Magic In Marketing

Disruption is one business trend overarching most others right now.

- Alan Deans

Retailers are threatened by the looming arrival of Amazon. TV and print media are being savaged by Facebook and Google. Batteries are the death knell for the internal combustion engines in the cars we drive, and fintech start-ups are unleashing technologies to cannibalise banks. The opportunities are enormous for those embracing the trend.

Marketing is no different. Lauren Fried is an adviser and business strategist who describes her agency, Pulse Collective, as dedicated to growing entrepreneurial businesses. Those causing all this upheaval need help, and there’s no doubt those suffering at the hands of disruption do too. Fried is perhaps best known for her sharp insights as a panellist on the ABC’s advertising-focused TV show Gruen. “There is confusion,” Fried says of the new marketing world. “Chief marketing officers most likely are dealing with a PR company, a content company, a social agency, a creative agency, a marketing agency and might be offshoring some work with digital and a media buyer.

Their role is to keep all the balls in the air. Imagine having to do eight meetings each week with different agencies just to update you about the same thing. It is chaos. Being in a marketing role is really hard. You are meant to know a bit about everything. If I went on holidays for six months, there would be so much change in the digital landscape that I would have to get back on top of. It is changing rapidly.”

Advertising agencies once dominated – think Don Draper in the TV series