Is YouTube in Your Marketing Future? July 09, 2007 Marketers not ready to give conumers the power just yet
By Victor Van Valen
Contrary to its rapid popularity growth in the consumer sector, consumer generated media (CGM) is not considered by marketers to be an important asset to their marketing platforms. According to the recently released 5th annual PRWeek/Manning Selvage & Lee Marketing Management Survey, only 12 percent of senior marketers report that CGM—which includes activities like online social networking, YouTube video uploading and consumer generated advertising—is essential to their marketing platforms.
The survey asked U.S. chief marketing officers, VPs of marketing and marketing directors and managers to rate the importance of adding CGM to their marketing platform. It found that most respondents (44.5 percent) felt CGM was only somewhat important and 14 percent claimed CGM was not important at all. Only 12 percent of respondents actually reported that CGM was very important to their marketing platforms.
The study indicates that while marketers are aware of the marketing power consumers possess, most still have apprehensions about giving consumers that sort of control.
"These marketers basically address the consumer empowerment trend by using Web sites to get consumer feedback," says MS&L global chief executive officer Mark Hass."This raises the issue of whether or not marketers really understand the concept of new media and CGM. Marketers who think that using a Web site, or asking for consumer feedback on a web site, represent cutting-edge new media tactics are missing tremendous opportunities to build their brands," Hass says.
At a time when social media venues like Facebook and YouTube are at the peak of consumer usage and popularity, marketers could possibly be passing up extremely useful opportunities to truly connect with their customers.
But there are legitimate reasons for marketers' apprehensions about CGM, which include:
*No clear ROI: 32 percent *Consumers become to close: 6 percent * 33 percent gave various other reasons such as lack of managerial support, not currently a company priority and inability to make decision-makers understand how CGM works.
Ultimately, the results in their entirety suggest that a lack of understanding of new media techniques--and how they can build brands—is the main cause for CGM's low ranking on many marketing platforms.
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