Friday, March 14, 2008

Direct Marketing on Blogs


I am forever saying that DM should mean better targeting and measurement that can complement traditional brand-building, it should not refer to junk mail and flyers. Last month's Direct Marketing International magazine took an even broader perspective, the front page editorial discussed the impact of blogs and social networks. I quote from the printed page:

The more engaging of these blogs are becoming mass entertainment; like tuning in to a favourite soap. The Shakespeares of the blogosphere.

Of course this blog is neither mass entertainment nor soap opera. But I like the comparison of endless stories largely designed to sell advertising with Elizabethan playwrights currently considered to be the epitome of classic literature. However, if a blog does become mass entertainment, then does it become just another broadcast medium more like a 20th century television channel and less like a 21st century conversation?


2 comments:

Marc Steel said...

As much as I would like to think that blogging can become the mass entertainment medium that television has, I think drawing people away from flashing, moving pictures to the written word en masse would be quite the impossibility.

Rana said...

I was just quoting from a DM trade magazine - I thought it was noteworthy that they were writing about blogs.

And I saw that you had written a bit about direct marketing at your site too, this little post was just a taster, DM is changing fast.

And perhaps the "blog" of the future will be less of written word and more of flashy moving pictures ... but this one won't :)