory and philosophy remain the same.

Cluster analysis in digital marketing research.

5. Conclusion and implications

The bibliometric study provides a comprehensive picture of specific research fields and enables researchers to focus on unique areas to add new results and knowledge to the literature ( Ghorbani et al., 2021 ). In summary, this can be firmly claimed that the growth in the field of DM research has started in 2014. Three dominant themes of study have been developed including a strategic framework, mobile marketing and apps development and demographic analysis with web analytics. As a country, USA, UK and India contributed the most to this development. In the last half-decade, digital marketing has evolved as a buzzword. Revolution has been created by electronic commerce in business by transforming the physical aspect of delivery to the virtual aspect of marketing and selling. Digital marketing has become an integral part of any marketing and sales strategy ( Bhojaraja and Muniraju, 2018 ).

Analysis of the DM literature through bibliometric analysis will assist both the academicians and practitioners in various ways. First of all, this study will inform academic researchers and digital marketers regarding the evolution, trends and history of digital marketing. This paper will also inform about the most researched domains under DM, hence, enables researchers to identify research gaps to be filled by further studies in the future. The analysis shows that digital marketing is the single most keyword used in most of the studies. The other areas along with DM should also be investigated including consumer behaviour, social networks, machine learning, big data, advertising, mobile marketing, web 2.0, branding and so forth. Secondly, the study shows that research on DM has received tremendous focus since 2010 due to the growth of the internet and social media. As social media allure customers to speak for the brands, global companies increasingly focus on digital marketing as an effective tool of brand communication ( Bhuyan and Rahman, 2014 ). Thus, digital marketers should ensure the best use of digital media in brand communication. Third, the analysis reveals that DM literature is the most prevalent in the countries like USA, UK and India. Future researchers should focus on other parts of the world especially the developing countries regarding the prospects of digital marketing.

Finally, there are three dominant clusters are identified from the analysis. Strategic planning with digital marketing is the largest cluster suggesting the significant domain for both researchers and policymakers. After happening the latest technological revolution in businesses, digital marketing has become more prominent and widely practised. The methods of traditional marketing are completely replaced by those of digital marketing. Nowadays, marketers are forced to use the internet and digital technology for selling and promoting their products and services. Therefore, both the prospects and challenges of digital marketing must be properly detected and analyzed by marketers to set the best marketing plan and communication goals ( Bhojaraja and Muniraju, 2018 ). Mobile marketing with apps development is another domain identified from the cluster analysis. The rate of smartphone penetration and mobile applications is going up day by day due to availability and affordability. Therefore, markers should adopt mobile marketing such as banner ads on apps, SMS marketing and so forth to reach the target customers. The last research cluster is demographic profiles of customers along with website marketing metrics. The outcomes of marketing investment can easily be measured using digital marketing metrics. The effectiveness and quality of online content can also be evaluated and audited with the help of digital marketing ( Bhojaraja and Muniraju, 2018 ).

5.1. Limitations of the study and future research direction

This study does not include the major works indexed in another significant database (i.e. web of science), which is the major limitation of the study. In addition to that, documents were explored using the only keyword “Digital Marketing”, hence, other relevant keywords were not considered. Only one keyword is chosen to keep the analysis simple and to make it easier for the authors to interpret the analysis. Hence, further researches can be conducted to get a more holistic view by considering other strongly related keywords such as “online marketing”, “social media marketing”, “email marketing”, “affiliate marketing” and “mobile marketing”.

In future, how big data analytics and artificial intelligence are going to affect the digital marketing landscape can be explored. How marketing research has been shaped in the digital marketing field can also be an interesting pathway to pursue future research. Why USA, UK and India have contributed the most, on the other hand, why Canada, Australia, Germany, Russia, France and others are lagging in contributing to this field should also be analyzed.

Declarations

Author contribution statement.

All authors listed have significantly contributed to the development and the writing of this article.

Funding statement

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Data availability statement

Declaration of interests statement.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

No additional information is available for this paper.

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Dr Md. Abul Kalam Azad, Associate Professor, BTM, Islamic University of Technology for helping to retrieve the (.bib) data file from the Scopus database.

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Effectiveness of Digital Marketing to Protect Customer's Through Artificial Intelligence

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The influence of digital marketing on recruitment effectiveness: a qualitative study

European Journal of Management Studies

ISSN : 2183-4172

Article publication date: 30 November 2020

Issue publication date: 24 December 2020

The purpose of this paper is to unfold how different digital marketing tools and strategies influence recruitment effectiveness. More specifically, it focusses on understanding if, and how, information sources’ credibility, content marketing, and organisational reputation influence candidates’ decision to apply for a job in the Portuguese market.

Design/methodology/approach

A qualitative research, aligned with a content analysis, was conducted to focus on the insights from the 21 participants interviewed, to understand their thoughts and experiences regarding the subject.

The results show that digital marketing tools owned by the company are seen to be more credible and more relevant for the job application decision. LinkedIn is considered to be a more credible platform for advertising job openings than Facebook. In terms of content marketing, LinkedIn has a positive influence on candidates’ decision, as well as companies’ reputation.

Practical implications

This study provides practical implications which are useful for both HR and marketing managers, namely, the implementation of an integrated marketing communication strategy, the reinforcement of the company’s website and LinkedIn page and a presence on universities’ platforms, and also in terms of the information that content marketing should focus on.

Originality/value

This research paper incorporates marketing insights into a well-known HRM subject – recruitment, and thus adds further knowledge to the literature and prepares the ground for researchers who wish to explore this subject further.

• Digital marketing
• Brand relationships
• Corporate reputation
• Recruitment
• Job advertisement

Rodrigues, D. and Martinez, L.F. (2020), "The influence of digital marketing on recruitment effectiveness: a qualitative study", European Journal of Management Studies , Vol. 25 No. 1, pp. 23-44. https://doi.org/10.1108/EJMS-09-2020-002

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2020, Dalvia Rodrigues and Luis F. Martinez.

Published in European Journal of Management Studies . Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence maybe seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode

Introduction

According to Judy (1999) , the demand for highly skilled and well-educated employees is constant, which subsequently leads to an increase in the educational requirements for both specialists and entry-level employees. Elving, Westhoff, Meeusen, & Schoonderbeek (2013) believe that this occurs because high-quality employees are fundamental to strengthen an organisation and have a positive influence on the organisation’s reputation. A survey conducted by Capgemini Consulting in 2013 suggests that 70% of the organisations surveyed were concerned about the ability to recruit and retain talent in the current competitive marketplace, and not surprisingly, those which lag behind in adopting digital tools overlap with those which are most likely to confront challenges in recruiting and retaining talent ( Spitzer, Vernet, Soderstrom, & Nambiar, 2013 ). Furthermore, the ability to attract and retain employees is seen to be the most important determinant of an organisation’s effectiveness by several authors ( Breaugh, 2016 ; Chapman et al. , 2005 ; Johnson, 2014 ; Rajan, 2015 ; Singh and Finn, 2003 ), and, according to Johnson (2014) , companies should take a more proactive approach which involves recruitment, marketing and branding.

This study was conceived in this context and aims to contribute to furthering the HRM literature on the subject of recruitment effectiveness, by complementing it with marketing insights, especially with regards digital marketing. Because each market has its own specificities, the scope of the study is the Portuguese market, although it would be interesting to attempt to replicate this study in other countries, to assess the reliability of its methodology. The goal of the research is not only to add further knowledge to the literature, but also to provide a clear and practical understandings for managers.

Recruitment: the definition and importance of information technology

As mentioned above, hiring talented individuals is crucial, and can often be a difficult task. Recruitment can be defined as being the process which determines the number and type of applicants who apply for a certain job opportunity, which involves the advertising carried out from the moment that the company decides to hire, to when candidates apply, providing a pool of potential candidates, who then integrate in the selection process (Silvertzen et al. , 2013). Recruitment is also known as the stage of attraction, whereby the process implies the development of a marketing strategy which is similar to the process which is used for products or services – namely, by setting the values, the selling proposition, the target audience and also the communication channels. According to Roberts (1997) , the process of attracting candidates to apply for a job requires a balance, as managers need to achieve a sufficient pool of candidates – in terms of quantity and quality, to make good decisions.

Who to recruit?

How to advertise the job position?

What message needs to be communicated?

Who are the recruiters?

There is no doubt that the way that the recruitment process is carried out influences the quality of the individuals that the company hires, their initial performance, the training required and, finally, the retention rate. Accordingly, if the recruitment process is carried out badly, then the company could end up hiring unqualified applicants, leading to a low performance and a lack of diversity, or even failing to attract applicants who would be a better fit ( Breaugh, 2016 ; Elving et al. , 2013 ; Johnson and Gueutal, 2011 ; Singh and Finn, 2003 ).

When it comes to the methods of advertising job openings, several authors ( Breaugh, 2016 ; Johnson, 2014 ; Paolini & Duguay, 2012 ; Singh & Finn, 2003 ) defend that companies have a wide range of options, the most common and broadest ones being employees’ referrals, the company’s website, job boards, social networking sites (SNS) and college recruitment, among others. Singh and Finn (2003) go even further, by stating that, in the past, companies mostly used low-tech methods, such as newspaper advertisements and employees’ referrals, but recently this is changing, mainly because of the substantial impact of information technology.

Spitzer et al. (2013) believe that digital marketing can revolutionise the way that HR processes are managed today. Technology – especially internet-based communication tools and social media – has already changed recruitment, as it reduces costs significantly and allows organisations to reach passive candidates more easily and enables them to be able to customise the recruitment message to different targeted groups, or even individuals – which ultimately prepares the ground for the development of relationships with prospective candidates through social networking sites ( Breaugh, 2016 ; Caers & Castelyns, 2011 ; Nikolaou, 2014; Richard, 2010 ; Singh and Finn, 2013; Spitzer et al. , 2013 ). Furthermore, according to Johnson and Gueutal (2011) , the so-called e-recruiting is a solution for reaching various organisational goals, such as the improvement of recruiting efficiency and cost reduction, as well as increasing the quality and quantity of applicants, while increasing the objectiveness and standardisation of practices and the convenience for applicants.

Companies use digital marketing to connect with their target, whilst at the same time building conversations and engagement through multiple touchpoints ( Rajan, 2015 ), which enables them to leverage their employer branding and attraction and retain employees ( Sivertzen, Nilsen, & Olafsen, 2013 ). Cappelli (2001) defends that companies can promote themselves affordably and effectively by using the internet’s power of spreading information through informal networking, which provides valuable content for the targeted groups, whilst collecting information on potential candidates at the same time. Rajan (2015) defends that it is increasingly relevant for HR managers to work with marketing managers to identify potential employees and to connect and engage with them and use this network to fulfill recruitment needs. Furthermore, the use of internet in recruitment is a win-win solution for both HR managers and job seekers alike – as candidates are searching for tech-savvy employers, whilst companies aim to build a brand which is attractive and achieves visibility for its job postings, which requires the use of digital marketing ( Johnson, 2014 ; Ladkin & Buhalis, 2016 ; Paolini & Duguay, 2012 ; Silvertzen et al. , 2013).

Digital marketing: definition, tools and strategies

Kannan and Li (2017 , p. 23) define digital marketing as being the process that uses digital technologies to “acquire customers and build customer preferences, promote brands, retain customers and increase sales”. Accordingly, in the recruitment perspective, digital marketing enables a company to attract and engage potential candidates and to promote a two-way interaction, with the goal of retaining the most adequate candidate for its recruitment needs, using promotional techniques that go beyond the internet ( Yasmin, Tasneem, & Fatema, 2015 ). To improve employer attractiveness, organisations nowadays use these different forms of communication to reach candidates, connect with them, and build a positive employer image ( Puncheva-Michelotti, Hudson, & Jin, 2018 ).

Over the past years, a great deal of research has been focussed on digital marketing – as this is still a developing subject. One aspect that represents a different perspective regarding the current literature is the classification and division of digital marketing tools. For instance, Goldfarb (2014) defines digital marketing as “online advertising”, and establishes three general categories, namely, search advertising, classified advertising and display advertising. Yasmin et al. (2015) define a set of the most important elements of digital marketing, which consist of online advertising, email marketing, social media, text messaging, affiliate marketing, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Pay per Click (PPC). Finally, Batra and Keller (2016) highlight six key online communication options, which include search advertisements, display advertisements, websites, email, social media and mobile phones.

As the focus of this study is recruitment, one cannot pass without mentioning those digital marketing elements which are specifically designed for recruitment, which, according to Johnson and Gueutal (2011) , include the corporate recruiting website, general online job boards (e.g. Monster, HotJobs), industry-specific job boards and regional job boards. However, just using one of the elements presented above would represent a limited vision of what digital marketing entails, especially with regards the recruitment environment. Therefore, the optimal solution is to create a combination of the elements of the digital marketing tools which fit the recruitment overview, which is shown in Table 1 .

In addition, the literature highlights a distinction between paid, earned and owned media, as these all have an influence on marketing strategy and are used together to ensure that the message is received multiple times and that it creates awareness, engagement and retention ( Bonchek, 2014 ; DiStaso and Brown, 2015 ; Stephen and Galak, 2012 ). Several authors have contributed to the definition of these types of media ( Baetzgen and Tropp, 2015 ; Boncheck, 2014; DiStaso and Brown, 2015 ; Stephen and Galak, 2012 ), stating that paid media is the category of media for which marketers have to contact a third-party organisation, which includes print, television and radio. Its main advantages are immediacy and scale, although these are being challenged by low credibility. Earned media includes all the media activity that the company does not generate directly, which results from public relations, press mentions and word-of-mouth (WOM). Earned media is also considered to be the most credible type of source, although it lacks control over the content, which can result in negative publicity. Finally, owned media represents all those channels which are under the direct control of the company, such as corporate websites and social media pages, which are made available without any media-buying costs. Table 2 shows how digital marketing tools can be distributed between paid, earned and owned media. In addition, social media can be seen to be both owned and earned media, because nowadays brands own their own channels and pages, although they do not control the WOM marketing which is created on these platforms ( Bonchek, 2014 ; Stephen and Galak, 2012 ).

Content marketing is a digital marketing strategy which represents the process of creating and distributing relevant and valuable content which is not directly connected to the product, service or the job opening itself, with the objective to attract and engage the target audience ( Baetzgen and Tropp, 2015 ; Kee and Yazdanifard, 2015 ; Rowley, 2008 ). According to Baltes (2015) , content marketing has become a crucial aspect for successful digital marketing which enhances candidates’ perception of credibility during the recruitment process, and thus positively influences their decision to apply for a job. Companies are beginning to realise that using digital tools in marketing is worthless if it they are not accompanied by a content marketing strategy which focusses on storytelling ( Pulizzi, 2012 ). Companies can distribute content through their website, social media pages and email marketing, as well as other owned channels – creating value and using data to tailor the message, which represents an overall valued strategy in the present information-driven context – where individuals are looking for evermore information to guide their decision-making process ( Bonchek, 2014 ; Kee and Yazdanifard, 2015 ). Furthermore, companies are still struggling with the ability to create truly engaging content for candidates which delivers positive and meaningful results ( Pulizzi, 2012 ).

Hypotheses development

Hanssens and Pauwels (2016 , p. 177) clarify effectiveness as being the “ability to reach the goal”, and therefore overall recruitment effectiveness corresponds to the ability to hire the most-suited candidates. More specifically, this is achieved by influencing the target candidates’ decision to apply for a job ( Chapman et al. , 2005 ; Maurer and Liu, 2007 ). Although a growing amount of literature is focussed on the effectiveness of online advertising in the marketing context ( Goldfarb, 2014 ), Maurer and Liu (2007) believe that the literature is still failing to provide a theory-based understanding of how digital marketing contributes to the success of recruitment. Therefore, the goal of this study is to understand the impact of digital marketing on recruitment effectiveness, by focussing on how different tools and strategies influence candidates’ decision to apply for a job, which culminates in the research question: “Do different digital marketing tools and strategies influence candidates’ decisions during the recruitment process, and if so, how?”.

Our objective is to add to the various hypotheses which have already been developed in the literature on human resources management and marketing fields, by carrying out a more knowledgeable research which contributes significantly to the current literature, while aiming to encounter findings which can be easily understood and can be used for managerial decisions.

When it comes to the candidates’ decision to apply for a job, the information provided by the digital marketing tools owned by the company is less relevant than that provided by earned media.

Fisher et al. (1979) believe that candidates assign different levels of credibility to the information that they gather through several sources, as the format of the presentation of the information can be as important as the information itself ( Allen et al. , 2013 ). Source credibility has two main dimensions: trustworthiness and expertise. Trustworthy sources are those which candidates perceive are not trying to persuade or influence them, and thus, sources which are independent of the company are generally seen to be more credible. On the other hand, candidates attribute more credibility to sources which they believe are knowledgeable about the subject ( Fisher et al. , 1979 ; Pornpitakpan, 2004 ).

Job advertisements placed on LinkedIn are perceived to be more credible than those placed on Facebook.

Content marketing has a positive influence on candidates’ decision to apply for a job.

Organisational reputation is more relevant for the decision to applying for a job than information transmitted through the digital marketing tools owned by the company.

Research approach

As mentioned above, the existent literature still fails to provide a theory-based understanding of how digital marketing contributes to recruitment effectiveness ( Maurer & Liu, 2007 ). Therefore, the best approach for the research carried out for this study is qualitative research, because of its capabilities to collect and analyse open-ended answers which illustrate respondents’ points of view regarding a topic about which little is known to-date ( Patton, 2002 ; Strauss & Corbin, 1990 ).

the body text – the starting point of the research;

the research question – the research aim, which guides the study and also includes the hypotheses;

the context – the conceptual environment selected by the researcher which gives sense to the body text;

the analytical construct – which represents what is already known about the topic, to avoid overlapping;

inferences – which are intended to answer the research question and hypotheses; and

validating evidence – which assures the contribution to the existing literature.

Content analysis also allows the researcher to analyse relatively unstructured data better, with the aim to comprehend people’s cognitive schemas, as well as the meaning and communicative roles which the data represents for individuals ( Kripperndorff, 2004 ; Schreier, 2014 ; Weber, 1990 ).

Data collection procedure and sample

As stated above, the study focusses on the Portuguese market, with the objective to understand its specificities and provide managers with a more comprehensive view. The data was collected through a semi-structured one-to-one interview (see script in Table 3 ), which aimed to examine the research topic from the perspective of the interviewee and to understand how and why they have this particular perspective ( King, 2004 ). The interview was also tested on two individuals to better adapt the script to new topics that emerged. Sampling was carried out by selecting the participants based on their knowledge and experience of the topic, together with snowball sampling, whereby new participants were contacted after asking a first selected group of respondents who to interview next ( Kripperndorff, 2004 ; Patton, 2002 ). The requirements also included asking certain questions to ensure that the participants were currently employed or had looked for a job during the past year, and that they used LinkedIn for their job search.

The interviews were carried out during October, 2017, either face to face, via phone or by Skype. All participants were first introduced to the study and then asked for their permission to audio-record the interview. On average, the interviews lasted for half an hour, and the data was further transcribed verbatim to ensure its correct analysis. The study counts with 21 Portuguese participants, 11 of whom are women and 10 are men, with an average age of 22.8 years old, ranging from 21 to 27. The interviewees came from a wide range of geographic locations, and either had a Bachelors (28.6%) or a Masters degree (71.4%). Additionally, 23.8% are currently in full-time study, 42.9% are currently in full-time employment and 33.3% are working and studying simultaneously (for a more comprehensive view, consult Table 4 ).

Data analysis

initial coding – reading each transcript and attaching codes to interviews’ extracts;

coding dictionary – development of a list of codes, sub-codes linked based on their conceptual and logical similarity; and

relationships – establishing and clarifying relationships among codes ( Murphy, Klotz, & Kreiner, 2017 ; Saldaña, 2009 ).

This process was carried out using the MAXQDA software, to ensure a more structured approach. The coding dictionary can be seen in Table 5 .

After the data was analysed, the coding dictionary was developed to systemise the findings and also participants’ opinions and insights. Additionally, Figure 1 shows the research model overview and the relationships found between the major constructs. In this segment, the results are presented within each hypothesis to give a better outline of the ideas found, which are highlighted by quotes extracted from the interviews.

Information from owned versus earned media

On the subject of digital marketing tools, participants were questioned about the relevance of these tools for their decision to apply for a job and their credibility. The results show that tools owned by the company seem to rank higher for both questions, which thus fails to support H1 . The data shows that owned media tools are seen to be more credible and that candidates regularly “search more on the company’s website” or the company’s LinkedIn page “to confirm the information” which they see on other platforms, as they seek tools “that can give more detailed information and that is trustworthy at the same time” (Interview H). Furthermore, owned media tools are also those for which more importance is attributed for the decision, as they are “generally more interactive and more representative of the brand” and can give a more personalised experience (Interview O). Nevertheless, some participants have shown doubts regarding the information provided by the company, because “it is the information they want to present, and not necessarily the truth” (Interview F). This represents the constant battle that candidates face because while, on one hand, they seek information from the company, on the other hand, they are also aware that such information can be embellished to persuade them to apply for the job.

Additionally, earned media tools can also be important for the decision, especially platforms provided by universities and job boards, as these offer a larger quantity of job openings and allow candidates to discover new companies and job functions. Besides, on universities’ platforms, candidates feel that “companies that advertise there are expecting a profile” similar to theirs, which “increases the chances of being called for an interview” (Interview K). Moreover, these tools are also seen to be credible, mostly because of the importance that candidates attribute to WOM and the opinions of acquaintances who worked in the company, as this can provide “a more realistic view” of the offer, even though such an opinion needs to be weighted “because the subjectivity of third parties can also lead to a bad interpretation” (Interview E).

Credibility: LinkedIn versus Facebook

In general, all interviewees agreed that LinkedIn is the better choice in term of credibility, which supports H2 . They feel that the platform “has a more formal environment than Facebook”, because LinkedIn was built for that specific purpose and provides a structure to advertise job openings, which makes them “more informative and professional” (Interview D). Therefore, the credibility of LinkedIn can be explained by the fact that candidates perceived it to be a more professional and trustworthy platform. On the other hand, Facebook is generally seen to be less credible, because of its personal environment, which creates doubts regarding whether the job opening actually exists, or not, and also the intentions of the recruiters. In addition, because Facebook is a platform which was not built for the purpose of recruitment, it lacks structure and provides less information. However, advertisements on Facebook can be seen to be credible if they are posted on groups with alumni or specific audience and redirect the user to the company’s website, LinkedIn page or an email address, and also when candidates know personally the person whose Facebook account is advertising the job opportunity, or if they associate the person with a closer group, and therefore they are more comfortable to ask questions and ultimately to apply for the job in question.

Influence of content marketing on recruitment effectiveness

The collected data shows that content marketing has a positive influence on candidates’ decision to apply for a job, which supports H3 . Interviewees see content marketing as being a differentiation factor for companies, allowing them to provide more information about themselves and their culture, and “assuming that the job openings are identical” they seem to be “more inclined for a company which has that kind of strategy and initiative” because “it is a way to present itself to the exterior”, which “gives a better perspective for whoever wants to apply” and “provides more realistic expectations” (Interview E). However, several participants also stated that although content marketing influences them, “it is not something essential” (Interview K) – i.e. it does not represent a major or eliminatory role in their decision. Furthermore, some individuals believe that the perception and influence of content marketing can differ from industry to industry, and job area to job area, because “there are several types of companies” and each must “understand if it makes sense for them have that concern, or not” (Interview J). There is also the risk of attracting candidates to the industry with the provided content, but not necessarily to the company itself.

Interviewees were also questioned about what information they seek to support their decision to apply for a job, and the answers focussed on the job offer itself, “the type of job, the functions” and the requisites (Interview A), the company and “the type of culture” (Interview B). In addition, some HR factors were highlighted, such as turnover rates and training, as well as the team members. Although most of the individuals who mentioned salary stated that it was not so important as to have to be present in the job advertisement, the truth is that salary was mentioned quite a lot.

Reputation versus information provided through tools owned by the company

The data suggests that reputation has a big influence on the candidates’ decision, whether it is from what they hear through WOM, the media or other platforms such as Glassdoor, where employees can give their opinion, which supports H4 . Reputation is not only seen as being quite important, but it almost has the power to “make other things that might be questioned when assessing a company less relevant”, such as the job function per se , or the touchpoint where candidates see the advertisement, and “make external sources (…) less relevant” (Interview O).

Individuals seem to be more willing to apply for a company that has a positive reputation, which has existed for several years and which has a more established presence in the market, as “by principle, reputation tells you that it is a good place to work, and that it could be a good school and a place to learn and develop as a person and as a professional” (Interview U). Regarding negative reputation, opinions seem to be split, with most interviewees stating they “would not like to work for a company with a negative reputation” (Interview A), especially in cases of corruption and other scandals, or the mistreatment of employees – all of which decreasing their willingness to apply for a job there. In contrast, negative reputation can be surpassed for some participants if the company in question is one where the candidate “really want(s) to work for and that matches the need at the moment” (Interview H), making them “willing to confirm” for themselves (Interview S).

Furthermore, most participants think that reputation “has more influence than what the company is actually saying” on their owned tools (Interview B). For reputation has more diversified sources, and participants “prefer to inform” themselves “through comments of people who work in the company” – because that information is “more credible and closer to the truth” (Interview C). Nevertheless, it is also relevant to state that some interviewees do not feel that reputation has an influence on the decision to apply, especially in the case of smaller companies or startups, as these are not sufficiently established to have created a reputation for themselves.

The goal of this study is to understand the influence of digital marketing on recruitment effectiveness and contribute to the existent literature on the subject with new findings or a further confirmation of established ideas. To start with, the findings of this study challenge the conventional idea that owned media is the least credible type of media, which has been defended by several authors ( Baetzgen and Tropp, 2015 ; O’Neil & Eisenmann, 2017 ). Our results show that in the recruitment environment, owned media tools are considered to be more credible, which is an essential characteristic for sources and their influence on how information is processed ( Van Hoye & Lievens, 2005 ). Furthermore, owned media tools are seen to be more capable of providing detailed and relevant information, which makes them the most important type of sources to support the decision to apply for a job. Company’s websites and LinkedIn page are the most preferred and the most frequently referred tools, with candidates even associating certain traits about the company and its culture to how the information is exposed on these channels.

Nonetheless, for companies, the question is no longer whether they should join the digital conversation or not, for the pressure to adopt an online presence is so significant that it is impossible to ignore it. The adoption of this strategy establishes ground for mutually satisfying long-term relationships with the audience – which in this case of this study are potential candidates. According to Tiago and Veríssimo (2014) , Portuguese companies embrace digital presence mainly because of external competitive pressure and internal efficiency, with the objective to build their brand, improve knowledge and improve communication flows.

Regarding social media, not surprisingly, LinkedIn was established to be more credible than Facebook, because of its trustworthiness and expertise ( Fisher et al. , 1979 ; Pornpitakpan, 2004 ), as it is a platform which is specifically structured for that purpose and it is more professional and informative.

This study shows that content marketing makes the company more attractive as a potential employer and enables it to differentiate itself from competitors, which has a positive influence on the decision to apply for a job. Moreover, content marketing also allows candidates to gather more information to support their decision. Research shows that a larger amount of information increases the perception of credibility and results in a greater possibility of applying for a job. Furthermore, the more specific the message, the greater the interest in the job opening and the more attention candidates give to the message – which can result in a better person–organisation fit ( Allen et al. , 2007 ; Breaugh, 2013 ). Lievens and HighHouse (2003) defend that candidates’ initial attraction to a company can be explained by instrumental attributes, i.e. concrete and factual attributes regarding a job and the company (e.g. salary), as well as symbolic attributes, i.e. subjective and intangible attributes that describe a job or the company (e.g. being innovative). Nevertheless, Allen et al. (2007) defend that questions remain unanswered about the usefulness of the information that is collected throughout the different stages of the job search.

Finally, the study confirms that reputation is a major part of the decision process, as the image that candidates create of the company deeply influences their perspective about what the company says and how they react to it – whether this image is created through their own experiences, or through the experiences and opinions of others. Ultimately, this image has an impact on their decision to apply for a job ( Cable & Graham, 2000 ; DiStaso & Brown, 2015 ). The study also suggests that reputation is more important than what the company actually says, as candidates have doubts whether the information the company provides is entirely real and accordingly seek other sources on which to base their decisions. WOM is especially relevant in this new digital era and it represents an interpersonal communication, that is independent of the company and which can transmit positive or negative information ( Van Hoye et al. , 2016 ). Furthermore, Collins and Stevens (2002) found that positive WOM has a strong effect on organisational attractiveness, and the study of Van Hoye and Lievens (2005) established that negative WOM has an even larger impact than positive WOM. This is perhaps the biggest fear of organisations in this digital and social world, as information can spread so quickly and get out of control so easily, that it can either ruin or build a company’s reputation in a few tweets or Facebook publications ( Kluemper, Mitra, & Wang, 2016 ; Malita, Badescu, I., & Dabu, 2010 ).

Theoretical contributions

The results show that owned media is a credible source of information in the recruitment context, challenging the conventional idea that refers to the contrary ( Baetzgen & Tropp, 2015 ; O'Neil & Eisenmann, 2017 ). The findings even suggest some reasons why owned tools are more relevant for the decision to apply for a job, namely, because they provide more information, they are more trustworthy, professional, personalised and interactive; they provide the opportunity to have a direct contact with the recruiter; and also because other sources redirect to them (especially earned tools, such as job boards and universities’ platforms).

In spite of this finding, possibly, our greatest contribution to literature on this subject is the identification of the parameters which can lead to more credible job advertisements on Facebook, namely, the use of groups with alumni or a specific audience; redirection to the company’s website, LinkedIn page or email address; familiarity with the recruiter; and the possibility to ask questions in an informal context (Fatkin & Lansdwon, 2017).

With regard to information, the study presents the following categories of information which have an influence on candidates’ decision to apply for a job: the job offer itself and its functions, requisites and type of contract; the company, the industry where it works and its culture, vision, products and services; the salary, where its mere reference in the job advertisement is seen to be a plus for the respondents; human resources factors, such as turnover rates and the expected training; and, finally, the team members and their qualifications.

The findings also suggest that content marketing has a positive influence on the decision to apply for a job, as it provides further information about the company and its culture and the team. However, although it has a role in the decision to apply for a job, content marketing is not seen to be the most relevant element. Furthermore, interviewees also mention that they can be more willing to apply for a job in the sector, and not necessarily for the company itself.

Finally, in relation to small companies and startups, our study shows that reputation does not have a decisive influence on the decision to apply for a job in these companies, as many of the companies in question had not had the time or the opportunity to develop such a long-term attribute.

The results show that it is essential that managers, especially those responsible for recruitment and marketing, implement the necessary strategies to tackle emerging challenges. First, managers should implement an integrated marketing communication (IMC) strategy – i.e. a communication strategy which integrates different tools to communicate the recruitment message effectively to the targeted audience, combining traditional and new media, whilst depending heavily on data ( Batra & Keller, 2016 ; Luxton, Reid, & Mavondo, 2015 ; Madia, 2011 ). If managers advertise job openings in all the available platforms, and convey a clear message, which is adapted to the audience for each one, then they will be able to reach even more potential candidates and retain their attention, which consequently results in a larger and more appropriate pool of candidates ( Luxton et al. , 2015 ). To successfully implement an IMC strategy, managers need to consider the following factors: consistency – and thus reinforce a persuasive message through the means of different tools and touchpoints; complementarity – using leverage on each tool’s strength; and cross-effects – as the communication effects from a previous touchpoint can improve the receptiveness of the information from others ( Batra & Keller, 2016 ).

Palos-Sanchez, Saura and Debasa (2018) also highlight the importance of emerging mobile technologies, which will have a significant impact on how digital marketing will work in the future, as they offer ease of use and accessibility and affect the effectiveness of conversion. Mobile marketing is fueled by the advancements in mobile technologies and their technical benefits, which currently are not being fully exploited, because of the lack of experience and expertise among professionals ( Smutkupt, Krairit, & Esichaikul, 2010 ).

Our research highlights candidates’ need for valid information and its impact on their decision, and thus, nowadays, companies need to do more than just advertise the job position when recruiting, and they need to promote their brand and corporate image to convince candidates that they are the best employer – through content marketing and storytelling ( Allen et al. , 2013 ; Blackman, 2006 ; Elving et al. , 2013 ; Fisher et al. , 1979 ). Blackman (2006) explains that a recruitment advertisement is a form of persuasive communication, which needs to attract readers’ attention and be able to stand out from other advertisements, to then create an interest to know more, building a relationship between the candidate and the company and enhancing the possibility of applying for the job in question. Several aspects make an advertisement better, namely, thought-provoking and appealing headlines; media richness; the structure and design of the advertisement; descriptive information; and interactivity ( Blackman, 2006 ; Baum & Kabst, 2014 ; Cable et al. , 2000 ; Cable & Yu, 2006 ; Frasca & Edwards, 2017 ; Howardson & Behrend, 2014 ; Maurer & Liu, 2007 ). Furthermore, a more targeted approach to advertisements would be welcome, which can be achieved by creating specific content for the different target groups of candidates (e.g. management students, engineering students). A more focussed approach has been proven to be more engaging and effective ( Pulizzi, 2012 ).

Additionally, social media usage will continue to grow as it gains more and more importance on individuals’ life, shaping how they receive and process information. As a result, companies must adapt quickly to answer these new needs, by changing their communication approach and by engaging their targets in online conversations through SNS ( Dijkmans, Kerkhof, & Beukeboom, 2015 ). Although most companies are becoming aware of this need and its advantages – namely, the enhanced trustworthiness, positive brand attitude and increased commitment – they still find it hard to implement a winning strategy, because they lack expertise and are unfamiliar with this environment and are still afraid of the costs involved or the negative reputation that can arise from a lack of control, with many remaining tied to traditional approaches ( Chui et al. , 2012 ; Dijkmans et al. , 2015 ; Kluemper et al. , 2016 ; Malita et al. , 2010 ; Melanthiou et al. , 2015 ).

In addition, it is extremely important to place all the information on owned media tools, because candidates like to confirm if the job opening is real on the company’s website or its LinkedIn page. Advertising on universities’ platforms is also essential, as individuals feel that such an advertisement is more tailored to them and that the company is looking for someone with a profile similar to theirs – which makes it easier for them to apply for the job or to search more. Furthermore, managers must be careful regarding content marketing, to ensure that it is used to attract candidates not only for the industry, but also for the company itself – by providing useful and valuable content regarding both topics and through signalling instrumental and symbolic attributes.

Finally, and perhaps the biggest challenge is the need to strike a balance between the control of the information by the company and the involvement and engagement of third parties, which is especially relevant in the current digital era, where individuals expect to be part of the conversation. Indeed, the capacity to generate and leverage insights through big data is a must-have for companies, and managers should put in place established processes to capture, storage, transfer and analyse all the data throughout the entire customer journey, to optimise advertising, content and the required budgets ( Leeflang, Verhoef, Dahlström, & Freundt, 2014 ).

Limitations and future research directions

Naturally, this study has limitations which need to be acknowledged. First, the use of mainly Portuguese students could decrease the possibility of generalisation and external validity ( Acarlar & Bilgiç, 2013 ; Silvertzen et al. , 2013). Additionally, the sample needs to be larger, to collect more insights about the subject. Second, in the content analysis, some topics were left out for the sake of the answers for the hypotheses, and therefore it would be interesting to follow up on certain topics which emerged, but were too dissimilar to be included (e.g. perceptions about video content). This would provide a more in-depth understanding of sub-topics which emerged during the interviews, and would thus result in a more inclusive study.

Based on the discussion and the limitations of this study, there is room to improve in future research. First, it would be interesting to carry out a cross-area comparison study with students, to understand whether diverse areas see digital marketing strategies differently. Second, a further validation of the parameters found that seem to make Facebook advertisements more credible would also be a valuable contribution. Third, a topic that emerged is the importance and role of review platforms for the recruitment process, such as Glassdoor, which help understand how candidates use them and whether they find review platforms useful and credible and if the use of such platforms impacts recruitment effectiveness, as research already has focussed on review platforms as being an integral part of the customer journey in the broad marketing sense ( Kluemper et al. , 2016 ; Leeflang et al. , 2014 ).

Fourth, the influence of content marketing on the person–organisation fit perception has room for further research, because candidates seek to understand if the attributes and values of the company match with their own, and, as our research shows, content marketing is a way for job seekers to obtain more information about the company in question ( Cable and Judge, 1996 ). Furthermore, because the results show that content marketing is not a preponderant factor, it would be relevant to understand its weight in the decision to apply for a job, how it changes from context to context (e.g. depending on the company’s reputation) and which type of content is more influential.

Finally, future research could focus on the impact of social media on brand reputation, to understand its role in managing brand reputation and to provide more practical insights for managers ( Leeflang et al. , 2014 ).

The main goal of this study is to understand how digital marketing influences candidates’ decision to apply for a job. The results show that candidates consider information from owned media tools to be more credible and relevant for their decision, and that they look for tools which are more trustworthy and specialised, such as LinkedIn, or the company’s website. Additionally, content marketing seems to have a positive impact on the decision to apply for a job, as it provides applicants with more insights about the company, its culture and the industry itself. Finally, reputation still represents a major part of the decision process, which is a challenge for companies in this information-driven age. The adaption to the digital era and the new consumer’s mindset is still a challenge for most companies; however, those who are willing to dare and take risks first will be those who succeed. Companies should definitely adopt an IMC strategy as a means to effectively communicate to the target audience and promote brand and corporate image through content marketing and storytelling. In sum, companies should strive to convince their candidates that they are the best employers. Furthermore, on account of the rapid development of technology, it is also relevant for companies to pay close attention to emerging trends, such as mobile marketing.

Research model overview

Combined categorisation of digital marketing tools

Distribution of digital marketing tools between types of media

Interviewees’ profile

Coding book/dictionary

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Acknowledgements

This work was funded by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (UID/ECO/00124/2013, UID/ECO/00124/2019 and Social Sciences DataLab, LISBOA-01–0145-FEDER-022209), POR Lisboa (LISBOA-01–0145-FEDER-007722, LISBOA-01–0145-FEDER-022209) and POR Norte (LISBOA-01–0145-FEDER-022209). .

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Effectiveness of Digital Marketing in the Challenging Age: An Empirical Study

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International Journal of Management Science and Business Administration Volume 1, Issue 5, April 2015, Pages 69-80 Effectiveness of Digital Marketing in the Challenging Age: An Empirical Study DOI: 10.18775/ijmsba.1849-5664-5419.2014.15.1006 URL:  dx.doi.org/10.18775/ijmsba.1849-5664-5419.2014.15.1006 Afrina Yasmin, Sadia Tasneem, Kaniz Fatema Department of Business Administration, Northern University Bangladesh Department of Business Administration, Asian University of Bangladesh

Abstract : Marketers are faced with new challenges and opportunities within this digital age. Digital marketing is the utilization of electronic media by the marketers to promote the products or services into the market. The main objective of digital marketing is attracting customers and allowing them to interact with the brand through digital media. This article focuses on the importance of digital marketing for both marketers and consumers. We examine the effect of digital marketing on the firms’ sales. Additionally the differences between traditional marketing and digital marketing in this paper are presented. This study has described various forms of digital marketing, effectiveness of it and the impact it has on firm’s sales. The examined sample consists of one hundred fifty firms and fifty executives which have been randomly selected to prove the effectiveness of digital marketing. Collected data has been analyzed with the help of various statistical tools and techniques.

Keywords: Digital marketing, Promotion, Effectiveness, Customer reach

Effectiveness-of-digital-marketing-in-the-challenging-age-an-empirical-study

 1.  Introduction

Digital marketing is one type of marketing being widely used to promote products or services and to reach consumers using digital channels. Digital marketing extends beyond internet marketing including channels that do not require the use of Internet. It includes mobile phones (both SMS and MMS), social media marketing, display advertising, search engine marketing and many other forms of digital media. digital marketing review digital marketing review

Through digital media, consumers can access information any time and any place where they want. With the presence of digital media, consumers do not just rely on what the company says about their brand but also they can follow what the media, friends, associations, peers, etc., are saying as well. Digital marketing is a broad term that refers to various promotional techniques deployed to reach customers via digital technologies. Digital marketing embodies an extensive selection of service, product and brand marketing tactics which mainly use Internet as a core promotional medium in addition to mobile and traditional TV and radio.  Canon iMage Gateway helps consumers share their digital photos with friends online. L’Oréal’s brand Lancôme uses email newsletters to keep in touch with customers and hence tries to strengthen customer brand loyalty (Merisavo et al., 2004). Magazine publishers can activate and drive their customers into Internet with e-mails and SMS messages to improve re-subscription rate (Merisavo et al., 2004).

Marketers increasingly bring brands closer to consumers’ everyday life. The changing role of customers as co-producers of value is becoming increasingly important (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004). Khan and Mahapatra (2009) remarked that technology plays a vital role in improving the quality of services provided by the business units. According to Hoge (1993), electronic marketing (EM) is a transfer of goods or services from seller to buyer involving one or more electronic methods or media. E-Marketing began with the use of telegraphs in the nineteenth century. With the invention and mass acceptance of the telephone, radio, television, and then cable television, electronic media has become the dominant marketing force. McDonald’s uses online channel to reinforce brand messages and relationships. They have built online communities for children, such as the Happy Meal website with educative and entertaining games to keep customers always close to themselves (Rowley 2004). Reinartz and Kumar (2003) found that the number of mailing efforts by the company is positively linked with company profitability over time. The primary advantages of social media marketing is reducing costs and enhancing the reach. The cost of a social media platform is typically lower than other marketing platforms such as face-to-face sales or sales with a help of middlemen or distributors. In addition, social media marketing allows firms to reach customers that may not be accessible due to temporal and locational limitations of existing distribution channels. Generally, main advantage of social media is that it can enable companies to increase reach and reduce costs (Watson et al. 2002; Sheth and Sharma 2005).

According to Chaffey (2011), social media marketing involves “encouraging customer communications on company’s own website or through its social presence”. Social media marketing is one important technique in digital marketing as companies can use social media form to distribute their messages to their target audience without paying for the publishers or distributor that is characteristic for traditional marketing. Digital marketing, electronic marketing, e-marketing and Internet marketing are all similar terms which, simply put, refer to “marketing online whether via websites, online ads, opt-in emails, interactive kiosks, interactive TV or mobiles” (Chaffey and Smith, 2008). Giese and Gote (2000) finds that customer information satisfaction (CIS) for digital marketing can be conceptualized as a sum of affective response of varying intensity that follows consumption and is stimulated by focal aspects of sales activities, information systems (websites), digital products/services, customer support, after-sales service and company culture.

Waghmare (2012) pointed out that many countries in Asia are taking advantage of e-commerce through opening up, which is essential for promoting competition and diffusion of Internet technologies. Zia and Manish (2012) found that currently, shoppers in metropolitan India are being driven by e-commerce: these consumers are booking travels, buying consumer electronics and books online. Although spending per online buyer remains low, some 59% of online consumers in metropolitan India already make purchases online at least once in a month. Dave Chaffey (2002) defines e-marketing as “application of digital technologies – online channels (web, e-mail, databases, plus mobile/wireless and digital TV) to contribute to marketing activities aimed at achieving profit acquisition and customers retention (within a multi-channel buying process and customer lifecycle) by improving customer knowledge (of their profiles, behavior, value and loyalty drivers) and further delivering integrated communications and online services that match customers’ individual needs. Chaffey’s definition reflects the relationship marketing concept; it emphasizes that it should not be technology that drives e-marketing, but the business model. All types of social media provide an opportunity to present company itself or its products to dynamic communities and individuals that may show interest (Roberts and Kraynak, 2008). According to Gurau (2008), online marketing environment raises a series of opportunities and also challenges for social media marketing practitioners. digital marketing review

The main objective of this paper is to identify the effectiveness of digital marketing in the competitive market. The supportive objectives are following: digital marketing review

• To show the various elements of digital marketing;
• To focus on the basic comparison between traditional and digital marketing;
• To discuss the effects of various forms of digital marketing on the firm’s sales and other activities;
• To show the various advantages of digital marketing to the customers.

2.  Theoretical and Conceptual Framework

2.1 traditional marketing versus digital marketing.

Traditional marketing is the most recognizable form of marketing. Traditional marketing is non-digital way used to promote the product or services of business entity. On the other hand, digital marketing is the marketing of products or services using digital channels to reach consumers. Some comparisons are presented below: digital marketing review

Table 1: Traditional marketing and digital marketing comparison

Advertising mediums that might be used as part of digital marketing strategy of a business could include promotional efforts made via Internet, social media, mobile phones, electronic billboards, as well as via digital television and radio channels. Digital marketing is a sub branch of traditional marketing and uses modern digital channels for the placement of products e.g. downloadable music, primarily for communicating with stakeholders e.g. customers and investors about brand, products and business progress. digital marketing review

2.2 Various Elements of Digital Marketing

There are various elements by which digital marketing is formed. All forms operate through electronic devices. The most important elements of digital marketing are given below:

(i) Online Advertising

Online advertising is a very important part of digital marketing. It is also called internet advertising through which company can deliver the message about the products or services. Internet-based advertising provides the content and ads that best matches to consumer interests. Publishers put about their products or services on their websites so that consumers or users get free information. Advertisers should place more effective and relevant ads online. Through online advertising, company well controls its budget and it has full control on time. digital marketing review

(ii) Email Marketing

When message about the products or services is sent through email to the existing or potential consumer, it is defined as email marketing. Direct digital marketing is used to send ads, to build brand and customer loyalty, to build customer trust and to make brand awareness. Company can promote its products and services by using this element of digital marketing easily. It is relatively low cost comparing to advertising or other forms of media exposure. Company can bring complete attention of the customer by creating attractive mix of graphics, text and links on the products and services. digital marketing review digital marketing review

(iii) Social Media

Today, social media marketing is one of the most important digital marketing channels. It is a computer-based tool that allows people to create, exchange ideas, information and pictures about the company’s product or services. According to Nielsen, internet users continue to spend more time with social media sites than any other type. Social media marketing networks include Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+. Through Facebook, company can promote events concerning product and services, run promotions that comply with the Facebook guidelines and explore new opportunities. Through Twitter, company can increase the awareness and visibility of their brand. It is the best tool for the promotion of company’s products and services. In LinkedIn, professionals write their profile and share information with others. Company can develop their profile in LinkedIn so that the professionals can view and can get more information about the company’s product and services. Google+ is also social media network that is more effective than other social media like Facebook, Twitter. It is not only simple social media network but also it is an authorship tool that links web-content directly with its owner. digital marketing review

(iv)Text Messaging

It is a way to send information about the products and services from cellular and smart phone devices. By using phone devices, company can send information in the form of text (SMS), pictures, video or audio (MMS). Marketing through cellphone SMS (Short Message Service) became increasingly popular in the early 2000s in Europe and some parts of Asia. One can send order confirmations, shipping alerts using text message. Using SMS for campaigns get faster and more substantial results. Under this technique, companies can send marketing messages to their customers in real-time, any time and can be confident that the message will be seen. Company can create a questionnaire and obtain valuable customer feedback essential to develop their products or services in future. digital marketing review digital marketing review

(v) Affiliate Marketing:

Affiliate marketing is a type of performance-based marketing. In this type of marketing, a company rewards affiliates for each visitor or customer they bring by marketing efforts they create on behalf of company. Industry has four core players: the merchant (also known as “retailer” or “brand”), the network, the publisher (also known as “the affiliate”) and the customer. The market has grown in such complexity resulting in the emergence of a secondary tier of players including affiliate management agencies, super-affiliates and specialized third party vendors. There are two ways to approach affiliate marketing: Company can offer an affiliate program to others or it can sign up to be another business’s affiliate. If company wants to drive an affiliate program, then, the company owner has to pay affiliates a commission fee for every lead or sale they drive to company’s website. Company’s main goal here is to find affiliates who can reach untapped markets. For example, a company with an e-zine may become a good affiliate because its subscribers are hungry for resources. So, introducing one’s offer through “trusted” company can grab the attention of prospects which might not have otherwise reached. digital marketing review

(vi) Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine’s “natural” or un-paid (“organic”) search results. In general, the earlier (or higher ranked on the search results page), and more frequently a website appears in the search result list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine users. SEO may target different kinds of search including image search, local search, video search, academic search, news search and industry-specific vertical search engines. digital marketing review

(vii) Pay Per Click (PPC)

Pay-per-click marketing is a way of using search engine advertising to generate clicks to your website rather than “earning” those clicks organically. Pay per click is good for searchers and advertisers. It is the best way for company’s ads since it brings low cost and greater engagement with the products and services.

2.3 Advantages Digital Marketing Brings to Customers

With rapid technological developments, digital marketing has changed customers buying behavior. It has brought various advantages to the consumers as given below:

(i) Stay Updated with Products or Services

Digital marketing technologies allow the consumers to stay with the company information updated. Nowadays a lot of consumer can access internet any place anytime and companies are continuously updating information about their products or services. digital marketing review

(ii) Greater Engagement

With digital marketing, consumers can engage with the company’s various activities. Consumers can visit company’s website, read information about the products or services and make purchases online and provide feedback. digital marketing review

(iii) Clear Information About the Products or Services

Through digital marketing, consumers get clear information about the products or services. There is a little chance of misinterpretation of the information taken from sales person in a retail store. However, Internet provides comprehensive product information which customers can rely on and make purchase decision. digital marketing review

(iv) Easy Comparison with Others

Since many companies are trying to promote their products or services using digital marketing, it is becoming the greatest advantage for the customer in terms that customers can make comparison among products or services by different suppliers in cost and time friendly way. Customers don’t need to visit a number of different retail outlets in order to gain knowledge about the products or services. digital marketing review

(v) 24/7 Shopping

Since internet is available all day long, there is no time restriction for when customer wants to buy a product online. digital marketing review

(vi) Share Content of the Products or Services

Digital marketing gives viewers a chance to share the content of the product or services to others. Using digital media, one can easily transfer and get information about the characteristics of the product or services to others.

(vii) Apparent Pricing

Company shows the prices of products or services through digital marketing channel and this makes prices very clear and transparent for the customers. Company may regularly changes the prices or gives special offers on their products or services and customers are always in advantages by getting informed instantly by just looking at any one mean of digital marketing.

(viii) Enables Instant Purchase

With traditional marketing, customers first watch the advertisement and then find relevant physical store to purchase the products or services. However, with digital marketing, customers can purchase the products or services instantly.

 3.  Methodology of the Study

Methodology comes from systematic and theoretical analysis of the methods to evaluate suitability of one specific method to apply to a field of study. It typically encompasses concepts such as paradigm, theoretical model, phases and quantitative or qualitative techniques. This study is conducted based on both primary and secondary data sources.

Primary Sources:

Primary source is a source from where we collect first-hand information or original data on a topic. Interview technique was used with structured questionnaire for the collection of primary data.

Secondary Sources:

Secondary source is a source from where we collect data that has already been collected by someone. We have collected secondary data from the published financial statements of the firms, newspaper and articles. For the purpose of this study, we have selected one hundred fifty firms randomly which are using digital marketing system to sell their products to customers. Additionally, we also collected data from 50 executives from sample and other different firms to know their opinion on the effectiveness of digital marketing.

Collected data and information has been organized, explained and analyzed by using different statistical tools and techniques. This study shows results both in descriptive and analytical way.

4.  Analysis and Discussion

4.1 correlation analysis.

To show the correlation between the various elements of digital marketing and increased sales, we have collected data from one hundred fifty firms who are taking the various techniques or elements of digital marketing. Results are given below:

Table  2:  Correlations

From the above table, we can conclude that the every element of digital marketing is positively related to sales increase. It indicates that all elements of digital marketing show positive effect on firm’s sales. Online advertising, email marketing, social media and search engine optimization (SEO) are highly positively correlated with sales increase since showing value of r to be .869, .873, .840 and .840 respectively. The value of r of text messaging, affiliate marketing and pay per click (PPC) are .667, .560 and .560 which also shows low positive correlation with sales increase.

4.2 Analysis of Digital Marketing

Digital media is so pervasive that consumers have access to information any time and any place they want. It was long ago when the messages people got about specific products or services consisted of only what a company wanted them to know.

Table  3:  Model Summary

From the above table, we can conclude that almost all the variables having weight explaining with great extent its relationship with digital marketing. For example, stay updated with products or services is explained by 71.80% of digital marketing and the remaining 28.20% is explained by other factor. Greater engagement is explained by 51.60% of digital marketing and the remaining 48.40% is explained by other factor. Clear Information about the products or services is explained by 62.90% of digital marketing and the remaining 37.10% is explained by other factor. We can also see from the above table that F value is bigger more than 80 indicating the strength of the model.

Coefficient of different variables:

The coefficient of different variables in relation with independent variables will be discussed below:

Table 4:  Coefficients Analysis for Dependent Variable -Stay updated with products or services

Unstandardized Coefficients (B) indicates that if independent variable is zero (0) then what is the impact on dependent variable? Here if we don’t use digital marketing then stay updated with products or services will be 2.882. Standardized Coefficients (β) indicates that if independent variable is increase by 1% then what will be the impact on dependent variable. Here if the usage rate digital marketing is 1% then 84.70% stay updated with products or services will be happened.

 5.  Concluding Remarks and Proposal

Digital channel in marketing has become essential part of strategy of many companies. Nowadays, even for small business owner there is a very cheap and efficient way to market his/her products or services. Digital marketing has no boundaries. Company can use any devices such as smartphones, tablets, laptops, televisions, game consoles, digital billboards, and media such as social media, SEO (search engine optimization), videos, content, e-mail and lot more to promote company itself and its products and services. Digital marketing may succeed more if it considers user needs as a top priority. Just like “Rome was not built in a day,” so, digital marketing results won’t also come without attempt, without trial (and error). The watchwords “test, learn and evolve” should be at the heart of all digital marketing initiatives. Companies should create innovative customer experiences and specific strategies for media to identify the best path for driving up digital marketing performance.

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BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article

This article is part of the research topic.

Industry 4.0: The Impact and Implications for Transitioning Process Industries

Matchmaking for Industrial Symbiosis: a digital tool for the identification, quantification and optimisation of symbiotic potential in Industrial Ecosystems Provisionally Accepted

• 1 National Technical University of Athens, Greece

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Effective waste management is crucial for sustainable industrial operations. This paper introduces a state-of-the-art digital tool designed for the circular economy. Primarily it pinpoints and quantifies symbiotic possibilities between industries with liquid waste streams, emphasising the most lucrative inter-industry connections. In practice, the tool takes in data such as waste stream volumes, material concentrations within these streams, market prices of materials, and industries' raw material consumption rates. Utilising these, its algorithm identifies and assesses the most profitable material exchanges among the specified industries. This assessment considers the market value of materials and the costs associated with recovering those materials from liquid waste streams. One of the major challenges, the estimation of recovery costs, is addressed using an innovative Sherwood plot analysis. This analysis draws a correlation between a material's recovery cost and its concentration within a liquid medium. The tool's output provides a detailed list of potential transactions complemented by illustrative graphs that detail mass flows, profit margins, and environmental advantages for each industry. Collectively, these details offer insights both for individual industries and the industrial ecosystem as a whole. One of the tool's most significant revelations is its ability to uncover potential 'bridges' linking industrial waste streams to resource needs, unearthing previously unnoticed economic and ecological gains. By calculating economic and environmental benefits of "waste" reuse, this tool offers a compelling rationale for the adoption of industrial symbiosis. Ultimately, it uncovers the transformative potential of aligning industrial activities with a balance that fosters both economic growth and ecological responsibility.

Keywords: industrial symbiosis 1, circular economy 2, sustainability 3, material reclamation 4, waste valorisation 5, digital tool 6, optimisation 7, Sherwood plot 8 . (Min.5-Max. 8)

Received: 31 Dec 2023; Accepted: 16 May 2024.

Copyright: © 2024 Makropoulos, Kritikos and Pantazis. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Mr. Nikolaos Alexandros Kritikos, National Technical University of Athens, Athens, 15780, Greece

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