Marketing Trends Today and Tomorrow

I am delivering a talk on the future of brand management and marketing next week. Things are changing so quickly in the marketing world that it is difficult for every marketer to keep up with all of the new approaches and techniques. While I do not have the space here to explain each one of them, I thought I would share my talk's outline to give you a flavor of the latest in brand management and marketing.

Today's Marketing Research Approaches

• Big data analytics (including predictive analytics)
• Combining data mines with attitudinal research
• Attitudinal (and values) segmentation
• Knowing when to apply which statistical technique – regression analysis, ANOVA, factor analysis, cluster analysis and logistic regression
• Eye-tracking technology
• Using MEG, GSR, EEG, SST, QEEG, FMRI, PET and CT scanning to understand likes and dislikes
• Better understanding memory encoders and triggers
• Improved retail traffic pattern measurement and analysis
• Drawing on the insights of behavioral economics
• Measuring ROI
• Identifying sales drivers
• Anthropological studies
• Conjoint analysis and AI
• Emotion measurement tools
• Online focus groups
• Mobile research options
• Color science and emotional response
• Olfactory science and emotional response

Brand Management Today

• Authenticity
• Shared values
• Community building
• Using cultural symbols
• Employer branding
• Internal employee and system/process alignment
• Brand co-creation with customers
• Brand storytelling
• Customer journey mapping
• Customer experience design
• Strategic partnerships and co-opetition
• Game theory and competitive strategy

Marketing Today

• Hyper-personalization
• Geo-targeting and geo-fencing
• Undercover, stealth or covert marketing
• The poison parasite defense (to reposition a competitor’s brand)
• Buzz (aka word-of-mouth) and influencer marketing
• Creating influencer swarms
• Content management, scaling content, creating viral content
• Co-creating content with customers
• Value-based community building
• Proactive publicity as a primary tool
• Unusual advertising media (crops, escalators, human tattoos, sidewalks, etc.)
• Flash mobs and street team marketing
• Authority marketing
• Attaching pejorative labels to competitors’ brands (used mostly in politics)
• Fully automated lead generation systems

If you are not familiar with any of these approaches, I would suggest that you look them up and become familiar with them. And I would be happy to hear from you if you think I have missed something. Please share your knowledge and insights with our readers.