What? Marketing is dead? *sigh*
Marketing experts around the globe are facing a trilemma. Is traditional marketing still efficient? Is the new era of marketing about to begin? Or is Marketing gradually dying?
With the global pandemic rising, a strange event seemed to be impacting every brand and business around the planet. Marketing got confused and lost focus. However, before this happened, some of the best international brands and big companies started to feel that the new era was just around the corner. They figured out that the roots of traditional marketing slowly would be getting dried up and very soon breakable. But, unfortunately, the major part of the market didn’t get the memo.
Apparently, it was the pandemic, that shook marketers around the globe, as a mindset earthquake, and made them realize that a new era was about to begin. It immediately collapsed to the ground the foundations of the old and pathetic marketing and made space so the new advertising form could flourish.
Marketers got frustrated and struggled to find a way out of the misery. The quarantine kicked their campaigns out of people’s attention. Nobody cared about their offers, promotions, or advertising. It was now more than obvious, that the marketing they knew about, was finally dead.
The only lifeboat that tested the new waters, was delicate, small, and unfamiliar. Digitalization. This means e-commerce, Social Media, and SEO.
This was not a drill. It was going to be permanent. If the business wanted to survive, having those three tools, was fundamental. It wasn’t a strategy, nor a matter of choice. If before, the usage of these three tools was dependable on the industry, now it was a necessity regardless of the product, service, or business. It wasn’t anymore a marketing advantage or a unique selling point. It was mandatory.
After the chaos flattened a bit its curve, the experts finally understood what just happened. Marketing was not dead, on the contrary, evolved. Shaped in a new and unknown form, softer, empathic, and more human, even though the occurrence that brought it within was absolutely alien.
The new shape of marketing is as complex as minimalist. Very few companies have adapted and practiced it in the past, considered as a luxurious way of advertising, with the belief that only big and powerful brands would implement it… But, the time has shown that this might be the only actual and future way of doing marketing if a business wants to thrive.
This new alien version of communication, is not loud, compelling, or blinding, as the previous one, where every advertising campaign, displayed itself violently and aggressively toward the audience, trying really hard to “attract” or hypnotize them, replaying on a loop, the same fascist message, over and over again. This old marketing practice is called “the call to action” tactic and is a very outdated strategy, led by a very old and unsophisticated mindset that believes that if you yell or give orders to your potential clients, they will eventually walk as a bunch of zombies, straight to your point of sales and give you all their money. This is a medieval way of doing things. And thank God, now is gradually vanishing, or being used just in the form of clickable buttons in the digital world.
Anyhow, marketing now has a different look, more pretty, more likable, and in favor of the audience.
What I’m trying to say is that now marketing is going to be more complex, and difficult and will need a lot more effort than before. "How did I come up to this conclusion?", - you might ask… - Well, it’s very simple…
The audience has been living under a harsh rain of promos and campaigns, like… every freaking day. And every freaking day, a new product or service joined the club and more and more advertising was pouring over their heads. This got worse and worse, till one day, people realized that every message delivered to them was pure marketing or better-called lies, and nothing was any more real and reliable to them. So, they unconsciously stopped being aware of the offers, commercials, and promotions displayed in front of their eyes and ears and just ignored them.
All this behavior resulted in unsuccessful marketing campaigns and lower sales growth. Things that forced board managers to sit and think for a little while. The questions were simple, how can we make marketing believable again? How can we make customers trust us? How can we approach the audience, in a more friendly way, avoiding their urge to throw tomatoes at our faces?
The answer was right there. Storytelling. If you want to tell something to your audience, don’t just send a bunch of unnecessary default messages, but personalize, be softer, kinder, and understanding. Try to be more friendly, minimal, and concrete. Avoid the usage of too many words or too many explanations. Keep it simple, original, and genuine. And for the Love of God, just be honest.
The marketing of the future is all about content. And I’m not talking about digital here, but communication in general, in every channel and medium. Content is everything. The message you deliver should share values with the audience and be thoughtful of their needs.
Storytelling creates the possibility for your business to explain and educate your audience, about the vision, mission, and principles of your company or product. Enables you to tell the story behind your logo or package, of what is all about. Why did you create this or that product in the first place? What made you do it, and why should the audience buy it? It's not just about meeting the audience’s basic needs anymore, it’s a lot more than that. Giving something extra, and I don’t mean something material, but in an emotional and thoughtful dimension. Connecting ideas and feelings between businesses and people.
This is what the new era is going to be about. It’s still an unknown road and no one is going to tell you which way should you follow. You just have to see a new bigger picture, be sympathetic, and keep a more human perspective. Said so, are you ready to start the engine?
Commentaires