Next year will undoubtedly be full of further surprises for the world's marketers, with changes in political leadership both in the U.S. and other world markets creating challenging environments for businesses of all sizes. Given the scale of damage to our financial institutions, marketers must also continue to adapt to rapidly changing consumer behavior while being more empathetic to their customers' more prudent mentality. It will be interesting to see how financial services companies approach the combined challenge of sustaining brand relevance while rebuilding consumer trust.
My predictions for 2009:
1. Digital media enables easier marketing access.
We'll witness an explosion of smaller advertisers increasing expenditures more rapidly than established advertisers who, in turn, will shift more resources to broader forms of marketing activities. We'll see the continued leverage of search marketing while seeing greater application of Web 2.0 to better target, optimize and measure marketing messages and user experiences.
2. Marketing means selling.
Advertisers will demand that their agency partners improve the effectiveness of their individual activities, as well as better protect their overall marketing investments. With a sharper eye towards actual performance, business outcomes will become more critical than media outputs.
3. Collaboration drives integration.
The endless debate about better integration through changed operating structures will give way to greater discipline collaboration, resulting in better architecture of integrated marketing activities. The focus on agency collaboration, culturally and commercially, will center on carefully constructed teams, including key clients and proactive consumers who may or may not be brand champions. Holding companies will demonstrate greater flexibility to accommodate customized solutions.
4. Data drives decision making.
2009 will the year of the "data" dragon -- and it will be tamed. We'll sit atop a mountain of real-time metrics from set-top boxes and addressable media platforms while having direct access to peer-to-peer conversations. However, data is useless unless converted into actionable insight. As the range of data increases, enterprise-level business-intelligence software and analytic services will become increasingly important.
5. New players bring new perspectives.
We'll see more innovation around Web analytics, e-commerce design, online customer-loyalty programs and e-CRM, with players such as Omniture, Huge Inc. and Microsoft's enterprise services increasingly prominent. Strategic alliances with addressable advertising companies will help us better understand superior consumer targeting and media work flow. Microsoft and Google will merge the science of technology with the art of creativity.
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