How has the internet evolved? Here are a few answers to that question.

1. The evolution of the internet
How the internet has changed the world of marketing.

2. Intro
The internet has changed a lot ever since it was released. The average person
now relies on the internet on a daily basis, and this leaves huge opportunity for
anyone to grow their business or brand.
To understand how people use the internet, a good way to understand it would
be the “Do, Know, Go” concept:
Do:
Know:
Go:
Know refers to the informational queries – meaning when someone wants to learn
about a particular subject, they can search for it online. Unlike “Do”, this doesn’t refer to
when people search for a product or service.
Do refers to when a customer searches for something specific on the internet, it could
be a plane ticket or a product on amazon. This is when the customer is actively looking
for something on the web.
Go refers to navigational queries – which means that someone is searching for a specific
website or location. For example, people who want to search for ‘Apple’ they will be
directed to apple.com. (Taylor D. 2018)
However, this concept is very simple, it only refers to the use of search engines
and doesn’t take into account social media.

3. Access to the internet
How many people access the internet on a regular basis?
Year 2000:
- 400 million
Year 2020:
- 4.7 billion
In just 20 years, the number of people that accessed the internet has increased by over 11 times
resulting in nearly half of the world population.
(Roser M. Ritchie H. Ortiz-Ospina E. n.d.) (Clement J. 2020)

4. Digital devices used by people
A study that compared the usage of mobile devices, desktops and
tablets found that the majority of internet access is done through
mobile phones.
Mobile
53%
Desktop
44%
Tablet
2%
(stat counter, n.d.)

5. How do customers search for information?
What search engines do people use to look for things on the internet?
Google
69%
Google Images
21%
Other
10%
(Fishkin R. 2018)
As you can see, Google has a near monopoly on search engines in the western world.

6. Consumers journeys online
What else can do people do online?
Cryptocurrencies
Amazon shopping
All of these examples don’t have to be done through search engines. If you’re
looking to buy bitcoin you’re probably going to download an app (e.g. Binance) to
do it on your PC or smartphone, the same with Amazon shopping. If you are to
make music, you can download a free software like Audacity and make your music
without being connected to the internet altogether.
Making music
Some examples include;

7. What customers buy online
What do people buy online? (in terms of categories)
Fashion:
596.1 billion
Electronics &
Media:
481.8 billion
Furniture &
Appliances:
312.9 billion
Toys, Hobby
& DIY:
504.1 billion
Food &
Personal care:
413.2 billion
(Oberlo, n.d.)

8. Online video consumption
Almost 5 billion videos are watched on YouTube every single day.
78% of users watch videos online every week, and 55% view online
videos daily. (Felix 2020)
Video consumption has surged over the years. The leading reason is that now people
are starting to rely on online videos for more than just entertainment, but also for
education and for work. Consumption and creation of videos is now a common part
of most working environments, for example, a marketer will watch videos from
successful marketers who share their ideas on the ever changing social market.
Additionally, marketers like myself also create videos to bring attention to our social
brands and build a reputation within our following and community.
And entertainment is also increasing, with people staying indoors more and more,
people are exposed to the never ending amount of videos on social media and
YouTube. And socially, watching videos and films online has become tradition; people
will go watch a film/video when inviting friends or family over.

9. Internet users worldwide
The world is having more access
to the internet, more people
now rely and use the internet
on a daily basis.
This impacts the life of the
average internet consumer as
they are exposed to more and
more content – making them
more hesitant to trust people
and businesses as quickly they
you might’ve done outside the
digital world.
This presents a psychological
change in consumer’s lives.
What continents access the internet the most? (by population)
(Broadband Search 2020)

10. How consumer technology evolves.
Whether we like it or not, new tech is appearing all the time. For
example, virtual reality is now becoming more mainstream for gamers,
and many people in western countries have a designated voice
assistant in their homes, such as Alexa or Google home. Why does this
matter? Because with every new piece of tech, you, a creator can reach
a brand new, fresh audience. Amazon Alexa’s have the ability to
purchase items by simply asking “Alexa, buy me a vacuum cleaner”, and
this means that vacuum companies should try to rank as the top
vacuum for that specific keyword on Amazon. Opportunities
everywhere!

11. Consumer trends
Overall, internet usage has drastically increased worldwide. And due to the surge of
smartphone companies – and reduced costs of these devices – the internet is being
accessed from mobile sources more than any other methods (such as desktop
computers).
The lives of consumers has been changed forever, as big businesses now have access to
grow more than ever before and expand in different countries and continents, everyone
needs to provide more value to customers and really compete over the attention of the
people. For example, Tesla have adapted their marketing so it’s purely based on PR. They
know that spending money on ads doesn’t provide value for their target audience, and by
avoiding ads they can reduce the price of their cars and sell to a wider market. Or
alternatively, how TikTok spent millions on advertising on other social media platforms and
now they became the most downloaded app on the app store (sensortower 2020).
In marketing terms, this means that new opportunities to promote business are arising
every year – and using them effectively will enable you to reach a rapidly growing
audience.

12. References
Broadband Search (2020), ‘Key Internet Statistics to Know in 2020 (Including Mobile)’ Broadband Search [online]. Available
at: https://www.broadbandsearch.net/blog/internet-statistics [Accessed 5 December 2020]
Clement J. (2020), ‘Global digital population as of October 2020’ statista [online]. Available at:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/617136/digital-population-
worldwide/#:~:text=Almost%204.66%20billion%20people%20were,percent%20of%20the%20global%20population
[Accessed 5 December 2020]
Felix (2020), ‘Online Video Consumption Statistics’ millenialstudios [online]. Available at:
https://millennialstudios.co.uk/blog/online-video-consumption-
statistics/#:~:text=Almost%205%20billion%20videos%20are,computers%20to%20watch%20digital%20videos. [Accessed 24
February]
Fishkin R. (2018), ‘2018 Search Market Share: Myths vs. Realities of Google, Bing, Amazon, Facebook, DuckDuckGo, & More’
SparkToro [online]. Available at: https://sparktoro.com/blog/2018-search-market-share-myths-vs-realities-of-google-bing-
amazon-facebook-duckduckgo-more/ [Accessed 5 December 2020]
Oberlo (n.d.), ‘TOP ONLINE SHOPPING CATEGORIES’ OBERLO [online]. Available at https://www.oberlo.co.uk/statistics/top-
online-shopping-categories [Accessed 5 December 2020]

13. Roser M. Ritchie H. Ortiz-Ospina E. (n.d), ‘Internet’ ourworldindata [online]. Available at:
https://ourworldindata.org/internet#:~:text=Globally%20the%20number%20of%20internet,online%20for%20the%20first
%20time [Accessed 5 December 2020]
SensorTower (2020) ‘Top Apps Worldwide for Q1 2019 by Downloads’ sensortower [online]. Available at:
https://sensortower.com/blog/top-apps-worldwide-q1-2019-downloads [Accessed 24 February]
Stat Counter, (n.d.) ‘Desktop vs Mobile vs Tablet Market Share Worldwide’ statcounter [online]. Available at:
https://gs.statcounter.com/platform-market-share/desktop-mobile-tablet [Accessed 5 December 2020
Taylor D. (2018) ‘How People Search: Understanding User Intent’ SearchEngineJournal [online]. Available at:
https://www.searchenginejournal.com/seo-101/how-people-search/#close [Accessed 5 December 2020]