Planning 2.0: The Next Agency Paradigm Shift
Planners need to re-think their discipline. An individual’s exposure to a brand is now more or less completely mediated by technology. It is insufficient to understand demographic or attitudinal information about a target audience. Who the individual is, what they want and are interested in, how they receive communications, and how they buy must all be viewed through the prism of the individual’s understanding and use of technology.
How tech-savvy are they? Do they use Google or MSN? Do they have a PVR? Do they listen to podcasts? Have they opted-in to email? Do they write or read blogs? How will they react to a new delivery format, product or service? Will they adopt it quickly? Will it appeal to several audiences? An understanding of the individual and their attitude now requires a sophisticated appreciation of current technical capabilities in the marketplace and audience engagement with, and understanding of, technology.
In addition to increasing their knowledge of technology and its impact on media, planners will have to be predictive in their application of this knowledge. Planners will have to lift their eyes above the concept of the traditional ad campaign within a set of static media. The discipline will necessarily become more consultative — delivering recommendations not just on what message a customer engagement should convey, but what means will most effectively meet the client’s business objectives, be it through communications, the creation of a new online service, the delivery of a new digital product, a new viral activity, engagement in a community, or whatever else is relevant.
Without a detailed understanding of the capabilities presented by new technologies, and the flexibility and reflexivity of different media, planners are ill-equipped to take advantage of the new opportunities afforded by digital. Sometimes, of course, an old fashioned ad campaign is still the right thing to do, but these days, that is something that must be proven, not assumed.
The planner’s role, in understanding what consumers will want and how they will want it, is now not only about writing a “single minded proposition” or formulating campaign “messaging” — it is just as much about identifying an opportunity to relevantly enable customers to do new things, and then translating this into a set of functionality, delivery vectors and messaging that collectively realize the opportunity. Media planning and communications planning are part of the broader “User Experience” planning. The planner will have to bring this all together by seeing through the eyes of the customer.
Planners will also play an important role in bringing digital experiences to life. “Creatives,” “Techies” and Media types habitually “talk past” each other. At the moment, creatives are wrapped up the message, media folks in ad placements, and techies in the function. They are collectively ill-equipped to cope with the broader engagement possibilities enabled by the digitization of media.
Having to understand both the attitudes and behaviors of customers with respect to Brands, messages and technologies, planners should be in a position to understand the “creative,” “media” and “technical” teams, and provide a means to translate communications between them. Planners will broker the ideation process, using customer insight as the effective means of exchange.
In addition, having formulated the desired end of the activity, the planner will be in an ideal position to validate that the proposed solution is relevant, actionable and on message. The planner will play a more active part in the “creative” process, guiding the delivery of all teams to ensure that the overall project objectives are met in a way that the consumer will understand and engage with.
The Rousing Finale
No doubt about it, “planning” is a bit of a slippery fish at the moment. The bad news is that you planners are becoming obsolete along with the rest of the old ad agency model. (If that’s a surprise, by the way, you should reconsider your job title at the very least.) The good news is, that if you get all your digital ducks in a row, and you’re very lucky, you might just be the answer to those awkward questions clients are asking about the point of ad agencies.
Reader Comments.
Hello Craig,
Thank you for your cogent comments. You have accurately captured the trend of disintermediation by the Internet.
However, all is not lost, what if there were a web based service that permits the viewer of Internet based television to choose advertisements to watch, independent of the broadcast content being viewed. The advertiser never misses their target and the viewer would have a variety of incentives to purchase the product.
“What if” exists. Let me know if you are interested in “getting the eyeballs back on the product” with a precise ROI.
I fully agree, I recently wrote an articly explaing the same concept. Today I linked at your article.
- Pingback from Weekly Linkage [06-09-06] at Experience Planner
Great article Craig! Really, a fantastic column and one that I was just thinking about.
- Pingback from mindblob » The new creative mind - Design thinking
Leave a Comment
Pages: « previous page 1 2 3
Tags: advertising_strategies, agency_roles and media_buying_planningArticle Sponsor
More Features
-
Loading ...
Latest News
- Hulu’s Bringing Its “A” Game But… March 19th 2010 ADOTAS – Hulu’s sales team is actively subverting the ad [...] more »
- Yelp! A class-action suit? March 19th 2010 ADOTAS – One of three civil suits against Yelp filed [...] more »
- Viacom Accuses Google; Testing Digital Millennium Copyright Act March 19th 2010 Viacom has accused Google of turning a blind eye to [...] more »
- Google to Leave China April 10th? March 19th 2010 ADOTAS – According to the China Business News, Google Inc [...] more »
- [x+1] Creates The Smartest Tagging System Around March 18th 2010 ADOTAS – Today, if you happen to be at the [...] more »
- IAB’s Video Standards Tackled By ADTECH March 18th 2010 ADOTAS – ADTECH, a part of AOL Advertising and an [...] more »
- Google Search and Mobile and….TV? Oh My! March 18th 2010 ADOTAS – Google wants to dominate your screens…. Not just [...] more »
Features
- Growing Pains March 19th 2010
- For Better or For Worse? March 18th 2010
- Yahoo! Wants to Get More Personal March 17th 2010
- Creative Considerations for the iPad March 16th 2010
- Amazon Leaves Colorado Affiliates Out in the Cold March 12th 2010
Spotlight
AdBidCentral’s CEO, Vivek Veeraraghavan Talks Openly*What was the inspiration to start AdBidCentral? The conditions that inspired AdBidCentral came from a variety of factors in my personal [...] more...
Reader Favorites
Classifieds
- Communications Fellow
- Sr Director, Marketing Services
- Senior Web Analyst
- Account Director
- Director of Analytics
Recent Comments
- Durk Price: This is one early adoption I would do!
- Rolv Heggenhougen: Companies invest a great deal in their website which in many cases is their only
- docreiss: I find it interesting that the author ("Bob") indicates the reader may have the "patients"
- Jedd Gould: I think you miss the point. Publications have to charge because the content most are
