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The Digital Marketing Toolkit:
A Literature Review
for the Identification of Digital
Marketing Channels and Platforms
Marc K. Peter and Martina Dalla Vecchia
Abstract Digital transformation, driven by technological advances and changing
customer requirements, is stimulating the use of digital marketing. 11% of Swiss
organizations regard digital marketing as a key investment area as part of their overall
digital transformation strategy, with over one third of Swiss organizations currently
investing in new sales and marketing tools. Unfortunately, there are implementation
gaps between Swiss small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) and large enterprises
(LE). In short, SME are lagging behind LE and generally do not use digital marketing
tools, channels, and platforms. Barriers that prevent SME from adopting higher
digital marketing tools are cultural change, limited resources/high costs, technology,
and expertise. The objective of this study is to close the knowledge gap and provide
SME with an overview of the most important digital marketing tools based on a
literature review in order to leverage the opportunity of digital technology in the
marketing discipline and reduce the distance to LE. The literature review identified
nineteen relevant articles. These articles include 162 citations of tools, channels,
platforms, and methods, which can be used by SME to close the knowledge gap and
thus take advantage of a new, digital marketing portfolio. The twenty-four unique
digital marketing tools are presented based on a comparative analysis, with the eleven
most often cited tools being defined and described. Potential for further research was
identified.
Keywords Digital marketing ·Digital marketing strategy ·Digital marketing
toolkit ·Digital communication ·Digital marketing tools ·Internet marketing ·
Digital transformation ·Marketing communication
M. K. Peter (B
)·M. Dalla Vecchia
School of Business, Institute for Information Systems, FHNW University of Applied Sciences and
Arts Northwestern Switzerland, Peter Merian-Strasse 86, 4052 Basel, Switzerland
e-mail: marc.peter@fhnw.ch
M. Dalla Vecchia
e-mail: martina.dallavecchia@fhnw.ch
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
R. Dornberger (ed.), New Trends in Business Information Systems and Technology,
Studies in Systems, Decision and Control 294,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3- 030-48332- 6_17
251
252 M. K. Peter and M. Dalla Vecchia
1 Introduction
The Internet has fostered new strategy and business management frameworks that
have also changed marketing practices. Here, digital marketing has transformed
the traditional marketing mix and the existing integrated marketing communication
model [8,43]. In the literature, this is sometimes referred to as the fourth marketing
revolution [3].
Digital marketing drives customer engagement and involvement in both the setup
of the marketing mix and the application of marketing communications. In addi-
tion, in order to remain competitive, businesses of all sizes—including SME—are
forced to take advantage of digital marketing [8,34]. Hence, the adoption of new
digital marketing technology is essential for the survival of SME [1]. Unfortunately,
marketing strategies and the adoption of digital marketing in SME are often not
formalized due to limited resources, lack of expertise, and other factors specific to
SME [9,12,30,42,44].
In this chapter, the goal is to understand the broader context of digital marketing
in business strategy (and especially with regard to digital transformation) with a
focus on Switzerland, and to identify the most important digital marketing tech-
nology (i.e. channels and platforms) in order to support SME in the development and
implementation of digital marketing.
An introduction to SME and digital marketing as well as data from a recent Swiss
study will provide contextual information in Sects. 2and 3, followed by a literature
review to identify digital marketing channels and platforms in Sect. 4. To support
business practice, the synthesis of the literature review is presented in the form of
the digital marketing toolkit in Sect. 5. Finally, Sect. 6provides the conclusion with
suggestions for future research.
2 SME and Digital Marketing
SME cannot continue to sell their products and services in the traditional way and
need to adapt their digital opportunities and tools [45]. Here, the Internet provides
a new, very different environment for international marketing and new paradigms,
which need to be considered. The Internet has become an important marketplace:
New frameworks for business and marketing strategies have emerged and the number
of Internet users continues to grow globally [3,8,28].
The potential for online or digital marketing has long been recognized: Poon and
Jevons [38] stated that “many small businesses […] are compelled to compete beyond
their comfort zone (local markets) due to the globalization and internationalization of
the marketplace. At the same time, the commercialization of the Internet has created
unprecedented opportunities for small businesses […]”. The goal of this opportu-
nity is in fact digital marketing: It tries to achieve marketing objectives through the
applications and tools of the Internet [11]. Digital marketing has especially grown
The Digital Marketing Toolkit … 253
Fig. 1 Global utilization of the terms internet marketing (blue, high starting point) and digital
marketing (red, low starting point) since 2004 [20]
with a large number of websites in the past two decades [28,46]. While in the past,
internet marketing (e.g. [21,31]) was the predominant term, digital marketing (e.g.
[5,24,44]) has been the preferred term since around 2013 (Fig. 1;[20]).
As mentioned earlier, marketing strategies in SME are often less formal than in
LE. This is due to the manner in which the owner/manager runs their business, limited
resources, lack of technology or the use of outdated technology, and also by the lack
of expertise [9,12,30,42,44].
Since SME have identified digital marketing as an important business function
and are investing more in new systems and channels, the impact of digital marketing
is seen as essential and is now an important element of a modern organization [45,
46]. However, SME still seem to ignore the many benefits of digital marketing and the
utilization of digital marketing still has potential for improvement [44,46]. Digital
marketing can help SME to market and promote their products and services. It also
provides cost efficiency/savings as well as faster communication and broader market
coverage, and creates customer awareness. With the advancement of technology,
digital channels are standardized, interactive, ubiquitous, and cheap. These benefits
motivate SME in the adoption of new digital channels and most importantly, help
reduce the distance to LE in the introduction of digital technology [22,30,42,44].
On the other hand, organizations need to cope with multiple challenges, including
the organization’s ability to generate customer insights, data security and privacy,
to manage brand health and reputation in the age of social media, and to assess
the effectiveness of their digital marketing activities [22,28]. Another challenge for
organizations is to align their marketing channels, especially since they need to be
tailored to the needs of customers. Here, the selection of channels is an important
strategic factor, as is channel orchestration, i.e. the integrated marketing or omni-
channel approach [29]. As the Swiss study has shown, SME lack the knowledge and
expertise how to use these tools. Therefore, a marketing toolkit would support orga-
nizations, including SME, not only to determine their strategic selection of channel,
but also to consider an alignment among these tools, channels and platforms.
254 M. K. Peter and M. Dalla Vecchia
3 Digital Marketing in Switzerland
Digital transformation of government and commercial organizations as well as
society is an ongoing endeavor in order to increase process efficiency, create trans-
parency, take advantage of new technologies, and drive customer value based on
changing market requirements. An important action field (or strategic dimension) of
digital transformation, as identified in a large Swiss study of 2,590 participants, is
digital marketing [35,36].
According to the Swiss study, digital marketing is a focus topic of digital trans-
formation in about 11% of Swiss organizations [35,36]: There is a clear trend away
from traditional marketing activities and tools towards digital marketing. Marketing
strategies are directed towards new technological opportunities offered by digitaliza-
tion, such as responsive marketing communication (with a direct feedback-loop from
customers back to the organization) or the multi-channel approach, where digital and
analog channels are served in a coordinated manner (including distribution, sales,
and customer service). This allows several target groups to be addressed in parallel,
which means that the market can be served more effectively. In the field of digital
marketing, most organizations focus on the new requirements of customers (e.g.
e-mail support), online platforms, website visibility, and social media.
However, barriers affect digital transformation initiatives in Swiss firms. The lack
of knowledge and expertise is the main barrier in 48% of the participating firms,
which also affects the success of digital marketing strategies and activities.
Digital marketing is the logical consequence of the general digitization of busi-
ness processes, of which the marketing and sales division is an important part. The
aim is to be able to react flexibly to market changes and customer needs. There is
an awareness that mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones have changed the
consumption and communication behavior of customers, and that technical devel-
opments will continue to influence the purchasing behavior in the future. In addition
to e-commerce, some organizations rely on search engine marketing (SEM) instead
of advertisements, and digital newsletters (e-mail marketing) instead of direct mail
campaigns. Many of the organizations are aware that a large part of commercial
transactions is conducted online and that the supply and sale of goods and services
is shifting to the digital marketplace. Organizations know that the traditional sales
behavior (where customers go to the store, obtain advice and buy the product locally)
has changed; towards a purchasing behavior in which customers like to inform them-
selves online (and perhaps by visiting a local store to see and touch the product) and
then buy the products (and services) online. Therefore, there is a shift of many
components of the physically accessible world to the virtual one on the Internet. For
this reason, many organizations also see the need to open up new digital sales and
procurement channels and to operate digital platforms, which are often more compre-
hensive than traditional online shops. The advantage of this lies in an increase of sales
efficiency, in the reduction of the time it takes a product to reach customers, and in the
additional customer data that can be obtained and further evaluated in this process.
The Digital Marketing Toolkit … 255
3.1 Important Concepts of Digital Marketing
The study [35–37] identified core concepts of digital marketing in Switzerland.
Addressing and connecting customers via digital channels seems to be important
for many organizations in the age of digital marketing. Digital marketing should
not only open up new sales channels in order to address new markets; it should also
increasingly address customer needs. As a result, some organizations develop mobile
apps for their customers, offer online payment options, provide as much information
as possible about their products and services online, and tailor their websites to their
customers’ needs. These customer needs and preferences can be further optimized
by analyzing search and purchase behavior.
Social media is seen as an integral part of digital marketing and serves to position
an organization’s products and services in the online community market and through
social media platforms. Social media is used by organizations for customer loyalty,
customer communication, social selling, and market expansion. In any case, the
advantage is seen in the relatively simple networking paradigm between different
stakeholders. In many cases, social media is already part of the communication
strategy and serves to increase the online presence. Organizations state that they
benefit from the fusion of private and business life through social media and use it as a
platform for their market offers. By developingvaluable and creative content, which is
then shared with a social media community according to the specific use cases, orga-
nizations try to turn customers into fans and employees into proud hosts/ambassadors.
The goal is to serve customers on the digital channels that are available to them. In
some organizations, social media, such as Yammer, is also used internally to inform
employees about new products and services, thus facilitating internal communica-
tion and interaction. The surveyed organizations in the Swiss study also use social
media, including Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, and XING, as a means of
acquiring new customers and maintaining contact with existing customer groups.
Finally, the participating organizations in the Swiss study are observing an
increasing need for strong online visibility. A good web presence, i.e. website, is
therefore essential to remain competitive in the market. A successful website helps
organizations to achieve stronger visibility in a market that has shifted significantly
to the online sector. In this sense, the digital presence secures their existence in the
market. At the same time, organizations are aware that not the whole population is
digitally savvy, and that a multi-channel approach is therefore needed to reach and
communicate with all groups. Analogue sales are combined with digital marketing
tools such as online advertising and newsletters. The awareness of the shift of the
marketing function to the digital sector is present among the organizations surveyed.
The focus is on expanding their presence in the web through extensive and up-to-
date websites as well as using social media and marketing technology to communi-
cate with customers and expand their own market. There is also a strong awareness
that the online offers must be strongly geared to the changing needs of customers,
which include mobile applications, personalized information and services, and the
aforementioned multi-channel approach.
256 M. K. Peter and M. Dalla Vecchia
3.2 Digital Marketing in Swiss Organizations
In terms of digital marketing tools, channels and platforms (Table 1), a number
of gaps exist between small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) with 1–249
employees (including micro enterprises with 1–9 employees, small enterprises with
10–49 employees, and medium-sized enterprises with 50–249 employees) and large
enterprises (LE) with over 250 employees [35,36].
The marketing approach in the digital environment with the highest relevance is
search engine marketing (SEM): This tool/approach is highly relevant in 57.5% of
Swiss organizations, followed by e-mail and social media marketing (both with a
high relevance in 50% of organizations). The major difference between SME and
LE lies in display advertising. Many SME do not seem to use this form of marketing
communication (only 17.7% of SME), while LE (43.9%) actively use it. This is
probably due to the work involved, as this form of digital marketing requires a
graphic designer and, in many cases, an advertising agency. With regard to SEM,
especially search engine advertising (SEA), the work can often be carried out by
the SME themselves or by an agency with manageable effort. It also seems that
SME have not yet discovered the advantages of content marketing, as this is relevant
for only 40.2% of SME (and 61.2% of LE). Especially in connection with social
media marketing, which is relatively high among SME at 47.6%, content marketing
could contribute to higher chances of success with this particularly interesting digital
marketing tool.
Tabl e 1 Digital marketing tools, channels, and platforms usage in Swiss organizations (n =278;
Scale from 1 (low relevance to 5 (high relevance), with high relevance defined as ≥3) from Peter
et al. [35,36]
Digital tools,
channels and
platforms
with high
relevance
Company size Tot a l
SME (%) Micro
enterprises
(%)
Small
enterprises
(%)
Medium
sized
enterprises
(%)
Large
enterprises
(%)
Search engine
marketing
(SEM)
58.20 45.60 65.30 66.70 55.40 57.50
E-Mail
marketing
51.60 45.10 49.30 65.90 45.60 50.00
Social media
marketing
47.60 32.90 57.90 53.50 56.70 50.00
Content
marketing
40.20 30.40 37.10 62.50 61.20 45.90
Display
advertising
17.70 10.60 18.60 28.20 43.90 24.90
The Digital Marketing Toolkit … 257
4 Literature Review
The objective of this chapter is to provide SME with an overview of the most impor-
tant digital marketing tools (for later reference, tools also include go-to-market
channels and digital platforms) in order to close the knowledge gap, leverage the
opportunities of digital technology in this field, and reduce the capability gap to LE.
An initial literature review revealed that only a small number of researchers had the
objective to identify and describe such digital marketing tools. Overall, there are only
a small number of publications on SME digital marketing that cover more than just
one specialized topic, e.g. social media, content marketing, or marketing automation
[9,12].
4.1 Research Design
A detailed literature review was conducted with the goal to identify and analyze
the current body of knowledge. Based on pre-defined keywords (digital marketing
platforms, online marketing platforms, SME digital marketing, SME digital
marketing channels, SME online marketing, social media platforms, SME online
marketing, online marketing tools, internet marketing, digital marketing, usage
digital marketing, usage digital platforms), four databases were used: EBSCO [15],
ProQuest [39], Google Scholar [19], and Google [18]. This resulted in a collection
of almost 140 publications from these four sources.
All academic publications from the first three sources were analyzed to evaluate
their academic standing. One of the criteria was that the literature was based on
survey results. Other publications, such as whitepapers (from the fourth source)
were included if the findings were based on survey results and/or if the source was
a known source (e.g. larger consulting firms). While many articles are based on a
literature review or general business practice, others have an empirical basis (e.g. [7,
13,24,26,27,30]). In order to focus on articles that provided insights into tool sets
or frameworks, only articles that took a multi-dimensional approach with at least two
digital marketing tools or methods were included in the analysis, as the focus was
on publications that included comparisons and/or linked tools. Articles with a focus
on one single topic (e.g. social media) were excluded from the literature review.
Following a review of the remaining literature of nineteen sources, a compara-
tive analysis was conducted that identified all digital marketing tools described or
analyzed in the literature. Following the completion of the comparison, all tools
were grouped and included in the digital marketing toolkit. Those which appeared in
more than 25% of all articles (i.e. have five or more citations), are briefly defined and
described in Sect. 5to provide contextual information and definitions. The threshold
was set at the 25% value because a significant differentiation could be observed at
this point.
258 M. K. Peter and M. Dalla Vecchia
4.2 Digital Marketing in Literature
The literature review identified nineteen articles, which described and/or analyzed
two or more digital marketing tools (Table 2). These articles include a total of 162 cita-
tions of tools and methods that can potentially be used and leveraged by organizations
to benefit from the new, digital marketing portfolio.
On average, 8.5 tools were mentioned in each article. In terms of number of tools
described, Demishkevich [14] and Jensen [26] list thirteen tools each, Chaffey [7]
lists twelve tools; & Bhayani and Vachhani [4], Borges Tiago and Verissimo [5]
& Trivedi [45] eleven tools each. Only for the past five to six years (since 2014),
the industry seems to have considered the utilization of multiple digital marketing
tools in organizations and thus has tried to articulate its benefits, challenges, and
opportunities.
It is worth pointing out that some of the fundamentals of marketing, e.g. analytics
and monitoring, brand management, customer relationship management (CRM) and
marketing strategy were not explicitly mentioned as tools or functions of digital
marketing. In some publications, they were discussed in an introduction, but not
individually surveyed or defined as a component or success factor of digital marketing
(except in [2,4,14,25,45]).
The literature with a large number of digital marketing tools are a consulting white
paper with empirical data [7], a dissertation [14], a literature review [4], an empirical
study [5], and two literature reviews in combination with an empirical study [26,45].
Section 5provides an illustration with the twenty-four referenced digital
marketing tools and describes the most frequently cited tools. The following tools
with less than five citations are not discussed in detail, i.e.
•Analytics and monitoring: The tracking, monitoring, and analysis of campaign
metrics, customers, and website data;
•Brand management: Branding in the digital age;
•CRM and big data: The utilization of customer insights and smart data to drive
digital strategy;
•Directories and listings: To further promote a business on specialized websites;
•E-commerce and web shops: Most likely because they are seen as a driver of
digital businesses, rather than digital marketing;
•Promotions and e-coupons: Price driven promotions/digital campaigns;
•Marketing automation: A more recent topic; the technology which combines
process engineering and digital marketing best practice;
•Marketing strategy: The analysis of the market and development of a strategic
plan;
•New technology: This includes, for instance, wearables as well as augmented and
virtual reality;
•Video marketing: This might be regarded as a subset or format of content
marketing; and
•Wikis (knowledge databases) and e-learning programs to further educate the
market.
The Digital Marketing Toolkit … 259
Tabl e 2 Digital marketing tools, channels, and platforms in the literature (own illustration)
260 M. K. Peter and M. Dalla Vecchia
5 The Digital Marketing Toolkit
The complete digital marketing toolkit available to SME (Fig. 2) to reduce the gap to
LE and to develop and implement a digital marketing strategy includes twenty-four
tools, of which eleven were mentioned in more than a quarter of all articles. These are
affiliate marketing, content marketing, display/online advertising, e-mail marketing,
mobile marketing, online public relations, search engine advertising (SEA), search
engine optimization (SEO), social media and its communities, viral marketing, and
the company website.
The digital marketing toolkit is divided into seven categories, based on the context
used in the original literature, namely (1) marketing strategy, (2) overall customer
experience, and (3) brand management. These three categories have a strategic focus
and have a direct impact on the following categories four to seven.
Channels, platforms, and formats (4) include a large collection of tools available
to marketers. Here, content marketing (5) plays a crucial, all-encompassing role
because it provides valuable and entertaining content for the organization’s digital
channels and platforms. Analytics and monitoring (6) provide the feedback-loop and
learning capabilities to the organization. Finally, all digital marketing capabilities are
supported by marketing technology (7), including CRM and marketing automation.
The most frequently cited tools include the following propositions:
Affiliate Marketing
The goal of affiliate marketing is to increase the number of channels and the orga-
nization’s market coverage through partnerships with other organizations/websites.
The company will provide a commission for the promotion and sale of products
and services through these third-party partner websites, or for leads (potential new
customers) generated by third-party partners [6,27]. In this category, Bhayani and
Fig. 2 The digital marketing toolkit. The eleven most often cited tools are highlighted in checks
(own illustration)
The Digital Marketing Toolkit … 261
Vachhani [4] also include link building. In addition, Demishkevich [14] refers to
lead aggregators, Jensen [26] to sponsorships, and Leeflang et al. [28] to third-party
online stores.
Content Marketing
Content marketing, including blogs, whitepapers etc., is seen as an effective strategy
for branding, developing customer trust and loyalty, and to generate leads through
targeted, valuable content [5,14,23,33]. Here, Bhayani and Vachhani [4] mention
blogs as an important component of content marketing, Demishkevich [14] highlights
the need for video marketing; and Järvinen et al. [25] and Jensen [26] refer to online
events and webinars as a potential content format.
Display/Online Advertising
Display and online advertising are two of the oldest and most common chan-
nels/formats of digital marketing. They utilize virtual space to promote marketing
messages and to drive user activity; they create a relatively low-cost, agile, and inter-
active channel between advertisers and consumers [6,14,24]. New forms of online
advertising include video marketing and games [26,30,45,46].
E-Mail Marketing
E-mail marketing is also one of the oldest, yet most effective marketing channels and
methods, especially due to the low execution cost and the relatively high response
rate. However, in recent years, the response rate has dropped because consumers
tend to ignore e-mail marketing campaigns [6,24,27]. In addition, aggressive e-mail
tactics (i.e. spam) could affect the organization’s reputation [17].
Mobile Marketing
Mobile marketing includes the whole spectrum of digital marketing tools avail-
able to organizations in order to target and engage mobile consumers (with a focus
on smartphone users). This category covers mobile apps (applications): They can
be used as a service tool, but also to interact with the market. Some researchers
also highlighted the ongoing importance of SMS (short message service) and MMS
(multimedia messaging service). The strength of mobile marketing is reflected in
the direct, personalized relationship it can build with the market and its customers
[5,14,24–26,45].
Online Public Relations
The aim of online PR is to engage organizational stakeholders through digital tools.
Online PR takes advantage of content marketing and social media (referred to as
social media relations); some dedicated marketing automation solutions are also
available for online PR processes. Content formats include blogs, media statements,
dedicated landing pages, and newsletters [4,7,10,14,26,27,46].
Search Engine Advertising
In most publications, SEA is part of SEM [4,27], which is used as an umbrella term
that also includes search engine optimization (SEO). Others (e.g. [13]) apply the
262 M. K. Peter and M. Dalla Vecchia
term SEM as a synonym for SEA. SEA is considered a necessary tool to build brand
awareness and drive traffic to the website. It includes mostly text-based online ads,
which are presented to a user based on a match between the keywords associated with
an ad (and other criteria, in most cases) and the search word/s from a user entered on
a search engine. Because of the many targeting options, SEA is an attractive digital
tool [4,24]. Instead of SEM, some authors use the terms paid search [28] or pay per
click [14,33].
Search Engine Optimization
The goal of SEO is to increase the visibility (in most cases this is measured by the
page rank and the appearance of the organization’s website on the first couple of
pages of a search engine) of a website and drive web traffic to that specific website.
It includes strategies and techniques (some technical, some content related) which
require expertise and ongoing optimization (hence the term). It is a cost effective
option for SME because it requires mostly human power, as opposed to a monetary
budget as is the case with SEA [6,24,27]. Some authors use the terms natural search
[28] or organic search [32,40] as a synonym for SEO.
Social Media/Communities
Social media is a cost-effective digital marketing tool. Its benefits are reflected in
brand exposure, increased targeted traffic, and search engine optimization (SEO),
word-of-mouth and lead generation. In addition, social media analytics provide infor-
mation about customers and competition. Social media includes strategies and tactics
(for instance, content marketing and online PR) to create and share information about
an organization, its products and services. Various stakeholders can create and share
content, including individual users, the community, and the organization. Marketing
technology is available to facilitate the process of sharing, listening, and responding
to social media posts [6,12,24,27,41,46]. Some authors, e.g. Jensen [26] and
Kilmartin [27], also mention community building in the context of social media.
Viral Marketing
Viral marketing (also referred to as viral advertising) is a technique that takes advan-
tage of word-of-mouth marketing and uses the user’s personal social media network
(or e-mail list) to re-distribute an organization’s brand, product or service messages,
with the ultimate goal of creating a hype or buzz. Content formats include text, images
and videos [4–6,27]. Because of its narrative capabilities, video is a recommended
format by Jensen [26].
Website
The website itself is an important digital tool to promote the organization and attract
customers. It enables organizations to provide information, interact with customers,
and generate sales. It also provides options for brand building, customer service and
communication efficiency. Hyperlinking allows that the collection of web pages and
multimedia content can be retrieved and consumed by users. This includes dedicated
micro-sites and landing pages, for instance for specific campaigns [4,26]. Here,
The Digital Marketing Toolkit … 263
onsite marketing refers to the discipline of optimizing an organization’s website to
drive activity and achieve digital marketing goals [13,24,27,30,45]. According to
Taiminen and Karjaluoto [44], it is the most actively used digital marketing tool by
SME.
6 Conclusion
Digital marketing is an important strategic dimension of digital transformation.
Unfortunately, the potential of digital marketing has not yet been leveraged by SME
to the extent that LE have implemented it. Naturally, this provides meaningful oppor-
tunities for SME. Digital marketing is distinctively different to traditional marketing
as it is based on new technology, responsive and measurable marketing communi-
cation, and a multi-channel approach, which allows the data-driven orchestration of
digital tools. As is evident from the literature, traditional marketing topics such as
analysis and monitoring, brand management, and marketing strategy appear as well,
but to a lesser extent than the purely digital tools.
The study identified 162 citations of digital marketing tools from nineteen sources.
The trend for a digital marketing toolset is supported by an average of 8.5 cited
tools per source. The developed digital marketing toolkit includes twenty-four tools,
with eleven dominating tools: Affiliate marketing, content marketing, display/online
advertising, e-mail marketing, mobile marketing, online public relations, search
engine advertising (SEA), search engine optimization (SEO), social media, viral
marketing, and the company website are the most cited, analyzed, and discussed
digital marketing tools.
Unfortunately, neither the existing literature nor this literature review succeeded
in providing a sophisticated decision-making tool, which would allow SME to plan,
select, and implement the most appropriate digital marketing tools for their individual
market situation. This is considered a major research gap that could arouse interest in
further enquiries. In addition, it could be beneficial to analyze the actual application
of these tools in the Swiss (and other) markets to validate the toolkit. Finally, the
low number of citations around traditional marketing activities (e.g. analysis, brand
management, and strategy) could highlight the need for a combination of traditional
and digital disciplines, which is another potential future research field.
As a first practical step for SME, the digital marketing toolkit will close the
knowledge/expertise gap and provide a basis and guidance to take advantage of
proven digital marketing tools, channels, and platforms in the age of market and
organizational transformations.
264 M. K. Peter and M. Dalla Vecchia
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