Welcome to the Digital Marketing Revolution. Thanks for being part of this course. Let's begin by taking a look at where we're going and what you will learn. This course is part of the University of Illinois' Digital Marketing Specialization. However, it's a bit different from the other courses in the specialization and is a bit unlike any other course on this topic. In fact, I believe there's no other course quite like this anywhere in the world. When I was in college, one of my favorite classes was An Introduction to Anthropology course taught by a great professor named Ken Feder. One of the things I remember from that course was Professor Feder saying that the goal of anthropology was to make the strange, familiar and the familiar strange. In essence, this is what we will try to do in this course. We'll take a close look at a very familiar territory, the analog world, and carefully consider how this world is affected by something that is still quite new and somewhat strange, the digital world. Let me give you example of what I mean. When I was in high school, listening to music was strictly an analog activity. You either listen to FM radio and hope that they would play a song that you liked or you bought a Vinyl record or perhaps a cassette tape that included your favorite songs. Now, back in 1983, if you wanted to buy a record, you went to your local record store where you had a lot to choose from. Back then, there were about one billion record albums sold across the world. Then the digital revolution arrived. The first stage of this revolution was the compact disc, which allowed music to be stored in a digital form and promised a better listening experience. By 1993, world wide record album sales dipped from one billion to only 100 million. This was also the year in which improvements in data compression technology led to the introduction of the MP3 file, which eliminated the need to go to record store altogether as music became something that you could download quite easily on your computer. This second part of the digital revolution further reduced the sales of record albums, which had a low of only three million in worldwide sales by the year 2006. Thus, it seemed clear that this old analog technology was being dominated by the digital. Then something happened. Around 2008, people started turning back to the analog. Since then, sales of Vinyl albums have increased every year, many of these albums are being sold at physical retailers, including a growing number of local record stores such as Exile on Main Street here in Champaign, as well as some national chain stores like Barnes & Noble and Urban Outfitters. Thus, it appears that, at least in some cases, analog music is resisting the digital revolution. In addition to this revival of local record stores, Vinyl records are also a hot commodity online. Or you can find websites for locating hard to find records, as well as online communities in which Vinyl Aficionados can chat and coordinate physical events such as Record Store Day, which is held every April. This is a great example of the synergy between the analog and the digital. Now, although they may look the same as records that were sold back when I was in high school, many of today's Vinyl records have also been transformed by the digital revolution. For example, the website vinylize.it allows anyone to make their own Vinyl record out of any SoundCloud track. This is a radical transformation of the traditional record making process. As you can see from the example of Vinyl records, the digital revolution has impacted the analog world in a number of different ways. In some cases, the digital has dominated the analog, in other cases, the analog has resisted the digital and in some cases the digital provides synergy with the analog or has even transformed its basic nature. Of course, we'll explore each of these four types of relationships in order to enhance your understanding of the digital marketing revolution. We'll examine each of these four relationships using a variety of learning modalities, including video lectures, case studies, hands-on exercises, vicarious experiences, and interviews with a variety of faculty experts. By engaging in these various learning activities, you'll increase your appreciation of how the digital revolution has affected the analog world. More specifically, there are four key lessons that I hope you take away from this course. First, the analog and the digital are two very different types of worlds, and each has their own distinct sets of benefits. Second, the value of these different sets of benefits will vary based on a number of factors, such as product type, buyer characteristics, or geographic location. Third, the relative value of analog benefits and digital benefits affect the relationship between these two types of technologies. For example, when the benefits of the digital exceed the benefits of the analog, we will see cases of digital dominance. Fourth and finally, within each of the four types of analog digital relations, that's dominance, resistance, synergy, and transformation, we see regularly occurring patterns across different types of products and services. Knowledge of these patterns can be used to enhance your ability to leverage both the digital as well as the analog. Are you ready to begin? Great. Let's get started.