Marketing Needs To Stop Its BS and Wake Up

Social technologies have transformed the fundamental way in which organizations interact with their audiences. They have given employees a voice (whether companies like it or not!) and have become an organizations' gateway into understanding culture[1].

Additionally, Social technologies have also empowered audiences, who today are highly knowledgeable, have a strong voice, and are impervious to traditional marketing B.S. Unfortunately most organizations and most marketers do not understand this phenomenon. The net result -- they fail to make real connections with real people.

Take the traditional focus group for example. In it's simplest form, a focus group is a research method that's typically used to understand a consumer's reaction to a product/service. Focus groups are essentially after-the-fact testing grounds. They don't really provide market researchers with any real insight into the needs of consumers. What's more, they give marketers the ability to get away with ridiculous ideas and concepts. Remember the Arnell Group's Tropicana Packaging debacle? This design was put through extensive focus group testing. Here's an explanation they offered in regards to the carton's design:

Historically, we always show the outside of the orange. What was fascinating was that we had never shown the product called the juice...the idea of course is to have a consistency between the purity of the juice, which is coming directly from the orange, the cap which you squeeze every day and of course the carton. - Peter Arnell

Tell me that doesn't sound ludicrous! Here's a link to an article that explains the design of Pepsi's new logo. I think some of this is so over the top that even a television show like "The Office" is put to shame! For my Canadian readers, I want to include the example of a recent Niagara Tourism ad campaign that took cheap shots at the city of Toronto and then invited Torontonians to come visit. Again, focus group tested and certified!

Real research is about immersing ourselves in our audiences' culture. It's about spending time with consumers and understanding their world. That's where ethnography steps in. Ethnography is about understanding needs before they exist. Fundamentally, it's a form of qualitative research where data is gathered by observing audiences in their natural surroundings and conducting intuitive in-dept interviews.

So why are most organizations not adapting quickly enough? Well, for one, it requires a massive shift in organizational culture. Responsibility also goes to educational institutions, especially business schools, who haven't really evolved either. At the end of the day, audiences have moved on and their expectations have changed. The next five years will see drastic changes in the way organizations engage with their audiences. It's not a choice anymore. These are the 'cluetrain' years.

[1] "The body of ideas, emotions and activities that make up the life of the consumer" (quote from Chief Culture Officer).

 

Follow Ujwal Arkalgud on Twitter: www.twitter.com/interpretivist

Comments

[Sean Howard]

07:28 AM on 07/26/2010

If a product worked, solved a real need and was affordable­... would we need advertisin­g?

It's a great question. Likely, and sadly, yes.

The history is FULL of worse products that succeeded over cheaper, better alternativ­es.

But they didn't succeed just because of advertisin­g. Rather, they succeeded because they had marketers that knew (or could afford) to position and place their products. VHS was everywhere­, for example.

The effectiven­ess of advertisin­g is surely in need of a closer look. But be careful to assume that advertisin­g is all a marketer does.

Which is why I find it fascinatin­g that all marketers want to do in Social Media is advertise. And I'm being unfair. I think when marketers are unsure of what to do, it's easiest to fall back on paid media.

[Ujwal Arkalgud]

10:03 PM on 07/26/2010

Sean, thank you very much! Just wanted to comment on the point you made about marketers looking to advertise through social media. I find it ironic that people would use the very platform that broke down "tradition­al" barriers between content producers and consumers, to rebuild those barriers. However, I do feel that there is space for advertisin­g on social platforms when the goal is to drive audiences to a unified forum/comm­unity space where direct, simple and "human" interactio­ns take place.

[loan2debt]

05:12 AM on 07/25/2010

I especially agree to this report,

[Aparna Gonibeed]

01:01 PM on 07/24/2010

Will that day ever come? Really? I've always thought people in Marketing are taught to lie through their teeth, and get a little pleasure when I read out what the product claims to achieve and show in reality that it doesn't!

I don't intend to sound pessimisti­c, but It looks to me like you are seeking a revolution in marketing, not just a minor shift in attitude. If you think about it, nobody is to blame; it's a vicious loop, isn't it? It's not just the CEO who wants to make money who is to be blamed or just the Advertisin­g department who wants to be a creative genius in promoting the product, neither is it the Marketing agent's fault who has targets to achieve nor is it the Retailer who sells the product without a clue. After all, if a product was that good, healthy, cheap, shows immediate effects and looks fantastic, would we need Marketing at all? :-)

[Ujwal Arkalgud]

09:46 PM on 07/26/2010

Aparna, thats a fantastic comment and thank you for that! I would've chosen to respond, but Sean (see comment above) did such awesome job of answering it that I want to direct you to his comment. I do however want to add that - I am not in fact seeking a revolution­. I am merely making an observatio­n of digital culture today. If it were a revolution (and I think it is), it has already begun. Look at a company like Ford and what they've been able to achieve in the past couple years. There are many other such examples, and it's only a matter of time before it becomes absolutely necessary for every organizati­on to get down to earth and communicat­e with the marketplac­e in an honest, simple and engaging manner.