FOREWORD
by Bryan Wiener, CEO of 360
i
arketing used to be a lot easier – and I’m talking about the late 1990s, not the 1950s. You worked with your agency to develop a big idea that would translate into a wonderful uni-directional creative execution that would be pushed in front of your target audience courtesy of a mass media buy. Even in the age of proliferation of cable channels, media planning wasn’t that hard. But now, the rules have
completely changed. TV advertising, while still very powerful, is becoming less effective and efcient by the
minute. Advertising dollars are concentrated where consumers are spending less than 25% of their time.
1
Even within online budgets, consumer-generated media represents almost 20% of time spent
2
but less than 3% of the dollars.
3
More signicantly, the Internet has altered the rules of customer engagement forever.
Social media is a prime example of this shift, sitting at the nexus of consumer-generated content, conversations and interactions. Before user-generated content became so pervasive, consumers learned about brands and products from (a) one-to-one word of mouth (b) press reviews or (c) advertising. Social marketing has elements of all of these, making it a bit more complex, but also creating fantastic opportunities for establishing stronger ties with
consumers. Because of this complexity, social marketing dees
organizational boundaries and standard line items in a marketing
budget. It doesn’t t cleanly into existing agency relationships.
Social marketing eliminates the middlemen, providing brands with the unique opportunity to have a direct relationship with their customers and to both listen and talk. Marketers who embrace their customers in social spaces will thrive. They will learn from their customers by listening, while concurrently using the medium as a platform to foster advocacy, earn stronger brand equity and inspire loyalty due to the direct relationship. The downside of ignoring this radical landscape change goes way beyond just a lost opportunity – ignoring the shift has the potential to erode decades of brand equity. To quote Sarah Hofstetter, head of 360i’s social marketing team, “Covering your ears is not a viable strategy.”
1. “A2/M2 Three Screen Report,” Nielsen/NetRatings. Q1 2009.2. ”Media Trends: Time Spent on the Internet Continues to Grow,” Forrester Research. May 2009.3. ”Interactive Advertising Forecast (U.S.), Forrester Research. April 2009.
M
blog.360i.com | twitter: @360i
Social marketing eliminates the middlemen, providing brands with the unique opportunity to have a direct relationship with their customers.
“
“
 
blog.360i.com | twitter: @360i
3
View on Scribd