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On a new marketing
order
The war
On one side are the marketing specialists. On the other, the public and the
consumers. In the middle, as we are used to find, products and services –
trademarks and brands. And either they are dispatched all of a heap, or they
are well-organized and nicely wrapped, they have but one mission: to be
utilized. Obviously, things do not happen like this only for the consumer’s
sake because, while some throw products at the others, the later group throw
money at the former. The more money, the better. This type of war – in fact
marketing as regarded so far – used to be quite simple. I say ‘used to’,
because for a while now the public and the consumers haven’t been willing to
participate in the war. Obviously, specialists in market research,
publicists and brand consultants were called in. They all tried to continue
the war and search for solutions to the imminent crisis. Yet, neither
science, nor creativity can make consumers accept the disproportionate war:
they obstinately refuse to go on accepting products and services
specifically created for them and, what is more, they start to make claims
over their genesis as brands. They were told in vain that although studies
and research have been developed in order to create them according to their
needs and tastes (and even according to their life style), the specialists
who promote the products and bring them to their attention have the greatest
importance; publicity, they were told, originates brands and keeps them
alive. They didn’t accept the explanation. They’ve started to cross the
front line and are heading, slowly but surely, towards the camp of marketing
specialists. And some are welcoming them – intentionally or not. However,
one thing seems increasingly clear for everybody:
the consumers want some peace and quiet.
Peace signs
The democratization of the Internet
and the Web 2.0 phenomenon
Flickr, digg,
Wikipedia, del.icio.us, YouTube, blog, podcast, RSS ! If you do not
understand any of the terms above and work as a marketing specialist, then
it’s time you did something for your and your company’s future. These terms
name some of the new manifestations existent online. The Internet – as it
was regarded last century! – is about to disappear. Understood as a purpose
in itself by the ones who created it and by its first users, the web is
about to change its very reason for existing: out of a purpose, it becomes a
way. It becomes the universal platform for communication and expression of
the human spirit. It’s not only about fast and easy access to information
any more,
it’s also
everyone’s contribution to the information universe. For instance, one can
not only express an opinion about one fact or another, but you can do
quality journalism without being a BBC employee.
And what
is more, you are taken into account and considered a relevant source of
information. The status of journalist is no longer awarded, but gained
through your absolutely private actions. Your opinions and beliefs can
reverberate in many minds, the others may find themselves in them.
Next,
Wikipedia – hard to believe it, a few years ago – has become, out of a
utopian project, one of the most accessed and used sources of public
information. The new web is becoming a universal and democratic
construction.
The human
being is not accepting a passive use of this environment any more, but is
actively contributing to creating and developing it;
the awareness and responsibility of the present
ability to communicate and influence in an unprecedented way and,
particularly, the feeling of participating in expanding a complex and higher
information entity represent, in fact, the strength of the web 2.0 reality.
Investor
Relations and Distributed Public Relations – the new tendencies in PR
The importance of financial transparence in public companies or the ones
listed on the stock exchange has been continually emphasized during the past
few years. Investors and capital market analysts have repeatedly appealed to
companies to deliver information in due time and in a more transparent
manner in order to prevent company collapse or crises.
Many have
emphasized that the cause is not distrust in administration boards or the
management, but a subtler need of the shareholders.
For
example, if a small shareholder of a very big company (which has thousands
of other shareholders) cannot take decisions which will be translated into
direct tangible and swift actions, then at least he should be kept informed
on all these and, thus, be able to control – indirectly - his financial
investments.
The
existence of a specific Investor Relations activity has become very
necessary within big public companies, with the proclaimed aim of
facilitating communication between them and their investors. This activity
has been defined as a set of actions and procedures connected to the ways in
which a company discloses information about its compliance with the law and
the policy of its own investments. In other words, I, the shareholder, do
not question the specialists’ and management’s competence, but want to
control, as well as possible, the policy of the companies I invested in.
Lately,
most Western European and American companies listed on the stock exchange
have a department or a company specialized in Investor Relations, which
manages communication with current and potential investors. The
democratization of information – once considered professional secret – is
becoming in this way a sign of the public’s desire to contribute to what, in
reality, belongs to them. Very soon people started speaking about
Distributed Public Relations. The newest ‘fashion’ in PR is represented by
the tendency to ‘delegate’ tasks and responsibilities to members of the
organization according to individual competences and activities. And –
hardly accidentally – this tendency refers primarily to actions developed
online. Obviously, such a practice cannot be done without the members’
agreement and their desire to participate in an activity which, for the time
being, is perceived as being reserved only to specialists.
The Traspersonal Brand
Nowadays, consumer’s loyalty to the brand and the complex, profound
emotional phenomenon which accompany this relation, can not be explained
only through the innate features of the purchased product or the successful
influence of the promotion and branding campaigns.
The simple fact that you’ve purchased a product – even
is it’s considered a brand – and you are using it, cannot explain the
extremely complex emotional and cognitive reactions
manifested by those who simply ‘own’ a product. Respect and loyalty to that
brand are only expressions of the feeling of belonging to something
transpersonal and beyond the simple emotional connection to an external
object. I don’t only HAVE the product, I AM part of it.
Many times, we are aware of the fact that, without us, the respective brand
wouldn’t exist. If we cease to be part of its ‘spirit’, then it will
disappear.
We are the ones who give it birth and keep it alive. Estimating the ‘power’
a consumer holds over a trademark, several marketing specialists have
employed a series of new interactive advertising procedures, through which
the public can manifest their feeling of belonging to that trademark and
which also ‘nourishes’ their need to participate in its development.
Lucian
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