Throw Out Your Digital Playbook, The Game Has Changed!!

I have notice a rising trend in my discussions about digital strategy among my peers.  The trend is that we all feel that we are in the middle of a tectonic shift in how we define digital strategy. In the past, strategy has be driven by a balanced approach to its execution. When new technologies would emerge, we would simple gradually add them to the mix and as they matured they would receive and increase focus and inclusion to the existing strategy. In other words, this strategy was an “add on” approach. However, Social Business and Mobile Media have made it clear that this “add on” strategy is obsolete. In fact, I believe that we need to fundamentally reconstruct our digital strategy starting from a completely different viewpoint. A point at which, Social and Mobile are becoming perhaps the dominant channel in which all other media should integrate into.  As opposed to the way of the past – Just add mobile and social into the current approach.

This is a great visual from the Dachis Group.

First let’s talk about what I believe is the most pressing new direction, Social. Social media or business (as it is starting to be called) is changing the way consumers interact with a brand.  Twitter, Facebook, Google + just to name a few are empowering consumers to interact with their peers in terms of relating to a brand. It is no longer a simple “push pull” environment.  Search algorithms have now prioritized search based on your social network, Bing/Yahoo/Facebook and Google +.  So gone are the days of “He who has the most money wins!” Today, if a listing is both ranked high organically as well as PPC they may not get consideration if someone in that consumers network doesn’t “like” of Google + it.  If there are 10 links that show up on my search page, I no longer go to 1,2 or 3. I look for at Google + symbol first, and then I look at rank. Subsequently, it is an environment in which a business has to market “like” a consumer markets themselves to their peer group.  A consumer is building personal networks of people that they respect and who in turn respect them. They are building relationships through reputation or even communal belief systems.  For a brand this is such a foreign way to think.

The world of Search is Changing

Now a company has to create demand by reaching prospects through other prospects using a strategy that encourages interaction with its brand in order to create a relationship. That relationship can translate and propagate through individual networks rather quickly. The problem is that we don’t really know what that brand image will be definitively because it is unique to the individual relationship and their social network. In some ways, Consumers are defining what your brand is to them. Instead, of a company telling consumers what they want them to think of their brand! So if this is true, then all components of your digital strategy should include or be hyper cognizant of the social implications.  Even components that we rarely think of as true demand generators will start to come further to the front of our strategies. For example, CRM strategy is now a full on demand generator! How your customers experience your brand is now incredibly important since they are powerful influencers in terms of the validity of your branding and marketing image. CRM systems now need to integrate social media into how they grade or track customer interaction and subsequent behavior.  Are you starting to see how BIG this starting to get?!

Then next major shift in how we think as marketers involves our Mobile strategy.  When smart phones were first introduced, most of us slowly developed Mobile sites as a low priority backup plan.  We were still aggressively trying to work on tradition User Experience and busy optimizing for search (sometimes at the expense of the consumer).  Now the tide has turned and boy has it turned! Smart phones are everywhere and tablets are replacing laptops at a record pace!  However, if you quizzed most marketing professionals on where mobile was prioritized, it would be moving up the ranks but still not the top priority.  I say this is a strategy that will come back to bite you and cost you an incredible amount of time and money if you are not aggressively optimizing your strategy with Mobile at the top of your list. Not only that, but you should be optimizing for Social Media on Mobile second! Just to further muddy the waters, Interactive Web Ready TV’s are flooding the market now. Experts believe that they interact with a site more like tablet readers than computer users.

Now be honest, look at your digital strategy for 2012.  Is social media and mobile in the top 5 of priorities? Unfortunately, most of you will say “nope”, but we are really thinking about it.  Stop thinking and start doing. Any direction towards a changing market is a good direction at this point.

The Dachis group has a slightly different take on the impact of Social and Mobile here. I highly recommend you check out Dion Hinchcliffe‘s perspective. Fascination read.

Advertisement