Much discussion between a broad range of marketers and agencies interested in digital took place this week at the iMedia Brand Summit.
Several conclusions were drawn:
- There are some extremely smart people around.
- There are some really excellent digital tools and platforms ready to be used now.
- There's zero common understanding about how best to deploy them.
One or two of the notable dissenting voices were Heidrick & Struggles' Steve Stine, who called for less emphasis on directly measurable ROI and more on the ancient craft of storytelling, while your correspondent flew the flag for a content-led approach, particularly in social media where the rules are radically different.
In a roundtable session on engaging social media, Yahoo's Ken Mandel referenced the Cluetrain Manifesto, now an amazing 10 years old. Markets are conversations more than ever before. Until brands and corporates truly comprehend this, they'll continue to barge into conversations and bring the whole thing down.
Scalability was also questioned, yet surely scalability in social media is only possible via word of mouth. It's not sufficient to engage customers via social media - we must engage those customers to the extent that we get them talking to each other.
