I’ve been accused of pulling a Chicken Little once or twice in recent times… but the fact is, it doesn’t take panicky poultry to point out the obvious: times are changing. Fast.
“The next five years will hold more change for the advertising industry than
the previous fifty did. Increasingly empowered consumers, more self-reliant
advertisers and ever-evolving technologies are redefining how advertising
is sold, created, consumed and tracked.”
-The end of advertising as we know it, IBM Institute for Business Value
According to Nielsen Online, social networking is officially more popular than email. Microblogging site Twitter grew by nearly 80% in a single month (and nearly 1400% in a single year). Meanwhile, online ad avoidance reaches a record high just as Millennials—a.k.a the Digital Generation—threaten to overtake Baby Boomers as the largest chunk of the US population.
If those ain’t the signs of change, then—by golly—pass the chicken feed!
Amidst all this madness, my ridiculously bright and forward-thinking colleagues here at Espresso have, for the last year, been actively bucking the business-as-usual trend with a trademark blend of digital, experiential, classic, and social media savvy that we call Brand Infiltration™. Far more sharp shooting than the good old fashioned spray and pray approach, Brand Infiltration™ is, in our collective and terribly humble opinion, the prescription for what ails traditional marketing and advertising.
What do you think? Is Brand Infiltration™ indeed the practice your dreams are made of? Or are we drinking too much Kool Aid? Are there areas we’ve missed? Take a peek at our latest attempt to express the philosophy of what we do… and tell us what you think.
Believe it or not, even Chicken Little has ears.
Entries
May 10th, 2009 at 6:59 pm
Customers don’t want to be spoken to but rather spoken with and I agree there is a dramatic shift in the way business needs to operate and attract customers.When this massive market turbulence will end? TBD, I think a important focus of any organization right now needs to be adaptability and learning, which I feel a lot of large corporations are just coming to the realization right now.
In terms of Brand Infiltration you’re right in saying that you need to make sure you’re not drinking too much of the social media Koolaid. While there are a lot of people actively online, much like organizations there are a lot of people who just don’t understand the current internet tools so it will be important to span the gap between old and new mediums.
May 10th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
Once again, Marta infiltrates my marketing psyche.
Watch the SlideShare presentation and got a lot out of it.
Plenty of insight but also, as per Richard’s comment, caveat about social media is right on. But it is exciting to be working through this pivotal period in marketing.
Keep the ideas coming.
May 11th, 2009 at 8:21 pm
Brand Infiltration definitely isn’t only about the social media thing – that’s but one component. We split by digital, experiential, and classic infiltration channels, and play in all kinds of tactics amongst these areas. The social media savvy, however, is important to us not just because we like to play in new channels (which – who are we kidding? – we can barely stop doing, hah) but because of exactly what you said – the shift in *how* businesses need to communicate with their customers. This is most often chatted about/seen in an SM context at this point, but that definitely isn’t the only place it needs to come to life.
Thanks for responding!
May 22nd, 2009 at 2:16 pm
What’s infiltrating is that I was actually able to sit through 101 slides! I think that says a lot in itself considering my short attention span in informative style marketing