Branding: A Day in the Life – Digital Media

If you had told me when I was 10 years old, back in 1994, that I would be working from home on a computer, having video conferences with colleagues from my phone or computer, watching movies and anime from multiple websites, and even owning a watch that can answer phone calls, I would have thought you were insane.

Though the tech hardware has evolved greatly, the social and digital part of the entire system has grown a hundredfold. News, Movies, Sports, Books, Talk Radio, Shopping, Games, and Education are all at our fingertips 100% of the time. 

I, like probably most people these days, use technology for all of it.  

A day in my life of interacting with digital media consists of: 

• Reading work emails 
• Reading websites to gather ideas and inspiration, or tools to complete my designs 
• Checking text messages on my iPhone from colleagues or family 
• Checking notifications on my iPhone from news apps and personal email 
• Watching series or movies via any number of streaming sites 
• Playing gaming apps on my phone, mostly crossword puzzles 
• Reading the news on my phone through multiple apps 
• Checking social media for family updates, or interesting information 
• Listening to Podcasts while walking or driving somewhere 
• Using websites, videos, and e-books to complete schoolwork 
• Checking group chats on Discord 
• Shopping for needs and wants through Amazon or other websites 

This list is things I do pretty much daily, and all of them can be done using multiple applications or websites. Here is a list of apps and websites I use for each one of these tasks.  

Most days I visit these apps or sites at least once. Whether it be from an outside link or directly to find information or keep updated on happenings for things I am interested in. Now there is not one type of digital media that suits all my needs. That is why the list of websites and apps that I use daily is substantial. 

Depending on the type of media and the curator of that media will determine if my reaction is positive or negative. There isn’t a line down the center that dictates the good from the bad. On social media websites like Reddit and Facebook, you get a lot of bad and good media. On Facebook, I may see families posting political stuff and disagree with their opinion, but their next post may be an update about them hitting a milestone in their life. Whereas a website such as Reddit, which is more of an open forum and content is curated based on popularity I might run into political posts I don’t agree with more often, but again it is mixed in with funny cat videos. So, there is that.  

Now one aspect of digital media that does give me an immediate negative reaction is spam emails. You would think these days it would be easier to ignore, but it is just as frustrating as junk mail in a physical mailbox. I get tons of emails from companies, prompted and unprompted. Prompted emails are ones I signed up for and subscribed to newsletters for deal notifications or new releases. Unsolicited emails, purchased by third-party businesses, rarely grab my attention.

For company emails to catch my attention, they must have a catchy or relevant subject line. I usually look for subject lines that are relevant to my interests at the time of viewing my email. Such as updates to services I subscribe to, brands that I am loyal to, and any subject lines that say “NEW”, “DEALS”, “COUPON”, “CLEARANCE” or something similar. I often open these emails to check for available offers but seldom take action on them. If the emails are from unprompted companies, they get immediately deleted no matter what the subject line says. Now considering so many businesses partake in the backhanded way of sending these spam emails, there must be plenty of people out there who open them and act on them to make them profitable.  

That is one thing that digital media in marketing has managed to do today, is expand the reach of media in some instances making the world a smaller place. Before digital media, print and broadcast media were the pinnacle. However, it could take days for news to travel from one side of the country to the other, and depending on the type of news it may not travel outside the local area. The same goes for entertainment sources, educational sources, and more. I can read a French Newspaper, watch Japanese anime, follow a South American environmental group, keep tabs on a small patch Peanut Butter company in South Dakota, or watch videos from a guy backpacking across Africa, and all of these at the touch of fingertips. Regarding marketing, digital media has both made the job easier and harder at the same time. It has made it easier to reach a bigger audience but difficult because you must be aware of the cultural differences from one audience segment to another. 

Digital media is a beast that can’t be tamed; you can cuddle it and pet it, but one day it may snap at you, and you could lose a finger or worse. It can be useful and assist in growing a business, but one bad decision with digital media could end the business just as fast.