Dennis Norman Musings

By: Dennis Norman

The methods by which you market your business or profession has certainly changed.  Old, “traditional”, media is not working like it once did.

So whats happening??  Has everyone stopped watching commercials and reading the voluminous junk mail we receive? 

The answer is yes, and sometimes, no….   So what in the world am I talking about?  Let me explain: Up until a couple of years ago “interuption advertising” was “the” way in which companies delivered information on their products and services to the consumer.  We as consumers were “interuppted” by television and radio commercials as well as display ads in newspapers and magazines we read.

The way this advertising worked, and, in fact very well for years, thank you, was by “interuppting” what we, the consumer was doing; whether it be watching a sitcom on TV, the news on TV, listening to music on the radio or reading an article in the newspaper or in a magazine and then delivering a message to us about the advertisers product or service.

At this point you may be saying, “yeah, that’s what we (I) do, and we have been doing it for ages, so what’s wrong with that?

In that statement lies the clue to the answer….this is what you have been “doing for ages”……we all get caught in a rut at times, doing something just because “we have always done it” or “it has always worked’…Well, I’m here to tell you, that doesn’t work anymore.

Today, largley due to the internet, information seems to travels at the speed of light…News and other information that, in times past, were either not available to the general public or took great effort to obtain, is now available at the fingertips of a 5 year old.  I am constantly amazed at how easily and quickly I can obtain answers to almost any question or information on almost any product  by simply “googling” it.

So what does all this mean?  I think it means that the consumer is no longer a “captive audience” or, if you will, “prisoners” to traditional media.  There is  no longer a need to set through a commercial on network television.  There are choices; they can watch one of a few hundred channels available on cable, satellite or on the Internet…they can use technologically advanced devices such as TIVO to record programs without commercials.  Commercial-free radio is available via satellite or Internet as well.

News, once only available on network television or newspapers at times they “released it” to us, is now available 24/7 when it happens via the internet.

The bottom line is things have changed…are changing and will continue to change when it comes to marketing to the consumer.

Today, consumers, do not want to, nor will they tolerate, being “interupted” by advertisers….those days are gone.  Today, when they want information on a product or a service they will, more times than not, go to the Internet for it.  They want the information at the time and place we are looking for it. 

So what about traditonal media, the televisoin stations, radio stations, newspapers and magazines?  How do they fit into all this? 

Good question….I don’t think it comes as any surprise that the companies that own the newspapers, television and radio stations around the country  all appear to be struggling to survive.  Unfortunately traditional media is much like the dinosaurs that once “ruled’ the earth…they had their day when they were king but their time has come and gone, just like the dinosaurs in my opinion.