A post by Murray Newlands on the future of social media marketing got me thinking. Social media marketing is not only affecting big brands but all businesses, even technology companies that are involved in Internet advertising. There is a lot of talk about how big brands are struggling to engage in social media arenas, but this condition is not is limited to big brands, it is pervasive through all sectors.
Tom Foremski is right. All companies are becoming media and publishing companies. As are people on a personal and professional level, we are all trying to get to grips with “brand me“.
Web and technology companies are no different. In the technology sector many companies are specialised and are trying to develop their services and products in a difficult economic times. This means there has been a natural “leaning” process in technology startup companies. Venture capital is expensive and more limited today and technology companies are getting leaner. This leaning process has an affect on resources. Ironically this means that startups will not be as able to leverage the new technologies which they used to be very good at doing.
It is not just big brands that are not engaging as quickly as they possible could, it is most companies, even companies operating in similar fields.
Social media has a cost, it is not free. It costs time.
Time in leaner companies is a limited commodity. While we may be running our companies more efficiently, it to has a cost. It limits our ability to participate in social media marketing. Catch22.
At Coull we have not got our social media marketing campaign sorted yet. We have not been able to engage as we navigate through the economic terrain are all operating in today.
We need a social media marketer…..
Interactive video advertising is quite similar, the return is very high, but there is an initial investment that needs to be made, time. As we all struggle with time to engage in the social media ecosystem and get to grips with how this revolution can assist our businesses, we struggle to find that balance and invest our most valuable commodity, time, in the most effective arena for the best ROI.
Social media traffic and seed has just scaled out massively and overnight. This is very positive from our point of view as it demonstrates, once again how disruption just emerges. It is hard to predict the future of online marketing and emergence. However, there are not many things that you can predict, interactive video is one of those. It just makes sense. One thing for certain is that one day all video will be interactive, it will be layered with information, it is just a natural evolutionary step.
One thing for certain, interactive video advertising is going to be a part of the future of online marketing (see Sitting on the Threshold). And for interactive video advertising as for social media marketing, the future is now.
20 July 2009 – Gary Wilson