Module 1 Bringing your brand into the modern era

Is your brand actually in the modern era?

That is the question. Are you bringing your brand, your business, your product and your service into the modern era from a marketing perspective?

Back in the day it was a couple of TV stations, a few newspapers, a few magazines and a bit of radio. The strategies were much simpler in those days and so were the communications. You would have long copy ads and we used to read them and take a bit more time over them.

The world has changed. Now we have a whole myriad of opportunities to place ads in front of people and communicate new benefits, almost too many. You think of the internet and it is an endless space in many respects, like the universe. You have got Facebook, you have got Twitter, you have got YouTube, with huge amounts of real estate available that is ever growing.

Why has video taken over from written communication?

Because people have become less patient and they would rather see than read. As a society we want quicker fixes and quicker answers. We do not take the time to find things out, we just want it now. We are all guilty of that. Fast food: do we want to cook? No, we want it delivered. Can we even be bothered to go out and pick it up? No, we use all kinds of apps to get it delivered. We are becoming increasingly lazy, which is a different conversation and a bit of a worry.

I have read many articles about the death of the long copy ad. There has been some great advertising done, but people do not really read. Before everybody says, well, I read, yes, books are different. In terms of communications, people are lazy. They do not really want to read, they want to see, and video has just boomed because of that.

People have not got the time. They are scrolling all the time, they want quick fixes and quick answers, they want it to be easy and they want to be able to see. The old saying is that a picture paints a thousand words. Well, what does a video do then? If I have to go and find out how to fix something through a user manual, it will probably implode my head, because I am more visual. If I can see it on a little video and stop and start it, it is much easier.

How much video are people actually watching?

There is an interesting stat on Forbes, the state of online video for 2020, so it is a little bit out of date now. That amazing figure is 3.7 hours a day that we spend on our mobile devices, much of that video.

I do believe that is probably true. In some countries it is probably far higher, in some it is less, and I think it depends on the age group and what they are doing.

What should you do with that as a business owner?

Do not think about it from your own business perspective, think about it from your customers'. You might feel very uncomfortable about doing video. You might think you have not got the budget, you might not want to go on camera, you might be thinking where do I start. This course will go through lots of tips on how to do that.

All I would say is that if your consumers and your clients are consuming that amount of video, and video accounts for huge amounts of the digital advertising market now, surely your brand needs to be there. Surely you need to put your face, your name, your company, your service and your product where your customers are.

Are your customers sat reading newspapers? They may be, but not like they were before. Are they listening to radio like they were? Perhaps not, because of things like Spotify and YouTube. Are they watching TV like they used to? Perhaps not. There are lots of stats out there and I would encourage you to research it yourself rather than taking my word for it, or other people's, like Forbes. Connected TVs are changing the way we consume media, and YouTube is used on connected TV massively. In fact it is bigger than Netflix in the States.

Does that mean abandoning traditional media?

No. I am not saying you do not use a mix of traditional and modern techniques within your marketing. What I am saying is that video surely has to be part of that strategy going forward.

If your customers are fundamentally in a different place to where you think they are, they are not going to see your message if you stick to the traditional methods.

The great thing about YouTube is that a lot of it is user generated content. It is a very authentic place to go, so you do not necessarily need to be producing what I would call Steven Spielberg video commercials. There is a whole way around that now and we will touch on it later in the course.

If your customers are watching video this much, you need to take your brand, your business and your services to it. Video fundamentally has to be an intrinsic part of your marketing going forwards. Over the course of this course you will see how to implement various strategies, tips and techniques, how to film things and how to get them done at reasonable cost. So yes, video is absolutely part of the modern brand marketer's toolbox.