UK marketers face engagement problem

LONDON: Marketers across the UK believe the lack of major events, popular disinterest in advertising and the declining trust in brands are the main obstacles they must overcome in 2013, a study has found.

A poll of 500 client-side executives by the empty13 Group, a forum run by Bite Communications, showed 33% saw the absence of occasions to rival the Royal Wedding, the Queen's Jubilee or Olympics Games as posing the biggest challenge of next year.

Elsewhere, 31% of interviewees afforded such a status to the noticeable "apathy" towards advertising and marketing, and 24% mentioned falling confidence in brands among consumers.

The additional problems facing the sector included an inability to deliver fully integrated campaigns, cited by 80% of interviewees.

More broadly, some 38% of contributors agreed the media and marketing industries are not currently organised to effectively engage consumers.

When asked to rate the most important media channels in 2013, exactly 25% of participants named social media, while 13% pointed to the web as a whole, and 12% referenced games consoles. Mobile scored 5% on this metric.

When it came to budgeting, around a third of the firms represented by the panel were likely to increase their expenditure on television ads and digital campaigns next year.

By contrast, 58% of those polled did not expect to raise their outlay on press advertising, suggesting the difficult trading conditions facing this channel in the recent past may not improve in the near future.

"This survey confirms both the pace of change in brands' marketing budgets, and the need for marketers to remain ever vigilant on changing consumer behaviour," said Alex DeGroote, a media analyst at Panmure Gordon.

"Rapid growth in usage across all digital platforms, including social media, will help drive important budget decisions, particularly with prospects for 2013 remaining sluggish in terms of the UK economy."

Data sourced from The Drum; additional content by Warc staff, 17 August 2012

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