Sticky Sheep

Mass marketing gained success, if not born, from the launch of televisions across America. In the mid 20th century, a perfect storm in marketing allowed for mass marketing to work. Smaller selections of brands were in the market place and a smaller number of television channels led to the success of mass marketing. It was relatively easy for large companies to compete. During this time, it was also easy for consumers to weigh the options and make decisions. Consumer influence was easily captured.

In 1941, Bulova created the first television commercial in America. The watchmaker paid a total of nine dollars to WNBT to air a message before a Philadelphia Phillies and Brooklyn Dodgers baseball game. “America runs on Bulova time”, was the simple message.

It quickly became clear, mass marketing worked. This one Bulova commercial started a chain reaction of advertisers jumping on the mass marketing ship. There were more advertisers than channels.

Marketers saw the numbers. Increased advertising led to increase sales. They wanted to spend more. The demand increased. Television channels looked for more revenue streams. This caused the birth of more television channels.

Mass marketing became a simple formula. More exposure led to more revenue. However, the constant bombarding of advertising eventually led to consumer confusion and frustration. Mass marketing turned into noise, irrelevant noise. Now, we are exposed to thousands of advertisements per day. It’s a safe bet that you cannot name all of the advertisements you saw yesterday. In fact, try to name 20. 10? 5?

History told us the more we spent the more revenue we generated. That has changed. Consumers went from enjoying commercials to hating them. There is a cynicism toward advertising. Not only does mass marketing have to sell a message, but it also has to fight an uphill battle of negativity. In fact, many marketing efforts have turned consumers against them. How many commercials have you found annoying? Because of that annoyance, when you see that brand in a store you actually have a negative view and move toward another brand.

Consumers now have limited attention. Marketers face tough competition trying to get noticed in the noise. A new approach is required. With the advancement of analytics, search and social media, marketers are able to target better than they could sixty years ago. The idea of sending messages out to everyone is costly and foolish marketing. Today’s marketing is dependent on word of mouth, segmentation, transparency, and connectivity.

This is where these Sticky Sheep principles come into play. Through the success of mass media over a 30 year period, many basic principles of sales and marketing have been let go. We hope to bring some of those back to the forefront of marketers mind. In many cases, these basic principles of marketing are thousands of years old. Ideas like community, storytelling and crowdsourcing are not new. They just took a break for awhile to allow for the rise and fall of mass marketing. It’s time to get back to the basics of marketing.

How are you targeting consumers? What precision marketing techniques are working for you?

Written by John Ellis

John Ellis is a frequent online marketing industry speaker and blogger. He can also be found at www.JohnWEllis.com discussing search engine marketing ... (more)

Visit John Ellis's Website

Follow John Ellis on Twitter