Today, with the emergence of new
technologies and applications such as customized ads, Internet cookies,
databases, social media, neuromarketing, face recognition, and machines with
eyes, these are the first exposures to the future in the world of marketing. In
this article, 10 predictions about the futures of marketing are made, aiming to
present leading views on marketing futures from leading marketers. Realizing
that marketing has always been affected by the broader environment, this
article looks at worldwide developments over the next 100 years and predicts
how these will affect the marketing scheme. Findings suggest that marketing in
the future is not just confined to business, advertising, promotion, customer
relations, etc., and that marketing is much more important that simply being a
tool, but rather an ideology or applied philosophy to the society, business,
economy, and life. This paradigm includes convenience marketing, social
relationship marketing, marketing as a way to create structured thinking, and
marketing as an inherent part of human culture. It seems as if marketing can be
anything, and it is omnipresent where people are present, like a sixth
dimension. Marketing is a force that has a light and a dark side. In the
future, marketing will be a necessary skill for everyone. Whether it is for
learning how to build relationships, learning how to manage information, or to
knowhow to create a fairer and more just society, marketing transcends all of
these very meaningful subjects. As Einstein may have wanted to put it: ‘This is
the true theory of everything in marketing’.
Predictions about marketing in
the next 100 years.
Predicting the marketing scheme
over the next 100 years is of course, an overwhelming and risky task. The
difficulty is, obviously, that no one knows how the world will take shape in
the future. Even science has had its fair share in making wrong predictions.
But interestingly, predictions of scientific development have often been
underestimated.
1. 1. 3D
advertising, augmented reality and Internet in the contact lenses With recent
developments in 3D, it seems that the nearest prediction would be for marketers
to focus on developing 3D advertising and holographic imaging. The technology
already exists. There is a memorable scene from the movie ‘Back to the Future’
where Michael J. Fox travels to his distant future to save his son from making
unfortunate mistakes with Griff (Biff’s grandson). In that opening future
scene, Fox’s character is intimidated by a 3Danimation/hologram of a great
shark, attempting to get its teeth into him, and which seemingly is an
advertisement from the nearby cinema for a continuation of the Jaws series.
This could very well be in development now as the technology is already
flourishing. In the future, such 3D adverts would not just be confined to large
billboards or street ads but also in our living rooms – engaging ads coming out
of our 3D televisions. Similarly, Minority Report style advertising billboards,
which can recognize passers-by, and target them with customized adverts are
already under trial by IBM’s innovation laboratories. Such billboards would
take target marketing to the next level, effectively allowing large billboard
adverts or shop windows to match individual customers’ demographic profiles
with targeted products
2. 2. Telekinetic
powers and neuromarketing
It is
astonishing to even imagine how computers will be able to read our thoughts,
and take action on what we desire. Indeed, as unimaginably as it may seem,
science should not be underestimated. It was not long ago when, Thomas Watson,
chairman of IBM, said in 1943, “I think there is a world market for maybe five
computers.” Assuming that such scientific progress, i.e., Moore’s Law keeps its
pace, in a hundred years time, we may well, have telekinetic abilities. In
fact, recent research has successfully made monkeys move objects with their
thoughts alone by wiring their brain. For marketers, this is a new area that
should be speculated on. In doing so, we may think in terms of what the logic
of marketing currently is and where it is headed, which then, feeds into the
predictions of how marketing will be implemented in the future. Certainly, the
field of neuromarketing exists even today, where brain scans will reveal how
certain customers will respond in certain ways to certain stimuli. Take this
concept into the future, and what we will experience are customers skipping
away from adverts on their TVs not with a remote controller, but rather with
their minds! It is astonishing to even imagine how computers will be able to
read our thoughts, and take action on what we desire. Indeed, as unimaginably
as it may seem, science should not be underestimated. It was not long ago when,
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, said in 1943, “I think there is a world market
for maybe five computers.” Assuming that such scientific progress, i.e.,
Moore’s Law keeps its pace, in a hundred years time, we may well, have
telekinetic abilities. In fact, recent research has successfully made monkeys
move objects with their thoughts alone by wiring their brain. For marketers,
this is a new area that should be speculated on. In doing so, we may think in
terms of what the logic of marketing currently is and where it is headed, which
then, feeds into the predictions of how marketing will be implemented in the
future. Certainly, the field of neuromarketing exists even today, where brain
scans will reveal how certain customers will respond in certain ways to certain
stimuli. Take this concept into the future, and what we will experience are
customers skipping away from adverts on their TVs not with a remote controller,
but rather with their minds!
3. Matrix-like world – the future
shopping experience Even today, social networking websites have changed the way
in which people communicate and the way we develop our relationships with other
people. Facebook, in particular have developed many innovative ideas to bring
not just the Internet into the world of social networking but also, the real
world. For example, applications such as ‘Facebook pages’ gives companies a new
way to build loyalty and interaction; it gives users the opportunity to link
real life experiences with the virtual world in real time. ‘Facebook live’
shows live streams from different events where ‘things are happening’ and you
can join in and take part with your comments. ‘Facebook deals’ gives users
another incentive to be interactive and commercial by looking for discounts,
deals of the day, and offers. Perhaps, ‘Facebook check-ins’ will soon be a
rental space for companies to display themselves. In a way, word of mouth and
viral marketing are responsible for the popularity of Facebook and many other
major websites like Twitter, YouTube, and Google. In the future, it may not be
word of mouth, but ‘thought-2-thought’ or‘mind-2-mind’ that brings customers
together to use a particular platform.
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