This post was originally published in 2009 as part of the Making Mobile Media Work and The Mobile Consumer Series. While things are moving and changing really fast it it still is relevant today as it was then.
The traditional media eco-system is going through a major metamorphosis. At first glance it would seem that this is largely driven by the changes of an evolving internet platform and mobile media — something that I think many marketers are taking huge strain over – just to manage the effects its having on their brand and media strategies.
Changing Consumer Behaviour
Personally, I think this strain is more about the change in how consumers are making decisions today. And I think this is the hurdle that most media strategies – including digital marketing – are tripping over.
There is no doubt that there is a symbiotic relationship between the evolving multimedia platforms and consumer behaviour. How consumers make decisions and what influences these decisions has radically evolved from the first TV commercial and the marketer’s ability to refine the advertising process.
Today, TV commercials are not as as sticky as they used to be. As consumers, we no longer dogmatically believe what a brand says about itself to be true. Now we believe what other consumers say and we have the ability to find information in different ways and validate what we want through a peer review system.
How Billions of Dollars Are Being Flushed Down The Toilet
Today, all I have to do is go online and validate if I am making the right choice about a product I want. Lets say it’s a new printer that I am about to buy in-store. It looks like a good product and it has a good brand name.
What happens when I use my smartphone, click through to Amazon, and see that there are 10 negative reviews on that printer? You guessed it, I change my mind, and instead go for the printer that got 20 great reviews!
For the brand, that could mean millions of dollars of advertising investment and years of brand building down the tube. Ouch! And if your consumer believes that you are not being upfront and honest you will pay a severe price.
The Fragmented Media Eco-System
Given this shift in how consumers make buying decisions and the role that Internet and cell phone technology plays in our media, the traditional media eco-system has changed. We have to include these when we look at our communication strategies as the time will come when they may play a larger role than TV.
In the diagram below I’ve outlined a simple, traditional structure, and how disconnected the mobile and internet platforms are to the traditional structure. And yes, this is evolving rapidly.
Why a Disconnected Internet?
As marketers, we have a degree of understanding of what the Internet can do for our communication, but I don’t think most marketers have a full grasp of the extent of this tool. Many still see it as a simple communication device and do not see it as a relationship building tool.
After all, it is a key driver in shifting how we as consumers make buying decisions today. And you cannot apply traditional, above the line media strategies to this tool.
Mobile marketing is moving into this picture fast. Yet many brands and media agencies are still trying to figure it out. For me this was highlighted when I saw one of the Big Four banks in South Africa advertising on an adult content site – and I really do not think it was deliberate 
.
The internet and mobile media offer us remarkable communication opportunities, yet how do we leverage this?
Dispelling Some New Media Myths
To leverage these tools we first have to dispel three myths that I think are confusing how we apply them:
1. The idea of emerging media:
There is no ‘emerging’ going on here. It’s evolved well beyond this, and even the phrase “new marketing” is misleading.
Facebook, with its 700+ million subscribers, is not an emerging media – nor is Twitter. The reality of mobile media is that there will be more smart phone sales than PCs and notebooks by the year 2013. This is not emerging, or new.
The idea of the Internet and Mobile media is emerging as a misconception. They have evolved into serious contenders in the competition for advertising spend. As marketers, we need to understand these mediums. This is a non-negotiable – we just have to catch up.
2. Traditional media is dead:
No, in fact quite the opposite. Advertising in the traditional way through TV, print and radio is not nearly as effective as it used to be, but this does not mean it is dead. There is still a huge opportunity of integrating the traditional platforms with mobile media, the Internet and how consumer decision making has evolved.
3. Fragmented platforms:
A key part of Google’s strategy is the idea of device agnosticism. It won’t matter if you’re on a cell phone, smart phone, iPad, net book, notebook or PC. The platform will become “generic” and the experience will be the same irrespective of how you connect. Its just a matter of time…
One Platform To Rule Them All
For me, the key part of understanding this evolving media platform is to understand how consumers make decisions today. After all, this really is our key objective as marketers. We are trying to get consumers to make a decision that is favorable towards our brand.
There are six issues that I think we, as marketers and media planners, need to get on top of:
1. The speed of change
When TV was introduced to South Africa in 1973 it was really easy to get our heads around it. It was a static media. Not so for mobile media or the Internet. Blogs were game changing. Facebook was game changing. Twitter was game changing. What’s next? Who Knows?
As marketers we have to look and see what’s influencing our customers’ decision making process.
2. The experience is everything
90% of the decisions we make are irrational. They are driven by how we feel, and the environments we grew up in. When we make a decision – it defines us as a person. We are going to make decisions that reflect who we are and that will give us the best experience.
The key objective for any marketer is to create a very powerful experience. This has to be the end result of the communication strategy. This makes marketing a far more complicated process than it ever was before, for three reasons.
- We have to make sure that, what we communicate and the underlying brand promise – ties up with the actual experience
- The experience is now a fundamental part of the communication ecosystem
- We can no longer control the flow of information, and who says what about our brands
This is why change management and marketing are becoming far more integrated than ever before. It’s also why customer service is really a change management process. And it has an impact on what is communicated.
Yes, our role as marketers is changing, rapidly.
3. Live needs replaces implied or explicit needs
In the traditional model, we identify what we presume are the customers implied and explicit needs are, and then market to these needs.
Yet, the pace of change and the increased complexity that has become the norm of our lives makes us short-circuiting to what is familiar. When we find something that is familiar to us, our decision-making process is a lot quicker and a lot more decisive. There are less risks – even if the payoff is a bit more discomfort.
We also know that as our customers move through their experience with us, their needs evolve and change based on what they require at a specific point in time. What drives a pre-purchasing decision is very different to our post-purchasing decision.
The communication strategy needs to start understanding this and building in the ability to communicate to a person’s live needs changes.
4. Paid versus earned media
In the traditional model we paid for our communication. This has changed. In 2004 Dell’s word-of-mouth was the equivalent of $220 million worth of advertising. (Imagine what it is now in 2011).
This is advertising that they earned. They did not pay for it or ask for it. But they did create it through the experience that they created for their customers.
Your communication strategy cannot ignore this component with the Internet and mobile media. These are the key drivers of word-of-mouth today and both have to be built into your strategy [remember the printer and Amazon review example above].
5. Measurement
Half your advertising is wasted … you just don’t know which half. Yet, today I think this is probably closer to 75%. You just don’t which 75%. We have systems and tools that give us a guideline, but now we have an added complexity.
How we measure traditional media and these new media platforms is different.
As marketers, we haven’t got our heads around this and it’s something that we need to understand in a more comprehensive way. And it will evolve over time as some very clever people spend more time working on it.
6. Language
Mobile media is still very much in a techie phase and not too many traditional marketers have mastered this platform. This may seem like a non issue but there needs to be a common language around mobile media and techie speak with what we as marketers understand.
These are two different languages, and this is an evolutionary process of understanding the different platforms as they become more integrated. It’s really easy to be confused.
The Map Towards Media Integration
In the diagram below I have taken the original traditional media ecosystem and integrate mobile and online into it.
What is really different here is the “pull factor” that is created by the customer experience and their ability to talk to each other. As marketers, we have to build this process into our strategy so that our customers live needs become more relevant to us and our ability to deliver what they’re looking for.
I see three real big challenges in getting this right:
- Creating the Experience: The first is getting your entire organisation on board to create this experience. Our staff need to understand the customer journey and their role in influencing the key drivers of each of the major touch points. I’m quite sure some people be astounded by the idea that customer journey process is so integrated in the communication strategy, but I just do not see any other way. (Of course, this is also a matter of degrees, and how far you want to take your communication strategy to make it really effective).
- The “Pull Factor”: The “pull” impact that your customer experience has on your strategy and your ability to integrate the experience into your marketing strategy. This is not going to be easy, and it is something that is starting to take off in the marketing field.
- The “Push Factor”: The marketer’s ability to change how they think about the traditional media platforms, and the impact that their “push” strategies have on the experience.
In Conclusion
While I may have created two rather simple “pictures”, it will take a while for most marketers to re-educate themselves and create strategies that take into account all the different communication channels available. It’s certainly something that I will be writing more about on this blog.
Also, the idea that our customers can potentially be our greatest communication asset is a really exciting prospect. And to close off with I have included this video of a Heineken campaign in Italy that I think is just superb marketing, and part of the process of integrating the different mediums.
And in case you thought TV was dead, watch this ad …
About Michael Cowen