Future trends in marketing communication

Problem: Future trends in marketing communication  

This time our group had the chance to choose a topic we are interested in. After we chose future trends in marketing communication as the new topic, we came up with the following learning objectives:

1. New Channels

    a) Opportunities, Threats, Innovation

2. New Markets

    a) Opportunities, Threats, Innovation

Before starting with the learning objectives, I would like to point out that most of the problems that brands face nowadays result from problems in marketing communication and marketers that have not updated their strategies to todays's trends.

- consumers are more demanding in terms of customer service

- consumers are less loyal to favorite brands

- consumers are more resistant to traditional marketing messages

General trends according to Chrzanowska (2015) and Newman (2015):

1. Add blocking will continue to grow: Marketers should be aware of the massive cost of ad blocking and move towards alternative ways of communication. Today, only 6% of Internet population use ad blocking. However, in 5-10 years time, this number will increase significantly.

2. It is all about listening: Social platforms are so urces for news, information about friends and entertainment. They let users express themselves, share their experiences and views, interact with others and ask for opinions. Marketers who do not listen their audiences miss the opportunity to reach out to the most promising leads.

3. Emotional marketing: People want to hear stories about real humans, stories they can relate to. Relevant stories that speak to consumers make brands meaningful.

4. Influencer marketing: users are more willing to trust a favorite blogger rather than a recommendation from a brand. Thus, bloggers and other influencers have the power of shaping consumer opinions. They are more credible to today's audiences.

5. Dream and Market in 3D: Virtual reality literally drops people inside their favorite TV show, provides an on-the-ground preview of their next vacation, or puts them behind the wheel of their next car. Customer experience is priority number one and 3D technology will move from novelty to mainstream. Smart marketers will look for ways to bring their products to virtual life. (Newman. 2015)

In an article of Dugdale Consulting (2014), a few thoughts were mentioned regarding the future of marketing communication:

- Knowledgeable Consumers

- Consumers as Advertisers of their own content

- 3D printing conceptual information and holography

- Consumers will want to ‘Find’ an answer on demand, not ‘Search’, but we should expect this to be automated

- Consumers lives will be more chaotic, so will need convenience providers to help them trade ‘time’ for money or favours

- Attention span will be less, but there will be a rapid Judge and Execution

- Consumers own Video’s will be routes/channels for your Marketing Communications and tools will become available to make that happen

- Consumers will demand/expect very high Content quality and highly intuitive

Trends regarding channels:

1. Mobile advertising: According to William (2015), the market for mobile advertising is exploding. The mobile as a medium is expected to outgrow all other digital ad platforms. Marketers and advertisers realize that the future lies in mobile marketing and are taking big steps to incorporate the power of the platform in their strategies. However, the mobile advertising platform remains immensely underutilized due to a lack of knowledge in maximizing the space.

            - AdBlock usage

            - people are now spending more time than ever on mobile apps (about 86 percent of        the total time spent by users on mobile devices)

            - By 2017, spending on Mobile Advertising is expected to be double that of Desktop     Advertising

Sources:

Chrzanowska. N. 2015. 4 trends that will change your marketing communication in 2016. URL: http://www.smartinsights.com/traffic-building-strategy/integrated-marketing-communications/4-trends-will-change-marketing-communication-2016/. Accessed: 24.04.2016

Dugdale Consulting. 2014. Marketing Communications and the Future. URL: https://dugdaleconsulting.com/2014/02/18/marketing-communications-and-the-future-a-view/. Accessed: 27.04.2016

Newman. D. 2015. The top 10 marketing trends that will define 2016. URL: http://www.forbes.com/sites/danielnewman/2015/11/03/the-top-10-marketing-trends-that-will-define-2016/#218d1367d582. Accessed: 26.04.2016

William. J. 2015. A Hand-Held World: The Future of Mobile Advertising. URL: http://www.business.com/mobile-marketing/the-future-of-mobile-advertising/. Accessed: 27.04.2016

 

Creative ideas & messages

Problem: Turning ideas into messages 

After watching the video in class and defining a related problem, we came up with the following learning objectives:

1. Idea gathering process

    a) sources of creative ideas for marketing communication

    b) tools for creation process

2. How people perceive/understand the message?

    a) How to align the message according to to the objectives 

1. Idea gathering process

A message has to have an appeal- an idea that motivates an audience to respond. Therefore the idea gathering process is a first and very important step. 

In the initial idea generation phase marketers use a lot of different sources to come up with great ideas that provide customer benefits and are compatible with the overall objectives. 

a) Sources of creative ideas:

• R&D department
• Employees
• Search Engines and Corporate Web Sites
• Publications: learn about general business trends
• Trade Shows and Associations
• Salespeople: eyes and ears of a company, know how products are faring in the marketplace, what the competition is doing, and what customers are looking for
• Suppliers and Industry Experts
• Customers
• Competitors
• Experience 

b) Tools for creation process:

• Brainstorming
• Mindmapping
• Focus Groups and surveys

2. How people perceive/ understand the message

As everyone should know, people perceive the message and the brand through their five senses:

• visual: colors, shapes, movements, light, (already talked about this aspect in the PbL about visual identity)
• acoustic: language, music, sound logo, product sound (eg. Harley)
• olfactory: aroma, perfume; excellent activator of emotional memories
• haptic: material, shape, temperature, surface
• gustative: taste
• multisensual

However, everyone interpret and understand the message and its information in a different way than the others do. According to Solomon, Marshall & Stuart (2012), there are several internal factors that influence the way people perceive the message and the decision making process. 

Perception = process by which people select, organize, and interpret information from the outside world. People receive information  through sensory receptors (eyes, ears, nose, mouth, skin). They further try to interpret the receiving sensations with the background of past experiences. However, there are many different information that compete for our attention and if people do notice the message, there is no guarantee that the meaning we give it will be the same the marketers intended. Exposure, attention and interpretation are important issues, marketers need to understand. 

• Exposure: extent to which a person's sensory receptors are capable of registering a stimulus. For example, the text an highway billboards must be gib enough to be read easily
• Attention: extent to which we devote mental-processing activity to a particular stimulus. Consumers are more likely to pay attention to messages that speak to their current needs. However, people's attention spans are becoming shorter than ever and we can do things multitasking
• Interpretation: process of assigning meaning to a stimulus based on prior associations and assumptions we have with it

Motivation = internal aspect that drives us to satisfy needs. Marketers also need to understand the level of needs relevant to consumers in their target market in order to be able to tailor their messages to them. (MASLOW)

Learning = change in behaviour caused by information or experience.

Attitudes = long lasting evaluation of a person, object, or issue. Consists of different components which are affect (the feeling component), cognition (the knowing component) and behaviour (the doing component)

However, creative does not directly mean that the message really stays in the mind of the customers. 

http://visual.ly/how-come-creative-ideas-ten-rhetorical-concepts-will-make-your-ideas-more-distinctive-innovative-and

 

According to previous courses at my home university, another important aspect that needs consideration is a good balance between an emotional appeal or story and a functional value or informational appeal. Customers can identify themselves more with a product, compaign, etc. when it tells a story and offer an emotional bond.

This video shows a discussion by Lindstrom and Harrop. They mention that the majority of signals send out by corporations appeal to the sense of sight and that 83% of information is received visually but the remaining 17% are left behind. In fact, it is more effective to bond with the consumers on more then one sense because the more senses you appeal to the more loyalty you genereate. It has kind of a multiplying effect and creates synergies. Furthermore, they highlight that the majority (85%) of decisions taking place in the brain's non-conscious segments and only 15% occure in the conscious ones.

Another aspect within this video is the high investment of adding an additional sense. On the one hand, it may increase marketing costs, but on the other hand it may increase the number of customer retention.  

According to Lindstrom, retailers who appeal to three of consumers' senses double their marketing effort.  

Examples:

Starbucks:

Starbucks is doing quite well in multisensory marketing. Through their smell and taste of fresh they occupy all of our senses. They even stopped serving breakfasts because the smell of eggs interferred with the smell of their fresh coffee.

BMW

The following video shows the old sound logo of the german car manufacturer BMW in comparism with the new one. The slogan of the company is "Freude am Fahren" which means pleasure of driving. The customers should enjoy the ride with any BMW. However, the old sound logo that was called "Ambossschlag" (anvil beat/hit) was mainly associated with coldness, dark, technic, power but not with pleasure at all. After BMW received feedback and conducted research, they changed their sound logo to a more joyful one which is now associated with pleasure and joy. 

Therefore, it is very important not to underestimate the power of the composition of different senses because they play along with each other and need to be aligned.  

Sources:

Bevz, N. (2014). Sensory marketing - 5 senses. URL: http://www.slideshare.net/nadezhdabevz/5senses-sensory-marketing?qid=5048cea3-a702-4230-96f4-f2805926c5d6&v=qf1&b=&from_search=2. Accessed: 10.04.2016

Fill C. 2013. Marketing Communications. 

Solomon. M.R., Marshall. G.W. & Stuart. E.W. 2012. Marketing - Real People Real Choices. 7th ed. Pearson