2021 Marketing Trends - Mass Marketing is Dead

 It has to start somewhere. It has to start some time. What better place than here? What better time than now?
 You're listening to the Radcast. If it's radical, we cover it. Here's your host, Ryan Alford.
 Hey guys, what's up? Ryan Alford here with the latest edition of the Radcast joined by the Digital Media Manager here at Radical Josh Hill. What's up Josh?
 What's going on?
 Hey, good to have you.
 Good to be here.
 So our definitive, are we going to definitive? I think it's definitive now.
 I think I've been playing it up as our definitive. We'll be later on because we talk about trends and a million other things when we're on the show about.
 Tentatively definitive.
 Tentatively definitive. We reserve the right. Change our minds at any time.
 Trends and things to end news in general changes so quickly these days. I don't think there can be anything definitive, but here today on December 21st of 2020.
 This is it.
 This is it. We're coming down to the end. We'll have our marketing transfer 2021. Before we get into that Josh, I think this is going to be primary looking forward.
 I like to look forward. I'm not a rearview mirror guy, but I think that it does do some just talk a little bit about what's been a pretty damn strange year.
 Yeah.
 Yeah, it's likely.
 I know. I think everyone's counting down the moments to kind of get through it. It's been weird, wacky and crazy, but what have been any like even personally, but definitely from a marketing perspective, anything that's obviously we've battled COVID and still battling it.
 But anything that's kind of resonating with you as we look back the general shift to the digital life.
 Like as a digital marketing manager, like I live pretty online.
 I mean, I work job.
 Yeah, it's my job to be online.
 Like a digital, a lot of my job, a lot of my teachers says that digital. It's my job. Like a digital guy.
 Yeah, but yeah, like a higher, I'd say like a higher portion of my learning entertainment and everything is kind of moved even further online.
 Like I had a lot of concert plans at the beginning of the year and some tickets that I had to get returned returned, but I attended a lot of live stream concerts.
 A lot of artists were doing bedroom stuff. A lot of people were doing like green screen stuff. One of my favorite artists did a show at the Red Rock's amphitheater, completely empty.
 And that was really cool. A lot of people like if you're online, you could like yell into your mic at the end of one song.
 And then you could vote on what colors to change the background. That was kind of fun.
 Ooh, but I like it. Yeah, their activity within the interactive.
 But like I think, yeah, that was the biggest resonator for me was shifted digital more live stream stuff, more face time hangouts with friends, stuff like that.
 Well, I think and we've talked about this on other episodes and maybe even add gal if you're the segments that we do.
 They say that the transition to e-commerce and digital channels sped up by the rate of what they anticipated to be seven years worth of transition happened in roughly 10 months.
 Yeah, I think a lot of, I mean, most of the tools that people are using for e-commerce and new online stuff is not new by any means.
 Like Instacart has been around these drive in grocery places been around curbside pickups been around, but it's the way we use it has definitely changed.
 And so more people I think realize like, oh wait, it is a lot easier to just online shop for groceries and then go pick it up or it is a lot easier to get delivery or all these things I was buying in person like e-commerce is way easier.
 Yeah, I think what you know, it's it increased the, you know, people start to adapt things when they're ready and try things on their own time.
 Suddenly it became necessity to try to try these things because if you were going to do that or get these experiences and or products, the only way it was digital.
 Yeah, you know, for at least no matter what state you lived in South Carolina being a little more conservative and thus opening up more quickly like we did here.
 But universally you had a three month ish period where everything was pretty shut down and if you wanted anything you needed to be online.
 Yeah.
 And then in most places, probably with the most population those things have stayed through.
 So it's been forced to try.
 And then once they've tried, you know, I think what you're going to see which will get into a 21 is that that gene is not going back in the bottle.
 Well, this really is more convenient.
 Well, I can, you know, do all of these things, you know, obviously Amazon's been around forever.
 But, you know, but still the numbers are crazy because as much as, you know, we live and breathe the digital world, it feels like, you know, Amazon's been around for a while and social channels have been around.
 But only eight depending on markets.
 So eight to 12% of all sales were did were online.
 Yeah.
 All sales.
 I can close my mind when I read that read that stat before COVID.
 So as far along as we had come, there were still the bandwidth, the headroom as you call it, was still so vast.
 Yeah.
 And even now they, I think they've gone, we've gone, there was anticipation of, you know, a couple points a year, but we think we've gone to like, we're in the 20s now, you know.
 I think you pull out the like, back to my business degree of the like product life cycle.
 Like a lot of people when they talk about trends, they're talking about the like trend setters, the early adapters and stuff.
 But then there's that it takes years for that big hump of most people to like jump on onto it.
 So yeah, this, these could have been trends maybe from five years ago.
 But I think now it's just now come to fruition of like these new e-commerce things, these new like delivery platforms like Uber Eats, grab hub, that stuff got really popular.
 I think we're just getting to that point of like, it's becoming widely accepted by people.
 I mean, it takes a long time if you look at the like streaming versus like cable people, like people who are audition traditional cable TV.
 Like, I think this last year or the year before that was the first time that streaming, like streaming users overtook the traditional cable, like saying traditional cable because it's still kind of new.
 But yeah, traditional linear.
 Yeah, linear.
 But these things take time and like it sometimes it takes just, I mean, literally took a whole pandemic and forcing people to stay inside to get on this.
 I know. So if you're, if you're a conspiracy theorist, Jeff Bezos caused the pandemic.
 Yeah.
 Is anyone's net worth increase more than Jeff Bezos?
 I don't think so.
 And it was, he was already overly wealthy.
 If you seen that video clip, he's got robot arms now.
 Yes, like Doc Ock from Spider-Man.
 So it's game over at this point.
 Yes, exactly.
 And before anyone quotes me, I'm joking.
 I have no ill will towards Jeff Bezos and I don't think he started the pandemic.
 But he certainly benefited from it from a financial standpoint.
 But you know, once you get into the billions, if you got 30 billion versus 100 billion,
 I'm sure he thinks there's difference.
 I remember my first billion.
 Yeah, I know.
 I've kind of lost track of mine.
 You know, I spent it too quickly.
 Yeah, because you know, before we jump into 21, again, you know, managing ads for all of our clients with your team.
 And you know, seeing into the channels and the formats and any like things just kind of like,
 obviously we just talked about digital as a whole and the transformation.
 It's just the gasoline on the fire that's happened.
 But anything by way of, you know, like observing and looking back at the year and going,
 you know, this changed or this really stands out.
 Yeah.
 So like one of the biggest hurdles any time is kind of like,
 when you're like messaging people, usually like a really effective way to go about it is building that,
 like FOMO, the fear of missing out.
 And one of the easiest ways to do that in the past was show like your restaurant with a ton of people there,
 or your store with lots of people there, or people using your product, your service, testimonials and stuff.
 And kind of showing that like within the lifestyle.
 And then now your last year, you're kind of going towards people in a digital lifestyle.
 Like how do you kind of jump in that hurdle?
 Like how do you make people like realize other people are involved where they want to join in?
 And so that was kind of a big hump to kind of get around.
 And so it took a lot more kind of building social engagement.
 Kind of collecting those views, collecting those likes and comments on posts so people were kind of creating a community online.
 And like really a big change was I saw this really successful brands did this.
 And then we did this with a few of our clients is trying to make those like posts and videos,
 those ads either like native posts or the ads kind of be a place of people can comment, give feedback,
 like really just engage and create a conversation between the brand and the people.
 We did some fun.
 Like we did even like silly stuff like we said like show us like tell us your favorite like menu item at this restaurant
 and I'll tell you what band or movie you would like the most weird like stuff like that.
 And it's just a way to like it people are like especially during the high of quarantine.
 People were bored at home like just looking to engage with someone else.
 So that creating that feedback loop for us is kind of what I'm summary that down.
 And obviously driving engagement but kind of having more of that real time discussion.
 Yeah, I think also leaning into it's kind of a content approach but like leaning into your videos and then leading into live streams was a big thing.
 Kind of like opening the doors up a little bit and kind of really being honest was really effective.
 I just be like hey like you're get online and you just talk to your people like you don't even have to talk about your business.
 You're not doing a sales pitch.
 You might just show them how something works.
 If you're a restaurant you might show them how to cook a meal.
 I saw a lot of places in town were doing take and bake meals of like there's a local pizza shop of like come get a ball of dough and sauce and cheese and like make it yourself.
 It kind of like helps you feel involved and also it's a great way to like show behind the curtains of like we make this fresh.
 And this is what goes into it and so I think that really helps in the future.
 The irony of everything that's happened is by taking people out of the businesses like not going live brick and mortar not having those in person experiences.
 Consumers are actually able the ones the brands have done well to get closer to the business.
 You know it sounds totally like against like reverse.
 Yeah.
 But in a way the brands that really have done well and thrived have opened the curtain more to really what's going on.
 What's happening?
 The transparency of doing it yourself or seeing what's happening.
 And so like the need and opportunity for content combined with the reality of consumers really wanting brands really wanting consumers to engage with them.
 Kind of required a little bit more of that transparency.
 Yeah, absolutely.
 And so I think that's a contrary to what you might expect.
 Oh, we get closer, you know, not to be cliche with some of the country music songs those two is like we've been closer by being apart.
 But in some ways the brands that have done well probably have gotten closer to their communities by being distanced.
 And I think that's not going anywhere.
 I think that's only going to continue.
 But I don't, while I think that's going to continue, I don't think everyone's going to jump on it.
 And I think only the people who do it and do it well and do it right will be really successful with that.
 Yep, I agree.
 Well, let's transition to 2021, shall we?
 Let's go to the future.
 Go to the future.
 If we had an effect, uh, uh, Riley, I would have wanted like, dude, dude, dude, dude.
 Anyway, uh, maybe it's not that insightful, but, uh, we'll pretend that it is.
 Yeah, yeah.
 No, no.
 So, Josh, let's transition to 21.
 Um, you know, not that we're going to start in order, but is there?
 I do want to just, these, and I will say this, these are 2021 marketing trends.
 We want to take this at 70,000 feet a little bit.
 We'll drill down some things.
 We're doing some drilling down with ad gab and those kind of things.
 I think we're talking holistically here from a broad marketing standpoint, branding standpoint,
 content standpoint, we'll get specific with certain things.
 But this is really about some overarching trends that we see going across the marketing landscape.
 Uh, so we'll teet up there.
 And again, not to put any of these in any sort of order of definitiveness.
 Yeah.
 Or, uh, or necessarily importance.
 But where would you start for you, Josh, is maybe, you know, a key number one.
 Key number one.
 Wow.
 Jumping right into it.
 Jumping right in.
 I think people need to, like, this has kind of been a running theme over multiple podcasts.
 I hear a lot of episodes, you say people are still not, like, utilizing digital channels as they should be.
 And I think it's time to do mostly digital ads.
 And it's time to kind of do more, more like cohesive content behind those.
 I think a lot, I see a lot where they have, like, their social channel looks one way and then their ads look another way.
 Um, they kind of need to feed together along with the site, their website.
 And I think messaging should be kind of, they're like, I see a lot of kind of disparate messaging across where it's like, there's no central theme to businesses.
 And I think broadly speaking with everyone moving online, there's going to be, it's not just, oh, you're in town.
 So you're a brick and mortar, like, B2B company, like, you don't, less people are seeing your visual store, your, your in-person stuff.
 You're moving online to the World Wide Web where there's a million other places, the exact same size, who can do the same thing you do.
 And you're trying to be this, that, and the other.
 And you're just kind of, like, blandly saying, hey, we're available and we do this.
 That's not going to cut it. You're just going to get lost in the noise. You're going to get lost in the sauce.
 Um, I love that because it's so, so interesting because hearing you say that and thinking about what I hear out of like business people and like things that I read and like e-commerce is no longer a different share.
 And I think a lot of businesses are still in that mindset of, yeah, but we have a, we're going to, we're going to have our stuff online.
 Yeah. Like nodding. Look, they want acceptance that that side differentiates every industry.
 Really? You are? Okay. Wow. You're going to sell a lot more.
 You know, I'm thinking like the Elf movie and like, uh, like, uh, thinking back to, uh, uh, to them like, yeah, sure.
 All right, gum balls and, and yeah, like, wow. Wow. Okay. Uh, really differentiated. You're, you can sell online. Okay. I could be selling t-shirts at five minutes on Shopify.
 Yeah. So, uh, again, thinking about what I would almost drill down that to online omnichannel.
 So forever, uh, we thought of omnichannel was integration of offline and online.
 I think what we're seeing here is in 21, there's going to be an expectation for consumers and a need for brands to be omnichannel in their online approaches.
 What I mean by that is that exactly what you just said, synergy across those platforms.
 Okay. So what do I mean for a real life example?
 One of the key trends we talk about soup, I will be bringing up is social selling.
 But again, your social experience with your online experience, with your chat experience, your products, your services, your communications across all digital being integrated.
 And having a cohesive experience for the customer. Yes.
 Because what happens now in a lot of instances, yes, it's still disconnected offline and online.
 But in this world where the digital genie isn't going back in the ball and consumers are shopping you across these channels and experiencing your brand.
 If you don't have a digital integrated approach, you're going to be left behind.
 Right.
 And you're already behind.
 Yeah. But I think you're going to see budgets have already started to head this way with digital ads and stuff, which is where you kind of want with this beginning.
 But the brands that really kind of get it together for having the right hand talk to the left across all of these channels.
 I mean it's both internally and externally.
 Yeah.
 Because a lot of what happens is disconnect.
 And I've seen this because having worked with the brands we work with now and brands I've worked with in the past.
 The disconnect connection of all of these parts is so apparent because I even like five years ago working with a brand I won't even name.
 How just disparate these parts.
 Well, that's with the online team.
 Like the brand team.
 That's the online team.
 We're talking about the digital team.
 Like I'm the brand team.
 Like how is this the same company?
 The same company work for the same place.
 So we're selling the same.
 What's the goal here?
 Well, we're trying to sell more of these.
 Well, I'm what we're trying to do.
 We're trying to get more service contract.
 Okay.
 All right.
 That's the goal.
 These all have to talk to each other.
 Yes.
 And I think with COVID it exponentially increasing the online channels.
 The expectation for those things to really live brave and act together is going to be really important.
 And I think, you know, I'm going to say it now.
 Linear TV is DEAD.
 Dead.
 Yes.
 Dead is a door now.
 And I'm just going to say it right now and somebody listening to me and I said media plan of friends in New York that I want a TV and I get it.
 But it's dead.
 It has, it is, if you have more than 10% of your budget in linear TV, it's in the wrong place.
 Yeah.
 That is your, your exclamation point trend there.
 And that should be a trend on its own.
 But I've been saying because here's the deal.
 And I will say this.
 We were talking about like what's changed even 18 months ago.
 I wouldn't have said that.
 Yeah.
 But people now, even when they're home, unless you're like 60 plus, there is linear TV is not being watched.
 I was 18 months ago.
 I was watching news in linear TV.
 I'm 43 years old and I'm a digital agency.
 But I don't do it anymore.
 And I don't know exactly what changed.
 And I have cable TV still at home.
 I watch sports only on it.
 That's it.
 That's the only time I watch linear TV.
 And I don't know what's changed, but something in my own habits have changed.
 And the need for people to realize that that digital, that everything needs.
 And I even, you know, hesitate sometimes of putting word digital in front of it because it's really just where marketing and eyeballs are today.
 Yeah.
 I think that brings a kind of extended, extended trend of advertising approach is with that being dead.
 You need to stop thinking of ads as commercials.
 Yes.
 Like they are, like you are going to digital channels with different placements and different looks.
 Stop making a 30 second TV commercial, try to work on Instagram.
 It's not going to be the same.
 That's exactly right.
 But and I think kind of going back, like when you are making these things, you're going to make, you're going to be making a lot different,
 a lot more formats, a lot different placements.
 But you're going to have the same key brand messaging of like you want to find that key pillar.
 Maybe a couple of supportive things, but it's all going to work across all your channels.
 Like you have to differentiate, differentiate yourself online.
 Otherwise you're going nowhere.
 And like you can try to be all things to all the people and like, oh, we do everything.
 We do it all.
 But like I think it's more effective way more effective when you're honest and you say we do this, but we're not for this.
 If you're looking for this, we like are probably not your best bet.
 And I've seen a lot of like new companies kind of do that really well.
 And like unless you've got that Coca-Cola ad spin that those massive budgets and you can spend a few hundred thousand dollars a month,
 you need to focus on what you can actually do.
 Yep, I love it.
 All right, I'm just going to tee up number two.
 So I put you on the spot for number one.
 And that was a broad one for sure for us.
 But number two for me and might be what I think 2021 to me is going to be the year of social selling.
 I think I've talked about this in previous episodes a little bit.
 But we've reached this plateau of demand with capability across the channels.
 And the ability to do what we just talked about with number one, which was integrate the experiences.
 Because it was so clunky before on Instagram or Facebook, like, you know, 17 clicks later.
 And I still don't have, you know, I haven't bought anything yet.
 Combined with how the interactivity within the content itself.
 And but you finally got the platforms figuring it out.
 I think you're going to see you've got the Shopify integration with TikTok.
 I think TikTok's app platform is going to continue to evolve quickly.
 I think so it's a matter of time where you're going to see direct buying within the platform.
 They're already linked with Shopify.
 So there's some integration already there.
 But I think you're going to see this.
 And I even lump into this, you know, it's a really large category.
 But even the influencer marketing within social and the ability to buy and purchase within that whole loop.
 I think all of these things are coming to a head here in 2021.
 So I see social selling, you know, if it's anywhere from, you know, eight to 15% of your overall e-com.
 I see it double tripling, easily being potentially 30% or more of the overall online buying pie for brands that do this well and leverage the platforms correctly.
 Yeah, I agree.
 And I think I see this a lot with kind of the like the side hustlers.
 Like I see a lot of like young college age students doing this where they're running businesses exclusively online.
 Like exclusively on like social media, not even they won't even have a website.
 It'll be just Instagram where they can do the tagable shopping.
 And I've seen it seems like a lot of like people doing side hustlers are utilizing it even more quickly than big brands are.
 And they're going, it's like going really well for them because there's other, they'll like integrate with Etsy and other things.
 They'll never have like an actual website, but they'll make a lot of money for it.
 I had some friends jump on that in college a few years ago and like one dude paid his rent and like put a down payment on a house just from doing like a few hours a week.
 When like you'd see massive e-commerce brands, not even like testing out anything.
 It's like you this is like there's money to be made here.
 These new platforms like you kind of have to like get with the program a little bit not be this like slow moving like wait till it picks up.
 Like if you want to be cutting edge, you have to do it.
 This is why the D to C brands are killing the major brands just to ultimately get bought by the big brands.
 Right.
 It's the nimbleness of leveraging these things fast enough.
 You know, that's what it is.
 It's like a slow bus to China.
 Like it's like it for those of us in the U.S.
 And if you're coming from China, China to U.S.
 Probably need a boat.
 So maybe not a bus.
 But nonetheless, it's just like, oh, let's get it so funny.
 Like we had James Gregson who's with Lego.
 One of the creative directors really got talking.
 And he was even admitting, you know, for Lego, like getting that bus rolling.
 You know, like how slow it can be.
 Like they try to be on the advance of things.
 But it does like stall innovation.
 Yeah.
 Just the red tape that's involved with the larger brands.
 And integrating some of these things while the D to C companies and the quick on young entrepreneurs can like, you know,
 they're on TikTok doing videos and selling stuff on their econ store within two days.
 Yeah.
 And it takes even the largest best brands in the world.
 Two months.
 And it used to take two years.
 But now they're doing it two months and they've gotten better.
 But it's like some of these trends come and go faster than you can.
 But leveraging social selling.
 I do think that B2B has got to find the car out there niche in this.
 Yes.
 I think you're going to see what you've got to make it easier for businesses to do business with you online three commerce and leveraging the aspect of social selling in some way.
 I think the businesses that figure this out will really win in 21.
 Yes.
 Absolutely.
 Like you've got to be able to transition from no trade shows and also like the webinar is kind of overplayed at this point.
 Having the social channels and doing the social selling creates this like perfect hub of content for people to go to on their own time instead of trying to schedule out a webinar that's just going to get a meeting like scheduled over.
 Totally agree.
 So social selling big on the 21 trends because opportunity is finally meeting capability along with demand.
 And so that's going to be a big one.
 Let's talk Josh, you know, just for the sake of numbering we'll call it number three.
 But I think it's as much a trend or an observation thing like cookie lists.
 Yes.
 So starting in 2022, Google some of the other platforms Apple and other party like started in integrate this, but there's going to be no more cookie retargeting.
 So I'm going to ask you to kind of give anyone the listening that might be, you know, not I won't even say digitally deprived, but they may not be in it every day.
 Maybe give everyone a broad understanding of what that what both what the how the cookie, how the cookie crumbles literally.
 It's crumbling.
 It is crumbling.
 But the impact of this and really what it's doing today.
 So like how is the cookie used today and what the impact of that going away might be and then we can both kind of chime in on what we see coming out of that.
 Yeah.
 So the cookie and its broadest form.
 There's been minor updates and stuff is close to 20 years old and technology wise.
 And it has a shelf life.
 That's why they call it a cookie.
 It's a small little thing and it deteriorates.
 So like 30, 60, 90 days out, it goes away.
 It doesn't taste as good.
 Yeah, it doesn't taste as good.
 So they're going to get you a fresh cookie.
 The cookie is really like really effective because whenever you whenever you go to a site and whenever you go like check out a product, check out a service, like watch a video, go anywhere online or like do your ad to cart start a check out process.
 These cookies are collecting data and they're saving it to your browser, whether on your phone, your computer, sometimes they're interconnected.
 And nowadays you can even do it through connected TV platforms and like video game platforms like Xbox, PS4, Roku, like smart TVs.
 So this is all collecting data to for a number of reasons.
 One, it's going to collect your behavioral stuff.
 So like what you're interested to in.
 So your ads and social ads are going to be more curated to match what you are interested in just based off your browsing behavior.
 And keep in mind like what you're what you're searching is signaling the computers.
 So it might not be guessing exactly what you're into, but so this is really important for small brands who are trying to reconnect with people who are like
 started the checkout process, but kind of abandoned it at some point.
 Like this gives you the cookie gay people the ability to send them more ads later, the retargeting ads, and do follow up emails and stuff.
 And a lot of marketers have kind of started leaning into their targeting and not their messaging to where it's just kind of an okay message of like,
 oh, we'll provide this service for you.
 And it's but it's highly targeted so it's reaching the right people.
 Now that's going away.
 So now you're going to bound to the social selling using the platforms you have your content creation, but you're going to be a lot more limited on targeting.
 Like Apple Facebook put out a notification to all like ads manager users where they said the apples already with their newest update is going to severely limit cookie use.
 And so a lot of iPhone users, which is a lot of people, you're not going to be able to retarget them nearly as well as you could.
 So that means like machine learning optimization is out like AI driven like stuff is out.
 So you can't you can't optimize for purchases.
 You now have to optimize for a higher funnel thing like optimizing for clicks.
 I know a lot that kind of like it's not going to be like useful to a lot of people unless you're in like manager like ads platforms.
 But for those of you are like, I think it's time to really kind of reflect where are your ads going.
 Like is it doesn't make sense contextually like you want to think of your consumer.
 I want to think about what your ad is saying is it different form is it standing out from the feed.
 I don't think we're still kind of seeing how it's going to affect geographical targeting.
 I know Facebook's really fighting that because if we take away geographical targeting then only the massive like national brands with the major budgets will be able to be seen.
 And your mom and pop stores with a few thousand dollars or a few hundred dollars ad spend are going to be like shove down the feed and they might be showing up three states over.
 For anyone listening does this mean that will you be able to retarget.
 So if I'm a if I'm a company and today you know you place a pixel on your website that again tracks you know the behavior and all those things will people will be able to retarget people that come to your site.
 Some some will it will depend on your website.
 It will depend on your browser and your platform like if you're on Google Chrome versus Safari it's going to depend on how much apples allow you to do versus how much Google is going to let you do.
 There is a lot of promise where there is a lot of like native kind of like the wall gardens kind of have a lot of safety measures put in place for their own self of like a Facebook embedded site is going to be able to retarget like on Facebook and Instagram.
 But I think a lot of the potentially a lot of the crossed of like cross channel targeting is going to be lost.
 But I think but like general web visits are going to be pretty targetable but you're probably going to lose a lot of the finite capabilities on certain platforms.
 And that's kind of where it's kind of up in the air where it's like they say it's ending for some people some platforms are rolling out like the end way sooner.
 Some are waiting till later and they're really kind of ambiguous on what's going to be allowed and allowed and there's already some like beta testing of new like alternative to the cookie.
 But we it's kind of like up in the air of is there something that's going to be effective develop fast enough or are we going to lose everything altogether for the sake of I guess like internet.
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 and they were in depth and an advantage.
 their advantage.
 is easier and not have to rely on cookies too.
 And I think the relationship part is a huge thing
 because if you, I always like to think of
 with the internet and like keeping the relationships
 and your messaging worthwhile and like making it memorable,
 you kind of have to treat it as being like your neighborhood
 mom and pop hangout spot of like,
 they're gonna know like if you go in there regular enough,
 like they're gonna know your name,
 they're gonna be able to call you if they like
 need something, they'll ask for your feedback,
 you're gonna be a loyal customer to them
 and you're gonna build that relationship over time.
 Like you kind of wanna approach digital in a similar way
 if like you wanna collect their information,
 stay in touch with them, get the feedback
 because they're your customer,
 like they're gonna teach you a different perspective
 of like what they need for solutions,
 like how they can improve your product and stuff.
 Kind of like your super fan, you wanna leverage
 the people closest to you who are like regularly
 or interacting and have the experience.
 Love it.
 Finally, we're gonna trim this down to four key trends.
 I think that's enough, we got a lot of in depth here.
 Let's talk about content changes, you know, trends,
 you know, content development, you know,
 how businesses should speak to their customers,
 the changes in the formats, all of those things,
 but maybe kind of our broad blanket kind of trends
 and content changes for 21, where would you start?
 I think starting would be looping back
 to what we kind of touched on earlier
 is the clarity and the honesty of,
 and when I say like honest,
 like you wanna be truthful with your honesty
 and not just be sincere,
 there was a lot of brands this year with COVID,
 a lot of political movements,
 a lot of like social political stuff,
 they were being very, like sincere
 and they're what they were saying,
 what they were putting on their social feeds,
 but they weren't being necessarily honest of like,
 not every brand is a social justice warrior.
 There was plenty of brands and a lot of them got exposed
 of like really trying to visually look diverse,
 like visually stand for diversity,
 like if you look at the Bon Appetit,
 like example, like they were having,
 they had a huge YouTube channel
 and they tried to promote different cultures of food,
 all these things and turns out for the video placements,
 only their white like cooks were being paid
 for the video stuff, they all had salaries,
 but the white chefs were getting paid extra
 for their video appearances,
 while everyone else was not.
 So it's stuff like, and they were trying to post about
 like other like current events and stuff,
 it's kind of like you need to,
 like people kind of see through the BS of like online
 and that's kind of like,
 the internet brings a lot of like transparency,
 like I think if you're going to stand for something online,
 you need to like fully do it throughout your whole company.
 And that's where I think it is okay to not stand for something,
 like you can,
 you don't have to come out and take a huge public stance
 on every single thing that goes on.
 That's not utilizing your social channels well
 and it's not gonna set you up for success
 because people are gonna,
 like people are gonna smell that out sooner or later.
 And just kind of like messes up,
 like it kind of just, you fall into the noise,
 like only I think brands need to become more focused
 and they're messaging and more kind of self-aware
 and honest of like we do this
 and this is what we're good at and we're for these people.
 I think if you can stick to that,
 you're kind of golden.
 Where it's like that.
 Prevents a lot of, it prevents a lot of issues
 and it prevents a lot of like confusion and like misleads
 to even like in a practical sense of sales.
 I think it's just, you know, brands mass marketing,
 it's kind of over.
 I mean, you know, like if there's one like takeaway
 from maybe all of these things, it's like mass is dead.
 I think like it's gotta be personal,
 it's gotta mean something, you gotta be relevant,
 you gotta be real, you gotta have it all tied together
 and you'll win, there's enough consumers
 and there's enough scale that if you do that,
 you know, like I think this these days of like,
 I mean, don't give me wrong Amazon
 who has all things wrong people
 because they aggregate, they're a curator,
 it's a little different, but like as a brand or as an entity,
 you need to hone in on who your audience is
 and speaking to them more clearly than how all things
 for everyone.
 Yeah, I agree.
 I think when you look into like,
 I guess culturally speaking of Gen Z and Millennial
 like thinking, we're kind of,
 we're not even kind of like we are in a,
 what people are calling the post post modernism
 or they refer, like there's all these concepts of like
 the new Dada movement, it's like new sincerity,
 it's just kind of this hyper honest like,
 like they're kind of given up on society,
 it's kind of, if you kind of do some,
 I would recommend doing some googling on the original,
 like Dada movement and like,
 think about the, I said it before,
 just absurd, like absurdism, yes.
 Where it's just kind of like, nothing matters,
 but to sum it up is like, society isn't matter,
 like all this like separate brand entity kind of thing,
 it doesn't really, it's not real,
 like we're just people who are doing things.
 I think that's a great approach in messaging of like,
 when you're on an ad, like people know you're in an ad,
 like you can be honest as a,
 we're a company trying to sell you something,
 but we're a team of people who know about this thing
 and we're here to help you,
 who needs help with this thing,
 we will do it at a fair exchange of like,
 we can help you for this much money.
 I think people who are really jumping into that well,
 like Ryan Reynolds, if you look at his ads,
 he's like, he will get in a video and say,
 hi, this is an ad, I make gin, buy this gin,
 I would really like you to try it.
 And it's just kind of like, there's no,
 like even there's like a lot of really funny commercials
 like that where it's like, it's super self-aware.
 Yeah, you've seen even ATT did that with like their latest ad,
 who used to do, it used to be called
 Word of Mouth Advertising,
 like you've seen the commercial
 with the girl that's been their ad's last few years,
 you know, she's like, I mean there,
 and at the end, it's like semi okay, you know,
 but I thought that was the best part of it was like that,
 real self-realization of this is really a TV commercial.
 I think it honestly, if you really think about it,
 it kind of makes things easier, it takes the pressure off
 of like, if I remember like starting to get into branding
 and stuff and like, I was around 2008 to 2010
 when everyone's like, you don't need a solely the brand.
 Your graphic has to look perfect,
 your fonts have to be pristine.
 And now it's like, man, just make the website work,
 like give me the place to like email or call someone
 and like, just tell me what your product does,
 I don't care what, I don't care what your site looks like.
 There's just so much noise out there.
 I think if you're just simple and you're like,
 this is what we, again, I've said this
 throughout the whole thing is like,
 this is who we are, we're a bunch of people
 who know how to do this thing,
 we'll help you either get this product or do this.
 People buy into that, people like to have,
 people like to buy into other people,
 people will support others.
 And we've seen that a lot this year of supporting small businesses,
 supporting groups of people who are just trying to do their business.
 And that's it.
 I think, you know, back to, and, you know,
 I'm maybe going to say it out loud,
 Riley, this is going to be, you know,
 like our headline for this, you know, whole thing, mass.
 And maybe it's less that linear TV is dead
 and it's mass marketing is dead.
 Yeah, you know, like I won't pick on just linear TV,
 but these mass channels where look, I get it,
 you want reach and you want frequency,
 but it's perceived region.
 It's, you can, you can drive up the frequency,
 but it's perceived reach because unless it's,
 and I know there's like night,
 unless it's like nightly news,
 like I can understand ads on nightly news
 and I can add ads on the Super Bowl.
 Totally makes sense because you get the reach.
 There's just no other reach that you can get like that.
 So I get it, but you're going to have a trouble
 getting the frequency that you need
 because Super Bowl is only once a year.
 A lot of these sporting events have gotten so splintered too.
 Yeah, with attention and everything.
 So it's embracing, not being overwhelmed
 by all the channels, but finding your channels
 and getting reach and frequency there,
 leveraging influencers and all these things
 and like leaning into the realities of now
 instead of being scared of the realities now.
 Because right now it could be scared of, it's hell.
 Like holy shit, there's, we got 37 channels
 that we could be marketing and I even found them this
 sometimes it's like, oh God, I got YouTube,
 Facebook view, we've got TikTok.
 I'll be like, how all these channels?
 Lean into where your customers are
 and be real open and honest with them
 and build a community.
 Like build a community.
 Like if you want long term business,
 you have to build a community and provide a place
 where like 90 people can come together, share knowledge,
 learn from you and it will generate
 revenue the long term.
 Yes, I think we've said this in meetings before,
 we're marketing to people, we're not,
 like I live in the analytic side,
 like I'm staring at numbers all day
 but these are people viewing things and interacting.
 Yep.
 And that your messaging needs to reflect that
 and your whole approach needs to.
 B to H, business to human.
 Yes.
 Yes, it's humanity wins every time.
 But humanity at the highest level
 but then heavily sprinkled with relevancy
 and specificity around what you are selling,
 who is buying it, why they're buying it,
 why it's important to them,
 why like you've mentioned before,
 like, yeah, it's great you have an offer
 but why do I care, how do we make that relevant to them?
 Yeah.
 And I think that's gotta go throughout your content
 in 2021.
 Yeah, absolutely.
 Mass marketing is dead.
 Mass marketing is dead.
 There's room, but there is room for you.
 Like just be...
 That's the thing, that's what people,
 you know, the boardroom gets scared
 hearing terms like that because they want,
 you know, more revenue but the pie can be big enough
 and you can create sub-seg bits of your offering
 to a cross-thing.
 Differentiation can be scary.
 Of like, you're seeing the monkey do,
 or monkey see, monkey don't, I guess,
 like monkey see, monkey do something else.
 Yes.
 But brands are doing it well
 and there's room for you to be different.
 Yeah, I love it.
 Cool, so there are your marketing trends for 2021.
 We hope that is helpful.
 We continue to drive what I think is one
 of the best marketing podcasts in the country
 and really appreciate your insights Josh.
 Oh yeah, happy, happy to get my insights.
 Are the outsights now?
 Yeah, the outsights are now.
 My insights are now outsights are outsights.
 Cool, we hope everyone has a great 2021
 whether you're listening to this pre-holidays
 or post-holidays, keep listening along.
 You can follow us at all times at theradcast.com
 or on Instagram at d.rad.cast
 and anywhere else you get your social content
 or content in general, you can find the radcast.
 And we'll see you next time, bye.
 Yo, guys, what's up, Ryan Alfred here.
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