Why should brands adopt a transmedia approach?
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It's all about the "E" word.
Engagement. Yes, it's an overused word, but it's earned its place as the go-to descriptor of marketing's future given the combination of expanding choice and increased control that we all enjoy as consumers.
Most marketers and agencies agree that the choice/control combo necessitates a new approach. At Carat, we frame this challenge in terms of the need to move from a model based on "buying time" to one of "creating time." In other words, brands can't be successful with an approach that's about aggregating eyeballs; they need to offer consumers experiences that are compelling enough that people choose to spend time with them.
The value of discovery
I'd argue that engagement is directly linked to discovery. If our goal is for consumers to choose to spend time with brands, what we're asking is that they become personally invested in our messages and experiences. And investments must have returns.
For consumers the return should come in the form of discovery: being able to learn or experience something new, to put the pieces of a puzzle together for themselves rather than being beat over the head with the same message over and over.
The transmedia approach is all about discovery. Jenkins talks about each of the complementary pieces as being "points of entry" into the broader story, which is a great way to think about each of the communication points in a broader marketing strategy.
Instead of each communication telling the full story, the approach rewards the consumer for investigating on their own to understand the fuller picture.
Adopting a transmedia approach would certainly be a major departure for marketers. We'd need to stop thinking of consumers as entities that we "target" and begin to think of them as fans who we entice.
We need to have faith that if we seed compelling and complementary messages, then consumers will choose to spend time with them. We need to stop throwing the kitchen sink at every single communication, and we need to think in terms of one overarching communication distributed in smaller pieces.
Most of all, we'd need to think about what it means to tell great stories, as opposed to communicating messages. Stories aren't repetitive. Stories elicit emotion and start conversations. Stories are worth spending time with. Stories are engaging.
Transmedia brand-building presents us with lots of tricky issues to sort out. But to steal the sentiment of Geico's advertising, if a Caveman can figure it out, I'm sure the rest of us can, too.
Adam Cahill is VP, director of client services for Carat Fusion’s Boston office. Read full bio.