Category: Communications

According to “The Evolution of Facebook for Brands,” 2009 was the year consumers ‘became a fan’ of brand pages, and by 2010, it was marketers who turned page posts into advertisements, not communicators. While marketers applied historical marketing tactics to this social network newly fit for businesses, communicators honed skills fit for the past.

Traditional journalism and communications consists of print media and broadcast journalism such as: newspapers, magazines, newsletters, brochures, television, and radio, to name a few. Once social media marketing grew in popularity, business leaders included its process into their company’s goals to help reach consumers and remain competitive. However, academia was and still is, slow to change.

The research article, “2015 Survey of Journalism and Mass Communication Enrollments: Challenges and Opportunities for a Changing and Diversifying Field,” reported that among college students, traditional journalism degrees were not particularly marketable.

As a result, the 2013 and 2015 surveys showed significant declines in enrollment on college and university campuses. The number of undergraduate students in journalism (undifferentiated) decreased by 16.3 percent, news editorial and print journalism decreased by 13.9 percent, and broadcast news and broadcast journalism decreased by 6.7 percent.

In the article, “New MJ-school curriculum aims to prepare students for new job market,”

Charlie Tuggle, senior associate dean of the School of Media and Journalism at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, was interviewed.

He observed: “Looking at where the industry is and where it’s heading, you no longer have a very defined, ‘I’m a still photographer,’ or ‘I’m a page designer.’ That just doesn’t work anymore.”

In late 2017, his school announced a new curriculum structure that combined eight concentrations into two areas of study: Journalism, and Advertising and Public Relations. Business Journalism was created as a special third area.

Laura Ruel, incoming director of journalism, said the new curriculum will enable future students to be fit for a multitude of opportunities in the job market.

She pointed out, “The jobs are all changing. Our students are going to embrace this change by coming out being able to use these new technologies and new skills to do news and tell stories.”

Collectively, Dorothy Bland, Monica Herk, and Mark Stencel & Kim Perry confirmed the job market’s current state and would all agree with Ruel. They described that “industry professionals have expressed interest in hiring individuals who have skills such as HTML coding, data analytics, digital design, new media literacy, visual storytelling, real-world problem solving, entrepreneurship, and diversity and cultural awareness.”¹

These skills are the minimum requirements for communicators. Without them, new graduates and even behind-the-curve professionals may have a difficult time landing a job.

To become more employable, students entering J-School programs should take courses that will deepen their knowledge in several areas.

Caroline McMillan, business reporter for The Charlotte Observer, and Jennifer Best, journalist & author, were asked what advice they’d give someone breaking into the field. In the article, “How to Break into Journalism,” they acknowledged in their own way that students should be omniscient:

McMillan said, “When it comes to experience, it’s not good enough to have a couple of internships. You also need a portfolio of stories from those internships, clips from a school publication, online experience, a strong social media presence, and a handful of people — preferably in the journalism field — who can vouch for your skill set and professionalism.”

Best stated, “Learn the cutting-edge technology. Be ready to program. Be ready to design and manipulate websites, applications, and other outlet software. … A reporter who can research and write stories, shoot photos, format stories for the internet, and manipulate web pages or applications will be more marketable than a simple reporter.”

This advice is useful for current industry professionals as well. To stay current, they can take in-person and online courses, attend conferences, earn certifications, and read, read, read.

But what about journalist and communicators against analyzing data and measuring work?

Unfortunately for them, the job landscape has changed drastically since consumers ‘became a fan’ of brand pages, and it will continue to evolve. As companies better understand the value of marketing communications (MarCom) teams and the need for integrated marketing communications (IMC), the more they’ll expect communicators to know marketing practices.

Nevertheless, because J-School degree holders are formally trained, they have an opportunity to stand on their journalism and communications foundation and apply their practices in a new way. Communicators must become dually disciplined and hone skills fit for the present and of course for the future.

All businesses have goals to reach, and like any other department, the intent of marketing communications (MarCom) is to support the overall business initiatives. MarCom should be allowed to help move the company closer to success. So, executives, when your MarCom leader has ideas to help the company accomplish its goals, leave the past behind and listen with your company’s future in mind.

According to research reported in the article, “State of Integrated Marketing 2017: Mapping the Journey to Success,” marketers’ top priority is to create a unified cross-channel customer experience, i.e., Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC). The American Marketing Association defines IMC as a planning process designed to assure that all brand contacts received by a customer or prospect for a product, service, or organization are relevant to that person and consistent over time.

With that definition in mind and the statement McGraw-Hill Irwin makes in the book “Marketing,” — “Good marketing is not a random activity; it requires thoughtful planning” —  it’s evident that thoughtful planning is essential to effective marketing outcomes.

An executive once told me that she and her peers are more concerned about the bottom line as opposed to social media and websites. In the same vein (and within the same company), the CEO shared reasons why he does not use paid advertisements. In his opinion, marketing is advertisements and it does not provide an ROI for his core business.

Unfortunately, both executives did not realize MarCom is not detached from business growth and its bottom line, but instead, they’re closely linked.

I would echo David Meerman Scott from his book, “The New Rules of Marketing and PR.” He says this way of thinking is not true anymore and people must transform their marketing. Scott would consider both executives’ perspectives to be old rules of marketing, such as:

• • Marketing simply meant advertising (and branding).

• • • Advertising needed to appeal to the masses.
  • • Advertising was one-way: company to consumer.
  • Advertising and Public Relations were separate disciplines run by different people with separate goals, strategies, and measurement criteria.

Consequently, if Integrated Marketing Communications was better understood, it would be a top priority for more than just marketers. If executives grasped this concept and began incorporating IMC into their company’s overall organizational philosophy, they would notice that it encompasses all industries. IMC can help grab consumers’ attention, produce a favorable response, and impact a company’s bottom line.

These planning processes help companies move away from antiquated, one-size fits all marketing ideology toward a successful business. One that provides a seamless experience for individual consumers across touchpoints. Companies thrive when executives support thoughtful planning and understand and use new rules of marketing, such as:

• • Marketing is more than just advertising.

• • You are what you publish.

• • • People want authenticity, no spin.
  • • Marketers (and executive leaders) must shift their thinking from mainstream marketing to the masses to a strategy of reaching vast numbers of underserved audience via the web.
  • Blogs, online video, e-books, news releases, and other forms of online content let organizations communicate directly with buyers (or audiences) in a form they appreciate.

Executives are more willing to give their buy-in when they know why the following is important:

• • Understand individual consumers

• • • Incorporate digital tactics
  • • Consistent messaging
  • Deploy an IMC philosophy cross-functionally

Individual consumers

It is an important part of the planning process to do primary and secondary research on your consumers to fully understand who they are, where they are, and what their needs or wants are.

Consumers don’t always follow a linear purchase or selection process. Instead, a large majority read reviews, get the opinions of others, visit websites, or browse social media pages. The goal of IMC is to guide them along by providing a customer experience at each touchpoint. Therefore knowing who you’re guiding and which touchpoint to use, helps the consumer and the company.

“The better marketers (and executives) understand the buying (or selection process), the more effectively they can harness great marketing and advanced data and technology to steer consumers toward a desired decision through personalized relevant interactions.”

– State of Integrated Marketing 2017: Mapping the Journey to Success

Digital Tactics

Meet your consumers where they are by including digital tactics into the customer experience. Pew Research Center reports that across a wide range of demographic groups, a ratio of 7-to-10 Americans use social media and 9-to-10 American adults use the Internet.

By having multiple touchpoints, such as advertisements, blog posts, direct mail, e-newsletters, podcasts, ratings and reviews, social media, testimonials, videos, a website, etc. your consumer can choose how they interact with your brand, shifting from the outdated, one-way communication approach to a two-way conversation.

Adding digital components to your marketing mix allows your company to easily record data and outcomes, and in some cases, receive real-time results. Digital tactics help the consumer become comfortable with your brand and helps the company save money, but it also pushes your company into the well-established digital age making your business competitive.

Message Consistency

Your marketing message must be consistent and carefully linked across all touchpoints. Consumers trust brands with consistent messaging. Trust reduces anxiety. With less anxiety, comfort rises. And once a consumer is comfortable with your brand, the likelihood they’ll buy, subscribe, or choose you, increases. This is critical to building a long-term relationship with that individual consumer.

Cross-functional IMC philosophy

The organizational structure must be just as integrated as marketing communications. MarCom departments typically work with several company leaders, so it’s important that everyone is moving toward the same goal. The “State of Integrated Marketing: Mapping the Journey to Success” reported two variables that stand in the way of achieving integrated marketing success: lack of collaboration across teams and a lack of unified measures of success.

The survey conducted in the article showed that shared performance goals and collaboration are highly correlated with integrated marketing success. Executives can make IMC a priority by adopting it into the organizational philosophy, which eliminates silos because teams will work cross functionally to achieve their shared goals.

Through the years, I’ve heard interesting comments from executives:

“You can’t make people learn new things.”

“I don’t need to attend conferences or training courses.”

“Ten years ago, I did a paid media marketing experiment that didn’t provide an ROI. Which is why I don’t believe in advertisements.”

If these executives were MarCom leaders’ only avenue to information, one may think the need to stay up to day dissipates after a certain level of success is reached.

However, it’s the complete opposite. Once a person reaches executive status, they may have more direct reports, making them increasingly responsible for their subordinates. They also are more responsible for the company’s success and should update their knowledge as the business landscape shifts.

If business leaders refuse to learn new information, the least they can do is listen to their direct reports. Often, executives value the knowledge and opinions of only those who hold comparable titles, not realizing it may be just as obsolete as their own.

Is your perspective outdated?

Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash