Steve Barrett took me on as Media Week’s “Digital” blogger nearly a year ago to comment on stories and events in digital media.
But there are many indications that describing media, or marketing involving the internet, as “digital” is becoming as much use as calling grass “green” or Andy Murray “muscular”.
There’s no need for the word "digital" because the lines between online and offline are now being blurred.
Digital TV is set to be the norm. Media power players are getting into advertising delivery on radio and TV using internet protocols. Research companies and search technology providers are getting better at being able to measure the impact of the internet on sales in the physical high street. More and more people are shunning the morning paper in favour of pouring over mobile devices on their way to work. Sports stadiums are using electronic billboards for outdoor advertising.
Even Microsoft dropped “digital” from its advertising brand because all advertising will be digital in the next 5-10 years – so says Mr Ballmer.
So are we ready for this shift? It makes perfect sense doesn’t it? How do we adapt and embrace any positive fall out?
In a “high speed/low drag” kind of a world we need to create efficiencies, and efficiencies come through understanding and making better sense of data.
Data isn’t all about the numbers either. There are plenty of tools out there that turn the digits into pretty graphs and pictures where trends can be noticed and acted upon.
We have to get used to dealing with data – “digital” is dishing it out like never before and in places we never thought possible.
Digital is OTS with a built in response function. It's what people do. But as ever the key question is to know why they choose to do that and not something else. And people have been losing the paid news paper habit to TV and radio for years whcih is why editorially daily papers are about comment and entertainment and not about the news of the Battle of Waterloo, or the Titantic's fate.This has been speeded up by the use of digital , but its digital's ability to produce cheap give way papers like the Metro, that is challenging paid for papers on the 8.00 am on Metroland commuter train. The future however might be swiping the Oyster card and getting the Metro download that you plug in and play on the way in. Provding that by then that you still need to travel in everday.
'Digital media' has become a catch-all term that needs a little unpicking. Who remembers the line 'everything that can be digital will be' that we used to say ten years ago? It's happening though, and the media selling, planning and buying industry is gradually getting that. Increasingly though the internet is first media point of call for anyone sitting at a desk and the ipod is first media point of call for anyone in commuting mode. Perhaps we need to redefine 'appointment' advertising for this landscape.
Think the shift is inevitable, but it seems that this debate (like lots of others) puts medium before message. This can be dangerous as there are fewer and fewer genuinely engaging communication ideas around. Whichever way you look at it, the vast majority of all marketing messages are unwelcome intrusions. How many brands are actively desired by consumers? And how many of these are within reach of self-same consumers? Answer is not many, so most digital (or non-digital) messaging is to a greater or lesser extent not really welcomed. In this context message becomes more important than medium.
Mel Carson
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Member since: 03 Jun 2008
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