(Unspun)

Growing up, one of my favorite shows was The Jestons. If you’ve never watched an episode or ever heard about it then you missed something great, in my opinion. The Jetsons was a 60s animated show that sported highly futuristic concepts, many of which were later invented and are now widely used (e.g., cell phones and video calling); however, other things shown are in the concept or early post-development stages with further advancements to come (e.g., A.I. with human-like personas and smart homes), and many other things haven’t even gotten to the concept phase of development as yet (e.g., flying cars, daily jetpack travel, and high functioning intelligent robots with human-like personas and abilities).

I referenced The Jetsons because of the high level of conceptualization of technology that was displayed, the coming to fruition of advancements depicted decades ago, the continued strides that the world of technology is making to catch up to what was “promised” in the show, and the continued development and transitioning to the highly digital and interconnected world as that shown. In the show, it was clear just how their world was interconnected through A.I. and technology, but there was also a heavy focus on the marketing and sales of products and services produced by the main character’s employer “Spacely’s Space Sprockets” and their competitor “Cogswell’s Cosmic Cogs”. Throughout the show, there were examples of digital marketing strategies being used and A.I. and interconnectedness helped with that.

To find out a little more about how businesses can build brand awareness using digital marketing strategies and the impact that technology, interconnectedness, and A.I. – such as The Internet of Things (IoT) – will have on marketing, I asked some experts in the field of digital marketing about their thoughts on the subject.

Jair Nogueira – Digital Marketer | Branding and E-Commerce Specialist

     “Brand Awareness is a powerful way to bring a long-term return on investment. The challenge is that it is not built overnight but over months and even years and should not only be during promotions but especially when nothing is being offered. In the digital marketing environment, it is difficult to call people’s attention and engrave your brand in the consumer’s mind, but if you show consistent and relevant information about your brand you can rest assured that, with time, consumers will start thinking of your brand when they need it. How to do that? By using a combination of tactics such as Social Media, Email Marketing, Customer Relationship Management, PPC, and Organic Ads.”

Jair’s advice teaches us that building brand awareness can be challenging, but once you work hard, stay consistent, and use the right digital marketing tools, you can see a good return on investment.

 Chris Hoffman – Marketing Operations Co-Ordinator | Expert in improving customer engagement with Digital Marketing strategies.

“Building brand awareness through digital platforms is essential for businesses to survive in modern society. A properly executed digital strategy allows a brand to reach its audience in more intimate and curated ways. With the ongoing pandemic, the brands that had previously spent time curating [digital] content and building awareness are more likely to survive and possibly thrive during a time in which people can solely connect online.”

As Chris indicates, a digital presence is a must for brands to survive in today’s world because of the unpredictability of things, such as pandemics, but also because of the ability to reach more customers and to get their interaction and engagement in your marketing efforts when you use digital strategies.

Anthony Miyazaki – Executive Director of Marketing & Analytics | Brand Strategist | Marketing Educator

“As more and more buying decisions are automated via the Internet of Things, brands need to push their desirability to the top of buyer consideration sets. Once the purchase process is automated for a particular product category, it will become even more difficult for new brands or less popular brands to break into both the evoked sets and the consideration sets of their target audiences. So now is the time to innovate from two perspectives: first, to be top-of-mind by creating a bond with your target audience via collaborative storytelling, and second, to be connected technologically to the developing systems that will automate both decision processes and buying processes.”

Anthony brings up a very good point about a useful tool i.e., the use of automation during the decision and purchasing phases of the buyer journey. Automation makes the process smoother for your customers and, therefore, helps to solidify your brand’s place in their consciousness when they are ready to make a purchase, re-purchase, and/or refer your brand to others. An example of this is the ability for customers to place orders and set reminders to order items through A.I. assistants such as Siri, Amazon Alexa, Google Home, and smart refrigerators.

Paul G. Thompson – CEO | Expert in A.I. and Automation of Content Marketing | Business Development | Marketing Strategy

“The best way to build brand awareness is to ‘give first’. Choose to provide value first, and everything thing else will fall in place. If you’re an expert in your area write an article, give a free webinar, participate in your online community. If you’re in retail, provide helpful content about your product or niche. With devices that can now talk back to us, it is only practical that when your customer has a question you should be the first to provide the answer. The point of it all is to build trust. If you’re able to do this, early and often, you’ll find brand success easier to come by. “

Without your customers, your brand is nothing. As Paul teaches us, providing value to customers is the best way to build brand awareness, and using digital marketing strategies and A.I. can improve your brand’s ability to accomplish this task.

Evan Weber – Digital Marketing Consultant | Expert in SEO, Lead Generation, Social Media Marketing, and Content Strategy

“So, the issue is that building brand awareness through online advertising doesn’t necessarily lead to sales, revenue, or inquiries. In most instances, companies advertising online are looking for these types of results. The best type of branding in digital advertising, in my opinion, is when you advertise to your website’s previous visitors, known as retargeting. You can also advertise in this same way to current customers the company has in a database, but that’s more of a customer retention/loyalty strategy. The nice thing about retargeting ads is they do a great job of making the company look like it is everywhere online, which is [good] branding. And, these types of ads usually have a great return on investment (ROI), so it’s a win-win in most instances. The amount a company might spend on these types of ads is dictated by the amount of traffic their website gets, so it goes hand in hand with driving traffic from other sources, whether it be Google, Facebook, etc. Retargeting ads make your search engine advertising work better, for instance. It helps to close the loop on your website visitors that don’t convert into a sale, lead, or inquiry.”

Evan reminds us that our previous customers should not be forgotten but should also be included in our focus when continuing to build brand awareness. Re-targeting, which is a very useful strategy as Evan mentioned, can be accomplished using A.I. software that facilitates interconnectedness across platforms. This can greatly assist your brand with the retargeting of customers that already visited your website or purchased. A.I. can learn your customers and use that knowledge to customize the interaction with them throughout the customer journey. This enables your brand to provide the right information, at the right time, to the right customer. 

To sum it all up, digital marketing is the best way to create and build brand awareness in today’s world and the world that it is shaping up to be. As the experts above taught us, some very effective and useful tools for successful digital marketing include creating value for your customers, utilizing digital platforms, retargeting previous customers, automating processes along the customer journey, and being consistent in your marketing efforts.

Also, since a lot of the technology from The Jetsons has already been created and adopted into our lives, and many of us look forward to seeing further technological developments that can add value to our lives, in my opinion, it would be a good idea to begin to incorporate A.I. into your business processes to stay relevant in the world that is to come… the new normal.