How has Digital Marketing Evolved in the Past Decade

May 31, 2022 Subhanshu Digital Marketing

Marketing used to be simpler. Taking a leaf from 2010, social media was a tool to connect with friends, while the internet restricted sales pitches and advertisements to a few websites, and advertisements were never personalized. However, as the digital landscape changed, marketing also changed gears and became much more versatile.

Business owners can use different platforms to pitch their sales, including ads played over YouTube, while users can connect with any product they want by following hyperlinks. From popular TikTok challenges to influencers taking social media by the storm, there are no limitations to internet marketing now.

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To give you a better idea, here’s how drastically the virtual world of marketing strategy has changed:

The Evolution of SEO

Working with SEO used to be vastly different. There were no white hat or black hat SEO techniques. You could easily do keyword stuffing and create content that didn’t need good organizing and work without the need for many backlinks. The search engine did not strike you out no matter what you did.

However, when the panda updates came into the picture around 2011, SEO became more structured. Google began classifying strategies into good and bad while emphasizing that creators only practice white hat methods. This includes curating quality content with relevant keywords sprinkled carefully throughout the blog, using only high quality SEO backlinks that generate leads and don’t have dead ends contributing to the overall ranking. Avoid using images and videos without ALT tags and update the websites so that it doesn’t lag and looks appropriate for the digital era.

Facebook was nothing more than a way to connect with older friends, while Twitter was great to put your thoughts out for the world to read. These were tools of social engagement and had no place in marketing. However, now social media is a platform where million-dollar businesses are branding themselves. It has become a soapbox for political dialogue and allows companies to sell their products in the marketplace.

These platforms have also ignited the torch on many scandals, such as the election and the rigging of 2016. As a result, congress questioned Facebook’s (Meta) owner Mark Zuckerberg on the organization’s involvement in promoting false news and pushing propaganda. At the same time, social media stages like Instagram have also reshaped how digital marketing works. By introducing the influencer culture, standard users can create a brand for themselves online, which they can monetize and sell.

So instead of viewing photos, consumers can also buy products in real-time. It has also allowed smaller reels and videos to get played without the need for making giant advertisements. Consumers can engage with content, find the products they want, and purchase items from the marketplace by logging into their social media accounts.

The Importance Of Transparency

Consumers are all about trust. They no longer get swayed by plain ads and marketing strategies and need evidence that their data is now protected. With numerous data leaks and privacy that can quickly get endangered, such as the Cambridge analytics scandal against Facebook, where user data was not secure and mishandled, online users want to know they’re safe.

The Era Of The Mobile Friendliness

Smartphones have existed since 1992, but they only revolutionized when the first iPhone hit the market in 2007. Since then, smartphones have become a pioneer in mobile technology and even more helpful than carrying bulky laptops to do your work. By 2019 Google started prioritizing mobile-friendliness and website optimization as a factor for high search engine ranking and as a critical tool in digital marketing.

So instead of a website that is limited to working correctly on a desktop, companies now have to create a format that fits a mobile screen, does not lag, optimizes images, and allows users to purchase products with all the relevant security features intact.

Content Is The Centerfold

From 2018 to the present date, digital marketing has been hyper-fixated on generating top-tier content. This can be anything from words on a blog to videos and even podcasts. Content and branding now go hand in hand. If consumers are pleased with what they see, they’ll put down their money. In current times Tiktok has been outperforming other companies in content generation. By allowing users to post from 15 seconds to 10-minute videos, it has steadily become a $50 billion business. This has also attracted many rich celebrities and luxury brands to partake in the growing trend.

Instagram followed the same example. The new features allow users to post long-form videos under the banner of Instagram TV. This paved an opportunity for content creators like makeup artists to use Instagram as their primary platform to showcase their skills and connect clients to their business profiles. The search engine is also steadily shifting away from picking up keywords to using content and context to provide search engine results.

As a result of these innovations, brands have become more conscious about what they’re putting out, their purpose, the medium of engagement, and the issue they’re addressing. After all, no one wants a repeat of the poorly coordinated and distasteful advertisement starring Kendall Jenner in the light of racial disparity, which only made Pepsi look ignorant.

The Emergence of Machine Learning

In 2017, Google was declared the first machine learning company. With the emergence of artificial intelligence, Blockchain technology, big data, and predictive analytics, it has become much easier to connect businesses to their consumers. Machine learning is a process in which a consumer’s data footprint gets studied.

A company takes note of how a consumer buys, observes products, searches, and what kind of advertisements they look for. At the same time, it compartmentalizes the client’s personal information to generate personalized content. So the sponsored ads, recommendations, and suggestions a consumer receives are all carefully monitored and displayed. Previously, the ads were arbitrary, making them a big hit and miss.

Final Thoughts

Digital marketing has evolved and single-handedly brought businesses closer to consumers by making personalized content its bottom line. Digital marketing has changed in all directions. Working with SEO is more technical now than it has ever been and cheap tricks and shortcuts no longer fool the search engine into providing a higher ranking.

Social media is also in the spotlight, becoming more than a social tool. It has become a significant stakeholder in privacy management and forefront of dialoguing and discussions that impact economies. Businesses also view it as a hub to spread their roots. However, at the same time, consumers now crave privacy and work with applications that are willing to protect data and not sell it ahead.

This is also embedded deeply in mobile-friendliness and cellphones as a primary tool for engagement. Factual content has dominated digital marketing. Finally, machine learning is becoming more prominent in studying consumer data. Digital marketing is also becoming highly specific.