Beyond advertising: Choosing a strategic path to the digital consumer.

Today, the distinctions between advertising and marketing have blurred, as new forms of communication combine the ROI-characteristics of direct marketing with the brand characteristics of traditional advertising. With digital consumers increasingly in control of their media experience and advertisers shifting their spend to more interactive, measurable formats, companies must move beyond traditional advertising to combine granularity of targeting and measurement with cross-platform integration. To adapt and succeed – especially in the current economic environment – content owners, media distributors and agencies need to build a new set of capabilities now: cross-platform innovation, greater insights, open collaboration and digital processes.

Digital formats such as social media, online video, mobile communications, gaming and advanced TV enable companies to simultaneously meet transactional and brand-building objectives. Four primary trends are blurring the boundaries between traditional brand advertising and direct marketing:

Consumer adoption of new distribution formats – Consumer behavior has changed forever: They are more digital-savvy, willing to provide personal information in return for perceived value, and increasingly ready for permission-based advertising.

A shift in advertiser spending – Spending is moving from traditional advertising toward measurable, interactive marketing. Combined with spending contraction in the new economic environment, this requires smarter advertising, and doing more with less.

Digital migration of platforms – Traditional boundaries are fading, creating opportunities for innovative business models for content platforms.

Emergence of new capabilities – Game-changing moves, by both new entrants and existing players, are driving new types of industry innovation, challenging existing business models and accelerating the pace of change.

In response, media and entertainment (M&E) companies need to start moving beyond traditional advertising: the scenario of the future is consumer centricity. Becoming consumer centric requires a combination of granularity – the ability to target and reach desired consumers while measuring results – with cross-platform integration.

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