This blog post is courtesy of our CEO, Reggie Bradford:
The looming recession acts as a true accelerant on trends which were already shifting to new media. We are forced more than ever to rethink our traditional notions of advertising and search for the right way to reach and impact consumers. The challenge of any great brand is to create loyalty beyond reason. Today this requires engaging the consumer in a dialog and inviting them to understand and develop the brand. Building a force of passionate advocates is a remarkable and effective way to grow brand awareness and ultimately market share. We know now that the marketing model has flipped. The consumer now owns the brand and has a vested stake in how it will be evolved.
Necessity is the mother of invention but in this case we will claim adoption. In the beginning of the social media revolution brands had a choice. They could choose to embrace social media and be know as an innovator or could bury their heads in the sand and pretend there was nothing to embrace. Denial is no longer an option. With ad budgets being slashed marketers must find the most effective and cost efficient ways to reach and empower their consumers.
These are unprecedented times and we are all marketing in the new now. For consumers, social media provides freedom of expression, incredible creation tools and multiple outlets for true self expression and a place to be understood. For marketers, social media provides unparalleled engagement, measurable ROI and huge cost savings. As ad budgets continue to drop in this tough climate, these elements are creating a perfect storm for social media to be championed in a down economy.
In the following video Reggie further talks about the opportunity for marketers to leverage social media in our down economy.
