Agile marketing and communication – our Iterative world
“Real artist ship
…and then you refine, refine and refine yet again.”
The way we work have changed over the past years, and rightfully so, towards a more iterative and agile way of working. Everything from technology to building a brand is effected. The primary driver behind this is a more democratic (if I may call it that) landscape changed by the tools available by the “digital industry” and a limitless imagination, tenacity and passion of the individual with an idea.
And thats one of the reasons I really love working with digital strategy and business development. There is always something new and creative around any corner that you can use to create user/customer and business value.
Both the advertising industry and the more creative agency industry is effected by this change. Long gone are the days of “project” thinking. Now you see a tighter client-agency collaborations that are more on an ongoing basis with regular evaluation points, rather then project basis.
First you discover, then you do an prototype (either it be a pilot marketing initiative or a first draft for an app), which you evaluate and which results becomes an embryo that you then refine, draw conclusions from and add more complex layers upon as time and discovery goes on.
Here are a few examples of what I mean:
Advertising – has changes from a campaign mindset to an ongoing activities that are optimized based on results discovery. Usually something that effects everything within your digital ecosystem. Now advertising is focusing on the customers existing needs and world views, rather than trying to create a new need.
Building a website – now companies are more focused on building an online presence. Where a study in customer behaviour and needs to become relevant. Each digital touch point are today a member of a company 24/7 sales department and your company hub for advertising and proving what value you add for a potential customer as well as positioning your brand all day, everyday, any day.
Building a brand – now days it’s likely that customers define what a brand are more then a company define what their brand are. Hence you can start with an embryo idea then you see what happens, reactions, investigate data, and refine the experience, from a logo to the story as long as you have a core idea. All you need is a foundation to build from. And for a more old-school perspective this can be the hard part. If you don’t beta launch now, chances are that someone else will. (To elaborate what I mean I have added a case with twitter below).
Customers – social media and the digital space has changed the expectations on a company and brand. From the way companies offer their service to advertising. It’s now more customer centric and rightfully so.
Information – with the vast amounts of data available today, companies need to be agile and work with iterations, launch, test and refine.
Technology – there are new features invented and released then I can even care to google. Hence why a smaller launch, that one can build from is more likely to succeed as the digital landscape evolves everyday. (Uber and AirBnB are relevant cases here)
The iterative case of twitter.
This is what twitter looked like in 2006
Then this version launched somewhere around 2007 or so:
2008 twitter looked like this:
2011:
2016 (today)
Summary:
- Start small – with a core
- Launch, evaluate and discover
- Change and add
- Launch again
- Repeat from step 2
It’s easier to criticise something then to create something.
Image collage by: flowtoolz.com
The rest of the images for twitter I’ve grabbed from a Google Image Search, and the 2016 screen grabs I’ve taken myself. Feel free to use them.