siliconindia | | March 20188BRIDGING THE DIGITAL DIVIDEBy Sangeeta Chacko, Head ­ Corporate Communications, Percept LimitedPercept Limited is Mumbai-headquartered media, entertainment & communications company offering services under three major verticals ­ Marketing Communication Services, Assets, and Digital. It also specializes in Production & Distribution of Movies & Ad Films, Event Management Creative Advertising, PR, Brand Activation, and many other areas.T echnology is transforming the communications land-scape in ways and means that are unimaginable. Consumers are far more connected and yet dis-tracted today than ever before, even as brand marketers struggle with the tech, winds of change propelling the indus-try forward. As people spend more time on their mobiles, laptops, i-pods and tablets, the test for brands is to re-connect with customers through all these new-fangled gadgets in real time and design campaigns that connect across social media, display adver-tising and e-Commerce. While some marketers struggle to keep pace, oth-ers have started re-imagineering the communication landscape for their brands and companies. After all, with challenges come many opportunities. There has never been a better time to gain competitive advantage by be-ing a tech-savvy marketer. Real-time 2-way dialogue offers brand market-ers an opportunity to leverage brand connect and increase customer loy-alty via smart storytelling that taps into existing consumer desires and aspirations while leveraging on the speed & scope of digital engineering, reach and analytics. This calls for the perfect marriage between the Market-ing Team with the Digital team which can be a massive challenge in itself. The Marketing team is focused on gauging consumer motive and desire and uses its findings to craft communication programs that drive the desired con-sumer emotion and purchase action. It's an instinctive, insightful, passion-ate and creative process that gradu-ally unfolds in the marketplace. But, the Digital function is perceived as a cold brusque team that handles algo-rithms, statistics, computing, tracking and analysis. The trick lies in bridg-ing this perceived divide to leverage core competencies.While the objectives of marketing haven't changed, the devices and tac-tics of marketing have changed drasti-cally due to digital disruption over the past decade. Digital enables speed of message delivery, accuracy and scale of Target Audience reach, 2-way re-al-time dialogue and meaningful con-sumer engagement. Thanks to Digital algorithms, communication messages can now be customized and relayed to the right target audience, therein mak-ing the message relevant for the recip-ient. Smart marketers can capitalize on the wide array of free/cost effective digital platforms to gain mass traction and reach for a simple innovative com-munication idea. Content Management System (CMS) can help the brand's online presence and reach. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) can help marketers manage one-on-one relationships via leads, prospects, em-ployees, consumers, associates, media and other key stakeholders. This was unheard of in the days of expensive one-way traditional media channel reach. Digital equalizes the market-ing landscape by enabling the smaller player to gain visibility through FOC Digital platforms and devices, therein trumping the moneybag players. It's not the budget that matters anymore; it's the innovation, creativity, speed and amplification of the idea that cuts through the clutter today!So, where does that leave the tra-ditional Marketing Specialist today? Desperately in need of a mindset and skill upgrade in order to capitalize on the new age platforms and devices available at hand today. Brand Mar-keters must take Digital teams into confidence and work closely alongside data analysts, web designers, blog-gers, social media experts and digital professionals to develop winning 3600 outreach messages & campaigns that are relevant, engaging and scalable to their TG. Digital Specialists also need to move away from simply displaying IN MY OPINION
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