Page 77 - Marketing the Basics 2nd

COMMUNITIES
A fourth feature of the Internet is that it is a collection of millions of communities that are not constrained by geography. Individuals can belong to multiple communities, and they actively share information with each other, which in turn influences the opinions of the group as a whole. The content that users are creating and sharing, which are often blog entries, comments, videos or photographs, presents a dilemma for marketers. On the one hand, it means that marketers lose control of message and positioning of their brand as users are creating the content on their own volition. On the other hand, it’s a source of free word-of-mouth marketing. Successful brands require an element of authenticity. What could be more ‘real’ than a personal testimony from a friend? We take a closer look at the communitarian feature of the Internet in our discussion of social network marketing later in this chapter.
ONLINE MARKETING SPENDING
It’s an understatement to say that for the 1.5 billion people who have access to it, the Internet has changed the way people live dramatically. Instant messaging, blogs, search engines and social networking sites are just some of the platforms that exist to connect, communicate and interact with people all over the world. Just about every demographic is online these days, some spend upwards of 16 hours a day on the Internet.
Predictably, marketers’ interest in using the Internet has grown in tandem with the growth rate of the Internet access. As you can see from Table 4.1, advertising spending on the Internet in the US, the largest advertising market the world, has mostly been on an upward trajectory.
Figure 4.2 is from Oglivy, one of the largest and best-known advertising firms in the world. The illustration shows the gap between the percentage of advertising budgets that are spent on online activities versus the percentage of time spent by consumers online. As we can see from the graphic, the ‘Marketing Confidence Gap’, is growing, which only means that at some point in the future, and we believe in the very near future, there is going to be a flood of advertising dollars into the online space. This gap is one
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