Internet marketing is gaining increasing interest among companies and business owners due to unlimited possibilities, especially now that web indicators are expanding at exponential rates. This phenomenon occurs simultaneously with the development of digital innovation that surprises us on a daily basis
The last ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau Report “Facts and Figures 2019 Measuring Digital Development” concludes that the Internet evolution is still extraordinary
Searches do not stop rising, social networks monopolize people’s communications, and digital applications give users endless possibilities. Almost the entire world population lives within reach of a mobile network, bandwidth grows fast, and computers are no longer needed to access the Internet at home.
In such a context, online advertisers can reach the world population by segmenting audiences in every possible way.
A new advertising paradigm
All these factors are relatively novel in a new era flooded with information, technology, and communications.
Not very long ago our parents used to recommend we work hard so we enter a big corporation. For a long time, these large corporations had massive capital because they were the first to take advantage of the -once very effective- traditional mass media. (television, radio, newspapers, magazines, etc.).
Mass media emergence allowed large corporations to invest a lot of money to reach millions of people with their messages. With heavy investments in mass advertising, corporations could easily and very effectively target great audiences obtaining huge returns on investment (ROI).
Due to its impact and effectiveness, this type of advertising became increasingly costly, closing the doors for small businesses. The ability to offer high-quality products- that were not viable because they could not afford to run large media’s prohibitively expensive advertising campaigns.
For that reason, previous generations developed the mindset that we should work for large corporations which could incur expensive advertising campaigns in traditional media that will ensure long-term sustainability and therefore we could secure jobs for our entire working life.
At that time it made sense to aim for working in a big company where we could secure our position, advance in our professional career, access to increasing salaries, and attain better positions.
Internet changed everything
Instead of having television as the most effective way to reach audiences, a wide variety of digital micro channels began to emerge.
The advertising sector changed a lot with the appearance of the Internet mainly because new digital channels allowed businesses to target their audiences at an affordable cost so these huge barriers to entry – exorbitant advertising expenses – now ended up dissipating.
This process is still in full development: changes are drastic and rapid so how can we take advantage of them to improve our businesses?
Great opportunities on the internet
The Internet has allowed people to develop and go deeper into their very specific tastes or interests like cooking, fitness, outdoor sports, business, marketing, etc.
As a counterpart, online marketing professionals or business owners are now able to micro-segment the market into people’s interests or behaviors. Even consumers’ buying intents related to those specific topics and ultimately target the clients with the most promising potential.
This scenario enables us to group specific audiences of people online that were very difficult to reach with precision in the previous physical world.
Today, we can even create new communities and have the opportunity of becoming an authority in a sector of our liking and chose the best way to monetize it. Thus we can not only attract people related to a certain interest by paying for advertising, but we can also attract new audiences for free.
This transition makes it feasible for e-marketers to make a comfortable living, now a micro-entrepreneur who knows very well how new digital marketing works and taking advantage of this great paradigm shift.
For all mentioned above currently the Internet has clearly become the best resource to disseminate and promote ideas, professions, services, products, associations, causes, ONGs, political parties, etc …
Pros and some cons of Internet marketing
So let’s see what are the advantages and disadvantages of Internet marketing
#1 Advantages of Internet Marketing
Beyond the benefits that we described in this article, to sum up, I will list a compilation of what I believe are the most outstanding advantages of Internet advertising:
- One of the most important advantages of Internet marketing is the rapid and accurate availability of data and information about how our campaigns are performing.
- It allows us to save money because with online advertising we can promote projects adapting to almost any budget, get results and easily scale up.
- This increased competition between young and old, small and big, provides huge advantages for users.
- In the digital world almost everything can be measured, so we can instantly understand if our campaigns are working or not. We can also know what we need to adjust to optimize them in a process of continuous improvement.
2# Disadvantages of Internet Marketing
Slow Internet connections can cause navigation difficulties if we build websites that are too complex or too large mainly on mobile devices. It will take a long time for users to see your offer, they will get bored and leave.
- E-Commerce does not allow the user to “touch” products before purchasing. For this reason, we must offer guarantees and policies to return products.
- Another factor is payment: some users still distrust web payment methods.
- Although more users know how to differentiate, we can consider a disadvantage the lack of trust of users due to promotions that seem suspicious (spam). This may be an aspect that deteriorates Internet image and reputation.
