Linkedin - business version of Facebook?

Future management community linking - video comment by Patrick Dixon

Future of retailing and shopping - video

How retailers and shopping centres need to fight back against online sales sites which will almost always be able to beat them with huge discounts. Shopping centres can deliver product faster into your hands than online – even with overnight delivery. Why in an increasingly fast-changing and impatient world the high street shop will always win for some consumers who need it NOW. And the other thing is providing living, breathing shopping experience. Customer behaviour and consumer choice. Online shopping and e-bay / online travel agents. Food shopping is likely to remain a go-out-shopping activity for a very long time because of immediacy and the fact that shoppers want to touch, feel and smell food before buying. Video comment by Dr Patrick Dixon, futurist, leading authority on global trends and conference speaker.

Why consumers won't wait - impatience online

People do crazy things when in a hurry - the future is about emotion, not about technology. Futurist Dr Patrick Dixon lecture on future of telecom, mobile phones, marketing, management and motivation (more)

Future of marketing in a YouTube world

Interview of co-founder of YouTube Chad Hurley by Dr Patrick Dixon at Google Zeitgeist CEO Summit. Lessons on future of marketing for every brand owner, advertiser and corporate image builder.

Future of Marketing - Dr Patrick Dixon at Google Zeitgeist

In a YouTube, Wikipedia and e-Bay world - how media, marketing, and brand management is changing. Impact on every large business. Dr Patrick Dixon chairing panel for CEO event Google Zeitgeist.

Connecting with emotion of customers online - Patrick Dixon

Why consumers trust online comments on bulletin boards more than slick advertising campaigns.

Confusing insurance industry marketing messages

The insurance industry is in a mess when it comes to image, branding and marketing.

There are two conflicting messages: the first is that we are here to make shareholders wealthy – which fits with the popular image that insurance companies charge high premiums and pay out as little as possible. The second is closer to reality, which is that we exist as a community service which is run in a way that also rewards those who invest.

• Marketing: We are here to protect your family, to pay out generously and quickly if something happens to you, giving you peace of mind at a fair price. We believe in the value of what we do for you.

• Investor Relations: Our mission is to make shareholders as much wealth as we can without breaking the law and landing up in prison. We raise life insurance premiums as high as we can get away with, and pay out as little as possible.

The answer is simple: focus on the good that you do, ensure the business is run efficiently and risks are assessed accurately, eliminate fraud and pay out promptly – and the rest should take care of itself.

The alternative is to continue as we are, with a public image that is both damaging and inaccurate.

Future of online marketing - overtakes newspapers

Still short of TV spending though by a long way in the UK.

Google accounted for more than 50% online advertising spend last year.

Web advertising spend is set to grow 39% while newspapers fall 9% in advertising revenue nationally.

 

Source:  Financial Times 30 May 2006

TV watching is becoming a lonely habit - advertisers watch out

45% of TV watchers do so alone these days compared to 33% 10 years ago.

 

Interesting but the truth is that I have almost stopped watching TV at all – at least live TV is now almost zero since having digital recording a few years ago.

 

Screen watching – yes but more likely to be home cinema movies or a few minutes of a pre-recorded comedy, and occaisionally TV news.  Hardly ever watch the main TV channels.

 

I’m not alone – ask anyone who actually works in television how many hours they watch for pleasure and the results may really shock you.  Often the answer is zero.

 

Now radio – that is something different – audiences and hours per week continue to climb.

 

TV will struggle to find a new role in the next decade, under pressure from people like the BBC which will soon have all their archives on line for instant free view.

 

It means the schedules will need to rethink…. Expect to see a premium for live TV:  where we know anything can go wrong and audiences can be involved.

 

But canned output – yes it still will live on as a community experience.  It is different watching a film on your own at home when you know a million others may be sharing the same event.

 

For more see http://www.globalchange.com/ppt4/bbc

 

Strange death of modern advertising - feature by Maurice Saatchi in Financial Times

This week Maurice Saatchi made a fascinating confession:  “I feel as thought I am standing at the graveside of a well-loved friend called advertising”.   He describes the death of TV advertising as audiences diverted into an ever wider range of infotainment, and the fact that multi-tasking teenagers recall very little of the adverts they supposedly are exposed to on TV even if you can find them….  The result of multi-tasking with SMS, e-mail and everthing else at the same time as watching the football.

 

Saatchi reckons it all comes down to one word branding.  Owning a single idea like “search” = Google.   The trouble is that there are few words worth having and fierce competition for them.

 

And even if an agency has a great idea for a word, the industry itself is being re-shaped at tremendous speed by new media.

 

Most senior advertising executives have yet to get their heads around Google adsense for example, which is capable of creating customised ad content for a new page I create within 60 seconds of it being online.  Adsense goes further by pushing up or down different ads depending on how the users of that particular page on my website react.

 

Poor ads are removed – however much people pay for showing their content on the page – while lower paying but useful ads replace them.

 

The advertising space is thus being democratised, with huge implications for every brand-creator.

Cause-related marketing - future of marketing

I talk more and more these days to audiences of all kinds about cause-related marketing, which is one of the fastest growing areas of marketing today. Cause-related marketing links products to something people believe in – and when products look increasingly the same on price and quality, values are what makes all the difference.

 

£50.4 million was raised in 2002 by 66 businesses benefiting 50 charities and good causes through 81 Cause Related Marketing programmes.  Over £17 million worth of gifts in kind were given as part of 23 of CRM programmes

Over £13 million worth and 65,000 hours of staff time was devoted by 27 CRM programmes

90% of US workers feel proud of their companies' values when they support a good cause

87% of workers feel a strong sense of loyalty

48% of consumers change behaviour - switch brands, increase usage or try or enquire about new products

46% of consumers feel better about using company

86% have better opinion of  companies trying to make the world a better place

 

See http://www.globalchange.com/ppt4/sustain for presentation I gave today which covers these issues in the context of creating sustainable enterprises (Impact conference in UK).

 

 

 

Future consumer trends in Europe - by Dr Patrick Dixon

Future consumer trends in Europe - by Dr Patrick Dixon: "How European consumers are changing, winners and losers in retail. The impact of technology, demographics and social trends on consumer behaviour, attitudes and lifestyle choices. How manufacturers, service providers and retail outlets will have to change to survive. "

Targetting older people - make sure print size is large

Most marketing campaigns are poor when it comes to targeting older consumers.  Just take print size as an example.  I gave a lecture recently to a company that produces electric razors.  Good news:  I use one of their products and have done so for the last 4 years.  Bad news:  I only realised the day before giving the lecture.  Reason:  the logo on the razor is so small that I need my reading glasses to see it and since when did I wear reading glasses in the bathroom when shaving?

 

I am only 49 but the company has lost 4 years of brand positioning in our home.  The problem is even more obvious amongst consumers who are 10, 20 or 30 years older than I am.

 

Just take a look at the print size on the outside of toothpaste, or in packaging of medicines, or on restaurant menus (read by candelight).

 

Print size is just one of a huge number of ways that marketing executives discriminate against older consumers without realising it.

 

And remember that over 65 year olds own 75% of the wealth of the US and UK – and incidentally, 65% of them are women.

Radio advertising needs a rethink

While great TV advertising can rank with short films for entertainment value, it is really hard to match that quality in sound alone on radio, using just a few seconds.  That is why radio audiences get bored so much more rapidly with often-repeated radio ads.

 

The answer of course is variety rather than quality. For example making a series of 20 compelling reasons to buy a product (randomly broadcast, and not numbered).  Radio advertising at best is more about information than entertainment. This is a words and sound effects channel, and sound effects can be really irritating after a while, as well as an odd voice or anything else originally designed to catch attention.

 

Do it once, do it twice, but don’t let people hear it a thousand times unless you have something they really need to hear again… just keep the content fresh.