The presentation by Dietmar Dahmen was full of valuable nuggets of advertising information. The long list includes concepts such as now-ism, first-ism, virtual urbanization, generation connected, mental cost vs. access cost, fame and how it relates to use-vertising and me-vertising, consumers vs. pro-sumers, and digital anticipation. I believe the most valuable of these nuggets had to do with how companies can fail because of their inability to adapt and change to new technologies. The example Dietmar used was the canning industry and it's inability to adapt into the ice block industry and it's inability to adapt into the refrigeration industry. Since technology is evolving at a ever increasing pace it is even harder for companies to stay relevant and interact with their target market. Companies like Google and Facebook are currently (or have been until now been) on the cutting edge. Both companies have managed to grow while providing a service that has expanded to encompass the demands of the consumer. They have both been able to monetize originally free services through unique advertising methods; however, will they be able to adjust to be relevant and incorporated into Web 5.0. Will Facebook or Google be the company that is in your interactive inanimate objects: your cars, your coffee shops, and your refrigerator?
My personal opinion is that we are moving closer and closer to having one singular online identity and that whatever companies can unify your now fractured online identity and incorporate it in an easily accessible way will dominate the Web 5.0 era and possibly even cheat death (see video below). For example, I have a Facebook account that I use to interact with friends, share cool photos, ideas, and chat. I also have Instagram and Pinterest where I share photos with friends. I have my school blog where I share school ideas and a personal blog where I share personal ones. I have 5 email accounts: a personal one, a business one, a freelance design one, a work one, and a school one! Work makes me use Skype to chat with my co-workers while I use Facebook Chat for talking to my friends. All this overlap and all this clutter makes my life seem very unorganized, hectic and yet monotonously repetitive and inefficient.
Singular online identity to the next level?
The real question lies in a T.V. analogy: If you buy a smart T.V. that has Netflix, Hulu, cable, Youtube, Facebook, Pandora, etc. do you throw away of the other media items you owned that previously allowed you to experience that media? No, you don't because Smart T.V.'s with their strange UI, weak speakers, and lack of portability don't allow you to enjoy the media in an easily accessible way. It is accessibility and ease of use that drives the consumer to interact with a product.
As a graphic designer my path has crossed with the advertising world many times and will no doubt continue to. What I find interesting about advertising is how it focuses on understanding people wants and needs, the sociology of group thinking including advertising's relationship to stereotyping and ethics. I am currently the creative director and chief designer at allthingsjeep.com, the biggest online jeep accessories and apparel retailer. Along with my team of designers, I create, design, and direct ad campaigns and promotional emails for holidays.
I hope that this class will not only increase my understanding of advertising techniques but also enhance my creative abilities by exposing me to ads I haven't seen before. Most importantly I hope to think more like an ad-man, to be creative in creating intangible value. Ad-man Rory Sutherland explains the perspective I wish to gain:
"Engineers, medical people, scientific people, have an obsession with
solving the problems of reality, when actually … once you reach a basic
level of wealth in society, most problems are actually problems of
perception.”
-Rory Sutherland
