Advertising & Marketing Blog

Just to continue the thoughts from the previous blog, that can befound here. ..

A lot of brand marketers are still dabbling with the internet and are not quite sure whether spending big dollars on the internet the way they do with print/tv/radio will drive the results they need, typically as measured for retailers by same store sales growth and foot traffic. Also, the web provides so many different ways to reach consumers that it requires traditional marketers to “re-tool” in order to understand the vast array of opportunities and options.

We’re seeing a shift for retailers in their direct marketing budgets. A lot of retailers are interested in moving direct mail budgets to the web, eliminating enormous cost centers for production / mailing etc. The issues direct marketers face via the web is that their options are limitless. Segmenting and analytics are often daunting and most marketers don’t really know where to start. It is super important that direct marketers retain the same level of control over their digital channels the same way they do via print, which means preventing things like coupon fraud and consumers sharing offers via social networks and email.

People used to share coupons in-person back in the day with shopper-clubs and other informal social networks, at times evening trading coupons and other offers so that the final allocation of offers between members of the club were optimal. These coupon-clubs have evolved into facebook groups, blog, and coupon message boards, which take the control-factor of 20 people in a room sharing coupons to the WWW with the ability to share an offer with millions of people within minutes. While both scenarios are viewed negatively by marketers who wish to reach their intended audience with control and measurement, the latter example clearly presents severe issues to direct marketers with a need for control, measurement and security.

I think that we’ll see marketers migrate to digital in even greater droves when they have these problems addressed, and they get up to speed with all the latest ways to reach their customers…