The study of consumer behaviour formally investigates individual qualities such as demographics, personality lifestyles, and behavioural variables (such as usage rates, usage occasion, loyalty, brand advocacy, and willingness to provide referrals), in an attempt to understand people’s wants and consumption patterns. Consumer behaviour also investigates on the influences on the consumer, from social groups such as family, friends, sports, and reference groups, to society in general (brand-influencers, opinion leaders).

Research has shown that consumer behaviour is difficult to predict, even for experts in the field; however, new research methods, such as ethnography, consumer neuroscience, and machine learning are shedding new light on how consumers make decisions. In addition, customer relationship management (CRM) databases have become an asset for the analysis of customer behaviour. The extensive data produced by these databases enables detailed examination of behavioural factors that contribute to customer re-purchase intentions, consumer retention, loyalty, and other behavioural intentions such as the willingness to provide positive referrals, become brand advocates, or engage in customer citizenship activities. Databases also assist in market segmentation, especially behavioural segmentation such as developing loyalty segments, which can be used to develop tightly targeted customised marketing strategies on a one-to-one basis. (Also see relationship marketing).

Origins of consumer behaviour

Main article: History of marketing § History of marketing thought

In the 1940s and ’50s, marketing was dominated by the so-called classical schools of thought which were highly descriptive and relied heavily on case study approaches with only occasional use of interview methods. At the end of the 1950s, two important reports criticised marketing for its lack of methodological rigor, especially the failure to adopt mathematically-oriented behavioural science research methods. The stage was set for marketing to become more inter-disciplinary by adopting a consumer-behaviourist perspective.

From the 1950s, marketing began to shift its reliance away from economics and towards other disciplines, notably the behavioural sciences, including sociology, anthropology, and clinical psychology. This resulted in a new emphasis on the customer as a unit of analysis. As a result, new substantive knowledge was added to the marketing discipline – including such ideas as opinion leadership, reference groups, and brand loyalty. Market segmentation, especially demographic segmentation based on socioeconomic status (SES) index and household life-cycle, also became fashionable. With the addition of consumer behaviour, the marketing discipline exhibited increasing scientific sophistication with respect to theory development and testing procedures.

In its early years, consumer behaviour was heavily influenced by motivation research, which had increased the understanding of customers, and had been used extensively by consultants in the advertising industry and also within the discipline of psychology in the 1920s, ’30s, and ’40s. By the 1950s, marketing began to adopt techniques used by motivation researchers including depth interviews, projective techniques, thematic apperception tests, and a range of qualitative and quantitative research methods.^[4] More recently, scholars have added a new set of tools including ethnography, photo-elicitation techniques, and phenomenological interviewing. Today, consumer behaviour (or CB as it is affectionately known) is regarded as an important sub-discipline within marketing and is included as a unit of study in almost all undergraduate marketing programs.

Definition and explanation

Consumer behaviour entails “all activities associated with the purchase, use and disposal of goods and services, including the consumer’s emotional, mental and behavioural responses that precede or follow these activities. The term consumer can refer to individual consumers as well as organisational consumers, and more specifically, “an end user, and not necessarily a purchaser, in the distribution chain of a good or service.” Consumer behaviour is concerned with:

• purchase activities: the purchase of goods or services; how consumers acquire products and services, and all the activities leading up to a purchase decision, including information search, evaluating goods and services, and payment methods including the purchase experience
• use or consumption activities: concerns the who, where, when, and how of consumption and the usage experience, including the symbolic associations and the way that goods are distributed within families or consumption units
• disposal activities: concerns the way that consumers dispose of products and packaging; may also include reselling activities such as eBay and second-hand markets

Consumer responses may be:

• emotional (or affective) responses: refer to emotions such as feelings or moods,
• mental (or cognitive) responses: refer to the consumer’s thought processes, their
• behavioural (or conative) responses: refer to the consumer’s observable responses in relation to the purchase and disposal of goods or services.

According to the American Marketing Association, consumer behaviour can be defined as “the dynamic interaction of affect and cognition, behaviour, and environmental events by which human beings conduct the exchange aspects of their lives.”

As a field of study, consumer behaviour is an applied social science. Consumer behaviour analysis is the “use of behaviour principles, usually gained experimentally, to interpret human economic consumption.” As a discipline, consumer behaviour stands at the intersection of economic psychology and marketing science.

Digital video was first introduced commercially in 1986 with the Sony D1 format, which recorded an uncompressed standard-definition component video signal in digital form. In addition to uncompressed formats, popular compressed digital video formats today include H.264 and MPEG-4. Modern interconnect standards used for playback of digital video include HDMI, DisplayPort, Digital Visual Interface (DVI) and serial digital interface (SDI).

Digital video can be copied and reproduced with no degradation in quality. In contrast, when analog sources are copied, they experience generation loss. Digital video can be stored on digital media such as Blu-ray Disc, on computer data storage, or streamed over the Internet to end users who watch content on a desktop computer screen or a digital smart TV. Today, digital video content such as TV shows and movies also include a digital audio soundtrack.

Digital video cameras

Further information: Digital cinematography, Image sensor, and Video camera

The basis for digital video cameras are metal–oxide–semiconductor (MOS) image sensors. The first practical semiconductor image sensor was the charge-coupled device (CCD), invented in 1969 by Willard S. Boyle, who won a Nobel Prize for his work in physics. Following the commercialization of CCD sensors during the late 1970s to early 1980s, the entertainment industry slowly began transitioning to digital imaging and digital video over from analog video the next two decades. The CCD was followed by the CMOS active-pixel sensor (CMOS sensor), developed in the 1990s.CMOS are beneficial because of their small size, high speed, and low power usage. CMOS are most commonly found today in the digital cameras in iPhones, used as the image censor for the device.

Digital video coding

Further information: Video coding format § History

In the 1970s, pulse-code modulation (PCM) induced the birth of digital video coding, demanding high bitrates of 45-140 Mbps for standard-definition (SD) content. By the 1980s, the discrete cosine transform (DCT) became the standard for digital video compression.

The first digital video coding standard was H.120, created by the (International Telegraph and Telephone Consultative Committee) or CCITT (now ITU-T) in 1984. H.120 was not practical due to weak performance.^[11] H.120 was based on differential pulse-code modulation (DPCM), a compression algorithm that was inefficient for video coding. During the late 1980s, a number of companies began experimenting with DCT, a much more efficient form of compression for video coding. The CCITT received 14 proposals for DCT-based video compression formats, in contrast to a single proposal based on vector quantization (VQ) compression. The H.261 standard was developed based on DCT compression,becoming first practical video coding standard. Since H.261, DCT compression has been adopted by all the major video coding standards that followed.

MPEG-1, developed by the Motion Picture Experts Group (MPEG), followed in 1991, and it was designed to compress VHS-quality video. It was succeeded in 1994 by MPEG-2/H.262, which became the standard video format for DVD and SD digital television. It was followed by MPEG-4/H.263 in 1999, and then in 2003 it was followed by H.264/MPEG-4 AVC, which has become the most widely used video coding standard.

Digital video production

Starting in the late 1970s to the early 1980s, video production equipment that was digital in its internal workings was introduced. These included time base correctors (TBC) and digital video effects (DVE) units. They operated by taking a standard analog composite video input and digitizing it internally. This made it easier to either correct or enhance the video signal, as in the case of a TBC, or to manipulate and add effects to the video, in the case of a DVE unit. The digitized and processed video information was then converted back to standard analog video for output.

Later on in the 1970s, manufacturers of professional video broadcast equipment, such as Bosch (through their Fernseh division) and Ampex developed prototype digital videotape recorders (VTR) in their research and development labs. Bosch’s machine used a modified 1-inch type B videotape transport and recorded an early form of CCIR 601 digital video. Ampex’s prototype digital video recorder used a modified 2-inch quadruplex videotape VTR (an Ampex AVR-3) fitted with custom digital video electronics and a special octaplex 8-head headwheel (regular analog 2″ quad machines only used 4 heads). Like standard 2″ quad, the audio on the Ampex prototype digital machine, nicknamed Annie by its developers, still recorded the audio in analog as linear tracks on the tape. None of these machines from these manufacturers were ever marketed commercially.

Digital video was first introduced commercially in 1986 with the Sony D1 format, which recorded an uncompressed standard definition component video signal in digital form. Component video connections required 3 cables, but most television facilities were wired for composite NTSC or PAL video using one cable. Due to this incompatibility the cost of the recorder, D1 was used primarily by large television networks and other component-video capable video studios.

A professional television studio set in Chile.

In 1988, Sony and Ampex co-developed and released the D2 digital videocassette format, which recorded video digitally without compression in ITU-601 format, much like D1. In comparison, D2 had the major difference of encoding the video in composite form to the NTSC standard, thereby only requiring single-cable composite video connections to and from a D2 VCR. This made it a perfect fit for the majority of television facilities at the time. D2 was a successful format in the television broadcast industry throughout the late ’80s and the ’90s. D2 was also widely used in that era as the master tape format for mastering laserdiscs.

D1 & D2 would eventually be replaced by cheaper systems using video compression, most notably Sony’s Digital Betacam,that were introduced into the network’s television studios. Other examples of digital video formats utilizing compression were Ampex’s DCT (the first to employ such when introduced in 1992), the industry-standard DV and MiniDV and its professional variations, Sony’s DVCAM and Panasonic’s DVCPRO, and Betacam SX, a lower-cost variant of Digital Betacam using MPEG-2 compression.

The Sony logo, creator of the Betacam.

One of the first digital video products to run on personal computers was PACo: The PICS Animation Compiler from The Company of Science & Art in Providence, RI. It was developed starting in 1990 and first shipped in May 1991. PACo could stream unlimited-length video with synchronized sound from a single file (with the .CAV file extension) on CD-ROM. Creation required a Mac, and playback was possible on Macs, PCs, and Sun SPARCstations.

QuickTime, Apple Computer‘s multimedia framework, was released in June 1991. Audio Video Interleave from Microsoft followed in 1992. Initial consumer-level content creation tools were crude, requiring an analog video source to be digitized to a computer-readable format. While low-quality at first, consumer digital video increased rapidly in quality, first with the introduction of playback standards such as MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 (adopted for use in television transmission and DVD media), and the introduction of the DV tape format allowing recordings in the format to be transferred directly to digital video files using a FireWire port on an editing computer. This simplified the process, allowing non-linear editing systems (NLE) to be deployed cheaply and widely on desktop computers with no external playback or recording equipment needed.

The widespread adoption of digital video and accompanying compression formats has reduced the bandwidth needed for a high-definition video signal (with HDV and AVCHD, as well as several commercial variants such as DVCPRO-HD, all using less bandwidth than a standard definition analog signal). These savings have increased the number of channels available on cable television and direct broadcast satellite systems, created opportunities for spectrum reallocation of terrestrial television broadcast frequencies, and made tapeless camcorders based on flash memory possible, among other innovations and efficiencies.

Digital video and culture

Culturally, digital video has allowed video and film to become widely available and popular, beneficial to entertainment, education, and research. Digital video is increasingly common in schools, with students and teachers taking an interest in learning how to use it in relevant ways. Digital video also has healthcare applications, allowing doctors to track infant heart rates and oxygen levels.

In addition, the switch from analog to digital video impacted media in various ways, such as in how businesses use cameras for surveillance. Closed circuit television (CCTV) switched to using digital video recorders (DVR), presenting the issue of how to store recordings for evidence collection. Today, digital video is able to be compressed in order to save storage space.

Digital television

Digital Television, also known as DTV, is the production and transmission of digital video from networks to consumers. This technique uses digital encoding instead of analog signals used prior to the 1950s. As compared to analog methods, DTV is faster and provides more capabilities and options for data to be transmitted and shared.

Overview

Digital video comprises a series of digital images displayed in rapid succession. In the context of video, these images are called frames. The rate at which frames are displayed is known as the frame rate and is measured in frames per second (FPS). Every frame is a digital image and so comprises a formation of pixels. The color of a pixel is represented by a fixed number of bits of that color where the information of the color is stored within the image. For example, 8-bit captures 256 levels per channel, and 10-bit captures 1,024 levels per channel.The more bits, the more subtle variations of colors can be reproduced. This is called the color depth, or bit depth, of the video.

Interlacing

In interlaced video each frame is composed of two halves of an image. The first half contains only the odd-numbered lines of a full frame. The second half contains only the even-numbered lines. These halves are referred to individually as fields. Two consecutive fields compose a full frame. If an interlaced video has a frame rate of 30 frames per second the field rate is 60 fields per second, though both part of interlaced video, frames per second and fields per second are separate numbers.

A broadcast television camera at the Pavek Museum in Minnesota.

Bit rate and BPP

By definition, bit rate is a measurement of the rate of information content from the digital video stream. In the case of uncompressed video, bit rate corresponds directly to the quality of the video because bit rate is proportional to every property that affects the video quality. Bit rate is an important property when transmitting video because the transmission link must be capable of supporting that bit rate. Bit rate is also important when dealing with the storage of video because, as shown above, the video size is proportional to the bit rate and the duration. Video compression is used to greatly reduce the bit rate while having little effect on quality.

Bits per pixel (BPP) is a measure of the efficiency of compression. A true-color video with no compression at all may have a BPP of 24 bits/pixel. Chroma subsampling can reduce the BPP to 16 or 12 bits/pixel. Applying JPEG compression on every frame can reduce the BPP to 8 or even 1 bits/pixel. Applying video compression algorithms like MPEG1, MPEG2 or MPEG4 allows for fractional BPP values to exist.

Constant bit rate versus variable bit rate

BPP represents the average bits per pixel. There are compression algorithms that keep the BPP almost constant throughout the entire duration of the video. In this case, we also get video output with a constant bitrate (CBR). This CBR video is suitable for real-time, non-buffered, fixed bandwidth video streaming (e.g. in videoconferencing). Since not all frames can be compressed at the same level, because quality is more severely impacted for scenes of high complexity, some algorithms try to constantly adjust the BPP. They keep the BPP high while compressing complex scenes and low for less demanding scenes. This way, it provides the best quality at the smallest average bit rate (and the smallest file size, accordingly). This method produces a variable bitrate because it tracks the variations of the BPP.

Technical overview

Standard film stocks typically record at 24 frames per second. For video, there are two frame rate standards: NTSC, at 30/1.001 (about 29.97) frames per second (about 59.94 fields per second), and PAL, 25 frames per second (50 fields per second). Digital video cameras come in two different image capture formats: interlaced and progressive scan. Interlaced cameras record the image in alternating sets of lines: the odd-numbered lines are scanned, and then the even-numbered lines are scanned, then the odd-numbered lines are scanned again, and so on.

One set of odd or even lines is referred to as a field, and a consecutive pairing of two fields of opposite parity is called a frame. Progressive scan cameras record all lines in each frame as a single unit. Thus, interlaced video captures the scene motion twice as often as progressive video does for the same frame rate. Progressive scan generally produces a slightly sharper image, however, motion may not be as smooth as interlaced video.

Digital video can be copied with no generation loss; which degrades quality in analog systems. However, a change in parameters like frame size, or a change of the digital format can decrease the quality of the video due to image scaling and transcoding losses. Digital video can be manipulated and edited on non-linear editing systems.

Digital video has a significantly lower cost than 35 mm film. In comparison to the high cost of film stock, the digital media used for digital video recording, such as flash memory or hard disk drive is very inexpensive. Digital video also allows footage to be viewed on location without the expensive and time-consuming chemical processing required by film. Network transfer of digital video makes physical deliveries of tapes and film reels unnecessary.

A short video sequence in native 16K.

A diagram of 35 mm film as used in Cinemscope cameras.

Digital television (including higher quality HDTV) was introduced in most developed countries in early 2000s. Today, digital video is used in modern mobile phones and video conferencing systems. Digital video is used for Internet distribution of media, including streaming video and peer-to-peer movie distribution.

Many types of video compression exist for serving digital video over the internet and on optical disks. The file sizes of digital video used for professional editing are generally not practical for these purposes, and the video requires further compression with codecs to be used for recreational purposes.

As of 2017, the highest image resolution demonstrated for digital video generation is 132.7 megapixels (15360 x 8640 pixels). The highest speed is attained in industrial and scientific high-speed cameras that are capable of filming 1024×1024 video at up to 1 million frames per second for brief periods of recording.

Technical properties

Live digital video consumes bandwidth. Recorded digital video consumes data storage. The amount of bandwidth or storage required is determined by the frame size, color depth and frame rate. Each pixel consumes a number of bits determined by the color depth. The data required to represent a frame of data is determined by multiplying by the number of pixels in the image. The bandwidth is determined by multiplying the storage requirement for a frame by the frame rate. The overall storage requirements for a program can then be determined by multiplying bandwidth by the duration of the program.

These calculations are accurate for uncompressed video, but due to the relatively high bit rate of uncompressed video, video compression is extensively used. In the case of compressed video, each frame requires only a small percentage of the original bits. This reduces the data or bandwidth consumption by a factor of 5 to 12 times when using lossless compression, but more commonly, lossy compression is used due to its reduction of data consumption by factors of 20 to 200. Note that it is not necessary that all frames are equally compressed by the same percentage. Instead, consider the average factor of compression for all the frames taken together.

Conversion marketing attempts to solve low online conversions through optimized customer service, which requires a complex combination of personalized customer experience management, web analytics, and the use of customer feedback to contribute to process flow improvement and site design.

By focusing on improving site flow, online customer service channels, and online experience conversion marketing is commonly viewed as a long-term investment rather than a quick fix . Increased site traffic over the past 10 years has done little to increase overall conversion rates, so conversion marketing focuses not on driving additional traffic but converting existing traffic. It requires proactive engagement with consumers using real time analytics to determine if visitors are confused and show signs of abandoning the site; then developing the tools and messages to inform consumers about available products, and ultimately persuading them to convert online. Ideally, the customer would maintain a relationship post-sale through support or re-engagement campaigns. Conversion marketing affects all phases of the customer life-cycle, and several conversion marketing solutions are utilized to help ease the transition from one phase to the next.

“Conversion rate” redirects here. For conversion rates in chemistry, see Conversion rate (chemistry).

The conversion rate is the proportion of visitors to a website who take action to go beyond a casual content view or website visit, as a result of subtle or direct requests from marketers, advertisers, and content creators.Conversion rate=Number of Goal AchievementsVisitors

Successful conversions are defined differently by individual marketers, advertisers, and content creators. To online retailers, for example, a successful conversion may be defined as the sale of a product to a consumer whose interest in the item was initially sparked by clicking a banner advertisement. To content creators, a successful conversion may refer to a membership registration, newsletter subscription, software download, or other activity.

For websites that seek to generate offline responses, for example telephone calls or foot traffic to a store, measuring conversion rates can be difficult because a phone call or personal visit is not automatically traced to its source, such as the Yellow Pages, website, or referral. Possible solutions include asking each caller or shopper how they heard about the business and using a toll-free number on the website that forwards to the existing line.

For websites where the response occurs on the site itself, a site’s analytics package can be used to track user behaviour.

Common conversion marketing services

RecommendationsBehavioral analysis that identifies products and content relevant to the customer’s perceived intent.Targeted offersTargeting attempts to fit the right promotion with the right customer based upon behavioral and demographic information.Ratings and reviewsUsing user-generated ratings and reviews to increase conversion rates, capture feedback, and engender visitor’s trust.Email personalizationE-mail with embedded recommendations and chat that are tailored personally to the recipient.ChatAs consumers tend to abandon sites after only three clicks, attempts to use proactive chat, reactive chat, exit chat, and click-to-call to convert consumers quickly.Click-to-callSupports cross-channel conversion without losing the context of the conversation when visitors move from the website to the phone.Call to action (marketing)Statement designed to get an immediate response from the person reading or hearing it. Broadly used in business as part of a digital strategy to get your users to respond through one single action.CobrowsingTool for support agent infrastructure (chat or call) to assist customers in transacting online.Voice of the customerFeedback about products, services, and online experiences that is captured through carefully analyzed structured and unstructured data.Automated guides predetermined steps that allow a customer to better understand product features, and options to assist with the selection process.RetargetingIdentification of visitors interested in particular products or services based on previous site browsing or search to offer relevant content through targeted ad placement.

Methods of increasing conversion rate

Main article: Conversion rate optimization

The process of improving the conversion rate is called conversion rate optimization. However, different sites may consider a “conversion” to be a result other than a sale. Say a customer were to abandon an online shopping cart. The company could market a special offer, like free shipping, to convert the visitor into a paying customer. A company may also try to recover the customer through an online engagement method, such as proactive chat, to attempt to assist the customer through the purchase process.

Among many possible actions to increase the conversion rate, the most relevant may be:

• Employ Attention, Interest, Desire, Action (AIDA) principles to design the user experience through the conversion funnel
• Enhance the user’s credibility and trust in the site, the product, and the business by displaying third-party trust logos and by quality site design
• Improve site navigation structure so that users can browse and shop with minimal effort
• Improve and focus the website content, including text, photographs, illustrations, and video, towards target conversion 
• Review, and edit or remove obsolete or distracting data
• Increase usability to reduce barriers to conversion
• Create a self-serving customer service format by letting the user reach informative answers quickly with a learning database.^{[citation needed]}
• Offer active help (e.g. live chat, co-browsing)
• Generate user reviews of the product or service
• Gather a baseline user experience by recording user actions and compiling key objections^{[citation needed]}
• Enable clear tracking of standardized metrics using website analytics software for a predetermined conversion goal (e.g. “increase volume of newsletter subscriptions” or “decrease shopping cart abandonment percentage rate”)
• Take repeated action to monitor and improve the site, based on quantitative and qualitative metrics

The development of early writing and paper enabling longer-distance communication systems such as mail, including in the Persian Empire (Chapar Khaneh and Angarium) and Roman Empire, can be interpreted as early forms of media. Writers such as Howard Rheingold have framed early forms of human communication, such as the Lascaux cave paintings and early writing, as early forms of media.Another framing of the history of media starts with the Chauvet Cave paintings and continues with other ways to carry human communication beyond the short range of voice: smoke signals, trail markers, and sculpture.

The term media in its modern application relating to communication channels was first used by Canadian communications theorist Marshall McLuhan, who stated in Counterblast (1954): “The media are not toys; they should not be in the hands of Mother Goose and Peter Pan executives. They can be entrusted only to new artists because they are art forms.” By the mid-1960s, the term had spread to general use in North America and the United Kingdom. The phrase mass media was, according to H.L. Mencken, used as early as 1923 in the United States.

The term medium (the singular form of media) is defined as “one of the means or channels of general communication, information, or entertainment in society, as newspapers, radio, or television.”

Media Ages

Scholars of mass media and communication often characterize the evolution of mass media in stages. Typically, these stages are distinguished by the technological advancements of the era.

Pre-Industrial Age

The earliest known printed book is the ancient Buddhist text The Diamond Sutra, which dates back to the year 868 AD and was printed using clay type. The first movable clay type was used throughout China by 1041. During the Middle Ages, wooden type was used throughout Europe but, like clay type, the carvings and impressions wore down quickly, This problem was solved in 1440 with the invention of the metal printing press by Johannes Gutenberg.

Industrial Age

The typewriter can be traced back to 1714, when the English inventor Henry Mill received a patent for the first known typewriter. The first commercially successful typewriter was not produced until 1874, and the first electric typewriter was released in the 1930’s.In 1923, the first news magazine,TIME, premiered. With the invention of the radio in 1894 and television in 1920, mainstream culture had entered what is known as the Golden Age for Television, Radio, and Cinema by the early 1900’s.

Electronic Age

With the 1940’s came the introduction of community antenna television (CATV) and early cable systems.In 1960, we had the rise of FM Radio, and in 1963 audio cassette tapes were released. Email was created in 1972 and a year later the first handheld mobile phone was introduced.

Regulations

Main articles: Media regulation and Media independence

The role of regulatory authorities (license broadcaster institutions, content providers, platforms) and the resistance to political and commercial interference in the autonomy of the media sector are both considered as significant components of media independence. In order to ensure media independence, regulatory authorities should be placed outside of governments’ directives. this can be measured through legislation, agency statutes and rules.

Government regulations

Licensing[edit source]

In the United States, the Radio Act of 1927 established that the radio frequency spectrum was public property. This prohibited private organizations from owning any portion of the spectrum. A broadcast license is typically given to broadcasters by communications regulators, allowing them to broadcast on a certain frequency and typically in a specific geographical location. Licensing is done by regulators in order to manage a broadcasting medium and as a method to prevent the concentration of media ownership.

Licensing has been criticized for an alleged lack of transparency. Regulatory authorities in certain countries have been accused of exhibiting political bias in favor of the government or ruling party, which has resulted in some prospective broadcasters being denied licenses or being threatened with license withdrawal. As a consequence, there has been a decrease in diversity of content and views in certain countries due to actions made against broadcasters by states via their licensing authorities. This can have an impact on competition and may lead to an excessive concentration of power with potential influence on public opinion. Examples include the failure to renew or retain licenses for editorially critical media, reducing the regulator’s competences and mandates for action, and a lack of due process in the adoption of regulatory decisions.

Government endorsed appointments

State control is also evident in the increasing politicization of regulatory bodies operationalized through transfers and appointments of party-aligned individuals to senior positions in regulatory authorities. Anatol Lieven in his book explains how Pakistan, a less economically developed country, regulated it’s media in 1980’s.

Internet regulation

Governments worldwide have sought to extend regulation to internet companies, whether connectivity providers or application service providers, and whether domestically or foreign-based. The impact on journalistic content can be severe, as internet companies can err too much on the side of caution and take down news reports, including algorithmically, while offering inadequate opportunities for redress to the affected news producers.

Self-regulation

At the regional level

In Western Europe, self-regulation provides an alternative to state regulatory authorities. In such contexts, newspapers have historically been free of licensing and regulation, and there has been repeated pressure for them to self-regulate or at least to have in-house ombudsmen. However, it has often been difficult to establish meaningful self-regulatory entities.

In many cases, self-regulations exists in the shadow of state regulation, and is conscious of the possibility of state intervention. In many countries in Central and Eastern Europe, self-regulatory structures seems to be lacking or have not historically been perceived as efficient and effective.

The rise of satellite delivered channels, delivered directly to viewers, or through cable or online systems, renders much larger the sphere of unregulated programing. There are, however, varying efforts to regulate the access of programmers to satellite transponders in parts of the Western Europe and North American region, the Arab region and in Asia and the Pacific. The Arab Satellite Broadcasting Charter was an example of efforts to bring formal standards and some regulatory authority to bear on what is transmitted, but it appears to not have been implemented.

International organizations and NGOs

Self-regulation is expressed as a preferential system by journalists but also as a support for media freedom and development organizations by intergovernmental organizations such as UNESCO and non-governmental organizations. There has been a continued trend of establishing self-regulatory bodies, such as press councils, in conflict and post-conflict situations.

Major internet companies have responded to pressure by governments and the public by elaborating self-regulatory and complaints systems at the individual company level, using principles they have developed under the framework of the Global Network Initiative. The Global Network Initiative has grown to include several large telecom companies alongside internet companies such as Google, Facebook and others, as well as civil society organizations and academics.

The European Commission’s 2013 publication, ICT Technology Sector Guide on Implementing the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, impacts on the presence of independent journalism by defining the limits of what should or should not be carried and prioritized in the most popular digital spaces.

The term is most synonymous with subscription-based video on demand (SVoD) services that offer access to film and television content (including existing shows and movies for which rights have been acquired from the content owner, as well as original content produced specifically for the service).

OTT also encompasses a wave of “skinny” television services that offer access to live streams of linear specialty channels, similar to a traditional satellite or cable TV provider, but streamed over the public Internet, rather than a closed, private network with proprietary equipment such as set-top boxes.

Over-the-top services are typically accessed via websites on personal computers, as well as via apps on mobile devices (such as smartphones and tablets), digital media players (including video game consoles), or televisions with integrated Smart TV platforms.

In 2011, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), Canada’s telecom regulator, stated that it “considers that Internet access to programming independent of a facility or network dedicated to its delivery (via, for example, cable or satellite) is the defining feature of what has been termed ‘over-the-top’ services”.

In contrast to video on demand video-delivery systems offered by cable and IPTV, which are tightly managed networks where channels can be changed instantly, some OTT services such as iTunes require that the video be downloaded first and then played, while other OTT players such as Netflix, Hulu, Peacock, Disney+, HBO Max, Discovery+, Paramount+, and Amazon Prime Video, offer movie downloads that start playing before the download completes (streaming).

In broadcasting, over-the-top (OTT) content is the audio, video, and other media content delivered over the Internet, without the involvement of a multiple-system operator (MSO) in the control or distribution of the content. The Internet provider may be aware of the contents of the Internet Protocol (IP) packets, and may be able to block or restrict their transit to end users (unless that internet provider operates within a jurisdiction that requires “net neutrality“), but is not responsible for the viewing abilities, copyrights, and/or other redistribution of the content. This model contrasts with the purchasing or rental of video or audio content from an Internet service provider (ISP), such as pay television, video on demand, and from internet protocol television (IPTV). OTT refers to content from a third party that is delivered to an end-user, with the ISP simply transporting IP packets.

OTT television, usually called online television, Internet television or streaming television, remains the most popular OTT content. This signal is received over the Internet or through a cell phone network, as opposed to receiving the television signal from a terrestrial broadcast or satellite. The video distributor controls access through an app, a separate OTT dongle, or a box connected to a phone, PC, or smart television set. By mid-2017, 58 percent of US households would access one in a given month, and advertising revenues from OTT channels exceeded those from web browser plug-ins.

The record of simultaneous users watching an OTT event was set at 18.6 million by Disney’s Indian video streaming platform Hotstar.

OTT messaging is defined as instant messaging services or online chat provided by third parties, as an alternative to text messaging services provided by a mobile network operator. An example is the Facebook-owned mobile application WhatsApp, that serves to replace text messaging on Internet connected smartphones.Other providers of OTT messaging include Viber, WeChat, iMessage, Skype, Telegram and the now defunct Google Allo.

OTT voice calling, usually called VoIP, capabilities, for instance, as provided by FaceTime, Skype, Viber, WhatsApp, WeChat, and Zoom use open internet communication protocols to replace and sometimes enhance existing operator controlled services offered by mobile phone operators

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Until the advent of such technology, photographs were made by exposing light-sensitive photographic film and paper, which was processed in liquid chemical solutions to develop and stabilize the image. Digital photographs are typically created solely by computer-based photoelectric and mechanical techniques, without wet bath chemical processing.

In consumer markets, apart from enthusiast digital single-lens reflex cameras (DSLR), most digital cameras now come with an electronic viewfinder, which approximates the final photograph in real-time. This enables the user to review, adjust, or delete a captured photograph within seconds, making this a form of instant photography, in contrast to most photochemical cameras from the preceding era.

Moreover, the onboard computational resources can usually perform aperture adjustment and focus adjustment (via inbuilt servomotors) as well as set the exposure level automatically, so these technical burdens are removed from the photographer unless the photographer feels competent to intercede (and the camera offers traditional controls). Electronic by nature, most digital cameras are instant, mechanized, and automatic in some or all functions. Digital cameras may choose to emulate traditional manual controls (rings, dials, sprung levers, and buttons) or it may instead provide a touchscreen interface for all functions; most camera phones fall into the latter category.

Digital photography spans a wide range of applications with a long history. Much of the technology originated in the space industry, where it pertains to highly customized, embedded systems combined with sophisticated remote telemetry. Any electronic image sensor can be digitized; this was achieved in 1951. The modern era in digital photography is dominated by the semiconductor industry, which evolved later. An early semiconductor milestone was the advent of the charge-coupled device (CCD) image sensor, first demonstrated in April 1970; since then, the field has advanced rapidly, with concurrent advances in photolithographic fabrication.

The first consumer digital cameras were marketed in the late 1990s.Professionals gravitated to digital slowly, converting as their professional work required using digital files to fulfill demands for faster turnaround than conventional methods could allow.Starting around 2000, digital cameras were incorporated into cell phones; in the following years, cell phone cameras became widespread, particularly due to their connectivity to social media and email. Since 2010, the digital point-and-shoot and DSLR cameras have also seen competition from the mirrorless digital cameras, which typically provide better image quality than point-and-shoot or cell phone cameras but are smaller in size and shape than typical DSLRs. Many mirrorless cameras accept interchangeable lenses and have advanced features through an electronic viewfinder, which replaces the through-the-lens viewfinder of single-lens reflex cameras.

 History of the camera § Digital cameras, and Digital image § History

While digital photography has only relatively recently become mainstream, the late 20th century saw many small developments leading to its creation. The history of digital photography began in the 1950s. In 1951, the first digital signals were saved to magnetic tape via the first video tape recorder. Six years later, in 1957, the first digital image was produced through a computer by Russell Kirsch. It was an image of his son.

First digital image ever created, by Russell Kirsch. It is an image of his son, Walden.

The first semiconductor image sensor was the charge-coupled device (CCD), invented by physicists Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith at Bell Labs in 1969. While researching the metal-oxide semiconductor (MOS) process, they realized that an electric charge was analogous to a magnetic bubble and that the charge could be stored on a tiny MOS capacitor. As it was fairly straightforward to fabricate a series of MOS capacitors in a row, they connected a suitable voltage to the capacitors so that the charge could be stepped along from one to the next. This semiconductor circuit was later used in the first digital video cameras for television broadcasting, and its invention was recognized by a Nobel Prize in Physics in 2009.

The first image of Mars was taken as Mariner 4 flew by it on July 15, 1965, with a camera system designed by NASA and JPL. In 1976, the Mars Viking Lander produced digital images from the surface of Mars. The process was different from, but comparable to, a modern digital camera—it used a video camera tube, followed by a digitizer, rather than a mosaic of solid state sensor elements. This produced a digital image that was stored on tape for later slow transmission back to Earth.

The first published color digital photograph was produced in 1972 by Michael Francis Tompsett using CCD sensor technology and was featured on the cover of Electronics Magazine. It was a picture of his wife, Margaret Tompsett. The Cromemco Cyclops, a digital camera developed as a commercial product and interfaced to a microcomputer, was featured in the February 1975 issue of Popular Electronics magazine. It used MOS technology for its image sensor.

An important development in digital image compression technology was the discrete cosine transform (DCT), a lossy compression technique first proposed by Nasir Ahmed while he was working at the Kansas State University in 1972. DCT compression is used in the JPEG image standard, which was introduced by the Joint Photographic Experts Group in 1992.JPEG compresses images down to much smaller file sizes, and has become the most widely used image file format.The JPEG standard was largely responsible for popularizing digital photography.

The first self-contained (portable) digital camera was created in 1975 by Steven Sasson of Eastman Kodak. Sasson’s camera used CCD image sensor chips developed by Fairchild Semiconductor in 1973. The camera weighed 8 pounds (3.6 kg), recorded black-and-white images to a cassette tape, had a resolution of 0.01 megapixels (10,000 pixels), and took 23 seconds to capture its first image in December 1975. The prototype camera was a technical exercise, not intended for production.While it was not until 1981 that the first consumer camera was produced by Sony, the groundwork for digital imaging and photography had been laid.

The first digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) camera was the Nikon SVC prototype demonstrated in 1986, followed by the commercial Nikon QV-1000C released in 1988. The first widely commercially available digital camera was the 1990 Dycam Model 1; it also sold as the Logitech Fotoman. It used a CCD image sensor, stored pictures digitally, and connected directly to a computer for downloading images. Originally offered to professional photographers for a hefty price, by the mid-to-late 1990s, due to technology advancements, digital cameras were commonly available to the general public.

The advent of digital photography also gave way to cultural changes in the field of photography. Unlike film photography, dark rooms and hazardous chemicals were no longer required for the post-production of an image – images could now be processed and enhanced from a personal computer. This allowed photographers to be more creative with their processing and editing techniques. As the field became more popular, digital photography and photographers diversified. Digital photography expanded the field of photography from a small, somewhat elite circle to one that encompassed many people.

The camera phone further helped popularize digital photography, along with the Internet, social media,and the JPEG image format. The first cell phones with built-in digital cameras were produced in 2000 by Sharp and Samsung.Small, convenient, and easy to use, camera phones have made digital photography ubiquitous in the daily life of the general public.

It can be conducted in a systematic way by comparing the content presented in the media with external sources, in an attempt of fact-checking, or in a less formal and time demanding manner by independent groups and media critics that aim to check the quality of what is available on the media, especially related to press freedom and focusing on the concept of responsibilizing the media organizations. In general, media monitoring focuses on developing insights, in various fields, of what is actually occurring while finding the balance to not overanalyze certain factors

In business

In the commercial sphere, media monitoring is usually carried out in-house or by a media monitoring service company that can provide such services on a subscription basis.

The services that media monitoring companies provide typically include the systematic recording of radio and television broadcasts, social media, web-TV, the collection of press clippings from print media publications and the collection of data from online information sources. The material collected usually consists of any media output that makes reference to the client, its activities and its designated topics of interests. The monitoring of online consumer sources such as blogs, forums and social networks is more specifically known as buzz monitoring which informs the company of how its service or product is perceived by users.^[3]

Most media monitoring is done within private public relations agencies or businesses in house public relations sectors. Publicists will track the number of times the company was mentioned within different platforms, including magazines, newspapers, blogs, and social media. These entries are referred to as “clippings” and are compiled into monthly reports by the Public Relations firm and then presented to the client along with the circulation and impressions from these platforms. Circulation is how many subscribers or viewers the platform has, and impressions are calculated by multiplying the circulation by three. Impressions are only calculated for print media because it is assumed print media will be circulated past the original subscribers. These figures are calculated to show the client approximately how many people their message has reached.

In social sciences

Media monitoring is often deployed by social scientists to look at how something is presented in different media all over the globe. They often look for common biases in how an event is portrayed in the many different types of media. The use of large-scale monitoring techniques by computer scientists enabled the exploration of different aspects of the media system such as the visualisation of the media-sphere, the sentimental and objectivity analysis of news content.

In 2021, media monitoring proved to be useful in the COVID-19 vaccine rollout, as it allowed social scientists to analyze the sentiment surrounding vaccines among the populous. They collected information from various articles and posts on social media from around the internet related to vaccines, which helped them capture and compile people’s various complex opinions on vaccinations. Social media interactivity, such as likes, comments, and retweets, also contributed to the study, as they helped indicate whether or not a post was in agreement with the opinion of the general population.

Technologies involved

Media monitoring is practically achieved by a combination of technologies—including audio and video recording, high speed text scanners and text recognition software—and human readers and analysts. The automation of the process is highly desirable and can be partially achieved by deploying data mining and machine learning techniques. These technologies compile and index data from all types of online media sites, such as Twitter, Instagram, and Reddit, which allows for a user to search for specific data on these sites, such as brands, mentions, and opinions, in a more streamlined, simple way.

Public Relation teams may often purchase these tools online for a premium, as they are important for their job and help make it much easier. Popular paid software tools include:

• TalkWalker Alerts
• Google Alerts
• Hootsuite
• Social Searcher

Free versions of these tools also exist, although with less capabilities, created for more casual instances of media monitoring.

A media monitoring service, a press clipping service or a clipping service as known in earlier times, provides clients with copies of media content, which is of specific interest to them and subject to changing demand; what they provide may include documentation, content, analysis, or editorial opinion, specifically or widely. These services tend to specialize their coverage by subject, industry, size, geography, publication, journalist, or editor. The printed sources, which could be readily monitored, greatly expanded with the advent of telegraphy and submarine cables in the mid- to late-19th century; the various types of media now available proliferated in the 20th century, with the development of radio, television, the photocopier and the World Wide Web. Though media monitoring is generally used for capturing content or editorial opinion, it also may be used to capture advertising content.

Media monitoring services have been variously termed over time, as new players entered the market, new forms of media were created, and as new uses from available content developed. An existing group may provide such a monitoring service, as it relates to their main purpose, while a monitoring agency generally provides such as their main business. Alternative terms for these monitoring services as well as the information they provide include:

• Press clipping service or agency
• Media cutting service or agency
• Information logistics service
• Media intelligence
• Media information services

Since mass media traditionally was limited solely to print media, naturally the monitoring was also limited to these media. The world’s first press clipping agency was established in London in 1852 by a Polish newsagent named Romeike. Actors, writers, musicians and artists would visit his shop to look for articles about themselves in his Continental stock. It was then that Romeike realised that he could turn this into a profitable business.

An agency named “L’Argus de la presse” was established in Paris in 1879 by Alfred Cherie, who offered a press-clipping service to Parisian actors, enabling them to buy reviews of their work rather than purchasing the whole newspaper.

As radio and later television broadcasting were introduced in the 20th century, press clipping agencies began to expand their services into the monitoring of these broadcast media, and this task was greatly facilitated by the development of commercial audio and video tape recording systems in the 1950s and 1960s. With the growth of the Internet in the 1990s, media monitoring service extended their services to the monitoring of online information sources using new digital search and scan technologies to provide output of interest to their clients.

Then, in 1998, the now defunct WebClipping website was the first firm to start monitoring Internet based news media, moving the industry toward tracking digital news quickly.

Typically, individual or organisational clients – e. g. private companies and corporations, charities, government departments and ministries – will subscribe to a media monitoring service to keep track of what is being said about them, their field of operations, their competitors, or other specified topics of interest.

Industry

The news monitoring industry provides government agencies, corporations, public relations professionals, and other organizations access to news information created by the media. Generally monitoring print, broadcast, and internet content for any mention of specific subjects of interest, a news monitoring company will analyze and provide feedback to their client in the form of press clippings, monitoring reports, and media analysis.

Evolution

From a cut and clip service, media clipping today has expanded to incorporate technology with information. Media monitoring clients can now opt to include print, broadcast and online to capture all their media exposure. While this technology has allowed some of the process to be automated, many media monitoring agencies still offer the services of trained professionals to review and validate results.

Service delivery happens at three fronts. Clients may get their original hard copy clips through traditional means (mail/overnight delivery) or may opt for digital delivery. Digital delivery allows the end user to receive via email all the relevant news of the company, competition and industry daily, with updates as they break. The same news may also be indexed (as allowed by copyright laws) in a searchable database to be accessed by subscribers. Another option of this service is auto-analysis, wherein the data can be viewed & compared in different formats.

Every organization that uses PR invariably uses news monitoring as well. In addition to tracking their own publicity, self-generated or otherwise, news monitoring clients also use the service to track competition or industry specific trends or legislation, to build a contact base of reporters, experts, leaders for future reference, to audit the effectiveness of their PR campaigns, to verify that PR, marketing and sales messages are in sync, and to measure impact on their target market. City, State, and Federal agencies use news monitoring services to stay informed in regions they otherwise would not be able to monitor themselves and to verify that the public information disseminated is accurate, accessible in multiple formats and available to the public. Some monitoring services specialize in one or more areas of press clipping, TV and radio monitoring, or internet tracking. Media analysis is also offered by most news monitoring services.

Television news monitoring companies, especially in the United States, capture and index closed captioning text and search it for client references. Some TV monitoring companies employ human monitors who review and abstract program content; other services rely on automated search programs to search and index stories.

Online media monitoring services utilize automated software called spiders or robots (bots) to automatically monitor the content of free online news sources including newspapers, magazines, trade journals, TV station and news syndication services. Online services generally provide links but may also provide text versions of the articles. Results may or may not be verified for accuracy by the online monitoring service. Most newspapers do not include all of their print content online and some have web content that does not appear in print.

In the United States, there are trade associations formed to share best practices which include the North American Conference of Press Clipping Services and the International Association of Broadcast Monitors.

The idea for Pinterest emerged from an earlier app created by Ben Silberman and Paul Sciarra called Tote which served as a virtual replacement for paper catalogs. Tote struggled as a business, significantly due to difficulties with mobile payments. At the time, mobile payment technology was not sophisticated enough to enable easy on-the-go transactions, inhibiting users from making many purchases via the app. Tote users were, however, amassing large collections of favorite items and sharing them with other users. The behavior struck a chord with Silberman, and he shifted the company to building Pinterest, which allowed users to create collections of a variety of items and share them with each other.

The development of Pinterest began in December 2009, and the site launched the prototype as a closed beta in March 2010. Nine months after the launch, the website had 10,000 users. Silbermann said he wrote to the first 5,000 users, offering his phone number and even meeting with some of them. The launch of an iPhone app in early March 2011 brought in more downloads than expected. This was followed by an iPad app and Pinterest Mobile, a version of the website for non-iPhone users. Silbermann and a few programmers operated the site out of a small apartment until the summer of 2011.

Pinterest grew rapidly during this period. On August 10, 2011, Time magazine listed Pinterest in its “50 Best Websites of 2011” article. In December 2011, the site became one of the top 10 largest social network services, according to Hitwise data, with 11 million total visits per week. Pinterest won the Best New Startup of 2011 at the TechCrunch Crunchies Awards. For January 2012, comScore reported the site had 11.7 million unique U.S. visitors, making it the fastest site ever to break through the 10 million unique visitor mark. At the 2012 Webby Awards, Pinterest won Best Social Media App and People’s Voice Award for best functioning visual design.

Founder Ben Silbermann (left) at the South by Southwest Interactive conference in March 2012

On March 23, 2012, Pinterest unveiled updated terms of service that eliminated the policy that gave it the right to sell its users’ content. On August 10, 2012, Pinterest altered their policy so that a request or an invitation was no longer required to join the site. In October 2012, Pinterest launched business accounts allowing businesses to either convert their existing personal accounts into business accounts or start from scratch.

In April 2017, Pinterest removed their dedicated post “liking” feature as it seemed redundant to “boards”, which are user collections of posts. Users’ existing indexes of liked posts were converted into a collection (“board”) named as such.

Although starting out as a “social network” with boards, in later years the company has put increasing emphasis in visual search and e-commerce, such as shopping catalogs.

In February 2019, The Wall Street Journal stated that Pinterest secretly filed for an initial public offering (IPO) of stock. The total valuation of the company at the time reached $12 billion.They went public on April 18, 2019, at $19 per share, closing the day at $24.40 per share.

For 2020, Pinterest reported an advertising revenue of $1.7 billion, an increase of 48% from 2019. On March 3, 2021, Pinterest announced “Pinterest Premiere”, a video ads product “which will appear in people’s feeds, targeted to their interests and other characteristics.” Later in April, chief financial officer Todd Morgenfeld announced plans to spend more money on marketing in order to offset a potential slowdown in activity as the United States economy reopened, with more people getting vaccinated for COVID-19.

On October 20, 2021, Bloomberg reported that PayPal is interested in acquiring Pinterest, with a potential price of around $70 a share. PayPal’s board and management decided later that same week to back away from a potential deal.

In December 2021, Pinterest acquired the editing and video creation app Vochi. Following this, In May 2022, it was announced that Pinterest released a new video streaming app “Pinterest TV studio”. The app is aimed at allowing users to live-stream on its platform and use different devices for different angles while live-streaming on the Pinterest platform.

On June 28, 2022, Pinterest announced that co-founder, CEO and President, Ben Silberman would transition to the newly created role of Executive Chairman, and online commerce expert Bill Ready will become Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Directors.

In January 2023 at CES, Pinterest announced its partnership with LiveRamp, a data enablement platform to create data ‘clean rooms’ for selected advertisers on the platform. These ‘clean rooms’ will allow Pinterest’s ad partners to utilize first-party data for personalized ads without having to share the data with Pinterest. With data privacy a large concern for online platforms and its users, this partnership is an effort to stimulate ad business on the platform while keeping its user’s data safe and in compliance with new data collection regulations. The first advertiser to pilot this feature will be grocery retailer, Albertsons with a winter healthy eating campaign.

The creators behind Pinterest summarized the service as a “catalogue of ideas” that inspires users to “go out and do that thing”, although that it is not an image-based “social network“. It also has a very large fashion profile. In later years, Pinterest has also been described as a “visual search engine“.^[27][44]

Pinterest consists mainly of “pins” and “boards”. A pin is an image that has been linked from a website or uploaded. Pins saved from one user’s board can be saved to someone else’s board, a process known as “repinning”.Boards are collections of pins dedicated to a theme such as quotations, travel, or weddings. Boards with multiple ideas can have different sections that further contain multiple pins. Users can follow and unfollow other users as well as boards, which would fill the “home feed”.

Content can also be found outside Pinterest and similarly uploaded to a board via the “Save” button, which can be downloaded to the bookmark bar on a web browser, or be implemented by a webmaster directly on the website. It was originally called the “Pin it” button but was renamed in 2016 to “Save” due to international expansion, making the site more intuitive to new users.

In August 2016, Pinterest launched a video player that lets users and brands upload and store clips of any length straight to the site.

The home feed is a collection of Pins from the users, boards, and topics followed, as well as a few promoted pins and pins Pinterest has picked. On the main Pinterest page, a “pin feed” appears, displaying the chronological activity from the Pinterest boards that a user follows.

In October 2013, Pinterest began displaying advertisements in the form of “Promoted Pins”. Promoted Pins are based on an individual user’s interests, things done on Pinterest, or a result of visiting an advertiser’s site or app.

In 2015, Pinterest implemented a feature that allows users to search with images instead of words.

In March 2020, Pinterest introduced the “Today” tab on the home feed which shows trending pins.

In October 2022, Pinterest announced its video-focused “Idea Pins” feature will now include the ability to add popular tracks from top artists, thanks to new licensing deals with Warner Music Group, Warner Chappell Music, Merlin and BMG.

In 2017, Pinterest introduced a “visual search” function that allows users to search for elements in images (existing pins, existing parts of a photo, or new photos) and guide users to suggested similar content within Pinterest’s database.The tools powered by artificial intelligence are called Pinterest Lens, Shop the Look, and Instant Ideas

The platform has drawn businesses, especially retailers, to create pages aimed at promoting their companies online as a “virtual storefront”.

In 2013, Pinterest introduced a new tool called “Rich Pins”, to enhance the customer experience when browsing through pins made by companies. Business pages can include various data, topics, and information such as prices of products, ratings of movies or ingredients for recipes.

In June 2015, Pinterest unveiled “buyable pins” that allows users to purchase things directly from Pinterest. In October 2018, the buyable pins feature was replaced by “Product Pins”

In March 2019, Pinterest added product catalogs and personalized shopping recommendations with the “more from [brand]” option, showcasing a range of product Pins from the same business.

Pinterest Analytics

Pinterest Analytics is much like Google Analytics. It is a created service that generates comprehensive statistics on a specific website’s traffic, commonly used by marketers. Impressions, Engagements, Pin clicks, Outbound clicks, Saves are some aspects of user data that Pinterest Analytics provides. It also collects data that depicts the percentage of change within a specific time, to determine if a product is more popular on a specific day during the week, or slowly becoming unpopular. This data helps marketing agencies alter their strategies to gain more popularity, often changing the visual content to appeal to the Pinterest community. The “Most Clicked” tab in Pinterest Analytics demonstrates products that are more likely to sell. Through the access of Pinterest Analytics, companies receive insight to data via API.

PPC stands for pay-per-click, a model of digital advertising where the advertiser pays a fee each time one of their ads is clicked. Essentially, you’re paying for targeted visits to your website (or landing page or app). When PPC is working correctly, the fee is trivial because the click is worth more than what you pay for it. For example, if you pay $3 for a click, but the click results in a $300 sale, then you’ve made a hefty profit.

PPC ads come in different shapes and sizes (literally), and can be made up of text, images, videos, or a combination. They can appear on search engines, websites, social media platforms, and more.

Search engine advertising (also known as paid search or search engine marketing) is one of the most popular forms of PPC. It allows advertisers to bid for ad placement in a search engine’s sponsored links when someone performs a search related to their business offering. For example, if we bid on the keyword “google ads audit,” our ad for our free Google Ads Performance Grader may appear on the SERP for that or a related search:

How does PPC advertising work?

PPC advertising looks different from platform to platform, but in general, the process is as follows:

1. Choose your campaign type based on your objective.
2. Refine your settings and targeting (audiences, devices, locations, schedule, etc.).
3. Provide your budget and bidding strategy.
4. Input your destination URL (landing page).
5. Build your ad.

Once the ad goes live, where and when your ad appears, and how much you pay for a click on it are all determined algorithmically based on your budget, bid, campaign settings, and the quality and relevance of your ad.

Since all platforms that offer PPC advertising want to keep their users satisfied, they reward advertisers who create relevant, trustworthy pay-per-click campaigns with higher ad positioning and lower costs.

So if you want to maximize your profits from PPC, you need to learn how to do it right.

What is Google Ads?

Google Ads is the single most popular PPC advertising system in the world. The Google Ads platform enables businesses to create ads that appear on Google’s search engine and other Google properties.

Every time a search is initiated, Google digs into the pool of ads and chooses a set of winners to appear on that search engine results page.

The “winners” are chosen based on a combination of factors, including the quality and relevance of their keywords and ad campaigns, as well as the size of their keyword bids. We’ll explain that in the next section.

How PPC works in Google Ads

When advertisers create an ad, they choose a set of keywords to target with that ad and place a bid on each keyword. So if you bid on the keyword “pet adoption,” you are telling Google you want your ad to appear for searches that match or are related to pet adoption (more on keyword match types here).

Google uses a set of formulas and an auction-style process to decide which ads get to appear for any one search. If your ad is entered into the auction, it will first give you a Quality Score from one to 10 based on your ad’s relevance to the keyword, your expected click-through rate, and landing page quality.

It will then multiply your Quality Score by your maximum bid (the most you’re willing to pay for a click on that ad) to determine your Ad Rank. The ads with the highest Ad Rank scores are the ones that show.

This system allows winning advertisers to reach potential customers at a cost that fits their budget. It’s essentially a kind of auction. The below infographic illustrates how the Google Ads auction works.

How to do PPC with Google Ads

Conducting PPC marketing through Google Ads is particularly valuable because, as the most popular search engine, Google gets massive amounts of traffic and therefore delivers the most impressions and clicks to your ads. How often your PPC ads appear depends on which keywords and match types you select. While a number of factors determine how successful your PPC advertising campaign will be, you can achieve a lot by doing the following:

• Bid on relevant keywords. Crafting relevant PPC keyword lists, tight keyword groups, and proper ad text.
• Focus on landing page quality. Create optimized landing pages with persuasive, relevant content, and a clear call to action tailored to specific search queries.
• Improve your Quality Score. Quality Score is Google’s rating of the quality and relevance of your keywords, landing pages, and PPC campaigns. Advertisers with better Quality Scores get more ad clicks at lower costs.
• Capture attention. Enticing ad copy is vital; and if you’re running display or social ads, so is eye-catching ad creative.

How to do effective PPC keyword research

Keyword research for PPC can be incredibly time-consuming, but it is also incredibly important. Your entire PPC campaign is built around keywords, and the most successful Google Ads advertisers continuously grow and refine their PPC keyword list. If you only do keyword research once, when you create your first campaign, you are probably missing out on hundreds of thousands of valuable, long-tail, low-cost, and highly relevant keywords that could be driving traffic to your site.

You can check our full guide to keyword research here, but in short, an effective PPC keyword list should be:

• Relevant: Of course, you don’t want to be paying for clicks that aren’t going to convert. That means the keywords you bid on should be closely related to the offerings you sell.
• Exhaustive: Your keyword research should include not only the most popular and frequently searched terms in your niche, but long-tail keywords. These are more specific and less common, but they add up to account for the majority of search-driven traffic. In addition, they are less competitive, and therefore less expensive.
• Expansive: PPC is iterative. You want to constantly refine and expand your campaigns, and create an environment in which your keyword list is constantly growing and adapting.

If you want to find high-volume, industry-specific keywords to use in your PPC campaigns, be sure to check out our Free Keyword Tool.

Managing your PPC campaigns

Once you’ve created your new campaigns, you’ll need to manage them regularly to make sure they continue to be effective. In fact, regular account activity is one of the best predictors of account success. You should be continuously analyzing the performance of your account and making the following adjustments to optimize your campaigns:

• Continuously add PPC keywords: Expand the reach of your PPC campaigns by adding keywords that are relevant to your business.
• Add negative keywords: Add non-converting terms as negative keywords to improve campaign relevancy and reduce wasted spend.
• Review costly PPC keywords: Review expensive, under-performing keywords and shut them off if necessary.
• Refine landing pages: Modify the content and CTAs of your landing pages to align with individual search queries in order to boost conversion rates. Don’t send all your traffic to the same page.
• Split ad groups: Improve click-through rate (CTR) and Quality Score by splitting up your ad groups into smaller, more relevant ad groups, which help you create more targeted ad text and landing pages. More on account structure here.

A freelance digital marketer is a professional with multiple ranges of skills from content and copywriting to social media, search engine optimization, ad creation, building websites, strategy building, and design. Digital marketers engage in online communities, join conversations on LinkedIn, and share great content on Facebook. They try to do anything they can to ensure their clients reach their goals (sales, generating leads, meetings, sales calls).

You might be surprised when I tell you that it can be anyone from anywhere.

It can be an 18-year-old at the start of his career or a 40-year old that comes from technical engineering. Freelancing in itself is a lifestyle that anyone can adopt at any point in their life and career, and it matters how and where you do it, not your past, school, jobs, or companies.

I’m a big believer that anyone can do marketing. And please don’t take any offense to that. What I mean is that when I dropped out of college, I barely knew a thing or two about the world of marketing. But I’ve learned everything by myself googling, reading marketing agency blogs, talking to experts from online communities, influencers, podcasters, social media managers working in agencies, CEOs, and employees – EVERYONE. Yes, I really embraced the wonders of the internet.

I talked with all the people I could learn from.

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I started to share my experience with them. And started taking courses – because again, internet comes to the rescue with dozens of courses on marketing and social media, like these ones.

And that’s the best part of it.

When thinking about the pros and cons of digital freelance marketing:

Digital marketers love that they can sometimes work for themselves, travel around the world, save on commute, and unnecessary meetings that you can do via an online conference calls platform. At the same time, sometimes they’re struggling to work alone.

What are the pros of working in digital freelance marketing?
Live wherever you want (Bali, Hong Kong, or Sydney).
Get to create your own schedule and be your own boss!
Build your own team and outsource work if you want to.
Save time and money on daily commuting when you work from home.
Enjoy a different office every day – choose any coffee shops or co-working space or just space that resembles an office.
Choose the clients and projects you’ll spend your time on.
Work as little or as much as you prefer.
Set your own social media management pricing.
What are the cons of working as a freelance digital marketer?
No fixed salary – you have to be crunch the numbers and make sure you’re earning enough.
No company benefits, such as health insurance, 401k, free gym membership, etc.
You’re a one-man (woman) show – account, writer, designer, and analyst, sometimes it might get overwhelming.
Distractions everywhere! Netflix, bed, food.
The sales part of freelancing can be very time consuming.
Lack of co-workers might feel isolating and not motivating.
You will be in charge of sales and marketing yourself.

What’s the digital freelancer day-to-day?
When working as a digital marketing freelancer – learning becomes a daily thing, because as I mentioned earlier – it’s a one-man (woman) show. There are multiple responsibilities and tasks to do, and they vary every day, depending on clients.

A digital freelancer can learn anything from Photoshop to web design or HTML. Which is quite exciting for some of us.

These are just some of the responsibilities of a freelance digital marketer:

1. Create a digital marketing strategy
2. Send monthly reports to the clients by using free marketing templates
3. Set up KPIs
4. Write blog posts
5. Create PDFs, eBooks, presentations, or any other promotional materials
6. Design case studies
7. Start a podcast (here’s a list for inspiration) or webinar
8. Design an infographic
9. Write newsletters
10. Write copy for the website
11. Build the marketing funnel
12. Learn marketing concepts
13. Improve conversions and CTAs
14. Create social media calendars
15. Hold a webinar
16. Design a website with portfolio website builder (and monetize it)
17. Stay active in relevant online communities
18. Have a client meeting to discuss the next steps
19. Create Facebook or Google Ads
20. Search Engine Optimisation
21. Join an in-house affiliate program
22. Build backlinks for website authority
23. Improve website speed
24. Take sales calls
25. Onboard new clients
26. Create QR codes (bridge the gap between traditional and digital marketing)
27. Build online courses

I know it might sound overwhelming, but there are dozens of productivity tools for better results. In case you’re looking for a digital marketing freelancer, you can use the list above to quickly build the perfect job description and help guide you through the requirements of your ideal candidate.

Did I miss anything? Let me know by tweeting this article and tag me on Twitter (@vladcalus)

What skills should a digital marketing freelancer have?
Firstly, set your expectations right.

Freelancers sometimes run in circles multitasking. It sometimes gets to situations where everything is chaos – there’s a half-written tweet, a few paragraphs of an article, some pieces of design left in the trash, a client meeting starting in 10 minutes and there’s always something to catch up on. There’s a lot to learn in freelance marketing. You can become an expert in marketing by learning all types of skills or choosing something to specialize in. Also, always keep an eye on marketing trends.

1. Email marketing
   Some of us really hate e-mails, eblasts, and newsletters. And that’s why marketers have to learn the witchcraft of building the perfect newsletter, onboarding e-mails, outreach messages, or product updates. It’s a much-required skill. As an email marketing freelancer, you’ll highly improve your copywriting skills that will prove to be useful in other areas of your freelance job.

Some of the basics you need to learn are the following:

Ask for willingness to receive emails (remember GDPR?)
Find your perfect tool to work with (NinjaOutreach, Mailchimp, or Mailchimp alternatives, EmailOctopus, Snov.io, etc.) When we checked out this GetResponse review, we found they now offer their email marketing software for free. That is a great way to get started, and then you can upgrade to other paid tools later
Master the perfect headline (few tips here)
Write great copy for the email
Improve your email signatures
Make sure you have powerful CTA
Run Email A/B Test (read a guide here)
Always follow up (even up to 5 times, when doing outreach)
Clean your list, if people are inactive
I also found these email newsletter examples to be highly useful if you’re looking for inspiration.

PRO TIP: Even the best-written marketing email can only go so far if it doesn’t reach the recipient’s inbox. Fortunately, free spam checker tools like MailGenius help make sure your marketing emails get delivered (and opened) instead of getting lost in the spam folder.

2. Content Marketing & SEO
   If you’re a Jedi with words and you type with the speed of light, then skip this part. Content marketing is everywhere. From billboards to Amazon products, articles, and websites. It’s one of the most useful skills for any digital marketing freelancer in my opinion, as any of them should be able to create a great copy. Did you know that Welcome Emails have an 82.57% Open Rate? That’s your perfect chance to charm your users with the perfect sales pitch.

I recommend checking out this piece by Inc. to learn more about Content Marketing. If you want to go more in-depth, I suggest signing up for Planable Academy. Upgrade Your Content Marketing OS. You’ll learn from 20 experts who are at the front of content creation and workflow management. In each of the 6 chapters, you’ll deep-dive into every step of the modern content workflow. In the end, you’ll get clear guidelines on what to do next. The best part? It’s free.

Also, you can use some SEO tools that could help you in this process such as Ahrefs, Semrush, SERanking, Moz, Linkio.

You’ll also have to master what SEO means, how to build links with other blogs, rank on the first page of Google, optimize your website speed, and constantly outreach the website. It’s hard and constant work but pays a lot- min. 500$ / month.

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3. Analytics
   I’m not a data geek myself, but in the world of digital marketing, you should measure everything. It’s one of the greatest things about this industry – data is everything. Ideally, your analytics approach should be divided into three steps – capture data, analyze, and interpret it. Taking data-driven decisions should be one of the most important pillars and values of each marketer.

With Google Analytics Academy you can learn analytics with free online courses, learn about Google’s measurement tools so that you can grow your clients’ business through intelligent data collection and analysis.

Additionally here’s a great piece by Link Humans – The Complete Guide to Analytics in Digital Marketing.

4. Facebook, Google Ads & Social Media
   Facebook Ads Manager is amazing, but a lot of small businesses and brands find it very complicated. And that’s exactly where you come into the game. There are A LOT of brands looking for someone to manage their Ads and this is definitely not a full-time job.

I’d say it’s more about monitoring the Ads and making sure you constantly optimize them. Also, learn more about sentiment analysis to understand how to better optimize your ads.

I totally understand the fear of facing the dragon. The first time I looked at Ads Manager I saw it as a complicated puzzle, and I just started poking holes. After a bit of research, I understood where to start from, found the best tips, and then chose it as one of the main platforms for my marketing strategy.

You don’t have to pay for Udemy courses to learn how to do Ads – it’s all online. Creating good ads is actually the trick. In the learning process, I suggest you create a fake page, put some cents into it and play around with all the ad formats available. There’s nothing like practice when developing a new skill.

You’ll have to master both the arts of design and copywriting, to understand who exactly is the audience you’re targeting, their desires, needs, problems, and how you solve them. You’ll have to learn to convert your audience to website visitors and then to paying customers. Facebook Blueprint is one of the best resources if you want to learn how to do ads. In case you’re looking to learn more about Google Ads, here’s a great resource.

Where can you find the best freelance digital marketing jobs?
Freelancer is not a typical employee in a company. They can easily choose from any variety of clients, depending on the budget and job required. Digital marketers working as freelancers provide their own conditions and consultancy on an independent basis. And a lot of them find their next client on one of the following platforms:

Upwork
Link-able
The Dots
LinkedIn Jobs
FlexJobs
ClearVoice Marketplace
Media Bistro
Problogger
People Per Hour
RemoteOK
99designs
Make sure you have a great description on your profile, a good profile picture, and a personalized message when looking to apply for a job. It will highly increase your chances. I’d also recommend you to read this piece. Oh, and don’t worry about the logistics for payment – there are tools such as Bonsai to help you with that.

What’s the salary of a freelance marketer?
LinkedIn recently introduced a new way to help its users and companies with their recruiting processes by showing salaries across countries, positions, and cities. It shows estimated data and salary ranges for open roles available on LinkedIn jobs. Numbers are either provided by employers or are estimated ranges from data submitted by members. The tool can be adjusted to reflect a professional’s experience, skills, education level, company size, industry, and location.

We can see that based on 1205 responses submitted by LinkedIn members who have this title in the United States, the average salary for a digital marketing manager is $72,000/year, in a range between $45K and $102k.

Digital Marketing Specialist – $51,000/yr
Online Marketing Manager – $77,000/yr
Digital Marketing Director – $110,000/yr
Digital Marketing Consultant – $70,000/yr
Social Media Manager – $53,500/yr
From these numbers, you can figure out some desirable hourly / monthly rate for you.

Let’s see what Glassdoor says:

Digital Marketing Manager $77K
Digital Marketing Specialist $67K
Online Marketing $37K
Online Marketing Manager $71K
SEO $57K
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5 tips to find your next client as a digital marketer

1. View profile → Connect → E-mail outreach → Follow up
   It’s one of my favorite hacks. So, what’s the story? You can find your next client on Linkedin, as it’s a growing platform meant exclusively for professionals and it has over 300M users worldwide.

What should you do?

Step 1: Install a software, such as Dux Soup/Meet Leonard

Step 2: Choose the people you want to reach using LinkedIn Search

Step 3: Automate View Profile using the tools above

Step 4: Automate Connect Profile with the people from Step 3 (with a personalized message)

Step 5: Scrap their e-mails using Hunter.io or FindThatLead

Step 6: Send them a personalized email (take care of GDPR! If they’re in Europe, don’t do it)

Step 7: Follow up on Linkedin and email

Step 8: Set up a meeting

2. Optimize your LinkedIn profile with the best keywords and description
   As I’ve mentioned, Linkedin is an amazing place to look for new clients, besides dozens of other marketplaces. Make sure you optimize your Linkedin profile with all the necessary details to target exactly the types of clients you’re looking for.

Some tips on optimizing your profile:

Fill in every section
Make sure you have a professional headshot – it improves your chances to get your profile viewed with 14x
Add an inspirational cover photo (you speaking at an event, guiding someone or working)
Ask friends and connections to endorse your skills
Create a vanity URL
Get recommendations from past clients
Optimize your profile for search engines with keywords matching your description, for example – Digital Marketing Freelancer, Expert in SEO
Showcase your past work, clients, results, and numbers!
If you’re lucky enough, people will view your profile, check out your headshot, cover photo, and headline. Consider complementing your efforts with tools that can help you boost your efforts in getting people to your profile. Now they’re reading your bio, checking your website, and looking to connect. Bam! Great job.

LinkedIn is your main landing page to get new clients.

Be specific in describing what you do, and how you can help other people!

3. Bring value for free
   Another secret for rocking the freelance digital marketing world is being generous. It takes time, but it’s beneficial without a doubt. Go to several Facebook/LinkedIn Groups (or your profile) and offer people your help in any marketing related problem (that you know). Here’s an example of a message

“Hey, awesome community!

I’m John, a digital marketing expert with more than 5 years of experience and I’m here to help. I’d like to offer to anyone interested a free 20 min consultancy on how to optimize your website and social media marketing strategy.

Interested? Drop a comment below.”

After that, you already have lots of leads and tons of people that can recommend you or intro to other companies needing a professional like you. You can also invite people in the Facebook/LinkedIn Groups to join a free webinar where you share your digital marketing knowledge. This is an effective way to interact with your audience and show off your expertise. Plus, hosting a webinar nowadays is simple, as there are tons of excellent webinar services that can help you handle the job.

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4. Engage in conversation
   Give feedback to the people you think can improve their Facebook company page or Instagram profile. Just go right there, and write them a personalized message with a few things they can easily improve directly to get better reach and conversion on their product. There are a lot of rookie mistakes multiple brands still do such as:

Bad profile description
No CTA on the page
Low-quality profile picture
No engaging photo
Lack of links
Bad Ads
It’s exactly your chance to tell them how you can help, share a few suggestions, and present yourself in the message. If they’re interested in knowing more, schedule a call and offer your services.

5. Join Facebook Groups
   Over the past few years, I watched Facebook groups skyrocketing. Position yourself as a freelance digital marketing consultant and make sure people understand it. You can start by sharing the latest social media news in the Facebook groups you’re part of. This way, your name pops up more often than the other – engage, talk, ask a question, and follow up with people to make sure you establish a personal connection. You can also explore the best Facebook groups for entrepreneurs and potentially find new clients there.

You can also write an eBook (like this one I published recently on building marketing teams of the future) and share it in multiple Facebook Groups or Guest Post. That’s a tactic to collect leads and follow-up with an offer for your services.

One more idea that’s time-consuming but brings good results, is by starting your own course on one of the popular platforms such as Udemy or Skillshare. Aside from proving your expertise and gaining credibility, you’ll get people to know you, get opportunities as a speaker or interviews and it may go way beyond a standard omnichannel marketing strategy.

Digital Marketing Freelancing FAQs
Freelance vs full-time
There is no easy “yes” or “no” answer to the question “is freelance better than full-time?” This might not be the breakdown you were expecting, but it all boils down to you. What is your personal lifestyle and what are your expectations from freelancing? What would you be giving up if you went from being a full-time employee to freelancing? On the other hand, what would you gain?

It might not be a glamorous answer, but making a pros and cons list will shed some light on this tough-to-crack nut. Only you know where the balance tips.

Is becoming a freelancer truly worth it?
Freelancing is not for everyone and you might belong to this category. Before you go all-in, do some soul-searching and think hard about what you want to get out of it. Are you looking for more income or flexible hours? With freelancing, clients ebb and flow, so if you’re not comfortable with hustling, wearing various hats and multi-tasking, it might not be for you.

What’s the best way to start a freelance digital marketing career with no experience?
The first step would be to get on a first-name basis with everything digital marketing. Curiosity and hunger for knowledge will take you far. Don’t overlook SEO: take some online courses and optimize your website to gain some experience. If you want to become a well-rounded freelance digital marketer, spend some time learning about Ads (primarily Google and Facebook). Spend some time on analytics tools to learn how to interpret data, measure KPIs and create customized reports.

You might also want to join a community of marketers like Acadium where you can launch your marketing career for free learn the basics of marketing to start building your portfolio, or even find an apprenticeship to skyrocket your career.

How can you get your first freelancing gig?
If it’s an option, get an internship to start accumulating experience ASAP. Whether it’s paid or unpaid, you will gain essential skills that you’ll later use running your own gigs. If you already have some experience but you’re unsure how to get started, start networking (reach out to connections on LinkedIn or past co-workers) or browse the many sites that list projects and tasks for freelance digital marketers.

How do you know if freelancing is for you?
Unfortunately, there’s no shortcut to figuring out if freelancing is for you. The first months (or even years) of freelancing are almost never smooth sailing. You need to keep grinding to build up your reputation and start accumulating loyal customers. Sometimes it gets easier. But other times, it doesn’t. This fast-paced, hustling environment is not for everyone. If you want to dip a toe in the stream of freelancing, consider taking up a couple of projects alongside your full-time job and only make the jump to freelancing once you’re fully confident the lifestyle suits you. Remember it’s always ok to change your mind if your priorities shift or if you’re unhappy.

How to easily collaborate with your clients
When it comes to seamless social media collaboration, Planable can be your go-to app.

Save time
Time is money. Especially for freelancers. From having all clients centralized in one place to the much cleaner inboxes, everyone will enjoy the actual productivity and efficiency of the new system.

Become more productive
Every new client you’ll take on means that communication needs add up, and inefficiencies along the way cause more wasted time. With Planable you can pick an hour you want to spend to go through client feedback and your days stay organized. Whereas with Google Docs and emails the days will become hectic. You might check emails in the morning, get 20 different messages with feedback from the same client asking you to check this and that. It will never come at the right time.

I always say marketers don’t focus enough on the operational side of things. We always postpone looking at this issue because we’re too busy and because it’s not an exciting project. The right workflow, however, can change the way any digital marketing freelancer runs.

Safe client management
When clients are onboarded in the wrong processes and setups, miscommunication is a big risk. Losing pieces of information and feedback can lead to frustration from both parties. It makes you feel guilty and overwhelmed by the scattered messaging and the client feels like they’re not being treated with responsibility.

Clients don’t and shouldn’t understand how complicated it can be for a freelancer to manage multiple brands at once. With Planable, everything is centralized as it’s all in that one place. Clients know that’s the place to leave feedback and they’re happy with it.

Automated publishing
Once you’re done with collaborating on your posts, you can easily schedule them to go live. In fact, there’s a magic button that enables you to automatically schedule posts once the client approves them. So. many. saved. hours. Plus, we just released the direct publishing feature for Instagram. Which is huge for the marketing community. Why? Because now you won’t need push notifications for every damn post. You can become the best Instagram freelancer combining Planable’s grid view & automated posting. Want to give it a go?

1. What does a freelance digital marketer actually do?
   A freelance digital marketer is a self-employed individual who uses one or several marketing channels and techniques to help businesses promote their products and services. Freelance digital marketers typically specialize in one of the many digital marketing channels available. Some of the most common freelance digital marketing fields are:
2. Content marketing
   Freelance digital marketers specializing in content marketing promote brand awareness using written content. Content marketing encompasses content strategy, copywriting (writing webpage copy), and long-form content writing (like this blog post you’re reading!). Often, content marketing works in tandem with other digital marketing channels like social media and SEO.
3. Search engine optimization (SEO)
   SEO refers to organizing and optimizing content so that search engines (like Google, Bing, and Ecosia) recognize it as useful and rank it highly in search results. Freelance digital marketers specializing in SEO typically work closely with the content team to optimize content for search engines using industry best practices.
4. Social media management
   Social media platforms have become a marketing pillar in many industries. Freelance digital marketers specializing in social media management work to improve engagement and growth on social media. They manage brand accounts, experiment with effective strategies, and monitor growth across platforms.

Curious about social media management? Learn about what a social media manager actually does in this guide, and learn how to become a social media manager here.

4. Search engine marketing (SEM)
   Although similar sounding, SEM is different from SEO. In SEM, the freelance digital marketer focuses on creating, placing, and monitoring ads on search engine results to promote a business. They research keywords and monitor the performance of pay-per-click (PPC) ads.

Learn more: What is SEM?

5. Video marketing
   Video is becoming an increasingly popular and highly valued content format. Videos can be used across marketing channels and shared on platforms like YouTube and Vimeo for greater engagement. Freelance digital marketers in video marketing conceptualize, script, and oversee video production.

We’ve outlined just some of the areas a digital marketing freelancer might focus on. Essentially, any kind of marketing job that can be done in-house can also be done in a freelance capacity, too! We’ve rounded up some of the most in-demand digital marketing skills and professions here.

A freelance digital marketing expert working outside on a laptop

2. How to get started in freelance digital marketing: A step-by-step guide
   Digital marketing can be intimidating if you’re a complete newbie. And even if you’ve worked in the field, starting as a freelancer can feel daunting. Follow this step-by-step guide to get started.
3. Establish your niche
   Digital marketing is a broad industry, so niching is key to the success of your career. Try to do everything, and you may find yourself spread thin and constantly feeling like a rookie starting from scratch with every project.

However, niching doesn’t mean you only have to do the same thing every day. For example, my digital marketing niche is content marketing. Within content marketing, I focus on content writing specifically. In content writing, I’ve decided to write long-form content for mostly B2B audiences. In that context, I’m open to more fields such as SaaS, digital marketing, healthcare, and cybersecurity. I’m also happy to try new subject matter—all within that niche.

Ideally, your niche should be at the intersection of your interests, capabilities, and high availability of well-paying gigs. For example, perhaps you’re interested in social media marketing. You’ll quickly learn that you enjoy some industries or jobs more within that niche. Maybe you prefer Instagram strategy to Pinterest management, for instance. You’ll also learn that some jobs pay better than others. You can then use that information to choose a niche.

TL;DR: Choosing a niche is crucial to succeeding as a freelance digital marketer. However, take time to try a variety of specialties and industries before you decide—and don’t be afraid to change your mind and pivot later.

2. Build a portfolio
   Regardless of your industry and specialty, you need a website as a freelance digital marketer. Digital marketers work online, which makes your website your online office or shop front. You can find cheap site hosts and simple setup options like Notion to get started.

Your website is foremost proof that you have the tech-savvy and expertise to market yourself. On your site, you can show off various skills, from SEO to copywriting, design, video production, and content writing. You can also host your work portfolio and testimonials, all in one place.

No portfolio or testimonials yet? Be your first client. Write blog posts, grow a personal brand and social media following. Tell clients the SEO results you’ve accomplished with your site. Be your first success story, and watch other clients roll in. You can learn more about how to create an awesome digital marketing portfolio here.

TL;DR: Every freelance digital marketer needs a website and online portfolio. To prove yourself as a digital media/marketing expert, start with your business and highlight your marketing skills on your site.

3. Find a network
   Marketing without an audience or network feels a lot like screaming into the void. Networking is essential to a successful freelance business. Peak Freelance’s study quoted earlier shows that 42% of freelancers find high-paying gigs from word-of-mouth referrals. In 2021, I found 3 out of 5 new clients through referrals!

Networking with other freelance digital marketers will also help you determine how to set rates based on the market and your experience.

On social media platforms like Twitter and LinkedIn, be curious about other freelancers—especially those in your niche or industry. Befriend them, share what you’re doing in your business, and even that you’re looking for work!

Facebook is known for having supportive freelancer groups and communities. Run a quick search for groups with freelancers in your niche. Join and participate actively. You can also join freelance communities outside Facebook, depending on your niche. For example, I have benefited from being part of Peak Freelance—a community for freelance writers (also how I got those referrals).

TL:DR: You need a network to win at freelancing. Hiring managers and marketing leads tend to rely more on referrals from trusted contacts than job postings. Build your network by actively participating on social media, joining freelancing communities, and patiently building relationships with other freelance digital marketers.

4. Promote your business
   Promoting your freelance digital marketing business requires a multi-pronged approach. Self-promotion is key to finding new clients—particularly high-paying ones. However, it can be tricky when you’re new to the business and don’t have many contacts or much of a portfolio. Thankfully, it’s not impossible.

In addition to the tips we’ve shared so far, try these two effective promotion strategies to find new clients:

Cold pitching: This involves reaching out to business owners or marketing leads in your preferred industries and pitching them your services. Many marketing leads need a freelance digital marketer but either don’t know it or have no idea where to find one. Before pitching, research how your skills can help. Can you help their site rank on search engines? Do you have a strategy to help them grow their social media platforms? Show them. Use stats from your website or social media profiles (hello, portfolio!).
Working for free: This may be contentious, but for some people, it’s the only way to gain experience in the field. It also looks different for every specialty. For example, writers can submit guest posts to big brands in their industries. Social media managers can pitch themselves for unpaid internships, and budding SEO experts can barter their services to another freelancer who can offer them a service in return. Win-win!
TL;DR: Being a successful freelance digital marketing expert requires salesperson skills. It’s good practice for marketing other people’s businesses. Don’t be afraid to pitch businesses and marketing leads or work for free at the start of your career.

5. Make it legal
   As your business starts to take off (it will!), it’s time to make things legal. Register your business (either as a sole-proprietorship or LLC—I prefer the latter), get a tax ID if it’s applicable in your country, and start tracking your income and expenses ahead of the tax filing season.

Even before you register your business, learn basic business skills like sending invoices—yes, even for your first job. Something else to implement from day one is using a contract for every business engagement (you can send yours if your client doesn’t send one) and including payment terms within.

More of a visual learner? Watch the following video with CareerFoundry’s own Chief Marketing Officer, Ed Wood, who goes over these steps and other insider tips:

3. Tips to help you succeed in your freelance digital marketing career
4. Treat it like a business
   You’re not just a freelancer; you’re a business owner. Some ways to treat your freelance career like a business include creating a separate bank account, paying yourself well (set competitive rates), and showing up to work whether or not you’re feeling “motivated” (as long as you’re mentally and physically healthy).
5. Keep learning
   Invest in yourself by learning about your industry and updating your skills as much as you can. It’s tempting to focus on scoring gig after gig, but it is vital to set aside time in your schedule to pour into yourself. Digital marketing requires creativity, and you can’t draw from an empty well.

Curious about a career in Digital Marketing?
Start learning for free!

3. Set boundaries
   Being your own boss is a double-edged sword. You have the flexibility to work 9-5 hours, but also to overwork yourself and work round the clock with no coworkers to pick up the slack. It’s easy to overbook yourself or find yourself tethered to your inbox, responding to client requests at all hours. Set firm boundaries about when you will work and what time to reserve for your hobbies and loved ones.
4. Raise your rates regularly
   Be a good boss to yourself by raising your rates regularly. This shows that you value your work and what you do for clients. It also allows you to grow your business (you can’t scale by charging the same rates for years and years). I raise my rates every six months, and when I was starting out, I raised them with every new client. How you choose to raise yours is up to you.
5. Take breaks frequently
   Finally, nourish yourself. Creating a sustainable freelance career depends a lot on how you care for yourself. You are the engine of your business. Hustling yourself into burnout is the quickest way to ruin all your hard work. So, plan breaks every quarter—or every week! I work a four-day week and try to take one week off every quarter. It’s always worth it.
6. Is a career in freelance digital marketing right for you?
   In 2020, there were 59 million Americans freelancing, a trend that continued through 2021 and beyond. With the booming freelance economy, many people are considering leaving their full-time jobs and working for themselves. But is freelance digital marketing the right fit for you?

There are two parts to consider: freelancing itself, and a career in digital marketing. Let’s look into both aspects and help you figure out if this is the best path for you.

Pros and cons of freelancing
On surface evaluation, freelancing can seem like abundant freedom—and it is in some ways. But from experience, I can tell you that there are other aspects to think about first. Here are the pros and cons of freelancing.

Pros
Freedom to choose your work projects, niche, and clients based on your preferences
A flexible work schedule
Ability to scale your business and salary as desired
You get all the credit for your work
All business profits belong to you
Cons
Unpredictable income
You’ll need to wear all the hats and market your business
Work-life balance can be challenging to achieve
No health or other employer benefits
Now you’re aware of some of the pros and cons of a freelance career, let’s look closely at the skills and qualifications you should master before becoming a digital marketer—freelance or not.

What to consider before becoming a digital marketer
Before you hand in your resignation and dive into the industry, figure out if this career is the best fit for you, your interests, and your abilities. Ask yourself these questions:

Am I creative enough to develop marketing strategies across various platforms and media?
How strong are my writing and editing skills?
Do I enjoy analyzing campaign results and adjusting strategies until I find the right fit?
How well do I know SEO? Am I willing to learn more about it?
Am I tech-savvy?
Do I have an eye for design?
How good are my community-building skills?
These questions highlight just a few of the skills you’ll need to possess to excel at digital marketing. Granted, not every skill is necessary for all facets of digital marketing, but you’ll at least need an understanding of them and why they’re so important to the broader digital marketing strategy and efforts.

If you’re convinced that this is the job for you, perhaps a look at your potential earnings as a freelance digital marketer will seal the deal.

A freelance digital marketing specialist sitting on a sofa, working on a laptop

5. How much could you earn as a freelance digital marketer?
   Freelancing earnings, in general, vary widely, depending on industry and years of experience. This also applies to freelance digital marketers. Your annual revenue will depend mainly on your specialization and your niche within that specialty.

For example, a study by Peak Freelance showed that over 50% of freelance writers (content marketing) earn less than $30,000 per annum. However, the same survey showed that 27% of writers earn over $50,000 per year. It also highlighted that all freelancers making over $100K have been writing for at least two years, showing how experience plays into annual income.

Earnings for other digital marketing specialties are slightly different. According to our research, social media managers earn an average salary of $54,874.

Zip Recruiter reports that freelance digital marketing managers earn $68,970 per year. Other outlets report varying average salaries between $84,000 and $123,000. For comparison, read our full guide to digital marketing manager salaries for in-house roles.

So, how much could you earn? The possibilities are endless. It just depends on what you do and how well you do it. You can learn more about how to price yourself as a freelancer in this guide.

6. Freelance digital marketing FAQs
   Before we wrap things up, we’ll answer a few common questions about getting started in freelance digital marketing.

Can I do freelancing with digital marketing?
Yes! Freelance digital marketing is a sustainable career. The nature of work, regardless of specialty, lends itself to a freelance schedule. Just pick a niche!

How do I become a digital marketer with no experience?
Learn about the field by taking introductory courses and then practice what you learn in your business. If you want to go into SEO, start an SEO blog and hone your writing skills along the way. Don’t want to invest in a blog of your own? Then help a friend optimize theirs for free or little pay. There’s your experience and first portfolio client.

What qualifications do I need for digital marketing?
Digital marketing does not require specific educational qualifications. A degree in marketing or journalism might serve you if you already have one. But if you don’t, you could take an upskilling digital marketing program, then focus on gaining experience as that counts the most. We talk more about whether or not you need a degree to become a digital marketer here.

7. Key takeaways and next steps
   Figuring out how to get started in freelance digital marketing can be tricky. I’ve been there! But I can also tell you that it is possible. As discussed, follow these steps to start your freelance digital marketing career:

Choose a niche: Which marketing channel would you rather focus on? And in which industry?
Build a portfolio: You can do this by working for free, being your first client, or trying an internship. The one thing you must do? Have a website.
Find a network: Build a referral engine by befriending other freelancers and joining communities on and off social media.
Promote your business: Tell people what you do on social media and by cold pitching.
Make it legal: Make sure your business follows legal guidelines. Treat your work like a real business by starting a separate business account and showing up consistently.
Ready to take the plunge? Start by learning more about digital marketing in our free, 5-day course, or read any of the following recommended articles:

Should you do a digital marketing degree or a digital marketing bootcamp?
How to become a digital marketing manager
The 8 best online courses to learn digital marketing
What You Should Do Now
Get a hands-on introduction to digital marketing with a free, self-paced short course comprised of five short tutorials.

Take part in one of our FREE live online digital marketing events with industry experts, and check out digital marketing student Adelina’s portfolio project.

Become a job-ready digital marketer in just 3-7 months—all backed by the CareerFoundry job guarantee.

This month, we’re offering 100 partial scholarships worth up to $1,285 off our career-change programs To secure your discount, speak to one of our advisors today!

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