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You guys know more about this than I do, Ciaran Cunningham Christopher Cashen & Anton Mc Menamin

Outside the realm of attendance points and personal reflections, there is a world

and once more there is a professional world. We all have to get a job and justify goingback to do a Masters, not just in the financial sense by securing a better position, but in

order to prove that we have given ourselves an edge that top companies want. For

those who attended the Marketing Foresight Seminar on Monday last, Carat/ Aegis

Media are the people we should all be looking to get a position with.

The core of the presentation was change, its inevitability, your response to it and

what the future may entail for our growingly familiar digital era. Mr. Cunningham admits

himself, as the biggest player in media planning in Ireland, that traditional mediums of

advertising are losing relevancy at best and redundant at worst. The change is the

interaction, we are no longer in a position to talk to customers and tell them the

benefits of using our products. Instead, we now have to adjust and talk with customers

in a more dynamic and relevant manner.

Mr. Cunningham, a DCU graduate, highlighted how much our society has evolved

over the past two decades due to technology. He stressed this by informing us that

when he was at college (Well be nice and not mention it was 1989) e-mail didnt even

exist. This highlights how far we have come as a society and the way we must be open

and adapt to the changes that are occurring all around us.

Technology is now an integral part of the majority of 18-34 year olds daily lives,

not that the rest are left in caves eyes wide in bewilderment of the telephone. Social

networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, You Tube and Linkedin have changed how

we act, interact and receive information. Due to this, the way that companies advertise

and connect with us must change accordingly.To accentuate these changes he used famous quotes from Charles Darwin and

Barack Obama, a man who is a modern day symbol of change. He also incorporated a

quote from Don Daper into his speech, stating Change isnt good or bad, it just is.

This quote resembles exactly what Mr. Cunningham was discussing throughout

his seminar. Change is something that is continuous, that every firm must incorporate if

they are to be successful. With this in mind Mr. Cunningham emphasised how

companies and brands must change in accordance to these technological changes. He

emphasised five key concepts that companies must use in incorporate to remain

successful. These changes included:

1. Do not sayMr. Cunningham believes that the way we advertise our products has changed

dramatically over the past decade. Companies now need to create peer-to-peer

relationships, investigating exactly what the customer wants and trying to provide it,

instead of the traditional telling them what they want approach.

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2. Think differentlyMr. Cunningham highlighted the need for companies and brands to differentiate

themselves due to the overwhelming variety of options there are for any one good

today. In order to sustain a competitive market share companies must emphasise

their USP to stand out from the crowd.

3. Ask yourselfwhy wouldnt anyone want to pass that on?Word of mouth can potentially create unbeatable buzz. In order to maximise the

potential of this medium companies must ask themselves this question. If they can

answer it adequately, and correct the reason why people wouldnt pass on the

message, then they are one step closer to their preferred destination of a major

market share.

4. Identify influencersInfluencers in social groups can have a large say on the actions of a group.

To emphasise this point Mr. Cunningham described the revolution of Cadbury Wispa,

where due to the persistence of peers and the use of internet social networks to

voice opinions, Cadbury re-released the product this year.

This point was confirmed by a Cadbury spokesperson who stated

This is the first time the power of the internet played such an intrinsic role in the

return of a Cadbury brand

5. Invite ParticipationIn order for companies to differentiate themselves from the crowd in our modern

society, it is essential to involve the customers in your advertising campaigns and to

ignite their imagination. Companies are now appealing to people with new

advertising techniques, such the Cadbury glass and a half production ads. These ads

have installed curiosity in the viewers minds and as a result has created buzzaround the brand and helped to appeal to a mass audience in the process.

This is something that Mr. Cunningham feels is essential in the modern era, as stated

in his first point, we now talk with, not to our customers.

Mr. Cunningham himself is a walking advertisement of how we can embrace

change. As previously stated he didnt work with email in college, and yet he was

here informing a younger, technology driven demographic, iPhones in pocket and

linked to every social media you can imagine, how we are going to be reaching the

next batch of better informed, more computer literate people.

He has identified the troubles that lie ahead for traditional media, particularlythe turbulent business model that newspapers lie in. The old vision of a family

dressed in their Sundays best, sitting upright while watching the television is now

marred with the traditional family now having the kids watching the exact content

they want online while the parents have the dilemma of choosing one of the

innumerable channels available to them. Its probably this kind of insight and market

knowledge that escalated Carat Ireland to become the largest media and

communications agency of the modern era. They were the first Advertising Company

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to exceed 100 million in billings in 2006 and while Carat/Aegis Media would have

suffered like anyone in the dreaded R word, a touch of realism while keeping up

the pace of an ever changing marketplace should steer them to safety.

We believe one of the most interesting observations from the talk was how

innovative the Irish people actually are and how open we are to the new digital

based influences and how much we expose ourselves to these stimuli. Facebook hasa 44% penetration, while the UK has a 22% penetration, thats despite the fact that

our broadband service is not what it should be, with Irish people screaming for

higher speeds. According to Mr.Cunningham, we wont have to wait long.

Mr. Cunningham continued to discuss how WiMax, the new quicker and cheaper

version of broadband, is going to change everything, yet again, in the coming years..

As previously stated this is something that Mr. Cunningham sees as inevitable in the

modern era. Change is occurring at an unprecedented rate and will continue to do

so. It is what divides the top Advertising Companies from the rest, the ability to not

only adapt to change, but to integrate the changes to the best of your ability,

differentiating yourself from the competition in the process.

Without a doubt this is something that Carat/ Aegis Media have not only done,

but they have excelled in doing so, ensuring that they have set a new benchmark of

which all other Advertising Companies must base themselves. Mr. Cunningham then

left to have dinner across the road in his mothers, just as he did twenty years ago

during his undergraduate, only to a very different world. Despite how hastily the

world moves and how technology has mutated (for better or for worse) the

landscape, there is something very human about the advertising scenery.