Digital Marketing Strategy: Tools, Benefits and SME Analysis

This report provides a comprehensive overview of digital marketing, defining it and exploring its related concepts. It highlights the importance and benefits of digital marketing, contrasting it with traditional marketing methods like broadcast and print media. Various digital marketing tools, including content marketing, SEO, social media marketing, mobile marketing, email marketing, company websites, and apps, are discussed in detail. The report also includes a comparative analysis of two tourism SMEs based on their digital marketing activities, providing insights into their strategies and effectiveness. The report concludes with a set of recommendations aimed at improving digital marketing practices.

Digital Marketing
Strategy

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................3
What is DM? Definition and other related concepts...................................................................3
Why DM is important (Benefits of DM).....................................................................................3
DM vs Traditional Marketing (Broadcast and Print media)........................................................4
DM Tools.....................................................................................................................................5
Comparative analysis of 2 Tourism SMEs..................................................................................8
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................10
Recommendations..........................................................................................................................10
References......................................................................................................................................12

Introduction
Digital marketing is a type of marketing where all marketing activities are done through
digital devices like laptop, mobile, computers and many others. Today, world is changing and
stepping into the new era of technological change, which influence most of the companies to
switch their traditional marketing activities to digital marketing activities. Digital marketing have
various kinds of benefits over traditional marketing like global reach of customers, more
recognition of brand image and many others (Kannan, 2017). The following report covers
concept of Digital marketing, importance of digital marketing, difference between digital
marketing and traditional marketing and digital marketing tool such as content marketing, SEO,
mobile, company website and many others. The following report also covers competitive
analysis of two different tourism SME on the basis of their digital marketing activities and at the
end this report will end up with some recommendations.
Main Body
What is DM? Definition and other related concepts
Digital marketing is also called online marketing where companies promote their
products and services by using internet sources. Here, companies also communicate with their
targeted customers through various online sources like social media, e-mail, website and many
others. Today, most of the customers use digital devices to collect any information related to any
product or services (Kingsnorth, 2019). Hence, companies use digital marketing for various
activities like sending their product’s feedback form to customers through e-mails and social
media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook and many others to analyse customer’s needs,
wants and experience they gain after using specific product. Secondly, communicating with
customers through social media messages by making them aware about new product or service
launch by updating pictures on social media platforms or official websites.
Why DM is important (Benefits of DM)
There are various kinds of benefits for using digital marketing within a company and these
benefits are mentioned below-
It helps to reach customers globally- Digital marketing have a worldwide reach which
means customers sitting in a country can collect information of company based in another
country. Same with companies, with the help of digital marketing and conducting online survey

they get to know that which country is having more demand of their products and services so that
they will start communicating with customers and offering their products to gain more profit
(Kaur, 2017). For example, a post shared on social media by a company based in UK can be seen
by various followers at worldwide range.
Help Company to communicate well with customers and build good relationship-
Digital marketing also help the companies to communicate with their targeted customers well
and analyse what issues they are facing so that they will take actions to mitigate the issues and
make a strong relationship with them. For example, customer’s complaint about defective
products through e-mails and companies respond the mails quickly and take actions to resolve
customer’s issues. This will help them to build good relationship with customers.
Analysing competitor’s strategies- Digital marketing also help various companies to
analyse about their competitors and their strategies by comparing their own performance with
their competitors performance with various comparing tools to analyse their strengths and
weakness in-front of their competitors (Chaffey and Smith, 2017). This will also help companies
to analyse how they will gain competitive advantage.
DM vs Traditional Marketing (Broadcast and Print media)
Digital Marketing Traditional Marketing
Here, companies promote their products and
services through social media, PPC, SEO
and many others.
Here, companies promote their products
through TV ads, banner, broadcast,
sponsorship and many others.
Digital marketing is considered as cost
effective (Dwivedi and et. al., 2020).
It consumes lot of cost to promote products
on traditional way.
It is good for building high brand image for
companies because the products promoted
on digital platforms have reached the
customers across the geographical
limitations.
It is not so good for brand building because
here the companies are able to reach few
customers within a limited geographical
area.
The performance of digital marketing can be
measured by various tools.
It is difficult to measure the performance of
traditional marketing.

Customers have the option to skip the ads
on digital platform whichever they don’t
like to watch.
Customers are not having any option to skip
the ads. They have to watch full ad.
Digital marketing is considered as two way
communication type where companies and
customers can interact with each other and
customers can clarify their doubts easily.
Traditional marketing is considered as one
way communication which means here
companies only convey their message to
customers (Purwanti, 2021).
DM Tools
4.1 Content Marketing
1.1.1 Paid (e.g. paid search engine marketing)- This is type of digital marketing
where when customers click on search engines such as Google, Bing and many
others then customers will be seen a ad of a company or product. For this purpose
company have to pay these search engine companies to show their ads to those
customers who use their services.
1.1.2 Earned (e.g. influencer, product review site)- Some of the companies use social
media influencers to promote their products on their account because they have
huge number of followers and their followers are so influenced with their idols
that they purchase the product after they see that their idol is advertising the
product (Mogaji, Soetan and Kieu, 2020). This will help the company to increase
their sales and attract more customers. Another example is product review sites
where companies analyse what reviews they get from their customers and for
which specific product. Here, customers provide ratings to the company’s
products and services and companies review these ratings and make changes for
those products which are having low ratings in market.
1.1.3 Owned (e.g. Company website, App) - Another digital marketing tool is owned
which is company’s website and apps. Here, company have to pay to IT specialist
to develop a well designed and attractive website so that customers will gain
interest to search for their products through their website. Today most of the
companies are having their own mobile application so that customers will

download it and only see their products and gain information like prices of each
product, quality, ratings by other customers and many others.
1.2 SEM/SEO- Search Engine Optimization is a tool for improving and monitoring traffic on
specific website of companies. They mainly target to unpaid traffic rather than paid
traffic. Unpaid traffic is those one who search about the company’s product like images,
prices and many others (Saura, Ribeiro-Soriano and Palacios-Marqués, 2021). This helps
the company to analyse what keywords are used by their customers to search for
company’s product and their prices. This will also help the company to identify how
many new searches they got on their website and how many customers search again
about their website which already visited their website few times later.
1.3 SMM- Social Media Marketing is one of the most popular and fastest growing digital
marketing tools. Here, companies promote their products on social media platforms such
as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and many others. These platforms are having global
reach which means a company based in UK can promote their product in Asian countries
by uploading the product’s pictures and videos on these platforms. Any customer can
follow the official social media account of company to gain information on regular basis.
It is considered as effective tool because today’s generation are spending more time on
social media tools to collect any information. Secondly, it is essential for the company to
focus on the contents which they share on social media platforms so that they will not
hurt any community
1.4 Mobile- This is a type of digital marketing to reach customers through their smart
phones, tablets and any other mobile devices. Here, companies send text messages to
their customers so that they will pay attention when their mobile phone vibrates due to
message receiver (Saura, Palacios-Marqués and Ribeiro-Soriano, 2021). Today, most of
the population prefer to have their mobile phones in their hand most of the time and they
use their mobile phones to search for any information. Hence, sending messages on those
apps which is used by mobile users commonly is a good idea for attracting them toward
the specific product and services by companies. Companies save their customers mobile
number when they receive their stores and then forward the message related to
introduction of new product or services on their mobile phone so that they will quickly
get aware and respond to shared information.

1.5 E-mail- this digital marketing tool is considered as most formal way of promoting
products to customers. Here, formal messages are transferred from company to customers
and back from customers to companies. In context of any issue with the product,
customers use e-mail type commonly and send mails to companies about the defect of
their product. Companies also use the e-mail method for various activities like sending
bill receipts to those customers on mail who pay their payments through online sources.
1.6 Company website- It is also one of the most effective digital marketing tool to
communicate with customers on regular basis. Today, most of the companies develop
their official website to attract customers and supposed to share every information related
to their company like products they serve, prices, about stakeholders, their positioning in
market and many other on the website so that when customers receive their website then
they will gain all kind of information related to company which they search (Buchanan
and et. al., 2018). Companies try to make their website attractive with beautiful designs
so that customers will gain interest to use their website to gain any information.
1.7 Apps- Most of the companies also makes mobile apps so that their customers will not get
confused on their real products and their substitute products. Here, customers can
download the app from Google Store and log in the app by filling personal details like
phone number, address and many others. These apps are used for ordering the products
and get the home delivery of their ordered products. These apps are having all products of
companies and most of the companies use discounts for their online orders so that more
customers will get digitalized and use the facilities well.
1.8 Other DM tools
4.8.1 QR codes- Quick Response Code is a type of digital code for each product,
company, bank account separately which get scanned by customers and analyse data
regarding the products. QR codes of products are used by customers to analyse about the
product like their website, locator and many others. QR code is also used to make
payments by one click only.
4.8.2 VR/AR- It is a type of digital technology which is used to generate artificial
environment which looks like similar environment of the theme selected (Key, 2017). For
example, retailing companies use VR for creating artificial retailing store for their
customers so that they will analyse which product they can buy at which shelf.

4.8.3 Newsletter (CRM) - Newsletter is a type of printed or electronic report which
contains news about the business activities. Here, company share that how they respond
to their customers and which type of complains they receive most of the time. It is like a
interview where company share real life experience of their customers for using their
products by using catchy headlines and images. Here, the content is written in headings,
sub-headings and in formal formatting same as newspapers.
4.8.4 Big Data- Companies are having various kinds of data which are tough to manage
effectively. Hence, big data is a digital marketing tool which helps the companies to
manage their large data in such as way so that they will utilize this data effectively
whenever they require using (Yoga, Korry and Yulianti, 2019). This tool is helpful to
respond correct customer at correct time for correct queries. Some of the time companies
deliver wrong product to wrong customer and this happen due to mismanagement of
large data of a company. Hence, this tool will help the company to mitigate this risk and
deliver correct product to correct customer.
Comparative analysis of 2 Tourism SMEs
SME hotel 1- Dakota Edinburgh is founded in the year 2006 by Ken McCulloch. This hotel is
having five locations in UK.
SME hotel 2- San Domenico House is a boutique hotel in London, UK. It is a small hotel with
just 19 rooms. It is founded in 1887.
DM Tool SME 1
(Dakota Edinburgh)
SME 2
(San Domenico House)
Company website www.dakotahotels.co.uk
While clicking on this
website, a good graphical
video starts which highlight
the features and services of
this beautiful hotel (Rodrigues
and Martinez, 2020). This is
attractive for customers to stay
on website for longer period
of time and search of other
information.
www.sandomenicohouse.com
While opening this website, a
beautiful image of hotel get
disappear which help to attract
customers and influence them
to scroll down to see other
features of the hotel. They also
have a map shared picture to
help their customer to analyse
their actual location in UK.

SEO/SEM It has 4.6 ratings.
Their customers reach their
website more than once and
try to analyse their queries by
reaching their website.
It has 4.5 ratings.
Their customers commonly
reach their website for
booking and analysing their
prices.
App The Dakota Loyalty App is
made for customers to book
their rooms and get to know
their prices and discounts
through their mobile phones.
There is no mobile
application of this hotel.
E-mail [e-mail]
This e-mail address is
mentioned at their official
website but at the corner and
tough to find the e-mail
address on their website.
[e-mail]
This e-mail address is easily
seen by the viewers of their
website because it is
mentioned in highlighted ways
(Munsch, 2021).
SMM
 FB
 LinkedIn
 Instagram
 YouTube
 Twitter
Facebook followers- 74,640
Facebook likes- 74,119
Instagram followers- 17.8K
Instagram post- 538
There You Tube channel
upload their videos on regular
basis and the time of their You
Tube videos are big basically
more than 10 minutes.
Twitter Followers- 3,304
They made their Twitter
account on November 2009.
They are regular to upload
images and videos on their
Twitter account and their last
video of Twitter uploads is
done on July 2021.
Facebook followers- 1,825
Facebook likes- 1,773
Instagram followers- 5,564
Instagram posts- 991
There You Tube channel did
not upload videos on regular
basis and the time length of
their videos is short such as
2-3 minutes.
Twitter followers- 526
They made their Twitter
account on August 2014.
They are not regular on their
Twitter accounts and their
last post is uploaded on July
2018.
Other DM tools They also use QR code and
Big Data analysis tool to
manage their data.
They also use newsletters,
review sites to analyse how
their customers provide
them ratting and what all
changes they can do to get
high ratings.

From the above comparison table of two SME tourism companies, one is Dakota
Edinburgh and other is San Domenico House it is evaluated that both the hotels are using
advanced and good digital media devices to promote their hotels. They both made their website
attractive. In context of Dakota Edinburgh their website is much more attractive and interesting
then San Domenico House because the designing of their website is good and while opening
their website a video start plays which help to analyse how their staff tread their customers in a
polite manner. In context of ratting, then both hotels are having almost equal ratings. Dakota
Edinburgh is having 4.6 ratings out of 5 and San Domenico House is having 4.5 ratings which
tells that Dakota Edinburgh hotel customers are more satisfied and gaining good experience than
San Domenico House (Graham and et. al., 2019). It is also evaluated that Dakota Edinburgh is
having mobile app for their customers whereas San Domenico House do not have any mobile
app for their customers. In context of social media performance, all platforms like Instagram,
Facebook and few others are having more followers and likes for Dakota Edinburgh hotel as
compared to San Domenico House. Hence, it is concluded that Dakota Edinburgh hotel is
gaining better position than San Domenico House. Therefore, Dakota Edinburgh is having
competitive advantage over San Domenico House due to their effective use of digital marketing.
Conclusion
From the above information it is concluded that digital marketing plays a important role
for organisational growth and help them to reach their customers at global level. There are
various kinds of digital tools such as SEO, social media, e-mails, mobile apps and many others.
It is also concluded that effective use of digital media will help the company to gain competitors
advantage and help them to gain more customers and marketing shares as compared to their
other competitors.
Recommendations
1. From the above information it is recommended that companies are required to analyse
their internal and external business environment well to identify what all digital tools and
devices they need for their organisational growth. After effective analysis, they can

adopt those tools and devices which are having more advantages then disadvantages
related to achieving their organisational goal.
2. It is also recommended that the website of every company must be beautiful, attractive
and good looking to influence customers to reach their website and get to know about the
company that what they sell and what they do not sell. For the designing of the website
companies can take help of advice of website designers.
3. It is also recommended that companies like San Domenico House which is a tourism
company must active on social media sites to aware their customers and must upload
pictures and videos related to their services on regular basis to attract customers.

References
Books and Journals
Buchanan, L. and et. al., 2018. The effects of digital marketing of unhealthy commodities on
young people: a systematic review. Nutrients, 10(2), p.148.
Chaffey, D. and Smith, P.R., 2017. Digital marketing excellence: planning, optimizing and
integrating online marketing. Routledge.
Dwivedi, Y.K. and et. al., 2020. Editorial introduction: Advances in theory and practice of digital
marketing. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 53, p.101909.
Graham, J.E. and et. al., 2019. Digital marketing to promote healthy weight gain among pregnant
women in Alberta: an implementation study. Journal of medical Internet
research, 21(2), p.e11534.
Kannan, P.K., 2017. Digital marketing: A framework, review and research agenda. International
Journal of Research in Marketing, 34(1), pp.22-45.
Kaur, G., 2017. The importance of digital marketing in the tourism industry. International
Journal of Research-Granthaalayah, 5(6), pp.72-77.
Key, T.M., 2017. Domains of digital marketing channels in the sharing economy. Journal of
Marketing Channels, 24(1-2), pp.27-38.
Kingsnorth, S., 2019. Digital marketing strategy: an integrated approach to online marketing.
Kogan Page Publishers.
Mogaji, E., Soetan, T.O. and Kieu, T.A., 2020. The implications of artificial intelligence on the
digital marketing of financial services to vulnerable customers. Australasian Marketing
Journal, pp.j-ausmj.
Munsch, A., 2021. Millennial and generation Z digital marketing communication and advertising
effectiveness: A qualitative exploration. Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing
Science, 31(1), pp.10-29.
Purwanti, Y., 2021. The Influence Of Digital Marketing & Innovasion On The School
Performance. Turkish Journal of Computer and Mathematics Education
(TURCOMAT), 12(7), pp.118-127.
Rodrigues, D. and Martinez, L.F., 2020. The influence of digital marketing on recruitment
effectiveness: a qualitative study. European Journal of Management Studies.