What do you think is lacking in the advertising world of to-day?

Mainly we appear to lack ideas, strong ideas, competing ideas, confident

philosophies, angry dissent. Advertising people used to have ideas &

policies; they jostled to present their ideas. But what is alarming is

the impassivity of our advertising people & the idleness of advertising

debate, as we wait. There is a sense of vacuum.

Where to-day is the bold advocacy, the impatience to persuade, the urgency of

argument? Where are the shouts of "here's how!"? Where are the leading

actors, the big voices, the great thoughts?

Headlines about "Twitter", the Internet, "Facebook" et al, are these now the

only images we have of a once great advertising industry?

But perhaps the problem is simpler but just as scary, in a headline " Lack of

experience affects business" the Institute of Advertising had this to say, "The

nature of the business is such that in order to be cost efficient process gets

dumbed down and farmed out to more junior people. There is a tendency to

commodity and that can lead to work being de-skilled".

So there you have it technology and a dumbing down are affecting all aspect

of advertising...it is time to change or else advertising will become like the

Zimbabwe bird flying around in ever decreasing circles until it disappears up

its own orifice!

　

Yes....or No?

Marketing…it's All a Question of Trust!

　

With the many billions spent annually on Marketing Communications, the TV programme

fakery together with the phone in scandals means that most of this colossal expenditure is

wasted because of a very serious issue, a declining lack of trust on behalf of your

customers!

And all the advertising in the world can't help you if you don't have trust.

The BBC and the commercial networks are not the only

organisations that have suffered a breakdown in trust recently.

Northern Rock, GMTV, Mattel, Bernard Matthews and Cadbury Schweppes have all,

recently, be weighed in the balance and found wanting. Levels of trust

in the West are in long-term decline, authority is something to be

challenged. So how have we come to this state? Perhaps it all started

as stores and communities grew larger and the personal bonds of trust and

loyalty that used to be enjoyed by the local trader who knew his customers wants

and needs, disappeared. In today's marketplace, time, attention and

trust seem to have become the scarcest resources and companies that fail to

recognise this fact are bound to suffer problems. As a result it is becoming

more and more important to ensure that there is a strong what's in it for me'

appeal to the consumer. With so many demands on their time they will

only spend quality time with those products and services that are clearly

offering them something of direct personal relevance and value.

Research published recently by Beyond Philosophy, a UK company specialising in

customer attitudes, claims 82 per cent of people never believe their experience

of an organisation will match the image promoted by television advertising.

Beyond Philosophy concludes that television advertising may actually be harming,

rather than enhancing, companies' relationships with their customers.

Similarly, research by the Henley Centre has shown that while nine out of ten

people will trust their spouse or partner and eight out of ten their children,

fewer than a third (27%) trust retailers or manufacturers, while just 14% trust

either the government or advertisers! Marketing appears to have

cottoned on to the fact that apparent intimacy enhances trustworthiness. There's no

denying that for business, being seen to be your trusted intimate pays.

There has been a loosening of emotional ties between business and society.

Indeed with the growth of new technology most transactions with consumers are

with faceless entities be it banking, our grocer or our car insurer.

In the past we did business with people you knew,

so trust was given in the interactions. In to day's world you have to

assume you can trust your bank it counts on a leap of faith that wasn't there

before. Only one form of communication can help overcome this lack of

trust that of interactive communication. Current conventional mass

media are weak conductors of knowledge and comprehension. This is because of a

number of factors, however the main reason is; they are non-interactive

communications vehicles, in other words conversations' cannot take place.

Interaction can be defined simply as straightforward

communication between two parties. Presently we are in danger of losing the real

meaning of interaction, as we tend to focus discussions on the emerging

technologies and neglect the communication process itself. With an understanding

of the real meaning of Interactive Communication, existing media can be made

interactive, and subsequently far more cost effective. Communication

research shows that interaction raises a communication's learning

effectiveness. Interactive communication, properly executed has none of

the woolly theorising that lies behind the arguments about various forms of

so-called interactive communication using direct

and electronic media (most of which involves at best the

minimum of true interactivity). It is also practical, down-to-earth,

and uses a readily comprehensible and verified mechanism to expand the relevance

and salience of advertising and other forms of marketing communications. It can

be applied to all major media and to various other forms of communication,

including new media. Trust absolutely sells, hence the urgent need to

understand and then implement interactive programmes. With interactive

communication you can go a long way to creating, and maintaining, a trusting

customer. Remember, trust is an end product, it is the consequence of other

things you cannot mandate it, you have to earn it and you earn it with a

rigorous understanding of, and then implementation, of interactive communication

Understanding Interactive Marketing

Communication.

Defining Interactive Marketing.

Interaction can be defined simply as straightforward communication between two parties. Presently we are in danger of losing the real meaning of interaction, as we tend to focus discussions on the emerging technologies and neglect the communication process itself. With an understanding of the real meaning of Interactive Communication, existing media can be made interactive, and subsequently far more cost effective.

Goodbye to the halcyon days of the TV advertisement of old?


A new wave of technology is promising to transform the obsolete analogue technology of television into a two-way medium which allows the viewer to determine what is to be watched, and when.

This could well create a situation where the consumers solicit information from the advertiser, rather than the advertiser soliciting the attention of the consumer.

Viewers are becoming impatient with television’s linear flow and are increasingly using the limited opportunities available to them to avoid the intentions of advertisers and programme makers. Even though too many the remote control is a fairly recent development, 44% habitually use it to avoid advertisements.

Television is an advertising medium, not a communications medium and, as television declines in the face of competition from the new media, conventional advertising will decline with it.

In many ways, ‘advertising’ is an outmoded concept, since media advertising is simply one means of communication with customers. In an environment in which the balance of power is shifting in favour of the consumer rather than the advertiser, manufacturers and service providers need to look at ways of replacing the monologue of advertising with a dialogue which can utilise a range of different ‘relationship’ marketing techniques.

Advertising has to modernise & change.


The market place has changed. Newspapers and television have lost their exclusive hold on the advertiser, the number of print and electronic advertising channels has substantially increased, such as pre-printed booklets pushed through letterboxes, or hung on doorknobs, local cable TV and Direct Mail.

Recent events have given advertising a permanently diminished role in the selling of goods and services. At the same time cynical consumers are wearying of the constant barrage of marketing messages. They’re becoming less receptive of the blandishments of advertisements, and their loyalties to brands erode as they see more products as commodities distinguished only by price.

Advertising ignores communication theory.


As the mass media have matured, the behavioural dynamics of perception and interaction, which were not address by Advertising Agencies in the 70s and 80s, during the explosive growth of advertising have become critical to the redefinition of media and its role in marketing communication. With passive, one way, forms of advertising such as media displays or television advertising, there is a certainty of a degree of non-response.

Lack of communication competence.


Most Advertising Agencies lack the skills of communication, advertising messages are more carefully prepared than interpersonal communication and yet ‘message’ comprehension tends to be lower.

Advertisements are more carefully prepared because gatekeepers (those who prepare and send out messages) are more cautious about what they say to large audiences than they are to audiences of one or a few, they check their facts more carefully and they prepare their syntax and vocabulary more precisely. And yet, because their audience contributes much less feedback, the source cannot correct for any lapse or understanding, so people are more likely to misinterpret what they hear or read over the mass media.

It is also important to note, of course that just because mediated messages are more carefully prepared, they are not necessarily more accurate. Gatekeepers have a way of looking at the world based on personal beliefs or motivations. This ‘world view’ sometimes tends to make media messages inaccurate.

Interactive Communication leads to a commitment to participate.


However, with interactive marketing communication, there is a commitment to participate, which in turn leads to a set of possibilities, which are significantly different in how they affect the communication process, itself.

The need for product information.


Image advertising doesn’t give the information needed to buy knowledge-driven products. Moreover communication results from an interaction in which two parties expect to give and take. Audience members must be able to give feedback. Media practitioners must be sensitive to the information contained in the feedback. This give and take can result on real understanding or real feedback.

The need for Interactive Marketing Communication.


Put simply, because there is a human desire for interaction. We have created a media society during the past 40 or 50 years where there is an extraordinary reduction in interaction because of the one-way and more passive form of information retrieval that exists.

People desire to be taken account of, to affect change, learn and personalise their relationships with their environment. There are a phenomenal number of reasons, which cause people to interact, which go far beyond just giving them things.

When people participate in interactive marketing communication they are told that their efforts and feedback are of positive help to the advertisers. Moreover, by participating, they then learn and understand the message from the advertiser, personalise their relationship with the advertiser and their products (or services).

Consumers tend to filter out information they do not want to hear and this alters the effectiveness of advertising in quite a dramatic way. The purchaser’s decision is invariably a compromise and this leads to a certain amount of anxiety. The worry that perhaps the purchase decision was not the best or right one. In order to minimise this anxiety the purchaser seeks to reinforce his choice and begins to take more notice of his chosen product’s advertising. And, at the same time, the purchaser deliberately suppresses data, which might challenge his decision by ignoring the advertising of competitive brands.

People are often loyal to a brand simply because they do not want to readdress a decision. The opportunity to screen out undesired data always exists when media advertisements have to stand on their own and fight for attention.

Interactive Communication takes the consumer through the barrier of not wanting to address change; and this is the ultimate market the advertiser is after – the people who use his competitors’ products.

Now the consumer can say ‘Yes, I will change my behaviour and I have a very good reason or series of reasons why", and have a well-informed opinion or image in mind.

If someone goes into a product purchase decision with a very specific image of the product and its reason to exist and why they have decided those reasons are worth its purchase, the test in reality, the use of the product, will tend to confirm that premise, and therefore conversion will be enormously enhanced.

Interactive Marketing Communication turns passive advertising into active advertising and actually alters behaviour during the communication and learning process.

Interactive Marketing Communication increases sale.


And there’s more!

It enhances relationships and dramatically improves consumer knowledge, understanding and loyalty.
1. Strong Company or Brand Values.

To be effective communication has to be single minded in choosing a specific proposition which by definition cannot appeal to all. Yet every product, service or retail outlet can offer several attractive benefits and in some cases these can be numerous. Interactive Communication presents consumers with a ‘menu’ of powerful benefits, both rational and emotional, and asks them to choose the one which they find most relevant and appealing to them.

This allows them: -

a) Personalise their relationship with the communicator.

b. To absorb and retain the majority – or even all – of those extra benefits while making their choice.

c.
Not one, but several, good reasons for buying the product or service.

Equally it puts these benefits into context, educating consumers to understand just how important those benefits are to them, and positions the product or service as unique in satisfying all those needs.
2. The emotional relationship.

By asking consumers for their opinions rather than telling them, the company makes them feel special and involved in an unprecedented way. A company prepared to listen! This disarms consumers and produces a feeling of trust and thereby an emotional commitment to the company and its products, which cannot be, generated any other way.

That emotional commitment enhances the more rational understanding of the Company or Brand Values discussed above and establishes an unprecedented, personal, relationship with the manufacturer/brand/retailer – even amongst those who may have had no previous experience.

3. Consumer Feedback.

Allowing consumers to interact with the brand by offering their opinions and views does more than create an emotional commitment; it allows large numbers of real people to express ideas in a way they have not had the facility to do before, to a company evidently prepared to listen and act.

Consumers are seduced and this generates genuinely expressed observations on the strengths of the company – as well as areas of opportunity for improvement or exploitation. It is, in effect, an enormous piece of qualitative research, but without consumers’ ability to vouchsafe real opinions being inhibited or guided by a researcher.

Thus the combination of all these elements produces a deep understanding of the company and its brands – and its role and value to the consumer; a greater level of involvement in an emotional commitment to the brand and an enhanced desire to buy it.

Understanding Interactive Marketing Communication.


With a better understanding of the nature of Interaction allows us then to give a more precise definition of the process, that is:

"With Interactive Marketing Communicationthe reader/viewer is actively encouraged to take careful note of what is being taught him,

The Author pioneered interactive communication to the advertising and marketing communities some twenty-five years ago. The communication issues he addresses have been neglected during the explosive grown of advertising in the 60s, 70s and 80s, these are Cognitive Dissonance, Selective Retention and Selective Exposure.

Would you like to discover the incredible results to be attained by using interactive communication? Well these are revealed for FREE at http://effectiveaccountablecommunication.blogspot.com or contact Paul directly on paulashby40@yahoo.com

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

　

You probably missed the 'Digital Life’

report from TNS .

Despite a major PR push from its authors, it barely made a dent in the Twittersphere or across traditional marketing and media channels. Which is odd when you consider that even the slightest news about social media usually garners a huge response in the marketing world. A small company launches a new app and headlines start flashing. A senior marketer announces a major investment in Facebook and 5,000 tweets are launched.

So one might expect that the biggest piece of empirical research ever conducted on consumers’ Digital behaviour and their attitudes to social media from the world’s biggest market research company would create quite a lot of buzz. After all, 72,000 consumers interviewed across 60 countries is quite a sample. Yet coverage of the report and its key findings was almost non-existent. Blink and you missed it.

One look inside the Digital Life report, however, explains the lack of attention. Unlike the overly optimistic and wildly out of touch proclamations of the social media industry and those that cover it, the TNS study was based on empirical data. And as a result, it presented a much more even-handed and objective view of the digital landscape than most marketers are comfortable accepting or forwarding to their peers.

For example, the report concludes that the majority of consumers in developed markets do not want to engage with brands via social media. In the UK, that proportion was at its highest with 61% of consumers stating they do not see social media as a place they want to interact with brands. That’s a bummer for every brand manager who spouts the usual crap about" Having a conversation with the consumer", because almost two-thirds of their consumers aren’t interested in talking to them.

The research also reveals that just a quarter of consumers in developed markets see social networks as a place to buy products. Again, that’s a blow both to those who have boldly predicted the commercialisation of social media as a retail space and to the likes of Facebook and Twitter, whose long-term business projections partly depend on monetising their impact on consumers.

But these facts and many more were probably not communicated to you because they do not fit the ideology that the marketing industry is attempting to propagate when it comes to social media. Like the Chinese government - which steadfastly refuses to describe Tibet as anything other than a part of China and which rarely covers any of the public outrages that take place there - the hegemonic forces of marketing prefer to tell a story of new apps and bold Facebook strategies rather than a more fair approach.


To the credit of TNS, it did just that in its report , and there was much to celebrate about the potential of digital as a vitally important medium for the people of the 21st century. But what also emerged from the data was clear evidence of the lack of credibility or engagement that most brands can expect from their forays into social media. As TNS chief development officer Matthew Froggatt put it: "many brands have recognised the vast potential audiences available to them on social networks; however, they are failing to understand that these spaces belong to the consumer and brand presence needs to be proportionate and justified."€

Bravo Mr Froggatt! Wise is the marketer who uses data to assess the situation. And he has a point, does he not? In all the hullabaloo, has anyone considered that the term social media has no place for brands within its definition? ’€Social media’€literally means the communication channels that exist between people. Not between brands.

But like every medium before it, brands try to invade that space anyway. And social media, like every other medium before it, is already suffering from clutter as a result. As more brands attempt to grab attention and start social media conversations with disinterested consumers, more of them will switch off. That’s probably why the sample in developing countries in the TNS research were more positive about brands on social media those in developed markets - they have yet to be switched off.

And clutter - as marketers should know from experience - does not eventually subside. The response of marketers to a cluttered media is to produce more clutter. As TNS notes: "Misguided digital strategies are generating mountains of digital waste, from friendless Facebook accounts to blogs no one reads"€・ The stark message from the TNS data is clear: it’s already hard to communicate with consumers via social media and it will only get harder as time goes on and more brands pile in.

The overall message from the TNS report is not one of complete hopelessness but of practical reality. Digital communications, and social media within it, is a genuinely world-changing development. But for those marketers who ’rank the Kool-Aid’€and spent all their money and attention on using it as their main communications focus, there’ a disappointing denouement ahead.

　

　

Are we at all surprised that the current advertising crisis has come this far?

Let's be honest: the warning voices have been around for a long time, the fact

that these warnings were consistently ignored has now brought about the near

collapse of the system.

We live in a schizophrenic world and we will be held

accountable for our sins.The reasons why the writing on the wall was ignored

has to do with the denying of inconvenient truths and also because nobody really

felt responsible or capable of action.The advertising/marketing bodies

either lacked the authority or the competency to deal with the challenges of a

global advertising system that has gone horribly wrong!

Furthermore, individual advertising agencies have not shown the initiative to address a

fundamentally flawed and restrictive process of communication together with a

total lack of accountability. Additionally none of the advertising agencies

and the media have shown any evidence of long term vision. Additionally the

regulatory functions, such as they are have been abused by many within the

industry, consciously or unconsciously to the great detriment of Clients and

their Customers. The professional role of Marketing and Advertising

Management has been undermined by the total lack of true accountability and

other problems that link this management to the short-term interests of the

advertising agencies themselves.

Maximum profit seeking has increasingly taken precedence over long-term accountability

together with a complete misunderstanding, and implementation, of the communications process!

Markets work best when consumers are well informed about the products they are

purchasing and companies are genuinely incentivised to compete for new business

on the basis of transparent products that perform in the marketplace. Sadly,

this hasn't been the case with the current Marketing and Advertising available

because of a number of factors, clutter, lack of interaction, no accountability,

no exchange of information etc etc. Radical reforms are needed to build an

accountable commercial commercial programme with consumers interests at its very

heart. The bubbles that always exist in every market. One of the most

famous bubbles in the advertising world is the Saatchi & Saatchi bubble

which nearly convinced every one that they, and they alone, were responsible for

the election win of Margaret Thatcher, they were not. Nevertheless they had

Clients flocking to them in the quite mistaken belief that they, the Saatchi

brothers, could increase their sales. Now, along comes another bubble, The

Martin Lindstrom bubble. Lindstrom is the so called guru of Neuro-marketing

which makes the whole process of selling sound so simple. Utter rubbish yet

more Clients will be persuaded to part with millions of dollars before they too

will see this as nothing but another bubble. His very existence proves yet

again that our current methods of marketing are inaccurate and very very

questionable. The article on Lindstrom is headlined "Now the buyer must

beware". The sad fact is that "the buyer" has always been aware, they are

turning away from the clutter, and meaningless chatter of current advertising in

their millions, a very similar bubble occurred a few years ago, this particular

bubble was called "subliminal advertising" and was a complete farce and hoax!

Neuro-marketing is an even bigger bubble and hoax.

　

What happens in real life is what matters to or between customers

.

Marketers should focus on creating social meaning and social utility-things that help real

world social interaction or support the group's interests-rather than forcing

meaning on individuals through brain washing or bribery. Products or services

could be devised to be interesting enough to become talked about in the first

place. The first change in the way we think about media, must be a major

shift away from thinking about media as channels' down which we tip messages

and information. Only in so far as they serve and help advertisers access and

harness the power of the social networks that lie behind them.

Incidentally, an interesting piece of research has just emerged which confirms

what I have long suspected, whilst, at the same time, going along with my

suspicion about the creative ego and the use of very high priced Hollywood

directors! Advertisements starring high profile celebrities such as David

Beckham and Jamie Oliver do not sell products as well as those featuring every

day people, new research suggested. A study by the University of Bath and

the University of St Gallen in Switzerland, found that ordinary members of the

public are more effective in selling products than super stars paid millions to

endorse them. That's because people are more worried about keeping up with the

Jones's than the rich and famous! Never-the-less we guarantee that those

Advertising Agencies will keep on using highly paid Hollywood movie directors as

well as using the rich and famous as models, there goes millions more of the poor

old clients budget again;again;again! All I will say is this, use

Interactive Programs, properly executed, and you will not have to spend money on

Hollywood Directors or, for that matter, the likes of David Beckham etc.

So the next time your Advertising Agency comes with their invoice, go through it

with a fine toothcomb and delete the name(s) David Beckham, or whomever. Then

check out who the director is, if he's Hollywood, strike him out as well; we

guarantee that you'll be surprised at how much you can save. Then half

your budget and start using Interactive Marketing

programs, again, you'll be surprised at the positive results at a fraction

of your normal advertising costs!With Interactive Marketing

you don't have expensive, unnecessary add-ons! With Interactive Marketing

Communication you don't have wasteful coupons! With Interactive Marketing

Communication you don't have wasteful promotional activity! With Interactive

Marketing Communication you don't have David Beckhams! With Interactive

Marketing Communication you don't have expensive Hollywood movie Directors!

With Interactive Marketing Communications you do have sales and increased

profits! - plus a whole lot more.

The Attraction of Interactive Communication is that it is a return to the

prehistoric human fascination with telling tales!

Since the beginnings of any civilized society the market place was the hub of

civilization, a place to which traders returned from remote lands with exotic

spices, silks, monkeys, parrots, jewels - and fabulous stories. Interactive

Communication, properly executed, more resembles an ancient bazaar than fits the

business models companies try and impose upon it.

People respond to interactive

opportunities because it seems to offer some intangible quality

long missing in action from modern life. In sharp contrast to the alienation

wrought by homogenized broadcast media, interactive opportunities provide a

space in which the human voice would be rapidly rediscovered.

Unlike the lockstep conformity imposed by television, advertising, and

corporate propaganda, interactive communication gives new legitimacy and free

rein to play.

People long for more connection between what we do for a living and what we

genuinely care about. We long for release from anonymity, to be seen as who we

feel ourselves to be rather than the sum of abstract metrics and parameters.

We long to be part of a world that makes sense rather than accept the

accidental alienation imposed by market forces too large to grasp; to even

contemplate.

Remember the market place, of old. Caravans arrived across burning deserts

dates and figs, snakes and parrots, monkeys, strange music and stranger tales.

The market place was the heart of the city, the kernel, the hub.Like the

past and the future it stood at the crossroads.

People worked early and went there for coffee and vegetables, eggs and wine,

for pots and carpets.

They went there to look and listen and to marvel, to buy and to be amused.

But mostly they went to meet each other to talk and interact! Markets are

conversations.

So what went so horribly wrong? From the perspective of corporations, many of

which by the twentieth century had become bigger and more powerful than ancient

city-states, nothing went wrong. Things did change however.

Commerce is a natural part of human life but is has become increasingly

unnatural over the intervening centuries, gradually divorcing itself from the

very people on whom it depends, whether workers or customers. The result has

been to create a huge chasm between buyers and sellers. Advertising's

failure!

Conventional advertising has failed the natural human need for social

interaction. We have created a media society during the last 30 or 40 years

where there is an extraordinary reduction in interaction because of the one-way

and more passive form of information that exists. People desire to be taken

account of, to affect change, learn and personalize their relationships with

their environment. These psychological and sociological factors are part of the

incentive to interact with advertising. However, these tend to be minimized in

the incentive direct response field, there are a phenomenal number of reasons

which cause people to interact which go beyond just giving them things.

　

The lack of education about the communication process




means that millions are being poured down the black hole of

ineffectiveness! The problem is caused by advertising agencies, we all

secretly feel that they are all a bunch of charlatans and yet! And yes,

we have all met advertising people who were touchingly sincere and believed in

what they were doing despite the lack of accountability! However the fact

remains that most advertising people have minds so devoid of realism that they

are still prepared to believe the mantra "advertising works!

The science of communication is so mind-shatteringly elegant and inspiring that

advertising, by its very nature, is demeaning and shallow and a total betrayal

of what it is to actually communicate, especially when one considers what the

human species has achieved in all else. Perhaps the periodic swellings

of emotion in the Western World over the past few years are, in actuality, the

anguished pleas of a lonely and atomised populace dehumanised and

depersonalised, and totally removed from any real social interaction, and

desperate for company! It is true to say that advertising is the enemy

of rational thought, it encourages the victory of feeling over reason.

Nevertheless there is a tremendous danger to which big business appears to

have succumbed in believing that advertising, in whatever form, is somehow

invincible and all that we can do is debate alternatives within its framework.



Now advertising is dazzling us with the wonders of technology. It is

all so new, exciting and wonderfully opportune and anyway if all that fails to

excite us lets use cool sounding jargon! The fact of the matter is

that Advertising is a grotesque manifestation of Top-Down-Management and has

about as much intellectual rigour as Bambi! What is really foolish is that it

clearly appeals to insecure political leaders who desperately want to be all

things to all people! In the current era of "The Market is always

right", where have all the sceptics gone? There is no one to expose the bogus

realities of much of advertising and marketing. Such is the grip of modern

advertising that to question the omniscience of advertising is to bring down the wrath of God!

Which results in the Emperor still parading in his new birthday suit and still

totally unaccountable! Advertisings' amazing benefits are simply an

illusion conjured up by exotic advertising personalities of whom the biggest

culprits were the Saatchi Brothers! And boy did they lead the business

world on a merry dance! Advertising people refuse to learn from

experience, and strive instead to discredit any new, superior method

of communication denying us all of enlightenment and the benefits stemming

from a superior method which, in turn, condemns them to repeat the past.

There is a far better way and it is proven accountable and very cost

effective!

While we in the West tries to shore up the ruins of Marketing, nobody

appears to want to reshape it

The financial crisis has transformed the global marketing world and, at the

same time, discredited many of the ideas regarding advertising, marketing,

consumers and society that were taken for granted in the pre-crisis decades.

Here nobody appears to see the crisis as an opportunity to build a new form of

capitalism. Nobody seems to see that the future can be and most certainly

should be better than the past. Without a doubt the institutions discredited by

the crisis can be replaced with something better, not merely patched up and

restored. Corporations see the crisis entirely as a threat to established ways

of life and modes of thinking. Nobody is presenting a vision, or even a credible

thought, about how the crisis could produce a better tomorrow. The best that

has been offered is a promise to clear up the mess created by previous

corporations.

Without a doubt the new forms of advertising and marketing that must emerge

from the crisis must be very different from the systems that were so badly

damaged in the early 1980. The transformation will not just be a matter of

rewriting some rules or replacing some incompetent people. It will mean

changing the relationship between markets and consumers that has defined each

successive version of marketing. It is time to engage with citizens' anxieties

about the profound problems of pre-crisis marketing and advertising suddenly

revealed in 2008, the creation of an over informed society, clutter, lack of

accountability, the Internet,Social Media and so on. Like all those packaged-up

bundles of bad debt, contemporary advertising has no fundamental value. It

was misplaced faith in future economic growth that drove up the values of 30-

second TV commercials! The Clients spent so much money on advertising

because they believed that they were living in the best of times and that it was

all just a one way street - upwards! We all now know all this wasn't true!

We really need a more ethical advertising, and our whole concept of marketing practice needs to change

.

We must recognise that advertising has real responsibilities and that marketing is not just about

making money. Nobody yet appears to have hit upon a solution to improving marketing, and thus

advertising, yet it has to happen because they have both become a dangerous

monster, in need of harness. It has to be said that people don't seem to like

big business very much, we really don't like the power that companies have and

we certainly don't trust them to use them in our best interests! Advertising

is not about hope but expectations, marketing is not about dreams

but plans. The false prophets of modern marketing have warped more than the

language of consumerism. The future is unknowable, what can be known,

commentary suggests, is that social media and the Internet is replicating the

same errors old advertising and marketing committed. Somebody needs to make a

move, unilaterally determining that Social Media et al are not excellent

marketing vehicles merely more clutter!

　

Advertising now has to go beyond "telling" people about products using mass media,




and advanced upon "listening" to customers through Interactive Marketing Communication programmes together with loyalty schemes and market research.

Advertising is now moving towards the third generation of true customer engagement, characterised by 'talking', by engaging in open-ended dialogue with customers. Through interactive programmes we can understand customers preferences and passions, we can identify consumers across brands and experiences. For marketing and advertising to be truly effective, operators need to have customer information that enables interactive targeted and relevant communications. Giving customers the choice to opt in or out of campaigns enables them to be user specific and ultimately provide more value. The widespread use of interactive communication messaging creates a far-reaching and significant marketing opportunity for brands.

By putting a reliable interactive communications infrastructure in place, and a means of controlling and measuring campaigns, Clients can deliver some of the most highly effective marketing initiatives through well structured and relevant interactive programmes. Lets face it, without improving the understanding and content of advertising and marketing all business must remain understandably concerned that advertisings' inflexibility inherent in the concept of creativity will act as a barrier to economic growth. It is also regrettable that these barriers come accompanied by rhetoric that still sounds as though agencies still believe the words "Advertising Works" because it doesn't! For advertising to enter 2011 the message must be sent that Advertising has demonstrably improved and that only the best and the brightest will not merely be tolerated, but are actively desired. Advertising people suffer from self-esteem enhanced but talent-deprived capabilities and, sad to say, advertising suffers from an inexhaustible supply of untalented people actively encouraged by indulgent clients who appear unable to criticise them! Unfortunately we are almost alone in our willingness to tell the hard truths, and it appears that there is a growing chorus of voices trying to convince these untalented people that hard work isn't necessary any more and they're entitled to a lengthening list of benefits paid for by others and that they don't have to accept the consequences of their actions when these consequences are bad. Advertising desperately needs the return of elder statesmen. Whilst the current fashion is to get rid of old advertising people, this should be stopped...immediately. Because advertising and marketing needs to listen to their advice, these wise old men who have already been through advertising downturns, marketing reviews and outlandish waste and who could spot all the tricks and bluffs as practised by to-days bumped up experts

　

Wake Up Marketing - Face the 21st Century




　

　

　

Your innovation-averse culture must go!

Marketing and advertising are on the slide. When will these once great

businesses confront reality and fight back? Because at the moment both

Advertising and Marketing have become innovation-averse cultures! Both

professions are risk-averse, innovation-averse and antipathetic to new

ideas.

Worse than that they are totally lacking in accountability because those

given responsibility do not have the requisite authority and knowledge to

discharge it.

So what's behind the decline and fall? Most certainly a sclerotic marketing

system that doesn't have the power to re-examine the need for massive

re-evaluation of the process of advertising and marketing. It's antiquated,

early 19th Century concepts do not work, (if they ever did!) they still do not

have any true accountability.

It may be that the future scholar identifies Advertising's sclerotic, twisted

concepts of communication as the biggest business weakness of all.Simply put.

An early 19th century concept cobbled together by a small number of

opportunistic men cannot properly function for the Western world at the

beginning of the 21st century. The current system of Advertising &

Marketing is an anachronism.

Among business people cynicism about advertising ability to deliver grow, now

with the advent of the Internet, this can only increase this cynicism.

The twin challenges to advertisings' 60-year old hegemony are enormous. The

first is a total misunderstanding of the word "communication" and a misplaced

belief that "creativity" is the sole criteria for the success or otherwise of

advertisings ability to sell products and services. Secondly there is a broad

global trend towards the internet together with the frightening inability of

advertising to be totally accountable, in the case of the latter just how long

can this stupidity last? Just when does Marketing dare to balance the

budget?

It could well be that the future business scholar will identify marketings

sclerotic, twisted business decision-making system as the biggest weakness of

all. Put simply an early 19th century business concept cobbled together by a

small number of business men cannot properly function for the West as the

number one business method for the 21st century. To-day it can be said that

Advertising and Marketing are an anachronism which is why so many articles

abound as to the way advertising is going. Nowadays some senior executives call

trust the scarcest resource of all and marketing enhances such an attitude!

It has been said that Marketers are stuck in a world between the old rules

and the new rules. To deal with the new rules of changing media, technology and

consumer behaviour, many marketers delegate emerging marketing solutions to a

handful of external partners or internal 'experts'. In doing so, they have

enabled the rest of the organisation to behave much like it did ten years ago,

clinging to the old rules!

.

Advertising has dehumanised and depersonalised the whole

process of communication,

 

  there just never was a mass market! They are also sick to death at the rampant corporate dishonesty

 

all around them, again more evidence of Management being totally unaware of the real world and the

communication process. Evidence of their ability to dehumanise and depersonalise

the process of marketing. It would appear that customers cannot trust

anything or anybody these days. There was a time, for example, when we trusted

our banks to look after our best interests and play fair with their charges. If

so these days are long gone. The bond of trust has been broken, not only in

banking, and people are rightly suspicious. However Interactive Marketing Communication could be

a positive start to resolving all theproblems facing advertising and marketing.

Interaction can be defined simply as straightforward communication between two

parties. Presently we are in danger of losing the real meaning of

interaction, as we tend to focus discussions on the emerging technologies and

neglect the communication process itself. With an understanding of the real

meaning of Interactive Communication, existing media can be made interactive,

and subsequently far more cost effective. Interactive Marketing

Communication turns passive advertising into active advertising and actually

alters behaviour during the communication and learning process.And all the advertising in the world

cannot help you solvethat problem!

　

　

As your products come to reflect the information provided by the genuine conversations of interactive communication,
instead of the ballyhoo and adversarial marketing tactics that poses as

marketing today, companies will be far better served, and so will their

customers.

Oddly enough with Interactive Communication, companies can have everything

they've always wanted. Greater market share, customer loyalty etc. etc. All the

empty promises that advertising has been promising their clients but failed to

deliver!

To day, big business, with their handmaidens, advertising & marketing

have created mass media.

And the biggest mass medium is broadcast. And that is command and control

management, complementing big business thoroughly. Both are all about

imposing control top-down and both are driven by ratings, research and cost

per thousand.

Sad for them people are turning away from 'broadcast' in their millions

because of a number of reasons, they have acquired other interests and concerns

which broadcast cannot provide. Plus the fact that people are heartily sick of

the sterile pronouncements of corporations and broadcast media. And especially

of advertisements!

I close by making the observertation that we live in surreal times when we

are asked "online Marketing Vs Traditional Marketing, which is more

effective"?

Well neither of them are even proven as effective. Eric Clemons, Professir of

Operations & Information Management @ The Wharton School of the

University of Pennsylvania, argues that the Internet shatters all forms of

advertising.

The problem is not the medium, the problem is the message and the fact that it

is not trusted, not wanted and not needed.

There are three problems with advertising in any form, whether broadcast or

online. 1) Consumers do not trust advertising,2) Consumers do not want to

view advertising and most important 3) Consumers do not need advertising!

Professor Eric Clemons said What?
Pushing a message at a potential customer when it has not been requested and when the consumer is in the midst of something else on the net, will fail as a major revenue source for most internet sites. This is particularly true when the consumer knows that the sponsor of the ad has paid to have this information, which was verified by no one, thrust at him. The net will find monetization models and these will be different from the advertising models used by mass media, just as the models used by mass media were different from the monetization models of theater and sporting events before them. Indeed, there has to be some way to create websites that do other than provide free access to content, some of it proprietary, some of it licensed, and some of it stolen, and funded by advertising.

Hey we have already been there – done that – and we have over $10m of independent research which proves how much more accountable Interactive Marketing Communication is...want to see some research? Then Call Paul Ashby on 01934 620047 or email: paulashby40@yahoo.com

What does Advertising do and how well does it do it?

Aside from comforting purchasers by assuring them that they made the right choice,

aside from comforting CEOs and employees that their work is important, aside from certain

unpredictable, short term increases in consumption, most advertising does not perform as advertised!

Take away the tax deductions that corporations get from advertising, and most expenditures would dry up overnight!

Although elaborate proofs...

Although elaborate proofs of advertising's impotence are available, the

simple fact is that you cannot put a meter on the relationship between increased

advertising and increased sales. If you could, (ad) agencies would charge by how

much they have increased sales, not by how much media space they have

purchased.

The social media debacle...

  Existing loyality to Advertising and Marketing preserves failed organisations and traditions whilst stupidy following it like a shadow.
And boy are we living in stupid times.

Allied to which is the corruption. Now there is no question that our current media, expecially the press, is corrupt, that has been proven time and time again recently.

The corrupt media just love the inefficiency of the current marketing and advertising world, that's why you will never, repeat, never, read an article within the press about the inefficiency of advertising, the lack of accountability and above all else the clutter, why media just love clutter, they make heaps of money on highly ineffecient clutter, so you will not be reading anything against the inefficiency of advertising and marketing in the media, rule number one, don't bite the hand that feeds you!

The prevailing belief in " the market" has just sent us all off a cliff. Advertising people, together with marketing, have a capicity for folly together with a weakness for enfolding myths (Advertising Works|) that shield us from the pain of doubt and uncertainty; and economic theory comes a close second to Marketing and Advertising in the exultant claims it makes for itself.

The belief in the ascendant at the moment is the mystical conviction that "Social Media" and the Internet, left to itself will operate with immaculate precision to maximise human happiness and prosperity. That's the doctrine that has just sent us charging over a cliff into an unpredictable future.

The Facebook debacle, together with General Motors denial as to the effectiveness of Facebook to sell products hopefully will put paid to that little myth.

Because we are flawed and complex creatures all our Marketing and Advertising instutions partake, intrinsically and permanently, of these same flaws.

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