The Brave New World of Marketing

This is a summary of a presentation by Daniel Lee (@danlee888), Regional Director of Euro RSCG (@eurorscg), at the iStrategy Conference, 2010.

Once again, we’re reminded that social media isn’t a final strategy. Before jumping onto the social media bandwagon, it’s crucial that we understand how it has changed the scene.

So what’s changed?

Nothing much, actually. The fundamentals of communication are still intact. Human beings are still social by nature – we still talk and share, but technology and connectivity has made it vastly easier, faster and thus making conversations more powerful.

Here’s a quick overview of the difference between analog and digital conversations:

According to Daniel, this calls for 3 shifts in the world of marketing:

1. The new world of marketing builds on the premise that marketing has always been social

The impact of social media is massive – we see nobodies becoming massive superstars via social media – think Nigahiga and Shane Dawson. Even Barack Obama attributed his success during the presidential elections to the use of social media. The fundamental shift is from the linear model of the old world of marketing: between brands and consumers (where a larger percentage of the conversation is driven by brands). Now, we’re in a much more complex ecosystem of conversations going on between brands, employees, consumers and prosumers. We can only manage what we can; and risk the rest of our reputations out in the World Wide Web.

2. Open source ideas

Daniel notes that social media plays the part of a catalyst, allowing brands to facilitate ideas rather than to control or own them. This means you’re allowed to work off other ideas. This also means the opportunities for collaboration and joint campaigns are endless.

Case in point: the tcktcktck campaign. TckTckTck is an unprecedented global alliance, representing hundreds of millions of people from all walks of life, who are united by a desire to see a strong global deal on climate change. Different people from different parts of the world have rallied in different ways for a single message: an agreement on climate change.