The Future of Marketing

As the graduating class of 2020, we are the next generation ready to be released into the world, where we start fully making our own decisions. Although most of us have been partially independent consumers for at least a few years now, as we become adults these choices shift to become entirely our own. For this reason, we need to learn to be smart consumers, aware of what we are buying and why we are buying it, especially in this new era of seemingly ubiquitous advertising.


We all know that ads are everywhere. Social networks like Snapchat and Instagram rely partially on advertising to make a profit since a major contributor to their popularity is the fact that they are free to use. But there are also other opportunities in advertising, due to recent advances in technology, that marketers are picking up on.

When eleven members of the Forbes Agency Council (a professional community of successful marketers) were asked about what marketing strategies they believed would shape 2019, over half of them directly talked about or mentioned the growth of technology and its use in marketing. One discussed the potential of influencers and mentioned "influencer-tracking technologies," which sounds just like a digital version of a "coolhunter" as discussed in the documentary. Two also explored the ideas and possibilities concerning AI and more personalized marketing, while another brought up the idea of integrating social, online, and mobile marketing. Also similar to the "love mark" concept discussed in the documentary, one marketer declared that Brands that are more willing to interact with customers publicly will have a strong impact—and brands that can show how this engagement influences their products and services will make an even bigger impact.


Although each marketer approached and answered the question differently, the consensus was the same: connect with the consumers, though networks, interaction, and "brand stories" that make the consumer feel as if they are experiencing more than just simple advertising.

Because of these personalized strategies, it may become increasingly difficult for us as consumers to restrain ourselves from buying too much into advertisements. If they are geared specifically towards us as an individual, why shouldn't we want it? Marketers gear specific ads towards us with the knowledge that we will, at least to some degree, desire to buy their product, such as how sugary cereal commercials are aired during kids' television shows. While this may be true, we still need to understand the forces at play behind all the ads we are seeing and decide what is necessary and what is likely a mostly useless commodity as we start to face the world on our own with our endless options.

https://thesiliconreview.com/2019/06/how-do-social-media-apps-make-money

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2019/01/15/11-trends-that-will-shape-marketing-in-2019/#3d73091f36a6