... And the Clients Went Wild!: How Savvy Professionals Win All the Business They Want

Chapter 15. Traditional Marketing Still Works

TV and Cable Advertising, Newspaper, and Other Mediums that Still Cause People to Buy

When I make the claim that "traditional marketing still works," it's important that I begin by distinguishing between the tools that are used to convey messages—radio, television, newspapers, magazines, billboards, and so forth—and the way these tools are used to deliver messages.

Yes, the traditional tools are still effective, but the ways you can use them have vastly changed. In their book entitled Punk Marketing, authors Richard Laermer and Mark Simmons waste no time describing the revolution that has taken place. Published in 2007, the book's prologue begins with the following: "The relationship that consumers have with brands has gone through a seismic shift over the past few years, and a new approach to marketing is long overdue.. . .Smart marketers and all of us businesspeople who rely on marketing realized with a jolt that all was not right in this ever-branded world we paid mightily to live in."

Laermer and Simmons define the term "punk marketing" as "a new form of marketing that rejects the status quo and recognizes the shift in power from corporations to consumers." Technology has indeed given consumers a voice and options they never had before. For instance, an acquaintance of mine who's a devoted hockey fan no longer watches the games on live television. Instead, he records them and watches them later without commercials—in less than half ...