What Tomorrow Will Bring

 

Between all the obligatory prognosticative posts roaming around, it's easy to forget the predictions that are really important. First - now that we've torn him down - it's about time we build Tiger back up. Like Kobe, Britney Spears and a thousand other celebrities, the only thing we like better than the fall is the rise up the other side. This seems to remain true for everyone except for child actors and stars of vh1 shows.

Second, I'll make my first million dollars, mostly by blackmailing Sean for something. Not sure what just yet. 

Third, I'm a big fan of Darren Herman, but proclaiming the death of the branding campaign within the next decade is probably a bit premature even assuming a much better measurement environment. It would require an amazing amount of invasive monitoring that traditional media has been incapable to create (or adopt) and a massive shift in privacy concerns already perked by the passive, anonymous monitoring in web-based media. And last, it assumes that we'll ever fully understand the human brain enough to know why one thing worked and another doesn't. We're pretty damn good at it in the short-term, but measuring long-term shifts haven't been the strong suit of agencies or many clients. So I guess I would say my prediction is that the opposite will happen. Our attention will shift away from causing a specific, momentary response to better understanding whether or not we're succeeding in the often arduous task of shifting behavior and attitudes.

Either way, Darren is a pretty smart guy, so we'll see how it all plays out. 

Fourth, we've spent the last decade (or two) striving for personalization, including more and more specific levels of targeting, me-based content, etc., but we've yet to see just the kind of pay off that the industry sold. Mostly because while our targeting has changed, value propositions for the most part have not. It's mostly a relic of the 360 degree brand sell that we've only personalized on the edges without actually concerning ourselves with the wants and needs of real people. Mostly because that's really fucking hard to do. Okay, that wasn't really a prediction...

But - what the backlash against algorithmic personalization will do is further the trend towards both the tangible and the authentically personalized. Emails are less meaningful than a handwritten note. Websites aren't generally as memorable as interestingness in real life. Experiences matter more. Expect to see something like the Slow Movement happening to digital things. As the amount of things I can't hold becomes more ubiquitous and easily delivered, I value stuff I can touch or things that we're clearly made for me. And, as per usual, these things will be collected and shared in digital forms. An index of my life, so to speak.

In other words, I'll value the things that are an expression of your time spent, not necessarily mine.

So there you go - that's not really a 2010 prediction, but more just a couple things that'll probably happen some day. 

photo via katarina 2353