The tangled web of marketing

Remember 30 years ago, when a brand manager would have the following (perhaps a few more, but these are the main) options available to him or her?
- Television ad spots
- Radio ad spots
- Newspaper and Magazine advertisements
- Trade promotion dollars for endcap displays

Fast forward to today: Retailers have more power in the negotiating process than ever before, slick technologies like TiVO, the web, etc. are reducing (or possibly eliminating) the influence of commercials and print advertisements, and there are more and more devices out in the market by which marketers have options to position their products today.

Add to that, the ever-increasing influence of the online space... which has been growing double digits for many years and is pulling more and more ad dollars away from traditional media. The good news is that the web offers advertisers and merchandisers new means to market to, especially younger, consumers. Better yet, the web offers what traditional ad spots have not really been able to definitively provide, quantifiable metric-gathering ability by which to measure the Return on Marketing Investment... which in a world where marketing (and all expenses for that matter) is being increasingly scrutinized is a really good thing.

However, the not-so-good news is that the web, and especially now the emergence of Web 2.0, provides an increasingly complex number and types of channels available to use in the marketing mix. Paid search, unpaid search, website impressions, click-through advertising, email, affiliate marketing, social commerce, social networking, SEM, cell phone couponing... you get the picture. And I'm sure that there are more options than that. With options, of course, comes the risk of analysis paralysis... "Which options should I use?" "What's the latest 'new' thing?" "What am I getting out of this ad, really?"

In reality, depending on your target segments and the types of behaviors/actions you want to influence, any one or a combination of these tools may be used. I will not go into any one of these right now (that would be for future blogs, of course), but here are my thoughts about evaluating your mix:

- Who are your customers? And how do they interact with you and others online?
- What is your desired outcome? Is it awareness? Visiting your website? Creating UCG to support your brand? Sales (obviously everyone's endgame)?
- What tools provide the most logical resource to accomplish your desired outcome and can the technologies/partners you use provide accurate and actionable measurements to help you assess your Return on Marketing Investment?
- How do these online channels interact with your current offline channels? Can you leverage cross-channel marketing?
- Do you have the right data on your customers (behavior, preferences, history, etc.) and sufficiently robust analytics available to make intelligent decisions about targeting with these channels?
- How rapidly can you adjust your messenging/strategy using this means if there is a need to course correct?

These are my initial thoughts. I will provide thought on specific tools later.