A recent national Yankolovich study concludes that the future will be less global and more local. It will hinge more on personal responsibility in how we treat each other and the planet (among other things). It will be built around consequences, meaning that we will ultimately think more about the consequences of our actions and decisions before doing them – what we buy, relationships, living situations, job choices, etc. Of course, the age of old school branding and marketing are long past dead. What we now call social media and networking is the new social DNA of anyone with a mobile device and the power to recharge it. Whether you call it Posterous, Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Ning, LinkedIn, Tumblr or whatever, people will do their connecting, relating, complaining and all the other ing’s using some form of digital network delivered through a screen the size of our palms.
Few people respond to what a company says anymore. They respond to their friends and family. And why not? Look at corporate messages foisted on the public leading up to and through the economic downturn. It seems the more truth people want, the less they get. It is a self-fullfilling Nostadamus-ian prophesy. Obfuscate the truth; talk genuinely and act disingenuously; say one thing and do another. It only takes a tweet for a brand to get outed in this digital environment. You may fool all of the people some of the time (balloon boy, Enron, investment companies), you may fool some of the people all of the time (political leaders and religious zealots), but you will not fool all of the people all of the time. People like you and me break almost every news story on Twitter or other sites long before any official news source. We are all Wolf Blitzers.
How will you get your message out when the only listening that happens is between people who know each other and don’t trust you or the way you choose to communicate? Alex Bogusky and John Winsor (in their book, Baked In) suggest we will have to make our products carry the branding – bake it into the product itself. Some do it. Some think they are doing it. Many don’t and don’t care. Others would like to, but are just dumbfounded by this new world where the top speed is 500 mph and they are only comfortable cruising at 55.
Even though most Fortune 100 companies are on Twitter (73, to be exact, up from 54 in August), few of those companies use it in any meaningful way to engage people. And the only meaningful way is determined by your followers.
Web development companies are working on assignments from businesses that want to compete in a landscape gone digital. But those businesses are rooted in analog management, and the two grate against each other like mp3′s assaulting CD’s. It is old school thinking butting up against shifting reality. We use quaint references that Millennials see as a foreign language. We don’t even relate to past sacred institutions anymore. Church membership is down, while personal belief is up. Fewer people are getting married, yet just as many are falling in love. Employer loyalty (diminished by layoffs) is a wistful memory and has been for years. Why? Perhaps people feel that these institutions (and others) betrayed them. There is no lack of affirmative evidence.
We are all going to be doing more with less, considering value more, becoming more self sufficient and less trusting of what anyone says except our trusted network. In many respects, those are behaviors our grandparents would recognize. Some things change and others repeat. We will change, whether we like it or not. From walking to horses to wagons to cars to ships to planes, from oral storytelling to print to broadcast to the Web, from fire to ovens to microwaves, we have adjusted to every move forward. That is what people do.
What are you doing?