NEW-AGE COMMUNICATIONS

ou don’t need binoculars to discover new-age marketing communications. It’s closer than you think.

Every phenomenon has an era. As human civilisation, we have transcended from the Satyug to the Kaliyug. Music has it’s classical, neo-classical and modern avatars. Modern Art is always the butt of critical analysis. So also communications has evolved tremendously. Not just the hardware, but the software as well. From mainframes we are now on to netbooks. Marcom, too has evolved and revolved more than it’s full capacity of 360 degrees. Radio, Newspaper, TV represent the initial phase of marketing communications. And they still exist as the pillars of advertising as long as India is a developing nation. But you cannot not admit that the new-age media has taken roots, turned into saplings and with technology would become that banyan tree with those very roots hanging out and providing shade.                             

NEW-AGE COMMUNICATIONS: New age communications in simple terms is the marketing media and  content which belongs to today’s generation of IMC. Any marketing media which has emerged in the past decade and is fairly new, is a part of the new-age communications model. By this definition, all the forms of communication including BTL (Activation & Events), PR 2.0, Web & Digital, Social Media Marketing, Youth Marketing are in the fray. And we are not talking just media – it is the content as well which needs to be new-age. Modern, appealing to today’s junta, which has evolved ten years on. Brand designs have emerged more sleek (Godrej and Wipro logos), creative content speaks a new language (youngistan)…                                         

NEW AGE COMMUNICATIONS IN INDIA: The Indian Market has yet to ripen to technology-based media like digital (online and mobile). While Events and PR now at decent levels of reckoning, social and digital media are yet being treated like the fantasized lady in red. Everyone wants her but don’t know how to. She is hot and happening, seductive, yet seemingly hard to get. Brands have already held out the bait to her – and she will soon be a big part of the brand game. Fragmentation leads to the need of new forms of media. Enter youth marketing – a new age form of marketing to the young segment. This is not even a trend yet, but the concept has so much potential that if used right and sparingly like social media, it could work like a case study.

The core essence of new-age media is building the brand, the guerilla way. While ATL brings brand awareness, new media helps build brand equity. Each has its own role to play – strategically as well as tactically. The successful communication campaign will be the one which uses both in the right way in the right quantity. Like salt to taste.