lazy marketers!!!

The marketing and communication industry is filled with lazy, non-lateral thinking marketers, yes i said it and this is why. Globalization and technological advancements has lead to market fragmentation and a paradigm shift in the manner in which marketing communications should be looked at i.e. mass has shifted to individual, marketers know all this yet they do not implement it because it requires a great deal of work so, they opt for the easy way out, which by the way, is slapping together a RAMS, TAMS, AMPS stats list and colourful pictures and vuala!!

Let me begin by making reference to multi-national brands such as L'Oreal who used to use standardised method of marketing (same strategy in different countries), which is the use of a beautiful looking celebrity such as a Halle Berry for instance who waffles on about what's the next best thing to use to hide your TRUE self according her. This strategy always worked for L'Oreal, and probably still does which is the root of the problem, because it always worked and probably may still work, marketers see this as a safe strategy to use and no longer see the need to innovate, if it isn't broken why fix it right? WRONG!!!
The application of this mentality leads to nothing else but laziness except in instances where one tries to polish a turd.

Innovation in this day and age is key and being ackowledged by the 'prestigious' Loeries without giving Mr Client a proper return on investement is as futile as trying to modernise a fossil. L'Oreal's answer to globalization is the use of a localised marketing strategy which is the use of SA's Halle Berrys which still fails to communicate to a Mam' Khoza from next door about her 'shubaba' skin problems. L'Oreal, like many other brands' marketers are too lazy and maybe even incompetent to create marketing solutions that specifically cater to ever changing markets hence they stick to the safe strategy because they have a frame of reference that it works, 'if it isn't broken why fix it huh'.

Marketers aren't the only one's to blame, Mr Client is also guilty. If you (Mr Client) is targeting black people living in skwatta camps, ensure that your marketing strategy shows that you know it by communicating in their language in their environment which leads back to the point of relevance Blank Thoughts covered extensively. Looking at SA's marketing industry, the lack of innovation is so monumental it fails to justify the amount of talented people we have in the country. Sunsilk recently did a big campaign using two deceased people namely Lebo Mathosa and Marylin Monroe, who if I may ask, within Sunsilk's target market believes that the above mentioned celebrities used Sunsilk? Even so, why use people who are no longer alive???

If anything, I say it shows just how DEAD the creatives who did it and MR Client who approved really are. Let us not just use the word innovate, let it manifest in our marketing and advertising strategies so that we can show the world how Mzansi do!!!!