Brand Communication

After the rough and tumble year of 2009, I am still receiving holiday greetings from unemployed colleagues who used to be full up with national and international work in advertising. My friends range from advertising agency broadcast producers and creative directors in the car industry (yikes!) to international agency HR directors to agency account executives. Notice the common word "agency" as in "advertising agency". There will always be the need for persuasive brand communication...yet I wonder if the classic advertising agency is the model for the future. Most smart marketers we work with at Element Three are looking for integrated marketing across all their brand communications, whether that is advertising, social networking, events marketing, product or package design or service delivery. When you define yourself as being able to deliver only one-way messages rather than an entire brand experience, it's no doubt that things have dried up. On the other hand, folks who can deliver integrated marketing seem to be on the recovery side of the recession–and rightly so.

What's your experience?