Author: Mark

The job of branded goods and companies is about to get much harder, says Sandra Burger, Business Unit Manager at The MediaShop

Smart assistants or rather AI (Artificial Intelligence), much like butlers or assistants of an era gone by, will require companies to transform their strategies by no longer selling to their previous direct customers and consumers anymore, but rather to preferred artificial intelligence platforms.

Human needs are satisfied repeatedly while being guided through complex buying decisions:

Customers are no longer humans (only) – AI platforms are now the trusted advisers to human consumers. These “new buyers” and “influencers” are deemed much more influential than their masters (consumers or end-users) when it comes to routine purchases. These AI platforms will anticipate what is needed, select a relevant brand and execute the transaction, long before their humans realise that they actually need the product. AI has such a large intelligence capacity in executing the selection process that brands will be selected on their masters’ anticipated needs base.

Brands will therefore have to transform and shift their focus to impress AI platforms and compete to be regarded as higher-ranking brands than their competitors, or to even be considered as a selectable brand for demanding AI platforms.

AI’s are the new gatekeepers, controlling brands’ customers that could make or break them much quicker than humans could through word-of-mouth. It is all about the distinctive algorithms at play, and brand recognition will no longer be relevant in product selection.

How can brands adapt and be recognised by the new intelligentsia?

• Companies and marketers will have to invest aggressively in understanding the algorithm platforms used to recommend and choose their brands, including bespoke weighting for each customer. Algorithms will consider aspects such as: is brand recognition more important than price (eg. BMW), or are brand names less relevant (eg. for floor cleaners)?
• Are the direct ties with consumers still relevant for brand building? Well, yes and no. Yes, should we wish to be promoting brand awareness and loyalty of products in the “smart and connected consumer electronics” categories, or when we wish to collect data from consumers. No, if we are promoting a brand which is less reliant on AI platform intelligence for selection.
• The bulk of retail sales globally, are still brick and mortar stores and brands might still be influential for the near future. However, as online buying increases, brands will have to regularly evaluate just how important physical retail channels are to them and adjust their strategy accordingly.

Tips to marketers in marketing on AI platforms:

There are three questions that need to be answered:

1. Is the platform working for us?

• Select the right platforms for your brands. There is currently a flurry to launch on many platforms, but in reality, only a handful of general purchase platforms will survive: mainly those where the customer’s needs are best met and have the best combined sales and service centre.
• As marketers and advertisers, we can ensure that customers/ the target market use the platforms for the algorithms to better understand the users better.

2. What do we want from the platform?

• We will have to build platform relationships rather than customer relationships. The current efforts to create and sustain omni-channel customer experience by marketers will in all likelihood fade away as the platforms are to become all-in-one fulfilment centres within themselves, providing powerful marketing mediums, sales and distribution.
• Branded products will most probably find themselves in weaker positions when these functions are concentrated within a few platforms. That in turn will supply AI owners with enormous cloud influencing price, promotions and the consumer relationship.
• We will have to trust our successes, which are currently being unified on customer interest, like signalling brand quality, and winning customer loyalty, to an allegiance with trusted AI assistants, who will in all likelihood be much more qualified to predict and interpret our customers’ needs.
• Focus on the single channel – THE PLATFORM/S – rather than multi ATL, TTL and BTL channels.
• The ability for humans to remember details are quite fallible and we know that people have biases toward things, but computer’s ‘brains’ can remember and interpret the finest details forever. These could range from product pricing, characteristics, past performance and authenticated reviews and past customer behaviour.

3. How can we make sure the platform chooses us?

• We might have to negotiate, and possibly pay platform owners to be able to understand and influence the algorithms applied by the platforms for customised purchasing criteria (and having access to our own customers in the end).
• There might even be an option to “list” on the platforms, much as brands are now paying for shelf space in brick and mortar retail stores.
• Similar to Google’s Adwords bidding, the bidding future on AI platforms would also possibly lead to brands paying extra for preferential positions. In addition, whilst there are brands opposed to this ability, there will always be brands willing to pay to have an advantage over their competitors. In fact, this might just become a major source of revenue for the platforms.
• We as media agents/strategists/buyers will have to recognise the fact that we will have to market through these platforms.
• AI platforms will most likely outperform us in terms of accountability, when it comes to linking consumer behaviour with our media selection/interventions.
• We will have to brace ourselves with the vast amounts of the detailed traditional market and media research we will be able to receive or buy from the platforms. On the positive side, it will be customers’ actual behaviour, instead of information at an assumed behaviour level.
• Imagine a world where reliable customer satisfaction and granular behaviour data are readily and speedily available from AI platforms, rather than the limited (and sometimes biased) information from customers we have access to currently through questionnaires, telephone polling, etc.
• Brands will have to sharpen their positioning in the marketplace in ways that platforms will recognise and register them as a brand of interest.
• Platforms will know how to adapt customers’ requirements and the exceptions they are willing to take in different contexts, whilst algorithms will be sorting, predicting and executing combinations to satisfy customers at a specific moment in time when it is most relevant to that particular individual and not necessarily mass consumers anymore.

In conclusion: The future has changed and if we have not caught up to that fact, AI is most likely to take over our functions. We will have to brace ourselves to be future thinking in this fast changing world we live in.

Hello AI, my new bestie!

Isla Prentis, Business Unit Manager at The MediaShop says that Big Data was pegged as a trend at the beginning of this year. For the sixth year in row. Something’s wrong with this picture.

“Understanding is deeper than knowledge. There are many people who know you but very few understand you.” I came across this anonymous quote recently and could not stop thinking about it. Why? Because it helped me to define the gaps that I believe we’re facing in the marketing industry at the moment.

It amazes me that big data was listed as one of the big upcoming trends at the beginning of 2018 – for the sixth year in a row. How can it still be a trend six years later? And if it’s been around so long now, why is it still a massive gap in so much of our industry?

Big data is not unique to the marketing industry, nor is it likely to go anywhere. I typed “big data” in the news tab of Google and received >651 million results. There isn’t an industry that isn’t talking about transformation driven by big data. I don’t question that it’s here to stay but I do question if we’re using it to add value in our industry.

Marketing and advertising businesses collect data, a phenomenal amount of data! But do we use it, I mean really use this data? More importantly, do we understand it? I personally love technology and automation because it allows machines to collect and process masses of information really quickly. By embracing automation, we make a shift from data to the insight.

Have we lost understanding in our search for big data? On that note, let me clarify that I am not against big data – in fact it is just the opposite.

With my curious mind, I’m always looking to gain new knowledge, and more importantly, new understanding, and big data helps us do this. But this alone is not enough, big data is a starting point not the end point. It helps us arrive at knowledge. Looking up and immersing ourselves into communities around us will help to move that knowledge to a new level of understanding.

Data helps us to predict patterns in consumer behaviour but it does not help us to understand what drives the behaviour. It is essential that we understand these patterns to ensure that communication happens in the right context, and it is equally important that we understand what drives the behaviour so that we can find a connection with our audience.

And if you’re anything like me, right now you’re asking why? Well, we don’t need to read another article to know that consumers are no longer passive audiences, or that brands no longer have the control. We also know that we need consumers to notice us in the relevant moment. By understanding predictable patterns, we can make sure we place communication in the most relevant places, and in the most relevant times.

But what good is a message at the right time or the right place if the consumer doesn’t notice it? That’s where the second challenge comes in – how do we connect with our consumer if we don’t understand them? If the consumer is in the driving seat, we have to make sure we get them to stop and look up. We need to understand what drives consumers both consciously and sub-consciously if we want to stand a chance of influencing their behaviour.

We need to immerse ourselves in consumer behaviour in order to gain true understanding. We need to let go of assumptions and stereotypes and start to observe the different communities around us. Like-mindedness is not created by the demographics that we happen to fall in but rather by a number of factors that we input – our culture, our interests, our attitudes to name just a few. These connections divide us into different communities, or micro-communities, and using this understanding in communication will create the connection needed to make your consumer stop and look up.

So let’s encourage big data – but make sure that it doesn’t get collected and then sit gathering dust. Analyse, interpret and apply it – it has to add value to everything that we do. But we shouldn’t stop there, we need to look up and start to understand the people behind the target audience definition, understand the communities that form around like-mindedness, understand cultural similarities and differences, and become experts in human behaviour.

And so I come back to the quote that I opened with – if you want to make an impact, make sure that you are one of those few that really understand the consumer. “Understanding is deeper than knowledge. There are many people who know you but very few understand you.”

At this year’s tenth anniversary of The MOST Awards, The MediaShop was crowned the inaugural Media Agency of the Decade, Full Service Media Agency of the Year and Overall Media Agency of the Year.

 “The MediaShop’s 30^th birthday year is turning out to be pretty incredible, this is really the perfect icing on the cake of what is proving to be a remarkable 2018,” says Kgaugelo Maphai, Managing Director of The MediaShop Johannesburg.

“Winning Media Agency of the Decade is absolutely incredible and testament to the continuous innovative nature of every team member. We understand that to stay relevant we need to constantly adapt, and we have some very exciting developments on the cards along this vein which we’ll announce soon.”

These awards are hot on the heels of The MediaShop being awarded a Gold Loerie for Nando’s #rightmyname campaign in the Media Innovation category.

“On behalf of the Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban management teams we’d like to extend our thanks to every staff member who lives our pioneering ethos every day, our clients and media owner partners that have been with us every step of this incredible journey.”

For more on The MediaShop visit www.mediashop.co.za, like them on Facebook: The MediaShop, follow them on Twitter @MediaShopZA or LinkedIn.