Get Progressive

A friend (an astute marketer leading a global financial powerhouse) and I got talking about digital marketing in the post-covid world. By how much has the cost of reaching the consumer increased in the last five years, I asked.

10X, he said, without batting an eyelid. He summed up his response with three arguments:

1. The platforms are now charging exorbitant for every exposure and engagement
2. Attention spans have declined which means the frequency and quality must be cranked up considerably
3. The consumer is no longer at a couple of platforms but all over the place

I’ve asked this question to start-up founders, marketing heads, digital agency bosses and the answers have been some version of the same.

Costs were rising even before Covid hit. The pandemic just turbo charged adoption and adaptation of all things digital thus raising them further.

To be fair, digital platforms promised reach with measurability, and they delivered. As for the price, that’s economics or shall we say behavioral economics.

Big tech already had a handle on choice architectures – a term used by behavioral economists with reference to design for influence. Instagram to Uber, platforms know user behavior patterns better than users themselves.

Rising costs of reaching the customer are a clear signal of Big tech’s increasing bargaining power. As more and more businesses go digital, the platforms armed with data will get better at nudging.

As communications folks, we understand the urge to splurge – the holy grail of great campaigns. But what happens when we are the targets?

We definitely can’t expect Big tech to publish tips on resisting the urge to splurge like the one by Bankwest titled “Resist The Urge to Splurge”. I even posted it on my family WhatsApp Group!!

Instead, we need to change the way we look at communications pretty much the same way everyone is switching to progressive lenses for vision. Ok, not everyone but definitely those who want them.

Progressive lenses, as you may know, allow us to read a book, work on a computer, and even drive without changing our glasses.

Similarly, we need to get progressive with our communications – one lens for everything. We all know that in the short-term digital platforms provide businesses the speed, reach and measurability to get the message out but in the medium-term and the long-term we need to catch the tailwinds.