The first video on MTV was the Buggles’ “Video Killed The Radio Star.” This song celebrates the “golden age of radio” and a singer whose career is cut short by television. The proclamation that the radio was dead and that all things musical would migrate to the small screen was profound if not exactly true.
Much of the music world quickly jumped on the video bandwagon as a way of extending audience interest and sales. And that changed the paradigm for the music industry. The same can be said for the on-line world and the future of branding. Maybe. In a recent article in Adweek by visionary Bob Greenberg, the CEO of R/GA, pointed out that the old rules of branding that served iconic brands like IBM, UPS and AT&T won’t work in today’s ever wired world. http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/community/columns/bob-greenberg/e3id9a975e26c8545c537eabf30e962eed8 That consumers tune out with ever increasing frequency “traditional” marketing tools -the monologue brand’s typically have with consumers. No argument that the game has changed and that many consumers get information differently today than they did 15 or 20 years ago (let’s get out of the way the fact that much of the radio and television programming is being delivered digitally – we live in a digital world – that’s a fact). I don’t argue with the notion that brands have to give consumers a reason to have a relationship. I wouldn’t be in this business if I didn’t believe that consumer/brand relationships weren’t the linchpin to loyalty and advocacy. I contend that a blended approach to relationship and engagement with a consumer or community of consumers is the right approach. Consumers gather information from so many places – family and friends, editorial, the digital realm as well as traditional media that the development of a relationship is not the function of one medium or another. They work best when they work together. There is no doubt that technology has allowed consumers to connect with brands on their terms. It has also allowed brands, if they are so inclined, to create higher levels on attention for themselves and their products and thereby injecting themselves into the consumer consciousness more easily than before. Traditional media however still has the power to reinforce messages and reach large numbers of consumers which is of particular importance to brands and products with broad and deep consumer appeal.
By now, it might appear that I am “Anti-New Media” which couldn’t be further from the truth, case in point is this blog and the fact that I’ve helped develop both experiential marketing and digital marketing skill sets within two traditional ad agencies. What I am is against saying any one thing is dead and that technology and the new media are the apes taking over the humans like in Planet Of The Apes. There has got to be a balance in the application of all marketing communication tools – old and new media, direct, public relations, experiential. The ratios come from understanding the consumer community with which a brand is trying to create relationships.
This leads to tremendous complexity for brands, CMOs and their partner agencies. To Mr. Greenberg’s point, consumers are on a path to pulling information rather than having it pushed upon them and brands must change the way the create engagements or interfaces in order to have success. This means much more than repurposedcreative for multiple channels. Mr. Greenberg is right in the assessment that brands cannot take a top-down approach as has been done for decades. I believe it must be a 360-degree approach from all sides to help the consumer with awareness, acceptance, trial, loyalty and advocacy.
Let’s not do the death march for “traditional” advertising just yet. Maybe Gloria Gaynor’s “I will survive” is a more approriate anthem to describe the evolution of advertising.
Posted by fjmoricca 
Posted by fjmoricca 