I was reading a Wharton article(http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/
article.cfm?articleid=1892) on why marketers arent moving into the online space. It is indeed interesting to note that marketers spend 22% of their advertising dollars on TV and only 6% online. The time spent online is 14 hours per week and the time spent watching tv is the same then why the bias towards offline media?

I think the major aspect that prevents marketers from going online lies in the way the web has evolved. From being a resource of information,it has become a participative medium and a platform for discussions and reviews. Marketers are scared that they might have to give up control if they allow the community to define their brand.

I feel this thought is totally unnecessary. If you look at traditional advertising methods such as Tv and print advertising, you only delay the participation of the community. Take for example, a brand like the Maruti Suzuki Versa launches itself amidst a slew of ads both on the print and the TV medium. It uses superstars like Abhishek Bacchhan and Amitabh Bacchan and spends a sufficient amount of ad dollars on the same. The result : expectations get higher but the product turns out to be a damp squib. The launch of the car beholds the participation of the community and as word of mouth(through offline and online media) spreads the sales dip and keep dipping.

In an online advertising campaign the results would obviously have been the same. You cannot save a bad product. However precious ad spending dollars could have been saved. A video upload of the same ad on a You Tube or placed on a well targeted microsite or widgets and ads placed contextually would have given Maruti greater coverage and savings. Participation through blogs and forums catering to the automobile world would have given them a feel of what the consumer needs. Add to that the mechanism of instant feedback and you exactly know where your product is. The greatest advantage : you know exactly why your product failed or succeeded and you have metrics to analyze the same.

Participating in Web 2.0 and making use of the technologies that enable it gives you certain advantages that an offline advertising campaign can never give. Some of the advantages would be:

• Instant Feedback
• Portrayal of a brand image that is willing to evolve
• Portrayal of a brand image that is willing to take feedback constructively.
• Measurement of the success of the brand
• Contextual targeting
• Behavioral targeting

The web having become a strong medium of communication also allows one to measure the success of an offline campaign as well. Blog posts,comments,forum posts,the sentiment being reflected,all of these can be measured online. I think marketers need to or would be forced to look at the realm of Online Marketing. With the web emerging as the social media it is one channel that no marketer can afford to ignore.