Comments on: lovemarks, part deux

By: Richard Stacy

Richard Stacy — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 00:24:05 +0000

As a PR (incidentally within the Publicis Groupe of which Saatchi is a part) I would have to say that the answer to Paul’s point is that most PR companies are not yet geared-up to handle inbound — although the smarter ones are trying to at least get their heads around monitoring the conversation.
The big issue though is that the clients that pay them are even further away from working out how to manage “in-reach” as distinct from “out-reach”.
Most — along with the media agencies they use — are locked into the mindset of seeing social media as just new niche channels to push messages down, rather than recognising that consumers will use the tools of social media to find them — and they need to prepare themselves accordingly.
My own belief is that the marketing departments of the future will have to become conversation departments — staffed by much larger teams of people than they currently employ. They will use the money they used to spend on paid-for media to fund this.

By: Paul Fabretti

Paul Fabretti — Thu, 04 Jan 2007 22:24:20 +0000

Good point Tim, although what I will find interesting to see is how the traditional PR agencies (sending largely outbound communication) can respond to the two-way methods that are required nowadays.
From a practical point of view, it is easy to send a journo an article for publication but how do the same agencies then handle the inbound messages?
Are they geared up both technically and personnel-wide to handle the time required to manage and monitor the web-based responses?

By: Tim Benjamin

Tim Benjamin — Thu, 04 Jan 2007 18:19:45 +0000

Hi Hugh,
As a former Saatchi copywriter myself, I agree with Kevin’s view that the individual must buy into a product at an emotional level if that product is to avoid commodification.
David Ogilvy made the same point 50 years ago.
However, given that few ads hit the right emotional buttons whilst remaining memorable, methinks traditional agencies will struggle to convince their clients to keep spending on expensive ad campaigns when those clients can enjoy better ROI by engaging in conversations with the people who use their products.
My hunch is that amongst traditional agency structures, PR companies will probably do best in the new world order because their business model is based on engaging in dialogue rather than merely banging people over the head with dull pieces of one-way communication.
Tim