MARKETING - A LOOK A CENTURY OUT

Our Chief Creative Officer, Curtis Newborn, shares thoughts on where marketing may be headed:

While my main profession is "photographer", so much of our overall business revolves around a level of involvement in the "marketing" that our client's undertake. And so in order to be a truly productive partner to our clients, it's important for our team to stay on top of what's happening in terms of marketing and advertising trends.

So the other day, I asked myself what will “marketing” be like when it grows up. Kind of crazy to think about, right?

I remember, like it was yesterday– being asked to participate in the first advertising production meeting at my first employer.  "Print" was king, and how we shot product photography was driven by the specs of a particular print campaign. Fast forward to today, and "digital" has become the go-to suite of marketing tools, providing instant customization, delivery and greater cost effectiveness.

In the immediate future, viral sharing, workforce marketing, new social channels, use of big data and mobile are now top of mind for every smart marketer.  And, each and every marketer is trying to figure out how to make them work for their target audience and deliver on that all-important ROI.

We all know that what is cool today is likely going to be ho-hum tomorrow... trends in marketing are changing at a faster pace than ever before. Really if you think about all of this, it was only about a 100 years ago that the printing press, motion pictures and the phonograph were invented. And now in someways they are dinosaurs in terms of frequency of use.

So, where will technology take us over the next 100 years?

Will marketing become like a science fiction movie—reading customers thoughts through their mobile devices? It may already feel like that the way Facebook seems to know things I'm interested in so they instantly serve up ads that I'll like.  Big data is the marketers dream. But how far is too far, and when will it start to turn off our clients and customers? How will we communicate in the future... will we even use words? Will the other senses be included more in our everyday marketing communication? Tasting something via our mobile devices, having a virtual experience such as driving a new car happen right in our living room– with feel, sight, and sound a part of the experience... it may just happen... I'm excited for the future and I truly dig thinking about how it will impact us all... both personally and professionally.

So what do you think Marketing will look like in the next 100 years? And at the rate technology is changing, do you think we will start to see some of this really cool stuff in our lifetimes? Let me know on Twitter @CurtisNewborn