Finally.  Digital Marketing is Dead.
source: coolmaterial.com

Finally. Digital Marketing is Dead.

I’ve been looking forward to the day digital marketing would die. Surprising coming from a CMO, I know.
You see, I was practicing digital before it was called digital.  Back when eBusiness was ”the disruptor.”  Oh how I miss those days.  Sitting between the business and programmers, developing code and systems before the Internet took off.  Those were the days of client-server applications and dial up Internet.  Then came Y2K, and everything was going to come crashing down around us.  What would we do?  We worked 24/7 leading up to Armageddon.  And guess what…nothing happened.  I’d like to think we prevented it from happening.  As I reflect on the eBusiness days, I find a bit of irony in today’s cloud based world. In the 90’s it was all about mainframe applications, and client-server applications.  Light weight applications that through a modem could connect to the big mainframes.  I remember “dumb terminals.”  But wait, isn’t that what a Chrome Book is?  Isn’t that what “apps” are?  In fact why do we even bother to run local applications?  We’ve come full circle.
Around 2000 and 2001 the term “Interactive Marketing” became cool.  Suddenly we were connecting systems at lightning speed with an ability to dynamically push content to the Internet.  Real-time offers, or RTM’s, were the next great thing and all of a sudden we were going to sell anything and everything on the Internet.  Even Ford Motor Company thought that when they introduced a new business model based on Ford Direct. “Edge Caching” allowed rich media to be delivered quickly regardless of the bandwidth challenges. After that  eCRMand portals popped up.   Representatives from Yahoo! and MSN suddenly appeared in my office selling me ads on “Garage Pages.”  It was a great scheme, and if I didn’t buy the ads, well they’d sell them to my competitors.  How some things never change (e.g. ad any endemic here).  As cool as Interactive Marketing was back then, those teams never got a seat at the cool kids table with the TV guys whose deep pockets made them King.
Then around 2006 or 2007 the term Digital Marketing came along.  Apparently that was an evolved term.  Forget Interactive, we are “digital.”  Digital agencies popped up (I worked for one of the best), smartphones came to the scene, SMS (er texting) became pervasive, banner ads hit the scene, Flash (R.I.P.) was the cool programming technique, and terms like web 1.0/2.0 were the latest buzz words.  Ah yes, the golden age of digital.  This was going to be the game changer, finally the world (e.g. CMO’s) would get it and the budgets would follow.  But guess what?  We STILL couldn’t get a seat at the cool kids table.  And while the percentage of marketing dollars dedicated to digital creeped up to 10%, TV ad guys still reigned.  But how could that be we asked, we can measure our stuff?!?!?  We can show ROI. 

source: akrsk.com

And while all that was true, digital still didn’t have two things I felt were necessary to sit at the cool kids table.  First, the eyeballs.  Seems obviously simple, right?  Sure “everyone” was on the Internet. In fact I recall Forrester and others claiming the "year of mobile" every year since 2010.  And certainly the consumer traffic was tremendous. But consumers weren’t going online to view banner ads.  Consumers were searching for brands and products, and website where they could purchase a product without leaving their home (Amazon.com , GEICO, etc.).  What consumer weren’t doing was experiencing the brand(s) online.  There was no emotional connection.  Which leads me to the second issue, digital wasn’t the platform for brand engagement, connecting on an emotional level.  Oh wait, I meant today’s buzzword….storytelling.  Call it what you like, people want to feel an emotional connection with brands.  We want to explore, understand the culture, be able to engage, and believe in the mission. We want a personal relationship with them with personalized content where and when we want it.  We all of course know that digital hasn’t delivered, yet.   
So what was stopping digital?  A combination of Internet connectivity (broadband) and video.  But what about Flash?  Ugh.  Those years pained me, I couldn’t wait to evolve beyond Flash.  So much money was wasted by brands and agencies on flash.  I have always believed “a pixel, is a pixel, is a pixel.”  In other words, TV was digital. It was storytelling.  It was beautiful!  And as smartphone technology progressed (and tablets thank you Apple), it forced the communication companies to develop BIG pipes for streaming video.  That’s when I knew times were changing.  Soon, not only would we be at the cool kids table, the chasm between so called traditional and digital marketing would be bridged.  It would all simply be Marketing, and “Digital” would be dead!  You see, once the creative gurus realized they didn’t have to confine their ability to create magic within a thirty-second “spot,” they would embrace digital.  It would open their world to long form content.  
It struck me when I started noticing my own children watching YouTube videos the moment they woke up in the morning.  I used to watch cartoons, you know Speed Racer.  Not my boys, they were watching regular kids like themselves doing skateboard tricks or learning how to make skyrockets out of toilet paper rolls and matches (yep!).  My boys didn’t use Google search like I did, instead they used YouTube as a search tool.  For everything. Sure, my boys enjoyed watching TV every now and then when mom and dad made them watch a movie before bed.  But soon, as they reached their teenage years, TV…defined as a big piece of glass on the wall…. became antiquated giving way to nascent technology called the smartphone.  You see my boys aren’t burdened with the history of TV.  Big sets, with mechanical channel changers, black and white, fuzzy reception, confined to a room, and enslaved to network programming.  Even the term “television” doesn’t make sense.  They just know video.  And mobile.  And instant.  They just know when they want something, they get it immediately.

source: mellennialaction.org

So here we are today.  Big Internet pipes, Netflix, cable cutting, “The Internet of Things” (the connected home), phablets, DVR’s, 4G in cars (Chevrolet), free public wifi, medical issues called “tech neck,” gamification and drones.  The mechanics, or infrastructure, to truly embrace all of marketing has never been better.  I’m seeing the integration of marketing teams accelerate like never before.  Sure we talked about integration for years, but it never happened.  I blamed budgets.  Until the budgets balanced out it would never happen.  But that was only half the problem, or maybe even simply a result. Don’t get me wrong, budgets are still out of balance.  I’d guess that most corporations are still running about 75% traditional media (i.e. TV, newsprint, OOH, etc.).  Digital most likely is around 25% of total marketing spend.  There’s a whole generation of marketers that grew up before the 80’s and 90’s that will never let go.  They believe TV is still the best medium to reach large audiences.  Only brands that “have made it” do TV.  It’s what big brands do.  I get that, and in some ways agree.  But here’s the shift I’d suggest….it’s all digital or if it makes you feel better….it’s all TV.  Whether it’s a big piece of glass hanging on a wall in your living room, or a small piece of glass you hold on your lap while sitting on the couch watching the bigger piece of glass on your wall, or its the smaller piece of glass you are staring at while you are driving (don’t act like you don’t) it is all TV or digital, or….heck now I am confused. Point being if we stopped the madness, and looked at things like my in-home focus group (twin boys) look at things, the budgets would balance automatically.  Balance?  Brand marketers would focus on creating magical stories regardless of medium.   
At Coldwell Banker we aligned around the idea of developing great content.  Great content can mean anything, shape or form.  And can come from anywhere... employees, consumers, customers, etc.  We didn’t necessarily determine short vs long form.  We just know that if we develop great content that speaks to consumers and not at them, creates an emotional connection with the brand, we could tell our story anywhere.  You see the days of the agency creatives coming in to develop a TV ad are over.  Yep, I said it OVER.  Now before you get to crazy, I don’t mean TV ads are over.  No, no.  But now a creative director, and especially a great creative director, can truly have an open canvas to creating great holistic creative without worrying about medium.  Today, the media partner can be an equal stakeholder in the planning.  In fact, ALL agencies are now equal in the planning (PR, etc.).  We don’t have to worry about “how will that look in a banner ad?”  Why?  Because a pixel, is a pixel, is a pixel.

source: en.wikipedia.org

So here’s a toast to all the Mad Men.  To all the Mad Women.  To all the digital natives who are now simply marketers.  Here’s a toast to the death of digital, and the future of one team.

Roy Murphy

I help businesses generate revenue with AI. Strategy and implementation using generative AI and emerging technologies.

8y

Couldn't agree more with the sentiments 'a screen is a screen is a screen' Also a fan of massive paragraphs.

Peter Gruben

People Performance Booster,

8y

Thank you Sean Blankenship, I enjoyed reading your article and yes, the speed of change is increasing that is why I feel that compatibility is important when looking at IT investments. However, I wonder: have the means become more important than the message? The variety of channels is a great opportunity for marketers to reach their target group in scale at any time or place and enable them to relate/experience the brand. Yes, I believe that it is possible to share emotional messages on the Internet, messages that touch us and that we can relate to. I see them every day and funny enough none marketers like them, share them and spread the message. To me content is still the core marketing enabler and my favourite is a short video that touches my emotions and includes a simple enough to understand message. I can also see a lot of outdated approach using new technologies (it feels as if the old brochure has been digitalised;-)..

Jeroen Snepvangers

C-level Tech Innovation Advisor | ex- Dassault, Urban Science | Advised Meta, Nvidia, Toyota, Nissan, GM, Under Armour, VF Corp, Citicorp, BofA, TBWA\Chiat\Day, Deutsch, Saatchi

8y

Well put. I very much like your summary statement: "a great creative director can truly have an open canvas to creating great holistic creative without worrying about medium". I would add that great 'story-telling on open canvas' creative directors have to stay continuously cognizant and accepting of new platforms popping up and thus adding them to their "open canvas". That's what my in-house focus group of two boys have shown me: every 2-4 months they use a new platform to watch great stories (videos, etc) that connect with them.

Nancy Schirm

3D, 2D, immersive, memorable animation from scripts that sell your products/services Medical/Energy/B2B./training.

8y

The medium is the message. This is merely to say that the personal and social consequences of any medium - that is, of any extension of ourselves - result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology. Marshall McLuhan I liked your article but please for the love of all that is conserving my vision, use paragraphs.

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Dorothy Gemmell

Chief Commercial Officer & President at GoodRx

8y

TOTALLY AGREE ! We banned the word " digital" at my Ad agency 2 years ago when I started there ( if you say it you sound like you are from 5 years ago). I told the teams we do great strategy and amazing creative that is designed for whatever medium, channel or device a customer is consuming information from. Now we have banned TWO words at Practice Fusion - digital and media - as it only minimizes what we can do - the ability to message providers in the workflow and during the patient visit - promotionally or clinically -informed by rich data that connects patients and physicians and drives better outcomes. EHR's are not a website ! We have an amazing cloud-based health platform that is so much more !

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