The latest within connectivity such as fibre optic and 4G will speed up Australia and hopefully keep us up the pace with the rest of the civilised world. What has been a standard speed in Europe is soon to arrive, instant Internet is near. Interface (screens) will be portable, fixed or communal. OLED (organic light emitting device) screens will soon be seen playing you favourite music video on t-shirts or folded up in your wallet.
We will go from voice search in 2011 to basically having a personal assistant in our phones in 2015. An artificial intelligence that can recommend wines just for you or manage your to do list. It is also the year where 90% of all new TV’s will have Ethernet and hard drives as standard (in developed markets). Ultra HD will take over our flat screens with more pixels than we can see. Outdoor will be ruled by multi-touch, interactive and face aware screens. Face aware screens that know when you look at it and respond accordingly. These augmented reality applications are amazing news for some, scary for others.
Some questions remain. Will we ever have a need for an internet connection that is quicker than instant? One possible reason would be for transferring large amounts of data but unlikely from an entertainment or media perspective. Why develop screen technology that enables more pixels than the eye can see? Surely this will affect the rate of change within technology?
Attention span will be a rare commodity in the future and this cannot be stressed more. The implications arise when consumers are exposed to not only tailored messages but all the time. One might feel that it would be a burden rather than a service. Even though a person might be looking to go on holiday at a certain time, being brain washed by a mindreading advertising apparatus that knows it before you is a daunting thought.
Major advertisers will become program creators (some already are). The entire industry will have to devote their time, resources and passion to create relevant content and services, not to source the cheapest and most accessible ones. Be aware, as people see through the cheap tricks played by corporations throughout the tainted history of advertising.
Big advertising houses also need to become somewhat prolific software developers. “What?” I hear you say. Leave that for the IT department! Unfortunately, the trend of integrating any channel with the digital space is crying out for it. Furthermore, all media needs to be socialized as standard. If that means a “simple” Facebook page solution or a truly relevant one, like Intel’s “Museum of me”, then so be it.
2015 may well see an online ad spend of between 40-50%, so advice your clients early. Discuss the endless opportunities offered by the online space. Look beyond banners; think how a campaign can truly be multi-platform AND interesting. Think about the implications and opportunities if ad serving applies to all media.
As the profit margins shrink in the media world, enter optimisation software. Well-developed, optimisation software can and will take over much of the manual work. Fear not, this only means that in order to keep your job, planners and buyers will have to start thinking about planning and buying again. Media agencies will also manage creative execution optimisation. Not necessarily by owning it, but media and creative agencies might have to start to (truly) collaborate again. This will be because content and software development is an expected service offering by the media agency in 2015.
Mobile marketing on smartphones will eventually be handled by media agencies, some will grow organically through the companies, and others will grow independently and merge later on. Planners will have the work cut out for them with training courses in behavioural economics along with scientific research on human, social and cultural behaviour in order to nudge economic behaviour. This may only be a wish but can soon be reality.
Print might change name completely to publishers because that is the business they are in. The trend in this area is will consist of premium printing magazines that are super exclusive and tailored to more or less specific people. Other publications will start to produce quarterly or annual editions to survive the down sloping trend in print, as we stand beside (with sadness) and watch the medium deteriorate, although some call it progress. Very doubtfully will I ever give in to the iPad.
Strap in because from where I am sitting, the next four years will be one hell of a ride.
Kristin Drakenberg
MediaCom
*Source: Talk by Chris Stephenson at Google headquarters on the 2nd of June 2011
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