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An Assignment Report On the topic

TRENDS IN IMC
For the subject of

Integrating Marketing Communication

SUBMITTED TO:

PRESENTED BY:

Mr. Rajan Sharma (Lecturer in Marketing)

Anupriya

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Trends In Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC)

2011 is poised to be an exciting year for marketers; trends that have been taking shape over the course of the past decade are creating new opportunities for business owners. The first 10 years of the 21st century brought economic problems, corporate collapses and environmental disasters, but it was also a decade defined by a shift in communications from traditional media to a worldwide conversation that flows faster and farther than anyone could have imagined. Thanks to the tools of the social web, such as Twitter, Facebook, blogs, online video and so on, news and information travels instantaneously, and that means marketers have new and exciting opportunities to reach consumers. With those economic, cultural, political and environmental events, as well as the advances in technology and the global online conversation in mind, following are trends that affect all areas of marketing, from advertising to branding and everything in between, and will shape marketing strategy throughout 2011 and beyond. 1. Transparency and trust are paramount. Consumers have lived through a variety of negative events throughout the past decade, and they're no longer willing to accept anything businesses tell them. Brands that embrace the loss of navet and make a concentrated effort to be honest and open in the marketing ir communications will generate positive consumer responses, which can lead to brand loyalty and brand advocacy. Building trust is the most important thing in 2011, and once you've earned it, you need to make sure you keep it. In other words, transparency and trust is not a one-time thing. They're an ongoing effort. 2. Less interruption, more enhancement and value-add. The days when ads and marketing messages were developed for the sole purpose of getting the attention of consumers are over. People expect more (or in the case of interruptions, less) from businesses and brands. Give them more by ensuring your marketing communications and efforts deliver useful and meaningful value. 3. Speaking of value . . . The economic downturn that occurred in the latter part of the past decade stopped many consumers in their tracks. Rather than spending money frivolously, consumers began seeking

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out deals, using coupons and actively looking for the biggest bang for their buck. When the economy recovers, that behaviour will not disappear immediately. Be prepared for the consumer focus on value to continue well beyond 2011, and build marketing campaigns with that consumer demand in mind. 4. Show it, don't tell it. Consumers don't believe everything they hear. Indeed, consumers are more skeptical than ever, and you need to prove your marketing claims. Don't just tell consumers about your product, business or services, show them what's in it for them if they pull out their hardearned money and buy from you. 5. Social media is not going away, and engagement is critical. Twitter, Facebook, blogs, YouTube, and other tools of the online social community are not going anywhere. Instead, these tools are being adopted by more and more people around the world. If you thought you could avoid joining the bandwagon, you were wrong. In 2011, it's critical that your business joins the social web conversation, and you must engage consumers on the social networking sites. Give them amazing content and interact with them to fully leverage the power of the social media. 6. Peace-of-mind messages prevail. Consumers have lived through a wide variety of negative events over the past several years, from economic turmoil to environmental disasters and more. They're actively seeking marketing messages that give them a feeling of peace of mind. Try to communicate a feeling of security in your marketing efforts to meet this need. 7. Relationships rule. With the growth of web-based social networks and a desire for transparency, trust and peaceof-mind messages, it shouldn't be surprising that relationships rule in 2011 and beyond. Leverage the social web to interact with people around the world and build relationships that wouldn't have been possible a decade ago. When you build relationships with consumers, you also build a band of brand loyalists that can become your most powerful source of word-ofmouth marketing, brand advocacy and brand guardianship.

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8. Online video and mobile marketing are hot. Both online video and mobile marketing are set to explode, and we'll really start to see that happen in 2011. You can create your own online video content or mobile content, or you can invest in online video or mobile advertising. The choice is yours, but there is no better time to jump in than right now! 9. Focus, focus, focus! Don't try to be everything to everyone in 2011. The strongest brands are focused brands. As the first decade of the 21st century unfolded, marketers and social media professionals began using the term niche more and more to identify highly focused products, websites, blogs and so on. Today, that strategy is even more important. Build your core and keep it as strong as possible before you try to extend your brand and branch out into new areas. 10. Integrated marketing trumps stand-alone tactics. It is absolutely essential that you surround consumers with your marketing messages in 2011. The number of marketing communications that people see each day is overwhelming, so it's important that your messages don't get lost in the clutter. You can make your brand, your business and your messages stand out by surrounding consumers with branded experiences and allowing them to choose which of those experiences they want to consume. For example, use online advertising, online video, custom content, point-of-sale collateral, and ads with consistent messaging to engage consumers in different parts of their lives. If you're consistent and persistent, your messages are more likely to connect with your target audience--raising brand awareness, recognition, purchases and loyalty. 11. Less will get done until we learn to do more with less..... While the year 2009 was marked by extreme economic turmoil, the marketing industry wont feel its full effects until 2010. Right now, marketers and their agency partners are focused on simply getting work out the door, with reduced headcounts and budgets. However, if they learn to align resources with more singular and powerful integrated marketing programs - at the perhaps necessary expense of individual marketing tactics - the breakthrough ideas and greater productivity will be the norm again.

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12. Marketers will mistakenly whack a medium of the marketing mix. With reduced marketing budgets, it is said that, something has to give. Unfortunately, marketers are making wholesale cuts to specific marketing/media channels in the process. Though the most dramatic cuts have occurred this year in newspapers and magazines, it cautions marketers to carefully consider if other media in the marketing mix can really compensate for these cuts, especially in terms of the consumer behaviours. Though it is believed that reduced resources should not affect a well-crafted, integrated, multi-channel mix, it does expect that such blunders may occur in 2011. 13. More data but even less understanding. Web analytics are making online campaigns easier to measure, while more studies are emerging from more sources - including media measurement companies, foundations, academics, marketers and the media themselves. While all this data clearly point to a highly fluid, highly interactive and mercurial media landscape, these data sets are - at the same time - less projective when the media world changes so quickly. So, while marketers may have a better understanding of what happened last week, last month or yesterday, they cannot take this understanding too far into the future. In this respect, it is liked that todays environment to a Wild West era of integrated channel planning. 14. Lines between media will continue to blur. In the coming year, more prime-time TV content will show up in more places than ever before. Fans will have multiple access points into shows that used to be an appointment view controlled by network programming executives. Such models as live view, live+3 day views from a DVR, video on demand, Hulu, network owned websites, and shared distribution deals (ala DirecTV and NBC for Friday Night Lights) it is no longer clear as to where one screen medium ends and another begins. Marketers will do best to understand that its all a screen, and plan accordingly. 15. Push vs. pull will become less relevant. In 2011, the classification of marketing experiences into push vs. pull will become less relevant because the best content (both programming and commercial content) will increasingly become push and pull at the same time. For example, American Idol is both a push medium because its broadcast during primetime on Fox, and a pull medium

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because of the plethora of votes, downloads, and chats which result from the broadcast. The reverse is also true. Given the vast reach of social networks, a viral experience that is pulled along by a small group of fans will quickly amass reach without too much effort on the part of the original sender. 16. Great content will travel at the speed of share while average experiences will evaporate. In 2011, marketers will continue to wrestle with a sense of time because messages can travel at the speed of share which renders the speed of traditional content distribution obsolete. With the click of a mouse, or a mobile phone, consumers can advance a great story/ad/video/picture/news site to vast, networked communities of hearts and minds. However, content will only travel at the speed of share if it is worth sharing in the first place. There now is much lower tolerance for mediocre content and consumers in 2011 will have even more means of disposing of, and/or avoiding it. 17. The adult 18-49 demo will become even less relevant as a target cohort. Though the diversity within the 18-49 adult demographic isnt new, the dramatic differences in media use and consumption for an 18 year-old relative to a 49 year-old are becoming increasingly pronounced. The great divide between internet-raised and television-raised

consumers may indeed become big enough in 2011 for integrated marketers to finally realize that this broad and unrealistic target cohort doesnt hold up. 18. Symbiosis will create interesting and - at times strange partnerships. Though many forecasters are predicting wholesale collapses in media channels, it is believed that the media and marketing landscape will be affected more by the laws of symbiosis than the laws of natural selection. As an example, the relationship between YouTube and TV which at first appeared on the surface as a competing interest - continues to evolve into a symbiotic relationship. These emerging relationships will continue to develop among what appear on the surface as competing media channels. 19. 2011 will become the year of the good idea. The recent past suggests that integrated marketing, as an industry, has become hyper- focused on the dynamics of channels to such an extreme that it has taken its eye off the ball. However, when a collective realization is made that marketing channels serve only as pipelines for

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content and that only great content can be both pushed and pulled along at the new speed of share, the good ideas will begin to flow again. Without a good idea, the content will simply evaporate.

References:y

http://www.entrepreneur.com/marketing/marketingcommunicationscolumnistsusangu nelius/article204804.html

http://www.marketingcharts.com/television/top-10-integrated-marketing-trendsbeware-of-hyperfocus-10876.html

http://www.brandingstrategyinsider.com/2009/10/top-ten-integrated-marketingtrends-for-2010.html