The document discusses the future of advertising and how businesses need to adapt to changing consumer behaviors. It argues that consumers now do most of their research online before contacting salespeople. As a result, businesses need to build strong digital presences to engage consumers early in their buying journeys. The document advocates that businesses focus on lead generation through content marketing, digital distribution channels, and marketing automation tools to reach consumers when they are researching and educate them. It outlines Morris Communications' plans to invest heavily in its digital sales team and lead generation strategies to adapt to these shifts in the advertising industry.

1. INFLECTION POINT
The future of advertising is now. Will we make the turn?
Steve Gray
VP of Strategy and Innovation
Morris Communications

2. Reframing
• New facts or old facts in a new light
• Clarifies priorities
• Shows new paths forward
• Reframe the future of advertising
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3. The digital tool department
• SEM
• SEO
• Targeting
• Retargeting
• Ad optimization
• Social media
• Video
• Reputation management
• Email
• Native advertising
• Content marketing
• Big Data
• Programmatic advertising
• Lead generation
• Marketing automation
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• The tool department at Sears
• Tool guys love it – I don’t
• Neither does our industry

4. The digital treadmill
• A struggle to:
• Learn them
• Sell them
• Fulfill them
• More tools all the time
• More competitors all the time – calling in our markets
• Our tools have to be at least as good as theirs
• We have to be better than they are
• If this is the future, we really could use some reframing
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5. Infinitesimal era:
Word of mouth
1440: Invention
of movable type
Gradual rise of
literacy
1605: The
Relation – first
“newspaper”
News
Virtually all
human
knowledge
1906: First radio
broadcast
1928: First
TV station
c. 5,000 B.C.:
Emergence
of writing
400 years 50?150 yrsc. 6,000 years (truncated)
c. 200,000
years
Pre-media
Infinite mediaMass
media
1991/93: Creation
of World Wide
Web and Mosaic
browser
1840s: “Penny Press”
leads to invention of
the rotary press
Reframing the big picture
Forever
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6. Reframing buying behavior
Adapted from https://www.marketo.com/lead-generation/
Today,buyersdotheirownresearchonline,findingavarietyof
educationalresourcesthroughsearchengines,socialmedia,andother
onlinechannels.Throughvastavailablecontentresources,today’s
buyerscanlearnagreatdealaboutaproductorservicebeforeever
speakingtoasalesperson. Soeachbusinessmustmakesurethat
itbuildsitsdigitalpresence.
Thishasproducedahugechangeinthetraditionalbuyingprocess. In
fact,accordingtoForrester,buyersmaybeanywherefromtwo-thirdsto
90%ofthewaythroughtheirbuyingjourneybeforetheyreachoutto
thevendor.Thisishappeningmoreandmorebecausebuyershaveso
muchaccesstoinformationthattheycandelaytalkingtosalesuntil
theyarevirtuallyexpertsthemselves.
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7. What every business needs
• Be seen when the buyer is looking
• Engage and impress the buyer
• Educate, inform, entertain
• Not just once – at the right times, with the right content
• Trigger a contact from the buyer
Then the buyer becomes a lead –
And that’s what the business really needs

8. Lead gen: One ring to rule them all
CONTENT
• “Content marketing”
• Websites
• Landing pages
• Articles
• White papers (Marketo piece)
• Blogs
• Social media
• Reputation management
• Videos
• Contests, questionnaires,
puzzles, games
• Email
DISTRIBUTION
• Big Data
• SEM
• Targeting
• Retargeting
• Programmatic advertising
• Ad optimization
• Native advertising
• Email
PROGRAM MANAGEMENT
• Marketing automation

9. Drinking the Kool-Aid
Why Morris is getting serious about lead gen:
• Tripling, then quadrupling our digital sales reps
• 100 calls or door pulls to get one presentation
• Too inefficient, too expensive, too demoralizing
• “That’s the way we’ve always done it”
Learn for ourselves, then lead the way
Summarizing….
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10. Self-education funnel
• www.marketo.com/lead-generation/
• www.marketo.com/
• www.hubspot.com/
• www.sharpspring.com/
• www.mediareset.com
Steve Gray
steve.gray@morris.com
(706) 823-3593
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