Corporations are shaping pop culture by paying for movies, producing television shows, and showcasing directly with Artists. The surreal advertising landscape of 2002’s “Minority report” is coming to life as interactive billboards and blockbuster video games offer a whole new way to build brand mindshare with the next generation of big spenders.
Brand & consumer planning, that infamous service that everyone talks about and none want to pay for, is becoming more and more of a business imperative as consumers get more sophisticated and overexposed. Planners are key to establishing the foundation for both the creative and the media teams, feeding them actionable insights to make sure the campaigns they produce hit home.
The walls are coming down as these teams work together in a more integrated fashion, feeding off each other, as the competition for consumer memory cells becomes a greater challenge than ever before. In this competitive landscape, savvy clients cannot make the mistake of confusing media efficiency models for effective media strategy. Brand messages are more likely to become forgettable if placed with turnkey buys that keep you in the clutter but not above it. In this context the conversation tends to revolve around the media “spend” and less about “effective branding.” This is especially true with emerging opportunity markets like the Hispanic market, where large media companies are not likely to push the envelope creatively or leverage digital & entertainment possibilities.
Another key point the creative and media teams must take into consideration is that they must establish dialogue with the consumer, putting the proper mechanisms in place to capture the customer’s response and capitalize on it in a way that will make a brand even more relevant. This will complete the circle feeding right back into the consumer & brand planning strategy, keeping the creative fresh and on point.
Brands are entertaining people in the theater, on TV, online, on their phones, on their iPods, and quite frankly wherever they can get to them.
In today’s “Advertainment” space, old fashioned notions like “creative just comes from the creative department, account management will take care of your planning, or media is simply a numbers game” are long gone. It is the creative & brand planning forces working in synergy with a strategic media team that will produce the most powerful results.