Since the somewhat heated debate between Thomas Madsen Mygdal and Matias Palm Jensen at the Danish Internet Award (DIA07) conference some ten days ago, my mind has once more been wandering about the limits of advertising.
Is it true that good products market themselves here in the age of the social web, where happy and unhappy individuals have excellent opportunities to make their opinions publicly known? That advertisement in the traditional sense therefore is obsolete, and that marketers should focus on Public Relations-like activities, ensuring the best conditions for the conversation between individuals (whether these are employed in the company selling goods and services or are performing the role of consumers, buying the goods and services)?
One thing I’m sure about is that no ad will succeed in getting anyone to buy anything, simply by saying: “This is a great product. Go to the nearest store and BUY IT”. Com’on! If this has ever worked (what I doubt) it certainly doesn’t anymore. This is 2007. More than a decade after “I’m not a consumer”, “Generation X” and what have you. Consumers are individuals, not masses, making up their own minds.
Phrased differently: In terms of the traditional AIDA marketing paradigm, the last “A” (the one where you get your target-group to Act, that is: buy) has been ruled out. Although the aim of marketing is to get the individual to do “the buy”, it is out of the hands of the marketer to make the individual do so.
However, it’s also true that not even the greatest product has a chance of getting success, if nobody knows about it.
Furthermore I hold it to be a truth, that products are more than their mere physical properties: That sentiments about the product may be a very important reason why anybody would buy the product at all. Take the Apples iPhone as an example: It’s very much more than a smartphone. As anyone who has observed the blogosphere during and after the launch (that is: of the presentation of what is to be in the US market in half a year, and in the European market in one whole year from now) of the Apple iPhone will truly be aware, the hype is tied closely to the expectations of what Steve Jobs and Co. will be able to deliver.)
Similarly: Coca Cola is more than a taste. Nike is more than a device for walking. Etc.
In other words: Marketing still has a role to play as regards to creating Attention of, Interest in, and Desire of products. The first three letters (“A”, “I” and “D”) in the AIDA still holds true.
The loss of the final “A”, the Action “A”, in the AIDA paradigm is not all that has changed. Modern times has not only cut off the most important part of what marketing is about. No – it has done something more. It has added a resource of such powers, that it’s hardly comprehendible. It has given marketers the notion of a “WE” to be working with. It has created the space for a conversation between marketers and the (people formerly known as) consumers.
This conversation does not necessarily need to take place on an abstract discussion-like level. On the contrary, I will suggest that conversation should be understood in the most widely sense of the word. That a game, which attracts an audience, is a kind of conversation, even though it might only have a slight connection to the way the product meets “objective” requirements. That the little green music-making man Pjotro (read my post on Pjotro here), who’s in reality advertising for Nokia, might be a great advertisement. Because it offers the individuals accessing the Pjotro-figure the opportunities to amuse themselves, while (very much secondarily) connecting the Nokia brand-name to interactive music. And because the creators of the ad has realised, that it doesn’t work just stating: “Go buy the new Nokia phone with MP3 capabilities”, but has succeeded in creating a community, a “WE” involving individuals, who like music, and like interactive playing around and the virtual Nokia-property Pjotro.
This is very much not to say, that only a few things has changed for marketers during the past decade. That the “AIDA” models still holds true, if you only modify it a little.
On the contrary: what we are witnessing is a paradigm shift. The whole instrumental way of viewing the marketing process, where you can move from point a to b, targeting the relevant consumers and eventually making them buy your product, is deemed to end in nothing but failure nowadays. Instead the “WE”-part should have the undivided focus of marketers. Whenever introducing a new product think of: how best to engage the individuals, you’d like to be consumers, in the sphere of your product. Talk to them, provide them with facts about you and the product, and play with them, create virtual universes and invite your “target groups” to get inside. Get them to be your ambassadors, to contribute to, and spread your message through their own viral channels.
Forget AIDA. Think “WE”. But also: think about and take the actions necessary, to create Attention about the product, Interest in the product and Desire for the product. Think “We” and think “AID”. Think “WE AID”.
(I first laid out these thoughts in my post “WE AID – a marketing paradigm for the user-centered era“).
Yes it is true that “Consumers are individuals, not masses” but we don’t make our choices not only as individuals, we can’t forget that every individual is a memeber of a group, is an active participant of the society that has a significant influence on his/hers behaviour. We, as individuals, don’t just make up our minds. We do make up our minds in relation to significant others, our choices depends on which role mode we are while making them. AIDA model is dying, just because we humans don’t think or act linear og within frames we defined ourselves. And markets needs the conversations with the consuemrs in order to understand the human that lives behind consumers mask. 🙂 Good post Jon!
Fascinating post (and comment) which I partly agree on. The WE AID model is certainly becoming more and more influential these days partly because we interact in social spheres and because we are getting more and more immune towards traditional advertising. The answer so far has been to spread the campaigns on more platforms (including the traditional ones).
It might be true that when introducing new products you should focus on the WE part and viral effects. I am still sure though that when you are targeting ‘later majorities’ (as opposite to ‘early adopters’ and possible ’early majority’) the more traditional platforms could be very effective. You can possibly even enhance the desired ‘Action’ at that stage. In other words, I think the approach is relative to the stage of the PLC.
@ Daria:
That’s a good point, I think, Daria: that individuals are never just themselves, but are part of communities with which they indentify. The “WE” in “we aid” should therefore not be understood only at a “we” of marketeers and consumers. Nope, the consumer-part of the equation is a seperat “we”, that the marketeer needs to become a part of. This genuine community is there first, and the marketeers should act very carefully in order not to disturb the community.
@ Anders:
1. Surely “viral” marketing is not only taking place among first-moving early adopters. Perhaps viral campaigns are especially suited young segments. But in these segments viral campaigns works with all of the segment. And the young segments (say up till age 30) consist of a lot of consumers/individuals. There is a lot of them!
2. WE AID marketing is not limited to viral campaigns. WE AID marketing also works in the areas of discussion-forums and blogs. And here both towards the (few) people actually contributing with blog-posts and posts in discussion forums and towards the (many) who reads those postings, when surfing the internet on a particular subject. Frankly I don’t know anyone (yes, my two grandmothers of respectively 88 and 93 years!) who don’t use the internet for research. My children, my wife, my parents, my oncles and ants my neighbours, my collegeaus, my hairdresser: all of these use the internet and pay attention to what people they like – or at least are able to identify themselves with – have to say on the subjects tey’re interested in when conducting the research. (Which they off course not themselves consider as research; to them, they’re just surfing the net on some issue).
3. WE AID marketing is not limited to viral campaigns, blogs and discussion forums. On the contrary, it applies to all marketing, both on the internet as banner campaígns, and on TV and in the printed press. In the traditional media the abilities to interact with the consumers are off course limited. But still, the exercise for “WE AID”-marketeers is to talk with the consumers, not to them. And always remember that the consumers are individuals, who primarily are not identifying themselves as consumers of any products, but as personal entities. One great example of this is the DOVE “Real Beuty” campaign. Remember it? The models posing in the campaign were real women, some thin, som fat, some old some young etc. In essence the campaign were saying: DOVE wants to talk to you and your needs. DOVE doesn’t want to make you think that you just by buying the DOVE soap will look like a supermodel. The campaign were executed big time on traditional media and followed up on the internet with a fine campaign site urging to discussion of the concept of beauty. But definetely the campaign worked fine also without the interactive part. Remember: if you say something to someone, and he responds by thinking about what you’ve said, but doesn’t say anything, you still have created an interactive situation!
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