The evolution has begun - are you ready?
Marketing, both as a science and job function, has evolved greatly in the past few years. From the advent of social media advertising, the relationship between customers and marketers has become more equal. Earlier, marketers could come up with a campaign that targeted their captivated audience through very precise channels. It was okay not to measure every single aspect of a launch. I call this Marketing 1.0.
Now the audience is distracted, informed and definitely more alert. Marketing campaigns need to be managed at multiple levels, with new customers flowing in and out of different channels. The biggest mistake an organization can make at this time, is use the same old principles to manage their ad campaigns. Setting up a social media presence without asking basic questions about your aim can be disastrous. Most firms have realized that, and now have dedicated and sophisticated social media advertising units. The best ones keep a captivated batch of loyalists coming back for more. (See: Red Bull). This is Marketing 2.0.
As organizations get better at recording data, measuring success ratios and creating specific campaigns for social media- the question is, what does Marketing 3.0 look like? The latest flurry of activity indicates that content is still king, and will increase in value over time. Content has always mattered, however, content used 'as media' is new (See Mitch Joel's blog on Marketing Agencies of the Future). Netflix has shown media agencies the way by creating their own shows and offering content that no one else can.
The same principles can be applied to organizations that create their own in-house newsrooms. By siphoning off content and marking your territory, customers are being told that "we offer something that no one else can". It would be interesting to see where this leads. My guess is that it will create more fragmented content in an already fragmented world. This in turn would feed into the impatience and luxury of choice that the audience already suffers from.
The question is: How does the media agency of the future handle it? How does an organization trying to build a brand deal with it? How do you gain credibility in a world where the customer gives you their attention for only a fraction of a second while your competitors distract them by colorful hand waving? Marketing 3.0 will be about creating fierce loyalists and giving them tremendous value in return for their loyalty. It will be about creating multiple fragmented products that can be customized with ease and tailored down to the individual. It will be about ads that are personal and displayed on media that enables one-on-one interaction. It will be more intimate and responsible than marketing has ever been. As a customer, that is amazingly good news. As a marketer, make sure you are ready to deliver in this new world.
