IJBIT/ISSN 0974-5874/V12/02/255

A comparative study of application effectiveness between digital and social

media marketing for sustainability of start-ups
Natika Poddar1 Dipti Agarwal2

ABSTRACT:
Technology is progressing and the digital marketing landscape is ever progressing. Social media marketing plays an
important role for any Start-up companies to grow and sustain. Start-up companies are expanding rapidly and increasing.
Social media marketing is one of the best platforms to create a brand loyalty and increase the ROI. Start-ups have played
and continue to play a significant role in the growth and development. Start-up companies are always associated with
innovation. It is said that biggest pain point in digital marketing are the advertising which is done with the help of Social
media marketing tools, web flexibility and integrating the digital tools with Legacy. Also, digital marketing helps in lowering
the marketing cost by paying cost per click or visit. And the most popular tool used for spent on advertisement is cost per
click. It is also cost effective for the start-ups to promote their business as well as launch of the product or service. Also,
it could be helpful to analyse your reach to target audience as well as how effectively you spent for marketing. Digital
marketing tool is a perfect marketing tool for start-ups. As compared to traditional marketing digital marketing is cheaper
as well as give better results. Although as a start-up entrepreneur, it’s important to focus on digital marketing and social
media marketing through implementing the marketing strategies and find out what will work better for the business. And
should always be open to adapt the changes and reap the benefits. Now a days Consumer prefer unique product and
spend most of their time on social sites. They keep looking up for good quality of product and service on multiple device,
locations and languages. Even for improving customer support various technology can be used by Start-ups. Digital
marketing and social media marketing are evolving and will bound to pose with the new challenges and opportunities.

The purpose of the study is to examine the sustainability and effectiveness of start up’s through comparative study of
social media marketing and digital marketing. Primary study is based on 100 sample size was considered for survey.
Hypothesis was tested through CHI Square and T-test.

Keywords: Digital Marketing, Social media marketing, Sustainability, Technology, Effectiveness

INTRODUCTION
With the motivation of Start-up India there has been a significant
increase in the number of Start-up companies in the nation.
Debjani Ghosh president of NASSCOM said “India is becoming
a start-up hub. Opportunity for growth is enormous, which we
had never seen in our lifetime,” and as per NASSCOM, Start-
up in India saw a 108% growth in total funding from USD 2
billion in 2017 to USD 4.2 billion in 2018. There are various
factors that lead to the growth of Start-ups in India in which
major share is taken by their marketing strategies to attract the
consumers and increase the sustainability of Start-up.
Digital marketing is the use of the internet and digital devices,
search engines, display advertising and other digital media
to reach the audience. Digital marketing involves Short
Message Service (SMS), Simple Notation Services (SNS),
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and other online ads to
promote product and services. Use of digital marketing has
increased the company visibility on the internet. Also, it helps
to study the customer behaviour with the website and based
on that analysis it provides the customer desired service to
the consumer. Social media marketing is one of the aspects
of digital marketing which also plays an important role in
increasing the company profit and revenue exponentially.
There are more than 2.46 billion active users of social media
network out of which 2 billion people are frequently online in
the network. Earlier people were attracted to use a particular
product or service by seeing the advertisement that aired on
television. Similarly, due to such a large increase in the people
connecting to social media, there is a creation of the platform
for developing of businesses through social media marketing.
Also, attracting consumers through social media marketing
helps to reduce the marketing cost. Thus, Start-up companies
find it as a platform to reduce the marketing cost and at the
same time increase their sales and revenue.
Thus, conclusion can be made that digital marketing and social
media marketing plays a vital role in cost effectiveness and
increasing the sales as well as revenue exponentially. Hence,
providing sustainability and growth to the start-ups.
Comparison of social media marketing & Digital marketing
1. Digital marketing means creating awareness as well as
promoting brand or product or services online by using
various digital channels. Digital marketing consists of
Internet marketing i.e. SEM includes Pay per click etc and
Non – Internet marketing is through Television, Radio etc.
whereas social media marketing is promotion of a business
brand by using social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram etc.

1
Natika Poddar, PhD, Associate Professor-Fin, St. Francis Institute of Management and Research, Mumbai
2
Dipti Agarwal, Researcher, St. Francis Institute of Management and Research, Mumbai

IJBIT / Volume 12/ Issue 2 / April-September 2019 50

Natika Poddar and Dipti Agarwal
2. Digital marketing is more affordable than the traditional
marketing, but it is costlier than the social media marketing.
Social media is a platform openly available to everyone to
promote their business for free of cost. The other advantage
of digital marketing is to spend as per the click or visit or
impression. It’s a cost-effective tool for the business to grow
and sustain in the market.
3. Further can be explained through a case study of Zomato:
Zomato is an application that connects the foodies with
various restaurants. The start-up has been a great success
within a short span. While studying the marketing strategy of
the company, found that Zomato has extensively invested a
lot over SEM, SMO and also has worked a lot to improve its
UI and make it more user interactive. On the other side they
have also invested in TV ads to spread globally. Zomato
used various social media platform to engage with their
customers Like Facebook, Twitter, Blog, and Pinterest.
4. Nowadays every company, having an online presence
demands their application developer to add a Search engine
optimization to their webpage but not every company desire
to have a social presence.
5. To sum up, Social media marketing is a part of digital
marketing. Through the various techniques the marketer
can track the impressions, through a number of visits or
clicks etc.
Comprehensive Online marketing cost
• The three largest online marketing platforms are Google
AdWords, Instagram, and Facebook Ad. Following are the
online marketing cost.
• The average cost of an advertisement on Google Ads
(AdWords) is $2.32 per click on the search network. The
average cost per click of an ad on the Display Network is
under $0.58.
• The average cost per action (CPA) in a Google advertising
search campaign is $59.18.
• The most expensive keywords in Google advertising and
Bing Ads cost $50 or more per click. These are generally
highly competitive keywords in industries that have high
customer lifetime values, like law and insurance.
• The average small business using Google advertising
spends between $9,000 and $10,000 per month on their
online advertising campaigns. That’s $100,000 to $120,000
per year.
• The average cost per click of an online Facebook ad is $1.72.
The average cost per action on Facebook Ads is $18.68.
• The typical CPM on Facebook Ads is around $10.
• The typical CPM for an Instagram ad is closer to $5, but
Instagram ad costs are rising as the platforms gains in
popularity
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Rajeev Pandey (2016): In Rajeev Pandey article on 17th
November 2016, states that key pillars can turn start-ups
into sustainable company. The article says that most of the
company focus only on raising funds and marketing, ignoring
product development which leads to high traffic and do to
which website goes down. And to build their start up new
founders and co-founders need to understand the framework.
This article states that we need to include product, capital and
marketing all three to sustain. If only product development is
ignored, then it may lead to site crash and the same mistake
was done by the Flipkart when they first launched the Big
Billion Day Campaign. And if marketing is ignored then you
IJBIT / Volume 12/ Issue 2 / April-September 2019 51
A comparative study of application effectiveness between digital and social media
marketing for sustainability of start-ups
might have a great product with funding but will end up with
no users (Google+). If capital is ignored, then you might have
good product with a lot of users but no way to make money
(Facebook faced it for few years).
So, it is crucial to understand the importance of each pillars and
focus on building the start up for the long tug. It states that, the
paid service should be less for the initial stage as customers
are least bothered to know from where they came to know
about your product or services. Even it doesn’t matter how you
reach to them through email marketing or paid services, but
they will try to use it, if they want too. So, start-up companies
should use less paid services till they reach to 100 customers.
Syed Sirajuddin (2015) -A blog by Syed Sirajuddin (2015) for
role of digital marketing in growth of Start-up. He talks about
how digital marketing is important for the Start-ups. Many start-
up companies think only digital marketing is important, but that
fact is that it should be a part of your business plan from the
beginning. He states that many start-up companies fail due to
poor marketing even though the product is good. In blog Syed
says, the power of digital marketing is nothing but the future
of marketing. A few start-ups like Bewakoof.com, apparels
and mobile cover seller has become India’s topmost socially
engaged brand with 1.5 Million fan pages on Facebook. And
now they have started selling through instant messaging
i.e. WhatsApp and they claim that 15% of his sale is from
WhatsApp itself. He says all company cannot work in a same
manner with same strategy. And for growth and to sustain
in competitive market, is possible only if winning marketing
strategy is generated.
However, all the start-up company need to focus on
effectiveness of digital marketing and social media marketing
by executing different marketing strategies which work best for
the business. And should always accept the changes as it’s an
on growing.
Jigar Zatakia (2017) – An article on Digital Marketing for Start-
up by CEO of First Economy Pvt Ltd. He talks about how difficult
is running your own start-up. For start-up entrepreneurs, it’s
must to plan and then execute. Jigar Zatakia says that many
entrepreneurs ignore digital marketing due to high cost and
feel it’s a liability. But digital marketing is a back bone for the
start-up entrepreneurs to sustain in the competitive market. If
digital marketing is done correctly, then it can create a huge
impact for a long term. Your content plays a major role for start-
up.
Garvit Bafna – An article by Garvit Bafna on 7 Must – Have
Online Marketing tools for Start-up. As per the article she talks
about start-up has to face a greater challenge to be successful
in the long run. An ease availability of tools and resources it
leads to success of Start-up. Here is an internet who plays a
major role for start-up. As it provides an unlimited number of
the resources as well as tools. She says, it’s a cost-effective
way for establishing brands to target the audience as well as
to market their products or services. Also, digital marketing
strategy is must for the start-up’s needs an implementation
for more bang of their buck. It helps to implement, analyse,
calibrate, monitor and evaluate a campaign. She explains how
these tools can help a start-up to run a ship and merrily sail
into the sunset.
A comparative study of application effectiveness between digital and social media
marketing for sustainability of start-ups
OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
1. To study an application effectiveness between Digital
Marketing and Social media marketing for Sustainability of
Start Up’s
2. To determine the success and failure of the Start-up’s in
India.
3. To understand the challenges, face by start-up for sustaining.
4. To find out the strategy to sustain for longer period.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
A thorough literature survey had been done to find out the
factors for sustainability of start-up. The study will be based
on survey method where we will be collecting data from the
start-ups, which will be termed as primary data. A study is
descriptive in nature. Secondary sources will be taken from the
articles published online and from few research papers. Both
qualitative and quantitative approach would be considered for
the study.
Sampling Technique:
Non – probability sampling technique which is also known as
purposive sampling method.
Sample Size:
This will be divided into two parts i.e. experienced and
inexperienced Businesses. Based on the responses exact
sample size was 100. Responses received 77 within the nation.
The data collected for the period, November 2018 to December
2018.
Test:
Chi-square and T- Test is used to test the hypothesis.
Overview of Cost Effectiveness between Social media
marketing and Digital Marketing:
Digital marketing and Social media marketing paid, and unpaid
services are used by most of the Start-up’s but we need to
understand the effectiveness of cost. For any business,
digital marketing has helped to lower the marketing cost but
also important to understand the money spent on marketing
for generating new lead to generate revenue. The cost
effectiveness analysis will help you to understand your reach
as well as how effectively and wisely you spent.
The digital marketing is must not only for the growth of start-
up but also for the survival. Like how OLA, UBER, FLIPKART
etc, have flourished through digital marketing. The mode of
payment for digital marketing helps in lowering the marketing
cost.
For example, cost for running a ten seconds’ advertisement
on Television goes around more than 3 lakhs whereas using
social media marketing platform like Facebook who offer host
ad’s in hundred.
Further can be determined through various formulas which
help to calculate the effectiveness are:
Basic
CPC Cost Per Click
CTR Click-Through Rate
CPV Cost per visit
Conversion Rate Conversion Rate
Return On Investment ROI
Percent Change % Change
IJBIT / Volume 12/ Issue 2 / April-September 2019 52
Natika Poddar and Dipti Agarwal
For Examples:
1. CPC – CPC means Cost per click is one of the most popular
model in online advertising. The company will pay as per the
clicks as they are concerned with the clicks. E.g.: If a campaign
as a banner at CPC of Rs.120 and the number of clicks the ad
has got is 1000, calculate what advertiser has to pay.
Formula: CPC = Cost of an advertiser / number of clicks.
Cost of advertiser: CPC * No. of Clicks.
Thus, Cost to an advertiser = 120*1000 = Rs.120000/-
So, Rs.120000 need to be paid by the advertiser.
2. eCPC - eCPC is known as Profitable per click. To calculate
the effectiveness of the online campaigns is used by the
internet marketers. E.g. If you want to calculate for single Ad
and if money spent is like Rs.10,00,000 and clicks generated
are 10,000 with actual CPC set Rs.180
Formula: eCPC = Total spent / Clicks
Net Profit = CPC – eCPC
Thus, eCPC = (10,00,000/10,000) = 100
So, Net profit = (180-100) = Rs.80
Rs. 80 is the profit per click.
3.CTR – CTR means Click-through rate. The effectiveness of
an advertisement is measured through CTR. E.g. If a campaign
Ad has served 10,000 impressions and generated 100 clicks.
Calculate CTR.
Formula: (Number of clicks / Number of impressions) * 100
So, CTR = (100/1000) * 100 = 1%
Therefore, it means there is one click on each and every 100
impressions.
4.CPV – This is commonly used by various companies. CPV is
known as Cost per visit. E.g. If the total cost is Rs. 1000/- and
the visit increased from 50 – 250, visit is equal to 200.
Formula: Total cost of Campaign / Number of total visits after
the campaign started.
So, CPV = 1000/200 = Rs.5/- Each visit cost.
5.Conversion Rate – CR is a simple formula.
Formula: (No. of conversion / Impressions) * 100
6. Return on Investment – Return on Investment (ROI) is
an important metrics. It cannot be miscalculated. It helps to
understand how much return a business is getting on a specific
ad campaign. Also the percentage figure represents how a
campaign is performing.
Formula: [(Revenue – Cost) / Investment cost] * 100 (For %)
So, from the above metrics we can conclude that digital
marketing helps to save the marketing cost. In other words, its
Formulas
Cost/Clicks
Clicks/Impressions
Cost of Campaign/Visits
Conversion/Clicks
(Gain from Investment – Cost of Investment) / Cost of Investment
(Old – New) / Old
Natika Poddar and Dipti Agarwal A comparative study of application effectiveness between digital and social media
marketing for sustainability of start-ups

cost effectiveness. Every business has different goals but also, they require a different marketing methods or varying budgets.

DATA ANALYSIS
Chi-Square Test
In order, to analysis the significance association between the digital marketing and social media marketing for sustainability of
start-up, chi-square test was used.

Null Hypothesis: There is a no significance association between the choice of parameter of importance and the choice of social
media marketing for sustainability of Start-up.
Alternate Hypothesis: There is a significance association between the choice of parameter of importance and the choice of social
media marketing for sustainability of Start-up.

Table1a: Observed Data

Media Platform
Parameter of Importance
Google Yahoo Facebook Instagram YouTube Total
Lead generation 53 19 40 44 38 194
Helps to reduce the marketing cost 48 22 34 32 32 168
Increase in sales 42 22 56 23 28 171
Right Content 39 23 42 39 36 179
Right Feedback 44 9 48 41 31 173
Total 226 95 220 179 165 885

Table1a: Observed Data

Media Platform
Parameter of Importance
Google Yahoo Facebook Instagram YouTube Total
Lead generation 50 21 48 39 36 194
Helps to reduce the marketing cost 43 18 42 34 31 168
Increase in sales 44 18 43 35 32 171
Right Content 46 19 44 36 33 179
Right Feedback 44 19 43 35 32 173
Total 226 95 220 179 165 885

Alpha Value – 0.05 Table 2:

P Value – 0.028
t-Test: Two-Sample Assuming Equal Variances
Interpretation:
Since the Chi-square test P-Value for the variable is 0.028 Case1 Case2
which is less than the Alpha Value 0.05. Hence, we reject the Mean 3.830952381 3.711904762
null hypothesis.
Variance 0.571768707 0.652017756
Conclusion: There is a significance association between the Observations 60 60
choice of parameter of importance and the choice of social Pooled Variance 0.611893232
media marketing for sustainability of Start-up.
Hypothesized
0
T – Test Mean Difference
T test was applied to understand the significant difference df 118
between the tools of digital marketing and social media t Stat 0.833572765
marketing.
P(T<=t) one-tail 0.203102971
Null Hypothesis: There is a significant difference in the rating t Critical one-tail 1.657869522
provided to social media marketing and digital marketing. P(T<=t) two-tail 0.406205942
Alternate Hypothesis: There is no significant difference in the
rating provided to social media marketing and digital marketing. t Critical two-tail 1.980272249

IJBIT / Volume 12/ Issue 2 / April-September 2019 53

A comparative study of application effectiveness between digital and social media
marketing for sustainability of start-ups
Alpha - 0.05
P Value - 0.406205942
Interpretation:
As the P-Value is more than Alpha Value, we will accept the
null hypothesis.
Conclusion:
There is a significant difference in the rating provided to social
media marketing and digital marketing.
FINDINGS
• Social media marketing and Digital marketing has a measure
role in promoting the brand name.
• Increase in the number of users of social media marketing
has provided a platform for the brand promotion.
• Start-ups with less capital investment can cut their cost of
marketing by adapting the digital & social media marketing
strategies.
• Major entrepreneur claimed that social marketing has helped
them to sustain their business at the start or the beginning
of their business
• 46% of the non-users of social media marketing & digital
marketing are unable to do it because of the lack of
awareness, data privacy gets compromised.
• 42% claimed that with the help of digital and social media
marketing the business are easily able to reach to the target
audience.
• 78 % agreed that Search Engine marketing & social media
marketing are important aspects while choosing digital
marketing for business sustainability & growth.
• 78% agreed that digital marketing increases the business
revenue.
• 45 % start-up entrepreneur has claimed that Social media
marketing and digital marketing has played a great role in
sustainability & growth of the start-ups.
• Even few matrix helps to evaluate whether the promotion or
advertisement on social sites is functioning or not.
• It also helps in reducing marketing cost through pay per click
or impressions or visit where you need to pay as per view.
• Most of the start-ups use this technique to advertise or
promote themselves.
• Cost per click is the most popular tool used by most of the
businesses.
CONCLUSIONS
The sustainability & growth of any organization depends on
the popularity of their work and product for which they work.
Popularity and recognition can be gained by marketing. The
most popular way is using social media marketing and digital
marketing to promote their product and services. From the
above study and analysis conclusion can be made as Digital
marketing & social media marketing has increased the sales
and revenue of start-ups. Increase in the number of the user
of social media marketing & internet will proportionately
increase the sales which will further increase the growth and
sustainability of the Start-ups. Search Engine optimization &
Search engine marketing are important aspects while choosing
digital marketing for business sustainability & growth. Digital
marketing increases the business revenue as well as reduce
the cost. Social media marketing and digital marketing has
played an effective role in sustainability & growth of the start-
ups.
IJBIT / Volume 12/ Issue 2 / April-September 2019 54
Natika Poddar and Dipti Agarwal
RECOMMENDATIONS
• Should create more awareness for the growth of start-up.
• Improve Expertise to increase the income as many start-ups forget
about the growth
• The start-up who do not prefer using social media marketing or
digital marketing should start using as it will help to be into market
as well as revenue may increase.
• Should always market first and then sell the product.
• Should encourage a collaborative idea from other people.
• Start-up companies should invest more to earn future return.
• Business must use at least unpaid services of social media
marketing if they are enable to go for paid.
• Also, multiple sites should be used to increase the sale, to lower the
marketing cost and also it helps to create a brand loyalty among the
customers.
• Maintain your services as consumer’s looks for best services.
REFERENCES
1. “Importance of Social Media for your start-up” https://www.tgdaily.
com/enterprise/startups/importance-of-social-media-for-your-
startup.
2. “How Businesses use Social Media: 2017 Survey” https://clutch.
co/agencies/social-media-marketing/resources/social-media-
survey-2017.
3. Reasons start-ups fails ”https://www.cbinsights.com/research/
startup-failure-reasons-top/
4. ”Start-ups in India sees 108% growth: NASSCOM” https://
economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/startups/newsbuzz/
startups-in-india-see-108-growth-in-funding-in-2018-nasscom/
articleshow/66365422.cms
5. ”Role of Digital Marketing in Start-up growths and success” by
Syed Sirajuddin https://digitalready.co/blog/the-role-of-digital-
marketing-in-startup-growth-and-success
6. “Importance of Digital Marketing for start-ups” by Jigar Zatakia
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/296856
7. “digital marketing for start-ups” https://yourstory.com/2016/01/
startups-digital-marketing/
8. ”Why an effective Social Media marketing important” https://www.
lyfemarketing.com/blog/effective-social-media-marketing-strategy/
9. ”Why social media is a cost effective marketing tool ”http://www.
faceitsocialmedia.com/2010/08/why-social-media-is-a-cost-
effective-marketing-tool/
10. ” How to determine an effective social media marketing strategy”
https://www.inc.com/brent-csutoras/how-to-determine-roi-of-your-
social-media-marketing-strategy.html
11. “sustainability of start-ups” through Rajeev Pandey https://
yourstory.com/2016/11/sustainable-startup-company/
12. ”7-must have online marketing Tools” by Garvit Bafna https://
www.business2community.com/online-marketing/7-must-online-
marketing-tools-startups-01800735
13. “Zomato successfully leveraged digital marketing to generate
funding” https://www.digitalvidya.com/blog/zomato-successfully-
leveraged-digital-marketing-to-generate-funding/
14. ”The comprehensive guide to online advertising cost. https://www.
wordstream.com/blog/ws/2017/07/05/online-advertising-costs
Acknowledgment: We would like to acknowledge time and efforts of
Dr .G. Ramesh for his critical suggestions provided to improve quality
of paper. Also, our respondents for supporting us in execution of our
paper.
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