The Blog

By way of an intro into the subject area covered by the Drinks and Digital Media Summit taking place next week, we thought it would good to answer a few teaser questions. Here goes from me then… WHAT DOES DIGITAL MEDIA MEAN TO YOUR COMPANY? It (they, really, but let’s call them it) is a great opportunity, and we are working really hard to fully understand how it can to harnessed to work for our clients – in terms of awareness, feedback and sales. It is undoubtedly an important addition to the communication armoury, and one that is already being built into every project and campaign. Digital media provides a new way for us to tell the stories that give brands equity, loyalty and difference. DOES DIGITAL MEDIA CHANGE THE RULES, OR IS IT JUST MORE OF THE SAME? There are a few reasons why digital media really does change the rules – immediacy, reach, richness of content, community and the democratisation of communications. It will influence all other media forms, but not necessarily devalue them – in fact, it may well work in harmony with, for example, print media to reinforce messaging. Of course, it is just one of the tools available to reach customers, clients, partners - and certainly the one that is currently least understood. One of the greatest challenges is the ‘noise’ that it creates – there’s so much to read, watch, see and hear. Blink, and it’s gone. Another challenge is to build in longevity. DO YOU THINK THAT SOCIAL MEDIA CAN BE USED TO PROMOTE DRINKS SENSIBLY? This is certainly an issue that has to be addressed from the start – especially with recent scare-stories of a blanket ban on alcohol advertising. Social Media is all about conversations. It’s about people connecting, interacting and sharing content. Provided the message is directed clearly to the right demographic from the off, encourages appreciation and tells a story that encourages community sharing, then I think it can be used to support drinks responsibly.. One can never expect to control social media, so it follows that whatever you introduce into it may not ‘stay in shape’. It’s rather like a glorified Chinese Whispers in that respect. Anyone that receives your communication is as entitled to comment on it as you were to post it. This makes for a challenging environment for marketers and PRs – especially when it comes to reputation management etc. – but also provides enormous opportunities to recruit influencers to your brand/cause. CAN DIGITAL MEDIA DIRECTLY LINK TO INCREASED SALES? Yes – just look at Stephen Fry’s book recommendation last week! One tweet from him about Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives increased sales by 6,000% in one day to take it from no.3,629 in the Amazon sales chart to no.2! Digital media per se has huge reach and relevance to a lot of people, so can undoubtedly have a massive impact on sales. Film trailers, music clips all work in this way. Unfortunately the sensations of taste and smell are not so easily communicated digitally – not yet, at least… The hot topic, of course, is how to leverage social media to affect sales – if it is indeed possible to leverage social media, since that implies you have a degree of control on it. You don’t. Most of the great successes are initiated by impartial people, and become a trend – like how Kickers became the footwear of choice amongst the US skateboarding community many years ago, way before digital media really existed. Others are sparked by a celebrity - like the book example above. Some come about by accident, or through pranks, such as the phenomenon of ‘rickrolling’ – http://bit.ly/eY0fl . The key question as a PR and marketer is this – how and when do you declare your hand, and potentially change your relationship with the communities you are looking to influence? I do believe that it can be done, but it takes a lot of time and effort. It is not a quick fix – it really does need engagement, not dabbling. TWITTER - FLASH IN THE PAN OR HERE TO STAY? It, or something like it, will now always exist. Quite how much it is used depends on how it feeds into other communications platforms. It’s great for sign-posting things of interest, and for building a sense of community, but it seems that the average user’s attention span is low (and getting lower) and there are frustrations it doesn’t allow you to say enough. Recent surveys suggest that 40% of tweets are pointless babble and almost two-thirds of Twitter users quit within a month of signing up. Other platforms are already rising to the twitter challenge – indeed, facebook introduced their @ mentions feature only yesterday - http://bit.ly/164KJC - in direct response and this will undoubtedly have an impact. This article sums it all up very well - http://bit.ly/3w6Tyn . The true power of the web is that it gives businesses the opportunity to talk directly to customers – the challenge is to work out how, and in what tone of voice.