Who am I kidding? I can't even have a thought a month. My brain went AWOL. I didn't have nothin' to say. And if you got nothin' to say, just shut up. If ever you get the urge to write a book, check that it hasn't already been written. I know people who have written many books and haven't said a single thing.
I should'a told you. But that's just one more unnecessary email. So that's that. It's not like I stole from you.You haven't lost anything. I just didn't keep my promise. That's the lesson here. That's right. I did it to show you how customers feel when the delivery doesn't meet the advertising.
Now that we've got that straight and in an attempt to get back in the saddle, I was going to make some predictions for 2008. Identify key marketing trends and given them a cool name. The standard stuff. But instead, I will bring you some insights I had while I was in my coma.
TRUE: All generalisations are wrong. (Including this one. Statements about 'consumer types' may apply for an individuals only in a narrow purchase category. Ie., an early adopter in motor vehicles might also be a laggard or late majority member in computer equipment, etc.)
FALSE: Being connected is important. (If you are the most attractive networking target in the room, you're at the wrong function. We all have too many connections to be effective. Some people are obsessive/compulsive about gathering connections. Some are also addicted to face-to-face meetings.)
FALSE: All successful people have a goal. (Lately I have noticed people who reach the top being applauded have a tendency to say: "never in my wildest dreams". I'm with them. GoalS get in the way of greater achievement. WHY LIMIT YOURSELF TO ONLY REACHING THE STARS?)
FALSE: Market forces rule. (If you are a big player called Visy or Qantas, you can do deals with competitors to fix price floors and steal money from your customers. You won't be sent to gaol like the common criminals are. A lot of Qantas passengers will miss out on seeing Geoff in prison greens. DAMN.) BTW: the same thing happened in the courier and road freight business 15 years ago. They were caught fixing prices and stealng. No one went to jail/gaol. Bad move.
TRUE: Anyone who shaves their head and acts like a guru is a shyster. Now I am not saying Seth Godin is a guru, or acts like one... sort of strange and disconnected at times, then rattling off 'ideas' at a machine gun pace. I didn't say that. Nor did I mean to imply it. Seth is not a guru. No, truly. Every one of Seth's concepts - starting with "Permission" marketing - was born wholey new and was not appropriated from another field (like direct marketing) and renamed in digi-speak. And Seth is not simply a brand construct. He is a real flesh and blood person. While it can be said of advertising that it is the art of capturing a person's attention long enough to extract money from them, it can't be said of Seth. He was 'the new' and always will be, even when he's not.
INSIGHT: Most marketing trendspotters are frauds. TRUE: Nothing is less publicised than the actual performance rating of popular promoters of trends. The king of them all - Tom Peters (In Search of Excellence) - was dethroned when a large number of the 'excellent' companies hit the wall within 5 years of his book appearing. Faith Popcorn is another. Everyone was going to live in "cocoons" at home with their home entertainment centres. (Traditional movie theatres went which way? They went boom through the roof...) The Trend Spotter has only one club in the golf bag: more in the same direction. Little knowing that history never travels in a straight line. Prius and Hummer - both the vehicle of the year. Go figure. Now I am not saying Tom or Faith are trend spotters, or act like one... I didn't say that. Nor did I mean to imply it. They do not make predictions that are vague and hard to prove or disprove. No, truly.
FAITH POPCORN'S PREDICTIONS FOR 2007
(Pssst! Notice how she says something that sounds big, but when you look at it, there's nothing new about it or earth shattering.)
The agency of Trend Spotting legend Faith Popcorn has released their 2007 Trend Report. The enclosed press release describes some of the next big trends.
NEW YORK, Dec. 26 /PRNewswire/—Leading future-focused trend consultancy Faith Popcorn’s BrainReserve anticipates the forging of a new type of identity in the coming years: The New Networked Self. The technological advances of the information age have produced the most powerful tools yet for shaping our collective human destiny. The world has simultaneously become more fluid and more connected, one of both infinite possibility and extreme intimacy. As a result, people are turning away from the ego-driven self-aggrandizement that characterized the old era of hyper-consumption. The New Networked Self is far more ecologically aware than her predecessor and sees herself as a tiny, but instrumental part of a much larger picture that is constantly in flux. With this newfound awareness comes a personal sense of responsibility to understand and engage with the whole.
Identity Flux
Technology has enabled us to experiment with different personalities, leading to a much more fluid sense of who we are. Having tasted the nectar of virtual liberation, we’re beginning to reject the singularly defined roles we’re expected to play in society.
The Future: Gender-neutrality goes mainstream. People list skills on their business cards rather than title, and dress up in various costumes depending on who they feel like being that day.
Liquid Brands
Today’s consumers are capricious and non-committal. Brands will have to become more liquid to keep up with their constantly moving targets.
The Future: Chameleon-like brands focus less on communicating a static message and more on being the right thing for the right persona at the right time. Constantly morphing retailers carry products until they sell out and never restock.
Virtual Immortality
Consumers globally are creating fully fleshed out existences in the virtual world-dressing up their avatars, making friends, having affairs and buying property for their pixilated alter-egos. And now that people have multiple lives, who says you can’t live forever?
The Future: While some let their avatars drift away to online purgatory, many more leave behind specific instructions on how their virtual selves should proceed. Services offering avatar surrogates flourish, and we bequeath avatars to friends and family in our wills.
EnvironMENTAL Movement
Like the movement to combat environmental pollution, the next consumer-led reaction will be against the mental pollution caused by marketers. With every corner of the world both real and virtual becoming plastered with marketing messages, bombarded consumers are starting to say they’ve had enough. The current attack against marketing to kids is just the beginning.
The Future: Companies are expected to reduce the amount of damage they are doing to our minds. Savvy companies sponsor marketing-free white spaces in lieu of polluting the environment with models and logos.
Product PLACEment
In the globally networked age, consumers are much more concerned about the consequences of consumption. Is my garbage poisoning someone in a developing country? How much fuel was burned in order to get these strawberries to my local supermarket?
The Future: Enviro-biographies are attached to just about everything, letting consumers know the entire life story of a product: where the materials were harvested, where it was constructed, how far it traveled, and where it ended up after being thrown away or recycled.
Brand-Aides
The government has let us down when it comes to providing the social services we had once expected from it. Brands are stepping in to take over where the government left off. Companies are already finding there’s profit to be made from providing affordable healthcare to the masses.
The Future: Socially responsible brands make a buck while providing desperately needed services. Communities are revived by Target daycare, Starbucks learning centers, and Avis transportation services for the elderly.
Moral Status Anxiety
In today’s increasingly philanthropic climate, expect conspicuous self- indulgence to go straight to the social guillotine. The globally conscious consumer regards altruistic activities as a necessary part of self- improvement.
The Future: A person’s net worth is no longer measured by dollars earned, but by improvements made. Families compete with each other on how many people they fed while on vacation, and the most envied house on the block is not the biggest, but the most sustainable.
Oldies but Goodies
Our culture is suffering from an experience deficit. With the availability of online knowledge, we’re claiming expertise based only on secondary experience. Now that everyone’s a web-educated know-it-all, we’re secretly longing for authority figures to guide and assure us with indispensable nuggets of wisdom that could only come from having actually accumulated life experience.
The Future: Respect for elders makes a comeback in the form of Ask Your Grandma hotlines and the proliferation of online video clips by seniors showing us how to tie knots and concoct home remedies.
Contact: Faith Popcorn’s BrainReserve
+1-212-772-7778
Fax - +1-212-772-7787
future@FaithPopcorn.com
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