Being direct... AdVantage Dec 2005
Are We Witnessing a Decline in the Absolute Communication Power of Mass Media?
According to David Hoffman, advertising as we know it is already being turned on its head -
by the people for whom it is intended simply ignoring it ... because it doesn't tell them what they want to hear!!
As I start to write this it is 4.30am and I am in my hotel room in Atlanta, Georgia where I have just awoken, (my body still believes that it is actually 10.30 in the morning) after finally arriving last night in the USA. My trip took some 36 hours in two trusty but somewhat uncomfortable aluminium tubes, and included five long hours in a British airport.
Why am I here? After a break of some 3 years, I have decided to brave the new US Homeland security procedures and see how much (if any) the rest of the world may have moved on; an attempt to discover what great new and exciting concepts and technologies may be revealed during the 2005 US Direct Marketing Conference. There is also an opportunity to see Seth Godin (The 'Prime Minister' of Permission Marketing) in person - as he is one of the keynote presenters at the event. I will write about the DMA.05 Conference in some detail, next month.
Coincidentally, next year marks the 40th anniversary of my joining the advertising industry. It seems like yesterday that I did so - as far as the passing of time is concerned, but is light years ago when it comes to the technological changes that have taken place since that day in 1966 when I was employed as a 'classified advertisement clerk' at Durban's Natal Mercury.
It took a few years for me to decide that this was really what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, and so I started down the road of tertiary education and ultimately earned a diploma in marketing management - a decision that eventually saw me appointed as the marketing manager of the Mercury.
Of course, during those days we had a very limited understanding of behavioural segmentation and even media audiences were understood simply in terms of basic readership (the first National Readership Surveys of the print media were carried out in 1962, and again in 1968) - and it wasn't until the first AMPS was completed in 1972 that we began to do detailed product category/media audience analysis.
I subsequently accepted that if I really wanted to expand my understanding of advertising, even though the thought was not a particularly pleasant one - I would have to uproot my young family and move away from Durbs. This decision resulted in the first of two lengthy periods living in Johannesburg, and the wonderful days of J Walter Thompson, DeVillers & Schönveldt and Mortimer Tiley, planning media and learning all about advertising proper and about media schedule analysis. Computers (mainframes - no PC's then, of course) were used to do these optimisation runs and then came mark-sense cards to process media bookings and copy instructions. We thought that we were at the cutting edge of technology at that time.
Reflecting back on those earlier days now, one accepts that even though we defined our target audiences based upon their demographic labels, and we used the computer to optimise media schedule efficiency and compared different schedule options with each other; we were always mindful of the fact that it was the content of the ad and the way that content was delivered that permeated the consciousness of the medium's audience and made the communication work. The primary task of any advertising (then and now) is to gain attention…be noticed.
In my view, the past 40 years has changed the process in 2 fundamental ways: technology has enabled a shift away (not for everyone mind) from a reliance by the masses on information and entertainment media as their primary source of information; and again, through technology, people have started to 'take control' of obtaining the information they want - rather than being dependent on media moguls to deliver it to them. And again - according to David Hoffman (more about him next month), we ain't seen nothing yet!!
So, on the one hand we have seen something of a decline in the absolute communication 'power' of the mass media, and at the same time have become aware of an increase on the part of the masses for 'instant' access to the information that they want. The growth of the 24-hour repetitive format TV news channel - (yep, it was born here in Atlanta) is a case in point.
Over the many years that I have being coming to the Annual Conference of the US Direct Marketing Association, I have seen the emphasis change from mailing lists and envelope incentives to technology-enabled one-to-one communication. As a great example, this year's conference offers registered delegates the option to get what they want out of the conference by logging on to the My05DMA portal to 'personalise' your conference (select which sessions you might want to attend) and/or download the .pdf versions of selected session notes. 'Control' has changed. Or, at least the perception of who has it - has.
Smart marketers will recognise that a sea-change shift is occurring as we speak…we should stop trying to suggest how people should or could behave - using classical advertising tools, and rather provide them with dialogue that enables them to experience the benefits of really interacting with a brand - for themselves. It's quite a challenge for those who are steeped in the way it's always been, and the idea of 'giving up control' is daunting in the extreme for some.
I am absolutely sure that my next four days in Atlanta are going to provide plenty of examples of marketing companies who have recognised that the old way may no longer be the future way, and who will regale us with success stories of the fantastic growth that comes from encouraging the customer to 'be in control'. David thinks so…so watch this space!