Is the generalist agency dead?

Over the last decade there has been a worldwide shift of spend from above-the-line (ATL) to below-the-line (BTL) – mirroring a shift in consumer's consumption of communication or advertising messages.

This is part of a growing trend towards de-massification. I believe, we have all realised that the consumer has increasingly become an ever moving target and traditional modes of communication are just not reaching them as they used to.

Much more selective

The consumer has become much more selective (in the US the average consumer is exposed to 5000 advertising messages a week) and adroit at dodging the efforts of advertisers by using technology and simply tuning out. Media proliferation and polygamous media consumption has resulted in marketers needing to become much more focused on how they target and reach their consumer. Even traditionally big advertisers such as Coke are increasing looking to create custom designed experiences such as the “My Coke Rewards” campaign.

In our increasingly connected world, it has become vital to engage consumers in ways that are both relevant and aligned to their interests or interest communities.

We need to do this by using new and innovative channels that ensure that the message is embraced and not blocked. The old, broad demographics used to define consumers are too crude or blunt and not specific enough in our ever-connected and in-touch world.

To meet this challenge, we have seen the re-emergence of the specialist agency after a period of the thru-the-line or 360 degree agencies or whatever you want to call large “generalist” agencies. Of course, alongside the benefits of focus and expertise, comes a level of agility and nimbleness of (the often smaller) specialist agencies which larger machines cannot compete with.

Shift in power

It is true to say that much of the power has shifted to the consumer. The rise of consumer generated content on sites such as Facebook (the site has more than 62 million active users) and YouTube is evidence of this. In fact, in the US in the 13 – 24 age group, 50% of the time they spend on the Internet is on consumer-generated content sites.

You only have to look at the success of the Adidas Soccer TV campaign to see the power of this trend. A powerful campaign that invited people to send in clips of themselves expressing the joy of football. A simple, but potent idea that saw Nike losing ground to Adidas in its world cup sponsorship.

Consumers can now even elect to take part in digital focus groups on sites like www.shareeverywhere.com – commenting on brands and re-shaping them. In fact the leading brands are the ones that encourage this kind of dialogue and reward their customers for their views (positive or negative). A good example is Dell's “idea storm” in which consumers are rewarded with points for their idea sharing. The consumer has truly become king.

Power of targeted communication

At UTR we believe passionately in the power of targeted communication. That intercepts and does not interrupt people in their day-to-day lives. We believe in digging deep, determining the “corridors of experience” for a particular community and then actively meeting them in a meaningful way along that corridor – thereby breaking through the ubiquity of the message clutter.

And best of all – one-to-one communication is ROI positive. Communication that is trackable and measurable.

Any wonder that specialist BTL agencies are doing so well?