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IS IT JUST ME OR DID YESTERDAY’S NEWS JUST HAPPEN A SECOND AGO? Customary telephone conversations have been replaced with faster-than-you-can-blink text messages. Thoughts and expressions whittled to scannable acronyms, and meaningful face-to-face conversations are now conducted in global social media chat rooms. The way at which we communicate with one another is head-spinning and as marketers, it demands a major shift in the way we connect with customers. We no longer have the luxury of time. Conventional methods are not enough. The platform for brand awareness and customer loyalty now lies in the personal insights, opinions and experiences of online consumers. At a recent brow-raising LDMA presentation, Shel Holz, a 30-year veteran in the business and author of five books, stated, “In three years, 50% of content will be consumer-generated and of the IM generation (i.e., those born after 1980), 62% of the content they consume comes from people they know personally.” The challenge is: How do you as a marketer control your message? RESEARCH, STRATEGIZE AND PARTICIPATE
Traditional marketers may find all of this a little daunting. It’s not the social media they’re afraid of, it’s the unknown. Leaving so much trust in the hands of consumers is unchartered territory. But forums, blogs and all of the other tools of the social media networks are here to stay so I say embrace them. If there was ever a time to push the creative envelope harder than ever before, it’s now. Good marketers will re-evaluate, reorganize and reinvent the way they connect with customers. They will quickly adapt and navigate the online maze to pursue and persuade moving targets. Good marketers will succeed. Valerie Deck is a freelance copywriter with more than 20 years of creative writing experience. Specializing in direct mail, newsletters and marketing collateral, Val provides strategic solutions for B2B and B2C customers and is the VP of Publications for the LDMA Board. IT’S FRESH. IT’S CURRENT. IT’S LDMA’S NOVEMBER LUNCHEON.
Join us on Tuesday, November 10, as Katherine Phelps, director of digital media at Creative Alliance, shares how to successfully position and sell your company in the social media world.
Hear the details first-hand as Phelps discusses how social media channels affect today’s marketing plans in LDMA’s Social Media in an Advertising World. WE’RE ON FACEBOOK!
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