What is digital communication?

Digital. Behind this pervasive buzzword lies, first and foremost, the digitization of information formats. Yet the real story isn’t there so much as in the strategic shift this shift toward digital implies. A closer look at digital communication.

What is digital communication?

Digital communication is, above all, the digitization of information formats. But beyond that, it also means viewing corporate communication as an entire ecosystem, an environment that encompasses and operates across every dimension of the digital world.

From my point of view, digital communication defines, within a digital ecosystem, the strategy and communication actions to carry out across the web, social media, various mobile devices, and connected objects.

Digital communication was therefore first applied to the web, social media, and mobile devices. It’s now opening up to new channels and technology trends: virtual reality, chatbots and voicebots, smart speakers, big data, and blockchain.

A liquid form of information: flows are replacing formats

Communication devices have mainly become screens: smartphones, PCs, tablets. Individual, touch-based screens. Digital communication marks the disappearance of fixed formats and now flows through information channels:

• Social media
• Website
• Blog
• Newsletter
• Mobile app
• Connected devices

Digitization means the fading away of fixed formats (posters, brochures, newspapers) in favor of flow-based communication, evolving, less structured, closer to conversation and exchange than to brand messaging.

Information is no longer solid, tied to a single format. It becomes liquid, moving from one device to the next, from one consumer to the next.

Information spreads like a fluid, independent of any single format, which in the truest sense becomes a channel in the digital age. Compatible, connected channels, where information flows from one to another.

These changes affect not only how these channels are used, but also the activities and role of communication teams. Two major shifts stand out: community management and content production, from which the trend toward ambassador programs emerges.

Managing a company’s various social spaces (Facebook, X, LinkedIn) has become one of the main challenges of digital communication. This is the central role of the community manager, or digital communication officer.

The goal?

Brand sociability. Listening to conversations about the brand, responding to comments, nurturing customer relationships, and building a community are now front and center.

Digital communication strategy on social media

Communication has always aimed to produce content, but social media has fueled users’ appetite for it even further. Channels therefore need to be fed with fresh, personalized content.

A few examples of content for digital communication:

• Storytelling: creating myth, emotion, or entertainment
• Expert content: becoming the go-to guide in your field
• Playful content: games, virality, interaction
• A variety of formats: video, live, photo, webinar, series

Another key mission in digital communication: ambassador programs. A blend of community management and brand content, these employee advocacy programs encourage employees to share internally crafted messages on social media.

An organized voice, backed by ready-to-share content, a true communication kit. Every employee becomes a communicator, with a personal audience that can carry real weight, sometimes rivaling that of an actual media outlet. The ambassador approach is a logical continuation of community management.

Communication or marketing?

Communication and marketing are closely related, to the point that communication is often understood as a part of, or continuation of, marketing. While marketing focuses on the offer, products, and customer experience, communication focuses on the company’s and brand’s image, and on exchanges with its audiences.

Operational marketing handles promotional actions, while communication has a more institutional focus. The marketing team manages display advertising, affiliation, organic and paid search, emailing, or social media advertising, while communication concentrates on community management and content production.

This distinction, however, remains quite relative: digital has blurred the lines, bringing back the broader concept of integrated marketing communication, an organizational model widely used in the United States.

What’s changing digital communication

By encouraging massive, public, and multi-directional feedback, social media is pushing companies to move from top-down messaging to genuine corporate communication, one that’s more egalitarian and responsive.

The original sender, the company, now increasingly finds itself in the position of responding to messages and comments from its audiences: customers, employees, stakeholders. Because it’s these audiences who, thanks to social media, produce most of the information circulating about the company.

Companies therefore find themselves having to react to messages from their audiences. This is likely one of the defining features of digital communication, one that requires revisiting communication theory itself.

The successive stacking of technologies and uses (web, social media, mobile, then connected devices) has given way to a more global vision, tied to a strategic dimension, positioning digital communication agencies and teams above the tools that used to shape their actions.

Digital communication or numerical communication?

In French, communication should technically be called “numérique” rather than “digitale,” as recommended by the Académie française.

The French adjective “digital” originally means “relating to the fingers.” It comes from the Latin digitalis, “the thickness of a finger,” itself derived from digitus, “finger.” It should not be confused with its English equivalent, which refers to numerical data; French has the word “numérique” for that.

One can debate the French adoption of the word “digital,” but its use has become widespread today, much like “web” once overtook “toile.” Beyond its numerical equivalent, “digital” also evokes the action of fingers on screens: after all, tablets and smartphones are now the main gateways to the internet. The word carries with it that tactile, immediate, and decisive dimension that “numérique” lacks.