Exploring Digital Marketing Practices for KUNTUM Magazine Publishing Company in Malaysia

- The development of new media has made a significant impact on all areas included in the business sector. Many marketers use new media platforms through websites and social media now become a phenomenon and important to the business world landscape. Digital marketing is one form of marketing commonly used for promoting goods or services and reaching customers across digital channels. The aspects of digital marketing conducted through websites and social media platforms can be used by magazine publishing companies to ensure enhanced product marketing activities. The goal of this study was to analyze the degree to which magazine publishers such as Kuntum magazine used their website and social media sites as their digital marketing strategies and explore the understanding of the definition and role of the digital marketing dimension by the publishing company and its effectiveness as a modern marketing tool. This research interviewed the Editor and Kuntum magazine employees using qualitative approaches. The findings show that with the change in their digital marketing strategy, Kuntum magazine is increasingly utilizing new media channels, and very optimistic. This research looks forward to finding a more effective and sustainable approach in the transition of the magazine publishing industry to digital marketing practices.


Introduction
Currently, new media platforms such as websites, social media, and new technologies are the driving force behind the practices and operations of businesses conducted in the magazine publishing industry (Nolan & Dane, 2018). Malaysia is one of the countries that focus on digital businesses that encourage entrepreneurs to use new media methods as a catalyst for their business. Looking at the modern-day situation, many marketers agree that the new media have an essential role in advertising their merchandise to clients both regionally and internationally.
Malaysia's digital marketing platform is gaining momentum after the government has made and launched numerous efforts to use information and communication technology (ICT) in the industry. The efforts are important in promoting business and industry to use the digital marketing platform.
The magazine publishing industry has long been rooted in the country and has become one of the most competitive and ever-expanding industries. The magazine publishing industry is engaged in a cultural and educational business that focuses on three main areas: product (writing and editing), production (printing), and marketing (promotion, distribution, and sales) (Ari Jantunen, Anssi Tarkiainen, Simos Chari & Pejvak Oghazi, 2018).
Based on the current trends, the magazine publishing industry has become increasingly competitive with rapid advances in the development and integration of computer, internet, and multimedia technology (Hesmondhalgh, 2013).
In every type of business, including the magazine publishing industry, the focus should not be on the design and production aspects of the product alone. In this context, an organisation, merchant, or publishing company should consider the marketing process for the magazine or book products. The manufactured product becomes meaningless and futile without an efficient and effective marketing process as it does not fall into the hands of the end-users (Todor, 2016).
New media platforms, including websites and social media, such as blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Whatsapp have several benefits for entrepreneurs or business organisations across conventional media formats from offline to online interactions, which include print and television (TV) advertising, brochures, and e-mail campaigns.
A trend in global marketing shows that digital marketing dominates the marketing world, which is important for any company to focus on digital marketing channels. This phenomenon occurs when customers are technologically driven and follow the latest trends. The idea of reaching out to individuals is linked to marketing theory 4.0 implemented by marketing expert Philip Kotler. In his book 'Marketing 4.0: Moving from Conventional to Digital' (Wiley, NJ. 2017), Philip Kotler and his co-authors, Hermawan Kartajaya and Iwan Setiwan, described the advancement and extension of human-centred marketing to cover every part of the marketing.
It is important to understand the effects of digital marketing that can influence the big scale of business. The influence of digital marketing impact is profound and widespread in the conventional market. The digital marketing landscape whips up the doors and encourages the person with the right opportunity to feel and become more connected to the business.
influence, which overtakes external marketing communications or personal preference (Payne & Frow, 2017). Philip Kotler, Hermawan, and Iwan Setiawan highlight on the term "power shifts to the connected customer". Today, customers follow their peers when deciding on their purchase. Brand conversations are more accurate than advertisement campaigns. Whether it is online or offline, customers will find comments and guidance.Based on the theory, the magazine industry found that readers communicate on social media platforms to each other. They will post a review of the magazine when they consider their purchase intention. Then, they will spread and share the content with a peer group to attract them and see their reactions.
The changes of era create a set of paradoxes for the marketers that involve online and offline interactions. Nowadays, publishing marketers decide to connect both online and offline readers. The publishers promote readers to visit book fairs. They also provided various attractions such as close-up and photography sessions with the writers. Other than that, readers can express and describe the content of a book directly to the writer. Marketing 4.0 is a movement towards online and offline interactions. Traditionally, the market is divided into a group that is homogenous. The group is divided based on their geographic, demographic, psychographic, and behavioural profiles. Social media platforms are used extensively to spread awareness about a specific magazine and a publisher.

The 4Ps of Marketing
Marketing is often seen as a process that a company provides a product or service to consumers in a market. The marketing process introduces several key components that cover the 4P aspects, which are Product, Price, Promotion, and Place. Over time, the traditionally developed marketplace is gradually shifted towards a new form of media through its digital segment; it forms a merger of medals that not only serves the community, especially the younger generation (Ballatore & Natale, 2016).
According to Kotler and Armstrong (2010), the 4P model (a version that enables us to reach and find marketing goals) can be used as an indicator for a better understanding of the element in marketing strategies.
The 4P model suggests the most vital portions when suggesting strong services or products to a target customer. The four elements of 4P should be considered if the four elements work well.
Digital marketing is a brand promotion process that utilises the internet as the main medium. The elements of marketing include the direct and indirect use of technologies to assist businesses in connecting and communicating with customers. The definition of digital marketing covers all types of businesses that use the internet as the medium to attract customers, retain current customers, and build the brand identity of the product or service (Mohd. Yuszaidy & Muammar Ghaddaffi, 2015).
The advances in digital marketing have provided a great space in the dissemination of information with the ease of communication in a very informal way. Businesses should integrate all of the existing contents into the Internet platforms to share with the whole community (Hetherington, 2014).
In Southeast Asia, Malaysia is one of the countries with high potential and good prospects for implementing digital marketing. For now, digital marketing influences several transactions and business activities from the traditional economic activities (Ruziаh Аli, Ahmad Yusairi Bani Hashim, Ahmad Zainal Abidin Abd. Razak & Abdul Raheem Mohamad Yusof, 2011).
The use of social media channels, websites, and applications of new technologies as marketing activities and practice can help traders or entrepreneurs to find potential new customers and increase sales. This strategy is not only for the neighbourhood market; it can penetrate the international marketplace using the digital marketing platform (Nolan & Dane, 2018). The internet is more specific than the World Wide Web (WWW) and is widely used to provide information in the field of communication.
Аlbаrаn (2004) suggests the importance of technology that is achieved through the internet's capabilities that can produce a media product, namely the process of production, distribution, and content of media based on the technology. Ronning and Slааttа (2011) found that small publishers have been establishing their position through the internet. The internet has opened up opportunities for brands to promote 'backlisted' books by small publishers in the marketplace. Besides, they explain their business model and specialise in creating online book-based businesses. The new digital and media marketing concepts have created competition in the country's emerging market and debate industry.

Impact of Digital Marketing on Business
This development trend has impacted to the entrepreneur's business over the last few years. The way people live their daily lives correspond with each other as well as their consumption pattern and behaviour changes to gain success in industries like food and beverage, consumer durable products, telecommunication, apparel, footwear, tourism, and healthcare products (Peceny, Urbančič, Mokorel, Kuralt & Ilijaš, 2019).
Pal. Sandeep (2019) reveals that digital marketing in this modern paradigm can play an important part to educate and guide customers through the purchaser journey. The traditional key performance indicators for marketing must be reviewed by the business owner that has impacts on the coordination with sales and marketing. This study examined the effect of the changes on the buyers and sellers. Many companies appreciate the online presence and improve their sales. The marketing of any product through websites and social media to compete with others is important. Digital marketing makes you compete with rivals to increase sales.
As a result of globalisation and developments in the aspects of the ICT that Malaysia had achieved since the 1980s, the internet becomes an alternative medium in daily life. Malaysia, as an emerging economy, has embraced technology at a rapid speed. Different industries like magazine publishing can improve with the diffusion of the telecommunication sector, mobile financial transactions, and the advent of Internet-based applications designed by businesses and supported by the technology-friendly government (Fadli & Md. Sidin, 2016).
Jimit (2018) stated that digital marketing plays a key role in corporate transactions and politics in India. Business owners use creative technologies to enter and broaden the segments of their market. A multinational company like KFC India uses digital channels to connect with clients to increase their market size and profit margins. In addition, digital marketing is used to broaden the Indian democracy by connecting politicians with the citizens to update them on policies, development programmes, candidates, and the overall performance of the government. This engaging channel verifies the party that won the 2014 general election's majority seats. This article shows that digital marketing has increased the interaction of business and politicians with the Indian people.
A study by Sathya (2015) revealed that digital marketing was the electronic communication tool used by companies to promote consumer products and services. Digital marketing major plan involves consumers and encourages customers to communicate with the company via digital media. From the study, the researcher focused on the scale of digital promotion, both for customers and marketers, and the data were collected from 100 respondents to obtain a better image of the present analysis. Brindle (2017) explains that product promotion in the modern digital era has become an increasingly important aspect due to its relevance in digital marketing. The conventional method of marketing lags behind digital marketing, which provides users with new opportunities such as customised messages or search query answers. There are several ways to advertise on the internet, and this study reveals the approaches, tools, advantages and disadvantages of digital marketing. In particular, it explains the search engine optimisation, display advertising, search engine marketing, e-mail marketing, and social networking marketing.

Different Type of Digital Marketing Channel
Previous studies provide various principles and understandings concerning digital marketing practice. Nathan Research (2016) revealed that digital marketing used electronic devices (gadget) such as computers, smartphones, handphones, and recreation consoles to include the stakeholders to be a part of the process.
The new media segment launches various digital marketing tools and platforms that help marketers to focus on the right target audience and attract them to their goods or services. The different marketing platforms are perused, analysed and described as below:

i. Website and Pages Marketing
Website marketing is used to support a website and bring more traffic to a website. According to Madhu Bala and Deepak Verma (2018), a website is the starting point in the Internet marketing campaign and communication with customers. It is a "place" in digital space that is "owned" by a company that presents all information about the company and its products. This platform is also the final destination of all banners, social media profiles, texts, and similar content that exist across the internet about the company.

ii. Social Media Marketing (SEM)
One of the foremost well-known strategies is social media promoting. The rise of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube has made a burgeoning commercial centre where businesses can interface with groups of onlookers. The unused stages have shown up and advanced that offer interesting focal points to reach distinctive markets. iii.

Search Engine Optimization
The most common digital marketing tool used today is search engine optimisation (SEO). It optimises the way that the website is retrieved by search engines such as Google.

iv. Web Analytics
Web analytics makes a difference in gather, measure, analyse data, to produce solid report, and foresee the net exercises for business. Web analytics should not be confused with Web Measurements. Web analytics helps to understand the behaviour of the customers and distinctive points to consider your commerce activity. Some of the vital web analytics instruments are Google Analytics, Spring Measurements, Woopra, Clicky, Mint, and Chartbeat (Madhu Bala & Deepak Verma, 2018). Each business should use web analytics data commerce activity and the return of investment (ROI) changes.

v. E-mail Marketing
E-mail Marketing is a coordinated way for individual and customised communication with new and exacting clients. It makes a difference to the business owner to get linked to more customers and delivering various messages in creative way with the plausibility of having organized feedback from consumers and effectively evaluating their viability.

vi. Content Marketing
Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach that focuses on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience besides driving profitable customer action

Research Objectives
The strength of the internet, new media, and social media will not decrease by the upcoming few years, and this topic will be crucial to every organisation (Giedd, 2012). This study intended to understand digital marketing and its method with the following objectives:i. Explore the effectiveness of digital marketing for Kuntum magazine practice; and ii.
Investigate Kuntum magazine's use of digital marketing platforms such as websites and social media as their digital marketing strategies.

Research Methodology
The data were collected using qualitative methods from respondents via the interview process. The interview data collection is a process or procedure between interviewers and interviewee to get information or data through face-to-face interviews.
This study uses in-depth interviews to support data and information. The purpose of this method is to get the views of individuals or groups of people on the subject. The interview sessions with respondents include the management consultants and employees in the production of digital marketing for the publishing company.
The interview was conducted on 17 September 2019 with the Kuntum magazine editor, Mrs Norlia Jaafar, and several employees from Star Media Group Berhad who handle Kuntum website, social media platform, and marketing unit. The employees are Mr Izzudin Noor, who is the Head of Product Development, and Mrs Sharifah Thuraizah Syed Hassan, who is the Executive Audience Management of Star Media Group Berhad.
For the in-depth interview, this study uses a semi-structured interview method. Based on some of the questions, there will be additional verbal questions if necessary. The respondents' responses were recorded on a special form before they are categorised and interpreted according to specific categories. The researcher used this approach to understand the views and expectations of the interviewer. The qualitative approach helps the researcher to explore new perspectives and individual views.
The researcher used the interview as the primary data collection and triangulated it with supporting records. All the findings were included with supporting records from Google Analytics and data prepared by the Kuntum team.

Case Study-Kuntum Magazine
Kuntum is a well-known educational magazine for children, and it is published on a monthly basis in Bahasa Malaysia for children aged from 6 -12 years old to expand their knowledge on topics ranging from maths and science to robotics and languages. It is the only educational magazine that is endorsed by the Ministry of Education Malaysia. Kuntum hopes to be a tool for children to bond with their parents, teachers, and friends through the stories and activities. It is owned and published by Star Media Group Berhad, and it has been enriching young Malaysians since February 1980.

The Overview of the Company-Star Media Group Berhad
Kuntum magazine was published by one of the pioneer media company in Malaysia, Star Media Group Berhad, which was formerly known as Star Publications (Malaysia) Berhad. It is a Malaysian media agency that is involved with the publication, printing, and distribution of newspapers and magazines.Over the years, the company has slowly evolved from a single-product company to a multi-channel media organisation. The presence of various channelsfrom print, digital to the radio, television, and events -Star Media Group Berhad shapes the society as a whole and delivers the best-integrated media solutions. This company is committed to providing action-driven content to the readers besides sharing stories to inspire readers.

Findings
The results of the empirical study show that digital marketing strategies that use new media such as website and media social have a significant impact on the following:-

Effectiveness of Digital Marketing for the Publishing Industry
One of the key reasons that digital marketing takes over conventional marketing platforms is the internet has helped companies to communicate in real-time with potential customers through websites or other social media channels (Çizmeci & Ercan, 2015). From the interview, the Kuntum team mentioned that their readers become accustomed to getting involved and interacting with the Kuntum brand. As a result, the Kuntum team came up with new strategies that focus on the digital marketing segment. Advertisers cannot sell their goods without an online and digital presence, and the rivals are going online. They market their intended customers on a larger scale. Small and large companies also reach out to online audiences. It is important to know the need and follow recent trends in digital marketing. This is another response from the Kuntum magazine team that they had realised from other magazine publishing companies. Digital marketing is important to modern businesses, and the Kuntum team needs to know the strategies of their competitors. The editor said that beating their rivals in business is important, but the most important thing is to know how they succeed in business. Many companies appreciate the online presence and improve their sales. Hence, it is important to market the product using a website and social media.

The Transformation of Traditional Marketing Tool Utilising the Website
The publishing companies need to look beyond the much-in-vogue idea of "digital transformation" if they want to maintain a competitive advantage and differentiate themselves from their competitors. Digital transformation refers to the idea of integrating the digital era into all areas to transform the manner that business operates and how it delivers value to customers.
For the Kuntum magazine team, the digital transformation change takes place at a slow pace. Before 2014, Kuntum largely focused on traditional marketing techniques. However, the change in top management since 2018 had catalysed the company in a new direction that uses digital marketing platforms.
First, the company invested on a specific website platform for Kuntum magazine. The website is the most effective brand-constructing tool. The company's website has the most critical detail of digital marketing than any online pastime. It is the company's second home online where clients and visitors can visit and see the modern-day news, offers, or products.
The Kuntum website is www.kuntum.com.my, which is the primary platform that provides the readers with basic information about the company, event, subscription, and the Kuntum magazine. Kuntum Internet site was first launched in 2014; the content material has advanced and expanded with the emergence of new gear (pictures, sounds, and video clips). Vukasovič (2013) states that the web allows the companies to reach a more extensive gathering of people and make compelling esteem suggestions that are not conceivable (e.g., Amazon.com extends 4.5 million book titles) while giving modern apparatuses for advancement, interaction, and relationship building through the site.
Kuntum website is an exceptionally straightforward and clean format and plan. The creation of a brief and clear message permits the reader to examine the data, get it, and keep it in mind. If the website displays a lot of information and advertising campaign on the same page, the reader will be confused. Often the customers are simply confused, if the location is overloaded with data, they don't get it where and what to analyse, they don't bear in mind the data they receive, and eventually become tired of browsing and turn off the website.

Figure 2: Kuntum Website Homepage
The company is involved in the children publishing industry. Hence, it is important to make the website convenient and user-friendly, which will contribute to positive feedback, sales, branding, and readers' engagement.
The website shows that the company has taken a proactive step in the digital segment. This is a very important step to keep up with the trends in the digital age, especially for the transformation of traditional organisational systems and cultures.  The analytic data shared from the Kuntum team show that their website gained more new users each year. The number of new users for the Kuntum website is 333,462, and the page views are 571,475. At the moment, they have 241 active users per day who visited their website. Based on these numbers, Kuntum magazine has the best way to attract advertisers and potential clients. In one part, this figure can help to expand the business, increase the number of clients (advertiser and customer), and broaden the interest in Kuntum magazine products or services.
The data and figure of the website traffic are important. From the interview session, the team agreed that any company is required to turn their website traffic to a sale. They want the Kuntum brand to be the most profitable business that keeps track of their metrics. Previously, all revenue figures come from their circulation unit numbers that are generated according to the print order (copies) for the magazine.
For the website traffic figure, the data can support the existing circulation numbers, as to date, the circulation figure is about 80,000 copies per month.

Active on Social Media Platform
Social media promotes business and its activities. Active social networks can attract more new customers or visitors. People are inquisitive about following corporate social networking than just surfing on their websites. Social networks allow two-way communication. Users or Kuntum readers, who are facing problems, can use social networks to share their views, knowledge, and ideas.
According to the Kuntum magazine editor, Mrs Norlia Jaafar, Kuntum magazine has an account on Facebook since 2010. However, the team changed the account to a Fan Page account (majalahkuntummalaysia), which was effective in January 2019. They also created an Instagram account (majalah_kuntum), a Twitter account (Twitter@PintarComel), and a channel on YouTube (Kuntum Star).
The Kuntum animation channel on YouTube was effective in 2019. After 39 years in the publishing industry, Kuntum tries a new segment in the digital world by starting their own YouTube channel.
For the YouTube channel, the company spends more budgets to generate animation videos to promote their messages for educational purposes. This is the largest investment made by the company in increasing product variations under the Kuntum brand.  The editor replied that the two most common and critical exercises are creating competitions with prizes, such as coupons, rebates, or gift products besides communicating with their readers. Every day, the team needs to communicate and post a status like "Selamat Menyambut Peperiksaan UPSR," "Selamat Hari Merdeka," inquiring readers on how they feel or what they expected to do on that day or weekend with their family.
Other than that, they use social media to present their readers with an unused opportunity, a workshop or event, and any feedback about the magazine. Giving advice and useful tips is something most companies do on their fan pages. Although it is regarded as part of the communication between the brand and the readers, the editor has made it clear that this is more than communication.
Lastly, the editor mentions it wasn't eager to start with; they 're starting to give the reader's primary level of advantages or complaints regarding taking after the reader's requests. The Kuntum media social team is attempting to solve and arrange action as social media is a 24hour channel of product-user coordination. It is the responsibility of the Kuntum team to take care of any comments and complaints from customers to ensure the quality of the product.
Company owners and administrators may measure whatever they want from website users to social media platforms such as Facebook or Instagram. These data collection and analysis can help them to see the functions and what can be improved in running the business.

Increase Brand Awareness
According to the digital marketing officer for Kuntum magazine, it is important to align the dreams of the social media approach with the desires of the general business using specific strategies and planning.
Social media is the key to enhance awareness; however, the company wants to have awesome information from your audience. This approach allows the company to create relevant contentwhich should not all be sales-focusedand deliver the proper purchaser service. Similarly, understanding what repels consumers can avoid social media errors that affect followers.
Overall, marketers want to become familiar with the measurement and report on social media return on investment (ROI). If the platforms and results are not about sales, marketers need to understand what engagement can contribute to the ROI and how to link it to the main strategic purpose of the company.

Improved Brand Reputation
Everyone has heard or seen the brand, but their consciousness can be completely "locked". This statement means that they are about this brand and will remember it if someone mentions it. This situation is happening in the publishing industry, which is faced by the Kuntum magazine.
From the view of the Head Product Development, Star Media Group, almost all industries in the country with various big brands adopted the new media technologies as their primary digital marketing medium. They realise that the internet is one of the best marketing methods.
Over the past 39 years in the market, Kuntum magazine has been steadily building its brand and maintaining its reputation. Kuntum magazine wants to keep moving and remain competitive as Malaysia's oldest children magazine. Although the readership and circulation segment are changing every time, companies keep coming up with new ways to reach new audiences and stay relevant.
New media such as websites, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube are used to accomplish marketing strategies using the internet. It is important for marketers to find suitable platforms to suit their marketing objectives. A good marketing objective enables marketers to acquire new customers while retaining existing ones through customer satisfaction.

Social Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Strategy
When an organisation or company starts the development in digital marketing, one important key area to sustain the business is implementing the social customer relationship management (CRM) strategy.
Managing customer relationships or CRM is a term that explains how the company deals with customers. Many people assume that CRM is a system to collect customer information. CRM uses technologies to capture the competence needed by the company to offer better support and services.
Under the main company group, the Kuntum team has a CRM system that gathers information from the Bookstore portal, Newsstand portal, Kuntum website, Kuntum Facebook, and enquiry form. The team can keep track of their potential sales with leads and opportunities. The CRM system keeps the information about companies in accounts, readers, and audience.
According to Mrs Sharifah Thuraizah Syed Hassan, who is the Executive in Marketing, Audience Management Unit, Star Media Group, Kuntum CRM system was built with strategic planning to help the circulation team in setting the vision for their CRM initiatives. Besides, it ensures that the company's investments can encourage good relationships with customers. Furthermore, the Audience Management Unit can control and handle the CRM system that identifies the targeted customers, who are the current and potential customers, to generate sales, profit, and long-term growth. The unit determines the needs of Kuntum products. Besides, it determines whether it has the infrastructure, human capital, and skills to achieve their objectives. The implementation of the CRM system is more than installing a package of software programmes. The management mentioned that it is important to engage all the functional areas of the Star Media Group-human resources, marketing, revenue, information technology (IT), and product development. The existing team needs to be flexible when using their CRM strategies in a competitive market to suit the evolving consumer behaviour.

Conclusion
This study comes to the conclusion that all organisations, regardless of big or small, should acknowledge the value of digital marketing. Without digital marketing, it is difficult to meet the target audience in this digital world. The presence of new media, especially the internet, has brought significant changes in the aspect of digital marketing for the magazine publishing industry in our country.
Engaging digital tools in marketing has become an essential strategy for many companies. Nowadays, small business owners implement digital marketing, and they are surprised by the low cost and efficient way to market their products or services. Digital marketing has no boundaries. This study found that digital marketing has an important role in the modern business environment.
This study revealed how digital marketing helped the development of the publishing industry in Malaysia. This study also acknowledged that businesses could benefit from digital marketing such as search engine optimisation (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), content marketing, campaign marketing, social media marketing, e-mail direct marketing, and display advertising that are becoming more common in our advancing technology.
This study has its limitation; digital marketing is often seen as a way to deliver information to customers. Instead of browsing in the digital platform, some other sectors and fields are more to touch and see (physical approach). In which digital marketing cannot build and sell trust in the product or service because many customers prefer direct interaction. For future studies, digital marketing will be more effective if it recognises consumer needs as a top priority and to evaluate the effect of digital platforms on consumer buying decisions to achieve more reliable results for a larger geographic region

Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding
No funding was involved in this study