Digital Marketing as a Communication Tool in Emerging Businesses

Introduction

According to GEM (Global Entrepreneurship Monitor) data for 2017, Ecuador has the highest rate of entrepreneurial activity (TEA) in Latin America (29.6%), being the highest in Latin America for the sixth consecutive year. Therefore, it is important to take into account this reality and the importance of good management and effective communication to benefit entrepreneurs.

In this context, the adequate design of marketing combinations involves the four Ps (Product, Price, Place, and Promotion). In the marketing communication’s field, efforts should be coordinated towards the last P of the marketing combination: Promotion (Todorova, 2015). Among these promotional tools, we find advertising and direct marketing, where digital marketing shows significant importance. At this respect, Carniani (2006) mentions that the digital marketing communication is aimed towards achieving outlined objectives, which are active in the communication process, as each communication flow may request an information response from the market. This opportunity returns immediate feedback, so that digital communication can be easily measured at a low cost.

Many emerging business ventures are born with small capital, with the intention of becoming a big brand; therefore, seeking the best means that digital media must turned out to be as the most common and effective as possible. According to Cizmezi and Ercan (2015), the creation of brand awareness is the first and most important stage of marketing communication; thus digital marketing tools have become the most important asset for the interactivity between consumers and businesses.

Reviewing social networking makes us realize the huge amount of products or services offered by this mean, and here we notice that many small businesses or entrepreneurs are just beginning, especially in Latin America and the Caribbean. For Harris and Rae (2009), social networks play a key role in the future of marketing, as they are externally replacing the annoyance of the client with commitment, and internally they allow the transformation from the traditional approach of controlling to an open and collaborative approach. As a result, social networks are more conducive to success in the modern business environment.

Also, blogs are a fascinating interactive media for online communication, which has led many Internet users to post their opinions and share knowledge on various topics of interest (Pal & Kapur, 2010). At this respect, Insights (2018) presents an analysis of the digital state of Ecuador in a study carried out by ‘We Are Social and Hootsuite’ called “Digital in 2018”, in which states that with a population of over 16 million, of whom 13.5 million are Internet users (80% of the population), 11 million (66%) are active users of Social Media.

The goal of this chapter is to study the importance of digital marketing as a communication tool for emerging businesses, and also the commitment of each business to use it properly. We will also try to identify the types of businesses that use this type of communication tool more often, and their results obtained, not only as a brand, but the effect on sales and business growth.

A major concern is to find the degree of knowledge for the correct use of digital marketing tools, is the proper use possible? When stakeholders meet business objectives, they contribute not only to research and academia, but also to the economic sector with query tools for entrepreneurs and business owners.