Traditional Marketing vs. Digital Marketing: Differences and Examples

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What is traditional marketing?

Traditional marketing refers to all communication, promotion and sales strategies that are developed in the offline environment. That is, non-digital marketing actions such as posters or physical events.

Marketing arises from the need for companies to promote and differentiate their products from those of their competitors. We could say that marketing has existed practically as long as there have been businesses, but it has been evolving.

Traditionally, businesses sold in a local environment and relied on posters, australia email list brochures, events and other direct contact actions.

In principle, when our objective is to promote a product or service locally , an offline strategy still generates more engagement. In this case, traditional marketing does not mean “old-fashioned”, but rather “non-digital” marketing.

In B2B, many industrial and technology companies have not yet discovered all their digital options to sell more. They continue to promote their products and sell with traditional marketing techniques.

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Why is it said that B2B companies are more traditional than B2C companies?
In the B2B sector there is still a strong tendency towards traditional marketing . Many industrial and technological companies still have large sales teams that travel around the provinces and countries visiting companies with cold contact.

The marketing department, if it existed, was a provider of brochures, catalogues and little else.

And although many companies still have this structure, digitalization has created stronger marketing departments with more responsibility for generating new business.



Extra Information!

According to data published in CONNEXT's annual Marketing and Sales Report, which analyses the state of digitalisation in B2B companies in Spain each year, this is the evolution of marketing departments:

2019/2020

Small departments with 1 or 2 marketing professionals (57%)
16% of companies have a department of more than 5 people.
7% do not even have an independent marketing department.

Download the full 2020 Report here

2020/2021

In 38% of cases, the marketing area is managed by just 1 professional, Marketing Manager, who in many cases is supported by an outsourced agency.

Between 2 and 5 people, in 47% of cases.
11% work in departments of between 6 and 10 people
4% say they have a team of more than 10 people.


Download the full 2021 Report here

2021/2022

Marketing departments are still small. The role of the “Marketing Manager” still prevails, but changes have occurred. 50.83% of those interviewed indicated that they had not grown as a team; 49.17% had.

Half of the respondents, between 2 and 5 people (50%).
Departments with only one person (30.83%).
Departments with more than 10 people (12.50%)
Between 6 and 10 people (6.67%).
Download the full 2022 Report here

2023/2024

Marketing departments are still not evolving in terms of size and composition of people. The figure of the “Marketing Manager” prevails over the rest of the profiles that could make up a Marketing department.

45.7% of the teams are made up of 1 or 2 members.
Apartments for 3 or 4 people (24.8%)
Apartments with more than 4 people (22.5%).
CTAs-Blog-Report2024




Offline marketing actions and strategies
These are some of the most common traditional marketing actions and strategies:

Posters
Brochures or catalogues
Home delivery
Cold calling
Traditional media (offline marketing)
Events
Showroom
Recommendations


Posters: Cities are still full of promotional posters. They are still more prevalent in B2C and more common when promoting events, such as concerts. Local governments also use posters for their promotional campaigns, sometimes placed on poles or buses that drive around the city.

Brochures or catalogues: although they now coexist with their digital version, brochures and catalogues are marketing assets that try to gather the right and necessary information to generate a sale. In B2B, they are an essential element, both physical and digital, for the vast majority of industrial companies.

Home delivery: Yes, some brands still send brochures and catalogues by post. It is also common in the catering, supermarket and telecommunications sectors.

Cold calling: In B2B as in B2C, marketing and promotion are still done through cold calling. Many companies continue to rely on purchasing databases or hiring a call center to try to generate sales directly.

telemarketing-blog



Traditional media: television, radio, magazine ads, newspapers… advertising spaces are still filled by brands, mainly from B2C companies. The most expensive advertising is that which is done in prime time on television, where there are more viewers. However, some sector magazines or radio programs are a good advertising space for B2B companies .

Events: These are still a traditional action that allows brands to build customer loyalty and generate engagement. They are expensive and it is difficult to measure the performance of an event. The budget is usually divided as follows:

budget-fairs-665466-edited

Showroom: In both B2C and B2B, being able to see and try out a product is key to the purchasing decision. That's why all kinds of companies continue to use this traditional marketing strategy. From IKEA and its exhibition area to intralogistics machinery brands such as JUNGHEINRICH, both at trade fairs and in the companies that sell their products.

Recommendations: If a company produces a good, quality product or service, it is possible that it will sell in a domino effect thanks to recommendations from its own customers. Word of mouth generates many sales thanks to prescribers, both in B2B and B2C. In fact, it has been taken “to the digital” with Google reviews or with apps like TripAdvisor.