Marketing

The new model of contextual marketing depends on accessibility and anticipation. Accessibility refers to the technology our customers use to engage with brands (apps, mobile sites, campaign microsites, etc.) and our permission to engage back (subscribes, likes, follows, etc.). It is anticipation, though, that separates the wildly successful marketing campaigns from the mediocre. Anticipating the customer need indicated by a specific social status update, a local cold snap or use of an app at a certain time and place gives you, the marketer, the opportunity to wow consumers through brilliant contextual marketing. Seems great in theory, but can brilliant contextual marketing be achieved at scale? You bet it can.

Influencer marketing is often defined as reaching out to popular bloggers and YouTube celebrities, vying for shout-outs in their latest posts. If this describes your influencer strategy, then you are missing out. Just as digital media doesn’t apply to banner ads alone, influencer marketing is not confined to a one-size-fits-all approach.

The 2014 State of Marketing survey asked marketers about their budgets, priorities, channels, metrics, and strategies for 2014. With more than 2,500 responses, we’ve analyzed their insights to give you a current snapshot of the state of marketing.

This is Ad Age’s 2014 Marketing Fact Pack, our annual guide to marketers, media and agencies. We’ll show you the biggest players, who’s rising and who’s falling, drawing on the Ad Age DataCenter’s rankings and analysis from the past year.

The 21st century has not been kind to the US recording industry. Since peaking at $14.6 billion in 1999, the business has shrunk to less than half its size, barely besting $7 billion in 2012, according to a new eMarketer report, “Marketing Opportunities in Digital and Live Music: More Musicians Say, ‘I’m With the Brand.’”

As we speed toward the end of one year and the start of yet another, here’s a quick look back at some standout 2013 mom-related trends.

Entering 2014, most would agree cross-platform marketing has become a must for any company hoping to reach consumers on their terms. They would also likely concur that such a mandate carries with it an expectation that as marketers tack on additional channels, formats and platforms, they would be met with a proper method to validate those decisions.

International Data Corporation (IDC) hosted a web conference “IDC Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) 2014 Predictions: The Emergence of the Chief ‘Something-or-Other’” highlighting the top 10 market predictions for the year ahead.

Marketing is in the midst of a performance revolution. The application of advanced analytics and plentiful data has allowed chief marketing officers (CMOs) to demonstrate the return on investment from marketing activities with a degree of precision that’s never been possible before. With companies spending as much as 10 percent of their annual budgets on marketing, depending on the industry—a whopping $1 trillion globally—this rapidly developing ability to put hard numbers against marketing performance is music to the ears of both CMOs and CFOs.

This has been the year of the debate over the “Total Market” approach.  The idea is to find a common denominator that different cultural groups can all relate to.  That makes some sense at first glance. After all, most people love their children, enjoy being free, enjoy food and other good things of life.  By Felipe Korzenny, Ph.D.

There are lots of CMOs in the world, and some do more than others.  In the past, I’ve said you should never trust a CMO who won’t go out and sell, but it’s more than that.  To truly understand what makes a great CMO, you have to understand more about the role they play in your organization  — a role that will be changing over the next few years.

When consumers head out for their everyday shopping needs, are they navigating the store on auto-pilot or are they open to new products and experiences? As with many of the puzzles marketers face, the answer here is anything but clear-cut.

Traditional segmentation studies just don’t cut the mustard these days. In a world of saturated markets, abundant consumer choice, endless information sources and evolving behaviors, to ‘do as we always have done’ is the route to decline. In the pursuit of growth, we need to be smarter to hunt the demand, upon which any brand’s life does indeed depend.

The rapid emergence of the everywhere, always-connected consumer places new demands on marketers, according to a new eMarketer report, “Key Digital Trends for 2014.” Specifically, it raises expectations about the speed with which marketers need to respond to expressions of interest across the customer journey, from the consideration phase all the way through to post-sales service. Gone are the days of 24- or 48-hour response times. Consumers expect instant interactions, whether it is a relevant offer or an answer to a customer service query, and the ability for same-day delivery of items purchased through digital channels.

For those brands still deciding on the merits of Total Market (TM) strategies and whether to make the shift, the panel presenting the preliminary results of AHAA: The Voice of Hispanic Marketing’s Total Market benchmark study at the recent Association of National Advertisers (ANA) Multicultural Conference, made compelling arguments on the need to evolve towards Total Market strategies.

The generation that many groups have characterized as lazy and self-absorbed is suddenly entering the parental space. Millennials are starting to become moms and dads. As a matter of fact, 10.8 million American households are now headed by Millennial parents, according to a recent study by Barkley, “Millennials as New Parents.” However, according to more than one source, the generation that many marketers thought they had pegged in terms of priorities and values may be very different than originally perceived. It seems that, especially once they become parents, Millennials take a more modest approach to consumer habits, valuing quality over quantity and practicality over status.

Over the past year, the term “native advertising” has evolved from a simple industry buzzword into a complex, frequently debated advertising strategy being heralded as the future of digital. At the same time, content is considered the number one marketing priority this year, according to eMarketer. The two are often mentioned concurrently. So the question often proposed to me is if there is a difference between native advertising and content marketing. I always reply with the same answer: There is no fundamental difference.

The average American consumed almost 60 hours of content each week across TV, radio, online and mobile in 2012. Of the many mediums, radio remains a constant in our daily lives. The average American radio listener tunes in to radio over two hours per day (or 14 hours per week), making it the second-most consumed form of media after TV. Given that more than 90 percent of Americans tune in to the radio each week, understanding how this fits into consumers’ total connections will help marketers best reach their audiences.

We are a nation of consumers.  In fact, we’re an entire world full of consumers.  We operate a global economy, which thrives on the simple fact that people either need or want to buy stuff.  Some of the stuff you buy is necessary, while most of it isn’t, but at the end of the day the world seems to revolve around consumerism (for better or worse).

To say it has be an interesting past few months for the healthcare and wellness industry would be the understatement of the year. The consumer health and wellness space is evolving and shifting at a rate and level never seen before. Of course, the rollout of the Affordable Care Act is a big reason why. But, perhaps more importantly, it is the part technology is playing. The consumerization of technology has propelled massive changes that have created a newly empowered consumer more involved and in charge. And it’s causing major disruptions with how to target, reach and engage with these empowered consumers to gain their loyalty, trust and business.