Part 2. Continued from this post.

Perhaps, as Al Gore said, this is the end of the marketing industrial revolution where powerful Barrons ruled (WPP, Omnicom, Interpublic)over a society where doors were closed to you unless you were of a certain class. I’ll go along with that but wouldn’t this indicate that these large conglomerates have somehow come to their fortunes not only unfairly but illegally? A strong inference to draw, for sure. I’m not willing to go there.

On the other hand, calling this the end of the marketing industrial revolution is a strange analogy since the IR was characterized by increased innovation, the spread of technology and mechanized methods of production not to mention child labor (your 15 year old nephew with a Mac making TV spots for $1000 hits that mark, right)?

Perhaps we’ve cycled and are returning to a more localized agrarian-like system where self reliant individuals hold the full methods of production. (We can work globally, but how many of us really do?) The industrial revolution also gave rise to mass production and thus mass communication but now we’re moving back to one-to-one localized communication among smaller groups.

Just for fun, maybe a better description of the industry is that it’s moving toward a marketing social democracy, where the tenets of capitalism and socialism are combined. If the definition of a social democracy includes “the creation of programs that work to counteract or remove the social injustice and inefficiencies inherent in capitalism”, isn’t that where were headed? For example:

• There are no marketing generalists any more. The days of the lone agency handling your entire account are long gone. Marketers need specialists. As the Hitch roster grows and evolves, the ranks are filled with specialists. But they’ve got a broad generalist view. Specialeralists!? (If this becomes the next buzzword, you heard it here first!)
• These highly skilled marketing specialists can do something your nephew working on his first spot for Current TV will never do: Look at business problems holistically and with a broader strategy, one that recognizes that all your business problems don’t begin and end in the marketing department.
• Scott Goodson’s quote in part 1 of this post referenced a bringing together of strong, diverse, smaller teams to solve larger marketing problems.

Aren’t all of these examples stripping away the inefficiencies inherent in our current marketing environment?

Maybe I’m thinking too much about this. Maybe it all doesn’t matter. But what does matter is that as marketing becomes even more noisy (and, trust me, when every teen with a Mac becomes a Creative Director–its gonna get loud) customers will devise even more ways to turn it off, tune it out and and drop off off the media grid. The logical conclusion to this conundrum is not rocket science: It will be tougher and tougher to gain customer’s attention, much less their trust–just like it is right now. Only much worse.

How your company handles Advertising’s power shift from Madison Avenue to Main Street is going to continue to be a challenge. Professional marketers ‘ work will coexist beside that of a 15 year old whiz kid from Omaha–that’s just gonna be how it’s done. Get used to it. Neither side’s giving in or going away. But which is the right strategy for your company? That’s why I started Hitch: to help you navigate the craziness and find order out of chaos.

No, Al Gore did not (re) invent the ad agency today when he said, in effect, that the only sustainable advertising model will be one where clients buy yeoman produced spots for as little as $1000. He did make some valid points, however, and backed them up with facts like ‘Viewer produced spots on his new Current TV network are preferred by his viewers 90% of the time.’

Al Gore is just one of many voices lately who have said we’re in uncharted waters.

• Dan Wieden has no idea what’s coming in advertising, although to his credit he doesn’t think the sky is falling, he sees this as an exciting time and I admire, and choose to share his point-of-view.
• Bootb (yes, I thought it said Boob the first time I read it too. FAIL on the name) in the Netherlands is crowdsourcing the ad agency and turning everyone into a marketer (or so they think). This model had marketers of every stripe with their hackles up this past March at SxSWwith a lot of the wrath focused on Crowdspring by the likes of David Carson and others. Mostly around the sticky spec work issue.
• Accellteon says “Today’s marketing problems will be solved by people with diverse skill sets” and I have to agree with the opening statement of the press release–although I haven’t read the ebook they’re hawking yet.
• Scott Goodson of Strawberry Frog has said “Why not give clients the opportunity to put teams of cherry picked talent together to work on their business and generate the best ideas? If a client decides , “I don’ want an agency, just want that particular team, made up of top talent across these areas” why wouldn’t we agree to collaborate on shared business with shared reward?” 

None of this means the end of the ad agency but it certainly signals the end of the ad agency as we know it. The decline of traditional advertising is a reality that’s been with us for a while now–it didn’t just happen when Oprah got on Twitter.

So what does this all indicate? The rise of classes in marketing? I think, yes. The end of the industrial revolution of marketing as Gore said in the above article? Probably not.   So, what does this new marketing society look like? Dare I say, marketing social democracy! I’ll explore this in part 2.

Next week after the Memorial Day holiday, check out David J. Deal from Razorfish on the Ad Industry Innovator series.  The following week, Spike Jones from Brains on Fire.  Then Scott Goodson from Strawberry Frog…and more. 

It’s a jam packed line up.  So tune in and don’t miss a thing~

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New series from the client side coming up soon along with a chance to win an autographed copy of Guy Kawasaki’s new book Reality Check.

Until next week, have a safe and fun holiday.  Hope it’s sunny whever you are.  And for our international readers:  Happy Weekend of the 23rd of May!  What holidays do you have coming up?