The Times They Are A-Changin’

Bob Dylan’s song would make an appropriate anthem for business today. This is not the time for complacency or the status quo in marketing. Communication technologies and realities are reshaping commerce rapidly. You can either harness these changes to shape your organization’s future, or ignore the upheaval and cast your fate to the wind. I’d suggest the former. Pete Blackshaw does a great job of articulating this marketingquake and its implications in his story on ClickZ. The epicenter of this marketingquake is clearly the Web. CMOs and others in marketing would do well to take note of his observations.

As he points out, leaders will be needed because in every paradigm shift, tough visionary people are required to lead the timid, reluctant, stubborn, complacent, unknowing and the comfortable into the new territory. Blackshaw’s observations are an evolution of what started as a prescient communication manifesto authored by Doc Searls, Christopher Locke, Rick Levine, and David Weinberger. There is a new marketing terra firma to explore; a new communication language to learn. What many mistakenly consider today’s marketing alternatives are, in fact, already de facto marketing imperatives. Empower this shift in your company if you want to move into high gear.

As I noted in another post, many marketers want The Easy Button. There isn’t an easy button, but Blackshaw at least suggests some “low-hanging fruit” in his article that makes it easier for marketers to partake of these new opportunities. Bon appétit!