Here are four key trends that will play out across the next five years – each with implications for brand strategy and communications programmes.
1. Hyper-connected devices
Devices will connect and communicate at increasing speeds. Connected media devices are constantly emerging, and they represent a wider spread of apparatus than the mobile telephone and tablet computer: internet-enabled fridges, interactive billboards, televisions, surface computers, vending machines, personal media devices, cars and even buildings are already talking to us via mobile devices and the internet. In the not-too-distant future, they will be talking to each other as well, and talking fast. Hardware will be hyper-connected.
This area is developing fast. Seven major mobile operators from around the world recently agreed to work together to develop an international 'machine-to-machine' platform that would help devices talk to each other.
Implications for brand strategy
Creating useful device connections can help brands build 'love'. However, there are myriad ways to make the most of this insight. From a creative perspective, ideas like the Project Re:Brief 'Coke Vending Machine' is very interesting. It is a connected media reinterpretation of Coke's iconic 'Hilltop' spot, featuring the song 'I'd like to buy the world a Coke'. The mobile ad enables viewers actually to buy a Coke for someone in a city of their choice. As they watch the mobile ad, which ran on Google's Admob network, users could pick a city to send the Coke to, attach a text message and press a button that dispenses a drink at specially designed vending machines in that city. The viewer can even watch as their Coke is delivered to the recipient. But could ideas such as this also deliver ROI beyond brand equity? There may be business solutions, such as creating operational efficiencies or cutting cost leakages, that will emerge from future brand ideas for connected devices.
A recent example of this embryonic practice would be Red Tomato Pizza's (Cannes Lions Winning) VIP Fridge Magnet from Dubai.
In this case, a small pizzeria chain boosted sales by handing out a fridge magnet that acted as an 'emergency call' button. When pushed, it used Bluetooth to connect with the pusher's mobile phone and set up an order for their favourite pizza.
How can brands respond? Brands should think about which things connect together and why. Which things are already connected today? There will be opportunities to run campaigns through connected devices that do not belong to the brand, as well as from a brand's own packaging or in-store media property.
Take interactive tables in retail, for example. What story could we tell as a consumer places their mobile on the table and it connects in real time? What should happen next? The creative format would be made up of multiple elements: the table surface/computer screen, the connected device, the retail environment, and a few other sensors such as the mobile's camera or sound from the speaker. There is a lot to play with. What would an advertisement look like across these devices? If a brand is a service, could it have a new digital personality once it is connected?
2. Hyper-connected applications
Mobile and web applications, and the personal and public profile information within them, will also be hyper-connected. That means information like social profiles, real-time media habits and purchase preferences: Facebook, Zeebox and Red Lazer profiles, for example. Coupled with connected devices, these connected profiles will have a significant impact on the way we do everyday things like shopping, travelling and consuming media and entertainment.
The way that people consume media is also changing. Connected television viewing, dual screening with mobile, and m-commerce are examples. The socialisation of TV is already in full swing (see www.zeebox.com).
Imagine for a moment that in five years' time you are watching a Bond film on an internet TV. It is connected to various devices and personal and commercial profiles. These profiles act as our spam filters. They do not allow irrelevant or unwanted messages to reach us, but they are open to new messages from brands which are relevant for that given place or time. Bond movies are famous for their product placement, which is great if you are in the market for an Aston Martin DB7, but most people are not. In the future there will be more product placement in the film, but we might see less. Only when Bond uses a product or service that is hyper-relevant to our profile, will the mobile buzz with an opportunity to have it delivered.
Implications for brand strategy
At first glance it looks like the hyper-connection of profile information will create a world where our mobiles buzz all the time and hassle us to buy too many things. On closer inspection, however, we might see something a bit different. The meshing of profile data with connected devices and digital objects through trusted infrastructures (Google, for example) should act as a filter through which irrelevant material will be blocked. This raises some challenges for brands, in that the audience will be in control of their 'filter', and brands will need to prove they are relevant. In theory, it will be much harder to reach the audience. But the filter will allow full access for trusted brands with relevant messages. In a culture of hyper-connectivity there will be no room for spam but lots of room, even preference for, relevant and contextual brand engagements. Can marketing thus become a service rather than an irritating interruption?
There is, unfortunately, the possibility this could lead to negative consequences. An insight into how is provided in Filter Bubble by Eli Pariser. The argument is that technology that filters out what it sees as irrelevant material can mean individuals are sheltered from viewpoints that challenge their ideas or preferences, narrowing their outlook.
3. The Mobile Hub
In a world where hardware and software are hyper-connected, it follows that the mobile phone will evolve into a digital hub. We will see more mobile 'phones' connected to other devices as we move around – train ticket barriers, bus stops, parking meters, EPoS systems, televisions, magazines, points-of-sale, packaging, outdoor billboards, fridges, stereos, heating and lighting systems, and cars.
It's apparent that a mobile will act as a wallet or train ticket, but what about as a receptacle for connected media distribution? One example might be when we pick up a free movie on our mobile from a digital billboard. People will get used to 'picking things up' from locations, using their mobile device.
Implications for brand strategy
We should think about a future where our communications properties (including packaging and in-store media) become the origins for connected media engagements. Think of them as stations from which the brand can broadcast digital experiences. If a consumer connects their device to a press ad – or if they dual-screen with an advert on TV – what should a brand do next? What would the brand's connected personality do? If the consumer then goes in-store, should they be able to get out their digital hub and pick up something really special in the aisle, because of the previous interaction?
4. The Mobile-Directed Experience
The connected media audience will have more power and control than traditional media audiences. Within five years, we will see audiences that are used to manually controlling their experiences.
A recent example of this in action is the 360-degree gyroscope-driven brand experience created by XS2 for Dutch railway operator NS in The Netherlands. The mobile app allowed consumers to take a virtual tour around the Royal Waiting Rooms in the railway stations of Amsterdam and The Hague, using the phone to control their journey.
Further to this, audiences will be able to use the mobile device (as a digital hub) to direct the flow of media. They will be able to send media to other devices instantly. The mobile has already become the ultimate remote control. A top-of-the-range Mercedes-Benz comes with a mobile app to control the ignition, windows and all sorts of other functions.
The A-class, Mercedes' entry-level model, has Apple's Siri software integrated into its on-board controls for voice control via iPhone. In some cars it is already possible to pick up a video on a mobile phone and play it on the dashboard. In a future of connected media we might be able to pick up a video guide for making sushi from the fish counter at the supermarket, then take it home and 'fling' it to the screen in the kitchen with a swish of the hand. Another example might be picking up a free CD track from a petrol station then playing it in the car on the way home.
Implications for brand strategy
The emphasis will shift from 'push' to 'pull' media and communications. Brands will reap more rewards by organising their assets into a usable suite of digital units (apps, connected media programs, connected services, etc.), then inviting the audience to engage with them through traditional media and mobile. And when people do engage, brands should be ready to give them something entertaining or useful as a result, and allow them to take it away and use elsewhere.
Conclusion: A new creative landscape
Marketers are still in the business of human understanding – we use human understanding to create business advantage. But in the future this will mean understanding the way people adopt connected media technologies. Today we are in the mode of making insight-driven brand experiences; platform ideas that grow beyond a single media channel. In the future, advertising will need to change again. Advertising will evolve into giving ideas to the audience: ideas of real value, as advertisements. We will be creating connected media campaigns that contain ideas that they can use right away; campaigns that invite engagement from the audience and enable brands to give valuable ideas to customers, through connected media and devices.
A connected media landscape might equip advertising to become a service. It's a tall order, and there are significant issues of privacy to be ironed out. But with power going to the consumer, and the mobile mode being 'pull communications', brands could do worse than to plan how to be creative and tell stories across devices and locations.
In the first stages it might be about realising and responding to current facts about the audience. More people will be dual-screening on their mobile devices while watching TV – so ask what can your brand do to make the most of that. One response might be to take a look at your various mobile internet sites and how they present themselves via different types of search on mobile.
Another response would be to think about changing the creative content in the TV ads to take account for connected viewing, as Tesco in the UK has done.
Whether consumers are experiencing a brand through traditional media, through the packaging or the product itself, they have a connected media device in their hand. In the future there will many more connected things, and some of these things are already beginning to connect with each other. Now is the time to plan a digital personality for your brand and start to work out how it might be able to help people (or even the planet) when the world's connected media infrastructure is established.
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