After an information-packed day at the Ad Age Digital Conference in NYC, we were excited to see what Day two would bring – and it did not disappoint. The highly energetic Gary Vaynerchuk, Co-Founder and CEO of Vayner Media and a New York Times Best-selling author, is extremely passionate about marketing. If you follow him on Twitter you’ll quickly note that he is responsive. So much so that Business Insider 
recently wrote an article about how he delivers great service to his followers. Vaynerchuk emphasized that agencies need to market in the year we live in. He went on to talk about how absurd the pricing models are for traditional media options when most people try to avoid being marketed to, i.e. fast forwarding through commercials or buying commercial free services through satellite TV and radio models. “It’s great to have 55 million impressions but not if everyone hates you for it,” said Vaynerchuk, further noted when speaking about how poorly digital campaigns are executed. He went on to note that consumers value time and the easiest way to go about business is to be romantic in the way you do it. Stop doing what we’ve always done just because you are comfortable there. In essence, as marketers and business owners we need to really note where everyone is spending their time and join the conversation there. He finished with, “we are all battling for attention and in 2014, if you are not understanding the speed at which the consumer is moving and the shift of where the eyes and ears are, you’ll be left behind.”
The general consensus of all the presenters was that marketers can no longer have a digital budget and call what we do digital marketing-it’s just marketing. It’s mainstream and where we live now. Most believed that eventually most television is going to get pushed to live programing because of the commercial value and the need to stop people from fast forwarding.
Mike Hopkins, the CEO of Hulu, noted that the concentration of viewers is changing from the old models of television. Of the Adults 18 through 49 years, below is the composition:
Broadcast 32%
Cable Nets 40%
PC Video 52%
Hulu plus audience: 82% average age of Hulu audience is 37
Noting the Emmy awards as the barometer of measurement for television shows, in 1991 there were zero major Emmy nominations from cable networks and 113 for broadcast networks. Comparatively in 2013, there were 102 nominations for Cable networks and only 60 for broadcast. Further, Hopkins noted that in 2002 the #1 scripted show was Friends and the average age of the viewer was 37. Comparing to 2014 in which the #1 scripted show is The Big Bang theory with an average audience viewer being over 50.
In the end, as marketers, our jobs are ever-changing and we must adapt to the needs and demands of the consumer or we, and the businesses we help, will be left behind. Digital marketing must now be an integral part of each company’s overall marketing plan and budget. And we can say goodbye to the boring ads of the past; today’s consumer wants to be visually coerced into paying attention.
Wondering where else this marketing industry and its various platforms are heading in the future? Check out our next blog where we discuss Scott Galloway of NYU and L2ThinkTank’s predictions and how it will impact our jobs as marketers.
Having trouble navigating the digital world? Bellagurl is eastern North Carolina’s premier full-service ad agency that specializes in both traditional and digital media. Say hello and see how Bellagurl can make marketing that matters for your business.
