Living in a world that is constantly shrinking, we cannot deny the fact that people are interconnecting beyond traditional boundaries of geography.
Less than twenty years ago, the Internet had not been invented yet and people were still rummaging through books and texts to find information; twenty years ago, communication was limited to phones and handwritten letters because there was no such thing called “e-mails;” twenty years ago, people had to network face-to-face and not “friend” each other on Facebook. Twenty years later however, our world has transformed completely into a digitized society, where technology is integrated into almost every aspect of our life: from online research to e-mails and instant messaging to social media.
iPhone 4G
The Internet has not only become a necessity, but also a lifestyle and culture in this generation. Our technology today proves to be an extremely useful communications tool for connecting people across the world. But the increase in channels of communication also complicates matters in way that challenges advertisers to fulfill different needs for different audiences. For example, young adults may rely on social networking sites and their cell phones more so than older adults who are still just now catching up with the usage of e-mails.
A t-shirt found in Rome
Media is converging in such a rapid manner that it is beyond our grasp how technology will affect the way we communicate in the future.
Think about Twitter, YouTube and Facebook. What do they have in common? Well, they are all social networking sites launched within the past five years and now are revolutionizing how people communicate with each other. Within five years, these sites have not only drawn millions of users, but also changed the way companies advertise their message. Now, companies resort to these social networking sites. With adequate research based off the demographics and information collected from people’s profile pages, companies are more able to target their audiences and influence their decisions. Thus, the usage of these tools is a means to interact with their desired customers.
Today a cell phone is more than just a phone, but a device that connects to the Internet, a camera, iPod (music storage) and many available applications. Traditionally, advertising is like propaganda where people are presented with information, but today people can be selective with the type of information that they want to get. Advertisers need to seek out all available means of channels and target the right message to the right audience. What is the future for advertising?
