WIUT 6MARK018C: Digital Marketing Report on Programming Platform

This report presents a comprehensive analysis of a digital marketing strategy for an online programming platform. The report begins with an introduction highlighting the impact of COVID-19 on the education sector and the rise of eLearning. It then details a business model based on Relaxation and Scale, emphasizing its ability to overcome temporal and spatial constraints. The core of the report focuses on applying the GRAVITY model, examining its components: Geography (targeting major cities in Uzbekistan), Resistance (addressing search and geographic friction), Adjacency, Vicinity, Isolation, and Topography. The report concludes with a discussion of monetization strategies, specifically the freemium model and its application in the context of online programming courses. The report also includes references to relevant academic sources supporting the analysis and recommendations.

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COURSEWORK SUBMISSION FORM
STUDENT USE STAFF USE
Module Name Digital Marketing First Marker’s
(acts as signature)
Module Code 6MARK018C Second Marker’s
(acts as signature)
Lecturer Name Umidjon Akhunjonov Agreed Mark
UoW Student IDs For Registrar’s office use only (hard copy
submission)
WIUT Student IDs 00006155
Deadline date January 15, 2021
Assignment Type GroupIndividual
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For hardcopy submission instructions refer to:
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MARKERS FEEDBACK (Continued on the next page)
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Table of Contents
Introduction..............................................................................................................................................3
Business model.......................................................................................................................................3
GRAVITY Model......................................................................................................................................4
Geography...........................................................................................................................................4
Resistance...........................................................................................................................................4
Adjacency............................................................................................................................................5
Vicinity.................................................................................................................................................5
Isolation...............................................................................................................................................5
Topography..........................................................................................................................................6
Monetization............................................................................................................................................6
Reference list..........................................................................................................................................8
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Introduction
Without a doubt, our world will change dramatically after the end of the fight against coronavirus. The
term "black swan" is increasingly used to describe the long-term impact of COVID-19 on various
businesses. Perrotta (2020), suggested that eLearning's epidemics could be the "black swan" that
could take educational technology to the next level. Moreover, education is considered to be one of
the markets, where after the end of the crisis, when everything has more or less calmed down,
radical changes will take place. Plus, in the United States, virtual learning has long been used in
schools under more familiar circumstances, for example, due to unfavorable weather and seasonal
peaks of colds, which lead to poor attendance. Twelve states have already implemented a policy of
special "e-learning days" where classes are only online(Robles,2020). Once students become
accustomed to using online platforms during their regular classes, emergencies such as the current
one will not be as traumatic for them. As it was stated by the United Nations (2020) says, future
disasters cannot be foreseen, but the best can be done in order to minimize their consequences. And
first of all, the negative consequences for the business itself must be minimized. Changes in the
educational approach are currently moving towards mass collective thinking and collaboration.
According to Maggionkalda (2020), CEO of Coursera, as universities develop digital competencies,
their temporary response to the crisis could escalate into an ongoing digital transformation of
education. Plus, the global e-learning and LMS market is expected to reach $ 15.72 billion by 2021
and $ 22.4 billion by 2023 (Markets and Markets,2020). And according to Lewis (2020), the mobile
learning market is set to grow to $ 38 billion in 2020. The main driving forces behind the expected
boom in the LMS market are, in particular, the increasing adoption of distance learning, the use of
artificial intelligence and machine learning in both business and education.
Based on the above facts confirming the growing popularity of online courses, the new online
business will be an online platform for teaching programming.
Business model
It is possible to explain why this business approaches the model called Relaxation and Scale on the
basis that this model in relation to education allows to cover new categories of students, overcoming
the existing temporal and spatial constraints. And according to the refinement from Zipwolf (no date),
this model is aimed at reducing temporal and spatial constraints. Therefore, the topic of distance
learning fully falls under this concept. Speaking about the advantages of this model in relation to
online learning, it can be stated that the introduction of the distance education model leads to the fact
that education is carried out not only at a distance, but also independently of any institution.
Therefore, the problem of remoteness from qualified educational institutions has been solved, which
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helps people with physical disabilities, who have individual traits and extraordinary characteristics, to
study, expands the communicative sphere of students and teachers. Plus, new learning tools are
provided, open up new horizons for teaching, learning and knowledge assessment, strengthen
research opportunities, and allow the introduction of new, more effective models of administration
and management. Studies of Teece (2019) provide data that companies building a business
according to this model note an increase in market value by 2-4 times and an increase in market
capitalization by about 200%.
GRAVITY Model
Geography
A company can apply the Geography component targeting customers from large cities such as
Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara for online courses. The choice of this particular city is explained by
the fact that clients from these cities are more educated, have a higher income level and are eager to
move up the career ladder. Moreover, potential clients of educational centers in this place are young
people, students who behave in a modern way, spending more time on the Internet. Internet
availability is the main metric that drives customer purchases. Thus, the availability of the Internet in
large cities is much higher than in other regions of Uzbekistan. As such, this location speaks to the
characteristics of customers and their behavior, these customers are more likely to buy online
courses.
Resistance
As far as resistance is concerned, there are essentially two types of friction to consider. The first is
search friction, the second is geographic friction. Search difficulties arise when it is difficult for a
consumer to find information about a specific product that he / she wants to buy. On this platform, this
friction will be eliminated as all prices are transparent and can be seen on the online platform. Plus,
for each offered course, its program and brief information are written. When it comes to geographic
friction, people want to stay at home during quarantine. And for those people who are ready to leave
the house, the obstacle also exists. It lies in the impossibility of always getting to the location of the
preferred training center, since some of them may live too far away and it will take too long to get to
it. As the new business runs on an online platform, geographic friction has also been eliminated.
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Adjacency
Adjacency is due to the fact that before trying new products, we often talk with friends and
acquaintances who share their location with us. In addition, we often just copy and imitate other
people in our neighborhood. We adopt what they do after directly observing their behavior.
Communicating, emulating, and co-locating people of the same type helps generate specific and
predictable patterns for searching, shopping, and selling online. Therefore, based on the fact that
people living in the same geographic area, on average, have the same characteristics, the same
tastes and, most importantly, the same offline choice, this means that if one neighbor likes online
programming courses, then the second neighbor is very close to him. demographically and
completely close on the issue with limited time will be interested in online programming courses. And
neighbor number two learns all the information about online courses from neighbor number one. As a
result, it can be said that shoppers do not know about sellers on the Internet at random. Rather,
online sellers will see new customers emerge from real locations that are adjacent to other locations
that already have similar customers. To do this, the new business should target potential customers
from different large cities of Uzbekistan with the aim of applying adjacency. A company can locate its
online course buyers by asking them to indicate their region when ordering courses on its website.
Vicinity
While the initial adoption of an e-commerce product was driven by geographic proximity in its initial
regions of focus, eventually a more spatially dispersed target audience with common characteristics
and preferences will also accept it. Despite the fact that the initial target audience will be the central
cities of Uzbekistan, over time, other regions of Uzbekistan and not only, can join the client base,
since most of the population of the CIS countries have a similar income and a similar cultural
environment, which determines their preferences and shows a high interest in online courses. This
fact creates an excellent opportunity for the development of the project.
Isolation
Regarding isolation, it can be stated that, for example, due to the geographical location and the fact
that there are no fans of offline programming in this area, training centers have not been created due
to low demand for them. As a result, people have trouble accessing what they want. In this case,
given the online platform, the problem of isolation is completely solved, since a person who is
interested in programming, regardless of whether there are people in his environment who have
close interests or not, he cannot be deprived of the opportunity to take online courses.
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Topography
Topography reflects the idea that we are constantly switching between the physical and virtual
worlds. The proliferation of smartphones has made sharing online content and products incredibly
easy; You can take your phone anywhere and easily and instantly share almost everything on the
Internet. For the new training center, this connection can be shown using a charity marathon. For
example, 10% of the course fee from each student can be donated to charitable foundations. Plus,
bloggers or their children who take a programming course with a donation program are most likely to
share this on social networks. After this content is scattered on social networks, it is likely that news
agencies will publish this news as well. Thus, it will affect brand awareness. Also on the online
resource, the training center will publish all news and events, services. It follows that the real and
virtual worlds do not compete with each other, but on the contrary complement.
Monetization
Converting the qualitative and quantitative indicators of project activities into money is called
monetization. Monetizing an online resource allows to determine its success, which is calculated in
this case in monetary units. At the same time, it is very important to choose the appropriate type of
monetization to start earning. There are a huge number of monetization models, but for this project 2
were chosen: the freemium model in collaboration with affiliate marketing.
As it was already mentioned, the first monetization model is the Freemium model - this is one of the
most popular monetization models in the online education market. Its main feature is the coexistence
of the free version of the product and its fully functional paid version. The user can use the product
for free or switch to the extended premium version of the product. The Big Four EduTech, Coursera
and edX are examples of startups that have gained popularity thanks to Freemium (Educatico,2018).
For stronger support, it is worth taking into account the opinion Wilson (2014) who argued that this
model is universal and international: the American EnglishCentral and Duolingo began with it.
Chinese XuetangX, Spanish ABA English and Russian Puzzle English still practice it today. As for the
application of this model, in the online education environment, the most popular practice is a free
offer to subscribers of a part of the products or a full course with payment for an exam and a
certificate. Therefore, with regard to new business after graduation, the freemium model will work as
follows. Users will be offered two service packages: free and premium. The first, free, includes
lessons, tests to determine the level of programming knowledge and elements of basic knowledge.
But for a premium, which includes a full course of study, consultations with a teacher and a
certificate, clients already have to pay. Moreover, the longer the course client buys, the more he
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saves. It is worth noting here that the price is important for users which is confirmed by Kumar
(2014). A transparent pricing model will give customers a sense of value for money. Reasonable
product pricing will help you attract more users and get good reviews. The main advantage of this
business model is increased user engagement: a free opportunity to take courses gives you a chance
to take a kind of test drive. It is enough to go to the website or the application, try the product, if you
like it, buy it. The disadvantage of this model is that the purchase is not made immediately. Some
new users can study for free and decide that they will purchase the course later. The payback period
for this business model is long. However, as Solomon (2020) stated, the payback in the long run is
very good.
Moreover, an additional way to monetize your business will be through affiliate marketing. Affiliate
marketing is a type of collaboration in which an online retailer pays a commission to sell their product
to an attracted customer through a website. That is, it works on the principle of performing targeted
actions, that is, the user will need to go to the site, register, or, for example, make a purchase, and
after fixing the action, the owner of the information portal who has connected this type of
monetization receives a set reward. In addition, the Coursify (2020) claims that many people use this
monetization method as a form of passive income and for some of them it generates thousands of
dollars every week. Also, affiliate marketing makes it possible to advertise more than one affiliate
program, but several on the site, which also increases income.
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Reference list
Coursify. (2020). BENEFITS OF AFFILIATE MARKETING FOR YOUR BUSINESS.Coursify.
Available from https://blog.coursify.me/en/benefits-of-affiliate-marketing/[Accessed 14 January 2021].
Educatico. (2018). Are Coursera and edX Really Free? Educatico. Available from
https://www.edukatico.org/en/report/are-coursera-and-edx-really-free[Accessed 13 January 2021].
Kumar, V. (2014). Making “Freemium” Work. Harvard Business Review. Available from
https://hbr.org/2014/05/making-freemium-work[Accessed 13 January 2021].
Lewis, C. (2020). How is the e-Learning Market Shaping Up?.E-learning Marketplace. Available from
https://www.elearningmarketplace.co.uk/how-is-the-e-learning-market-shaping-up/#:~:text=There
%20are%20now%20over%205,to%20%2438billion%20by%202020[Accessed 13 January 2021].
Maggionkalda, J. (2020). Announcing Coursera’s First Impact Report. Coursera Blog. Available from
https://blog.coursera.org/announcing-courseras-first-impact-report/
Markets and Markets. (2020). LMS Market worth $25.7 billion by 2025. Markets and Markets.
Available from https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/PressReleases/learning-management-
systems.asp[Accessed 12 January 2021].
Perrotta, C. (2020). Coronavirus quarantine could spark an online learning boom. The Conversation.
Available from https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-quarantine-could-spark-an-online-learning-
boom-132180[Accessed 12 January 2021].
Robles, Y. (2020). Amid coronavirus fears, the CDC told schools to plan for remote learning. That’s
harder than it sounds. Chalkbeat. Available from https://www.chalkbeat.org/2020/3/3/21178677/amid-
coronavirus-fears-the-cdc-told-schools-to-plan-for-remote-learning-that-s-harder-than-it-
sounds[Accessed 13 January 2021].
Solomon, J. (2020). The Pros and Cons of Freemium Business Model.Chargebee Blog. Available
from https://www.chargebee.com/blog/freemium-pros-cons/[Accessed 14 January 2021].
United Nations. (2020). Amid Threat of Catastrophic Global Famine, COVID-19 Response Must
Prioritize Food Security, Humanitarian Needs, Experts Tell General Assembly. United Nations.
Available from https://www.un.org/press/en/2020/ga12294.doc.htm[Accessed 15 January 2021].
Wilson, F. (2014). Is DuoLingo a Model for Freemium Education Apps? Games and Learning.
Available from https://www.gamesandlearning.org/2014/07/29/is-duolingo-a-model-for-freemium-
education-apps/[Accessed 14 January 2021].
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Zipwolf. (no date). Biznes-modeli v tsifrovoy ekonomike. Zipwolf. Available from
https://zipwolf.uz/sovremennye-biznes-modeli/[Accessed 12 January 2021].
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