Categories: Articles

Marketing Is About Extensions Not Adaptations

When does Digital Marketing get interesting?

There are two worlds when it comes to Digital Marketing:

World #1 = Adaptation. This is when the client already has a brand campaign that is headed to market and is looking for a digital component that falls in with every other piece of media. They are, in essence, looking for their brand campaign to be adapted to the digital channels.
World #2 = Extension. Some will call this "transmedia" but I tend to think of this as how the online channels can help extend and tell the brand story in a way that fits the media, instead of trying to make the media bend to the will of an existing advertising campaign. This is an original execution that, ultimately, fits in to a more cohesive brand narrative.

The true challenge?

Unfortunately, too many people in our industry confuse the words "advertising" with "marketing". It’s (somewhat) tragic when a great brand gets trapped in an advertising campaign and feels that the only way to make it work in the digital channels is to simply adapt it for the Web. Extensions are just so much more interesting. Think about it this way: you can adapt your 30-second spot for a banner ad or you can re-imagine your 30-second spot by taking the essence and thinking about what you can do with online video (don’t you find it tragic when a brand’s only online video content is their 30-second spots randomly posted to YouTube?).

It’s Thanksgiving. Let’s be thankful.

Instead of trying to cram an advertising campaign into something digital (or worse, something "social"), let’s be thankful. Don’t think of the Internet (or mobile or touch) as a media channel. Think of it as a publishing platform. You can put whatever you want into it (text, images, audio, video) and you can tell stories (short-form or long-form). You can connect, collaborate, share and deep dive. Marketing is challenged by Digital Marketing. For the most part, Marketers are (still) being dragged into it, kicking and screaming. It is (still) very foreign to them – especially those who have been running at the campaign level.

If it’s just a place to put a message…

We’re not only missing the point, but we’re not thinking about the future (the short-term future). We’re not only missing the point, but we’re not thinking about how we move marketing away from a (mostly) broadcasting mindset. We’re not only missing the point, but we’re not thinking about our consumers (how they’re connected, what they’re looking for and how to be a part of it). We’re not only missing the point, but we’re missing a huge, new and exciting opportunity.

Think extensions. Ask for permission to kill the adaptations… and just be thankful that we have the choices and options.

Mitch Joel

Mitch Joel lives at the intersection of technology, business transformation and consumer culture. He is the Executive Director of Next Era Institute, a strategic intelligence platform helping leaders understand the forces reshaping business, technology, culture and society. The Institute identifies which shifts matter, explores their wider significance and translates them into strategic direction and momentum. Mitch is also a globally recognized keynote speaker. He has delivered thousands of presentations across both B2B and B2C industries to organizations including Google, Walmart, LEGO, Shopify, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble and Unilever. Strategy Magazine has called him “one of North America’s leading visionaries.” Mitch built his career by working directly inside the waves of change that reshaped modern business. He founded and built a digital marketing agency that worked with some of the world’s largest brands and was later acquired by WPP, where he served as President of a firm operating in 25 countries with almost 3,000 employees. Mitch is the bestselling author of Six Pixels of Separation and CTRL ALT Delete, and the host of Thinking With Mitch Joel, one of the longest-running business podcasts in the world. His writing and commentary appear in outlets including Harvard Business Review, Fast Company and Inc. Magazine. He is a member of Dr. Marshall Goldsmith’s 100 Coaches and was named to the Thinkers50 Radar. Mitch also hosts Groove – The No Treble Podcast, documenting the oral history of electric bass players. Mitch is also Co-Founder of ThinkersOne, a platform that enables companies to bring personalized thought leadership from world-class experts into meetings, events and off-sites in focused 15-minute bursts.