Divining the marketing future: PART ONE

Marketing agencies function in a rapidly evolving industry where the relative stability in technological innovation and consumer predictability afforded in the period from the 1950s to 1990s no longer exists. Let's look at some facts:

Consumers are now extremely fragmented and define themselves as individuals with a unique set of marketable signifiers based on their preferences, consumption habits, and social affiliations. For example, marketers cannot expect a single television commercial to be relevant and meaningful to a large group of people anymore.


Media fragmentation – both in terms of the variety of niche content that is consumed and in the many personal ‘screens’ where consumers receive media content – has meant that it is also challenging for marketers to achieve any significant reach with a single message, commercial, or campaign. Instead, there is greater value in marketing to consumers at an individual level where relevance and an experience can be developed.


Based on these trends, the industry will be driven forward by agencies which are able to produce ‘strategic’ creative products – marketing communications with a very strong inclusion of consumer insight, data measurability, and campaign integration across multiple advertising channels.

We'll look at the implications of these needs tomorrow in PART TWO.