As a former analyst, this Cymfony chief marketing and strategy officer offers up his predictions for the online ad industry in 2007.
As I celebrate the blessings of 2006, my thoughts turn to what Father Time will bring us in the New Year. Here are a few of my predictions:
A bumpy road as Web 2.0 becomes a real business
This year we've seen big media companies making huge investments in social media, with Interactive Corporation buying MySpace and Google buying YouTube. In 2007, these Web 2.0 properties will have to become real businesses to satisfy their new corporate owners. A tidal wave of brand-dedicated MySpace pages and TV ads on YouTube will result in a backlash from consumers who initially embraced these new forms to connect with each other, not the brands that saturate other media. Companies that listen to these objections and modify their approaches in accordance with consumer wishes will create new, highly engaging experiences, not the clumsy intrusions many of these early efforts represent.
More fake blogs
As a member of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association Board of Directors, it pains me to say this, but we will see more examples where marketers try to take shortcuts to create buzz by pretending to be someone they are not. Sony just launched AllIWantforXmasIsAPSP.com, having missed the lessons of the "Wal-Marting across America" fake blog controversy that gave the retailer and their PR firm, Edelman, such a black eye just a month before. Pardon the slightly commercial message, but there is still time to give your company the Christmas present of a membership in WOMMA and embrace the Honesty ROI principles that will help you engage in authentic, valuable conversation with consumers.
Market research takes ownership of marketing accountability
Market research already has both hands in marketing evaluation: executing ad effectiveness, brand tracking studies, and other methodologies that contribute to determining whether marketing is effective or not. We already see them using these skills and upgrading their quantitative analysis skills to take on the ROI measurement challenge. In 2007, this transition will formalize responsibility, staffing and budget in the market research department for tasks like PR measurement and additional measurement approaches such as market mix modeling.
Super Bowl ad buzz will be about user-generated ads
Since the legendary Apple 1984 commercial, Super Bowl ads have been as much about pre-game PR about the commercial as they have been about the 30 seconds during the game. This year journalists will bypass speculation about what rap star will be in Pepsi's ads and what the Clydesdales will do in Budweiser ads. With the NFL, Doritos and Chevrolet already soliciting user-created ads for their Super Bowl creative, the buzz will be around whether the "creative talent of the crowds" can best Madison Avenue.
Beyond MySpace: Marketers seek sites that are "not your teenager's social network"
MySpace still grabs all the attention, but social networks have begun to spread, popping up to serve different segments of consumers. Although sites like Gather.com and eons.com don't have the raw numbers of MySpace, as marketers chase the buying power of aging Boomers, these audiences will catch marketers' eyes. Marketers will discover that novelties like a brand character page on these sites won't cut it. Instead, brands will engage with consumers on how to fulfill their LifeDreams on eons.com while resurrecting the concept of "cause-related marketing" to support issues they care about on Gather.com
The post-TiVo era begins
TiVo taught consumers they could break the control network programming bosses had over scheduling. Then the networks completely gave control over by putting popular shows on iTunes, and consumers learned they could have their video content not only whenever but also wherever they wanted it. In 2007, as video-enabled mobile phones become a reality, consumers will have even more freedom to view what they want, when they want wherever they want. Ads will spread but the real change will come as marketers create more product demonstrations and segments with expert advice. Someone wondering what to make their family for dinner will dial up a five-minute segment with Rachel Ray sponsored by Kraft.
Businesses embrace blogs
Fewer than 10 percent of Fortune 500 companies currently have blogs but this number will steadily increase in 2007. For the past two years, companies have been watching from the sidelines to follow a road paved by pioneers like GM's FastLane and Boeing's Randy's Journal. In 2006, more broad-based consumer companies addressed new types of topics, such as Starwood's thelobby.com with travel news and tips, and Wells Fargo Bank's Guided by History blog offering emergency preparedness tips. With these examples, more businesses will come to view the blogosphere less as a ranter's paradise and more as an influential business resource where they can engage with customers in valuable dialogues.
Engagement metrics become operational
The Advertising Research Foundation will complete its validation studies of the engagement concept, pointing the way to using engagement as a marketing planning and management concept. Reach and cost efficiency will begin to fade as the drivers of marketing planning; and marketers begin to measure effectiveness not by just exposure to a message or even responses like clickthrough. With the tools to value "turning on a prospect to a brand idea enhanced by surrounding context," media planners and creatives will work together to create more, smaller-scale programs whose deeper level of engagement creates more value for brands than less-involving mass programs.
Jim Nail is Cymfony's chief marketing and strategy officer. Read full bio.