insight

Commentary

5 Trends In Digital Marketing

In 2009, digital marketing experienced major shifts in opportunities, budgets and attitude. Twenty ten will see the hype calming around Facebook apps, Twitter campaigns and ROI models for social media. The following five trends point up what marketers can expect as the new decade opens.

1. Facebook replaces email

When a brand name becomes the verb associated with its use -- you Google or TiVo it, that's power. The newest is Facebook, meaning "I Facebooked you" -- added you as a friend But the noun/verb Facebook represents an act of personal inclusion, or exclusion, to one's personal circle. No brand has owned such communication power before.

The disruption of Facebook is its displacement of personal email. Completely permission-based, no spam, no address book -- all your friends are there. While brands are not included in the conversation, they can join, or host, the party.

Marketing Implications - Social Media

advertisement

advertisement

Opportunities in social media marketing seem boundless; the best seek to integrate conversations, to add something useful and compelling. And while there's lots of social media hype, every marketer needs one! But let's consider the implications of social networks. Great ideas can ignite short, powerful flames, i.e. CPB's Un-friend a Facebook Friend campaign, but if brands hope to influence conversations, strategists need to become someone's "friend."

2. Mobile commerce - still promising

Annoyingly tantalizing as "convergence" has been over a decade, mobile commerce hasn't delivered.

The game changer is the iPhone/iTunes platform. Apps tempt users to buy small items, upgrades, updates, etc., while iTunes holds their precious credit card information and handled seamlessly enough to promote impulse purchases. It seems an easy task to extend to other platforms with PayPal or Google Checkout.

Implications for Marketers - Going Mobile

Mobile commerce has the power to drive 'paid' models like test subscriptions, including micro payments, which seem particularly promising for news/magazine media. If the experience is good enough, people will buy the download. Special content, white papers, reports, etc., could be purchased through apps, providing new revenue streams. EBay and Amazon have done amazingly well with mobile applications. Figuring out new activities to do "on the go" will be the key to mobile success.

3. Disruption vs. continuity -- alternatives to the "big idea"

Businesses are investing in community building as a market driver. According to the Deloitte's "Tribalization of Business" study, 94 percent of businesses will continue or increase their investment in online communities. Meanwhile, as evidenced by new tools like Google Wave and Sidewiki, there is a shift toward social activity integrated into networks.

Marketing Implications - Social Nets

With the increasing emphasis on marketing through social networks, brand objectives often conflict with advertising techniques. Advertising faces a shift from "big idea," disruption to an emphasis on persuasion in the social sphere. The way in will increasingly be through persistence and continuity.

4. Open source DIY culture

Much has been said of the potential of collective intelligence (crowd-sourcing) to reconfigure industries. On the flip, the power of networked resources has emboldened individuals to tackle complex undertakings themselves. From drawing on the collective intelligence of blogs and university courseware, to services like Ponoko, Spoonflower, and CafePress, to offline resource pooling like pop-up retail and collective offices, people are discovering how easy it is DIY.

Marketing Implications -Networking for Growth

Brands might view the growth of online boutiques as a distribution shift opportunity. Small online retailers have cut through via well-chosen inventory, SEO and social broadcast elbow grease. Big brands might extend retailer networks by offering online tools for ordering wholesale, or APIs for retailers to white label directly!

5. Crowd-sourcing

Crowd sourcing will become a growing part of "elance" outsourcing strategies. Organizations will mobilize passionistas to carry messages but, more importantly, to collaborate.

Marketing Implications - A Gathering Crowd

From political canvassing to software development, citizen journalism to environmental activism, expect growth in crowd-sourcing models led by social media strategies. Consider the automobile industry. There's potentially many people with better ideas outside the corporate structure. How difficult to build a cloud environment and open development to a global team of engineers, whether bankers or school professors?

Happy 2010 to all.

2 comments about "5 Trends In Digital Marketing ".
Check to receive email when comments are posted.
  1. Roi Iglesias from Altabox, January 8, 2010 at 8:10 a.m.

    Digital marketing is not only marketing online...

  2. Kevin Horne from Verizon, January 8, 2010 at 12:04 p.m.

    Good luck with trend #1

Next story loading loading..