Digital Lifescapes

Why are today’s savvy CEOs more deeply involved in marketing strategy? We know from prior market research that digital marketing adoption is often the precursor to the creation and execution of a broad corporate-wide digital transformation agenda. That’s why. Moreover, the latest global market assessment by IDC concluded that all CEOs now need to better understand what the corporate marketing role can do to further their business technology adoption. Therefore, they also believe that the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) and the Chief Information Officer (CIO) working relationship is now the key to strategic goal attainment. Besides, CMOs that lead a traditional marketing organization have a mandate to move beyond merely achieving digital marketing ‘competency parity’ with their more progressive competitors. Optimal Environment for Marketing Exploration While it’s still a requirement that digital marketing skills training and mentoring of legacy staff continues into 2016, senior ma...

Once upon a time, at a typical enterprise organization anywhere in the world, all business technology procurement decisions were dictated by the company's CIO and the execution was managed by their loyal technical team.  Meanwhile, life was good for most people in an IT vendor's sales force who were laser focused on the few they considered as their 'buyer' customers. But one day, the status-quo was broken by the rumble of militant Line of Business (LoB) leaders who rejected the IT establishment and their old ways. The LoB rebels demanded a change and pushed aside the legacy CIO and their 'preferred' vendor collaborators. Now, anyone that was armed by the CEO with an IT budget could lead the Digital Business Transformation that enterprise end-users have craved for so long. This is the new way, the path that is taken by an open organization that seeks to survive and prosper in the Global Networked Economy. End of Tyranny: Open Digital Transformation A wid...

Consolidation continues across the key sectors of the digital technology markets within America. According to the latest market study report from  PwC , entitled the "U.S. Entertainment, Media & Communications (EMC) Deal Insights," the second quarter (Q2) 2015 deal value reached $76 billion -- that's compared to $39 billion in the first quarter (Q1) 2015. Furthermore, PwC believes that this trend is being driven by major deals in the Cable ($63 billion), Internet & Information ($6 billion) and Communications ($3 billion) sub-sectors. The abandonment of a major Cable consolidation in Q1 2014 originally valued at $46.2 billion had opened the door for a new and even bigger proposed consolidation in Q1 2015 valued at $55.6 billion. Meanwhile, overall mergers and acquisitions (M&A) deal volume, which declined markedly in Q1 2015 (198), recovered some lost ground in Q2 2015 (208) – spurred by Advertising & Marketing (57), Publishing (37) and Internet &...

By 2018, one third of the top twenty market-share leaders in most industries will be significantly impacted by new competitors -- and "reinvented" incumbents -- that proactively apply digital technologies to create new services and associated business models. According to the latest market study by International Data Corporation (IDC), the adoption of Digital Transformation (DX) methodologies will eventually disrupt the status-quo of all traditional enterprise business models and established strategic partner ecosystems. Business leaders are therefore challenged to move their enterprise to the next level of commercial competency -- by employing new digital technologies, coupled with organizational, operational, and business model innovation that will differentiate them in the marketplace. Their ultimate goal is to create new ways of operating and growing their commercial venture within the rapidly evolving Global Networked Economy. Framework for Digital Business Tr...

Cloud computing is now a potential fit for more IT projects, requiring Infrastructure and Operations (I&O) leaders to consider it as a viable option -- but it won't matter to the closed-minded CIOs that have already lost credibility at their company, according to the latest market study by Gartner, Inc. This is the first of four major impacts identified by Gartner from its recent 2015 CIO Survey. "The survey results show that, for most CIOs, public cloud is an option for projects, but only a first consideration for a small minority," said Dave Russell, vice president at Gartner . Gartner believes that many traditional IT leaders are too protective of their existing infrastructure and have been the biggest obstacle to cloud-based solution adoption. Moreover, the Shadow IT phenomenon is not the work of radical troublemakers. It's merely the result of Line of Business leaders refusing to accept the excuses of CIOs that have failed to transform their legacy practi...

This is a very difficult time to be leading a personal computer manufacturer that didn't anticipate the shift in consumer demand from netbook PCs to media tablets. Besides, those leaders that didn't fully comprehend the rapid evolution of commercial cloud services have suffered the most. Even those that had the foresight to see this shift coming may not have believed that the impact of the transition would be so swift and fatal to key segments of their legacy product portfolio. Worldwide PC shipments totaled 89.8 million units in the fourth quarter of 2012 (4Q12), that's down by 6.4 percent compared to the same quarter in 2011 -- and worse than the forecast decline of 4.4 percent, according to the latest market study by International Data Corporation (IDC). Although the quarter marked the beginning of a new stage in the PC industry with the launch of Windows 8, its introduction did not change sluggish PC demand, and the PC market continued to take a back seat to compe...

Senior executives at major U.S. broadcast television networks acknowledge that the shift to on-demand video viewing will disrupt their legacy status quo. They're also concerned that a recently redesigned Hulu offering may further accelerate the shift away from linear programming, and thereby reduce their video advertiser revenues. Should they be worried about the adoption of online video? Should they join the broadband service providers in lobbying the federal government to support broadband bandwidth caps -- in an attempt to curtail any further erosion of their legacy business model? Can they halt this transformation, without it erupting into a battle of the TV traditionalists vs. the digital media titans? comScore released data showing that more than 184 million U.S. Internet users watched 36.9 billion online content videos in July, while video advertising views totaled 9.6 billion. Google Sites, driven primarily by video viewing at YouTube.com, ranked as the top online v...

Under normal circumstances, a change in business practices typically flounders in the realm of the legacy marketer. Standing on the sidelines -- with no intent to act -- is the norm for too many executives. Any excuse that could be used to rationalize further inaction merely fuels the status quo. Undaunted, the progressives among them will still advance the much needed transformation. According to the latest market study by eMarketer , regardless of the growth of digital marketing practices in leading markets, advertising across all media in Western Europe will grow more slowly than expected -- as a result of the region's economic troubles. eMarketer estimates total media advertising spending in Western Europe will have grown 1.8 percent -- to $114.4 billion by the end of 2011. They previously forecast, in June 2011, that ad spending in the region would grow 3 percent to $115.8 billion in 2011 -- before reaching $120.8 billion in 2012. Online advertising is growing slightly ...

Marketers continue to shift their budgets from traditional to digital media, but simply including online ad campaigns and social media efforts is not enough for an effective marketing mix, reports eMarketer . According to Alterian 's assessment, the maturity of digital and social media requires integration of marketing strategies. Marketers must move from a focus on isolated campaigns to an emphasis on listening to and communicating across channels. In this study, more than one-half of marketers worldwide reported directing their efforts toward integrating their communication strategies to emphasize multichannel engagement. The majority of marketers surveyed recognized social media as increasingly important to the marketing mix, while only 14 percent said it's "critical" for their success. Most marketers say they're "prepared enough" to take advantage of new techniques in digital and social media, but more than one-third felt "minimally pre...

The communications industry buzz makes unified communications (UC) sound like it will cause seismic shifts across the business world, according to the latest market study by In-Stat. In the long run, some grand predictions may prove accurate because definitions of unified communications are so broad, with reports on uptake quoting big numbers, such as 50 percent of enterprises evaluating, installing, or running unified communications applications. However, apparently even the small baby steps of progress, such as a unified messaging installation or a web conferencing subscription, are being counted within those reports. "Real transformational changes will take more time, perhaps even a generation, to accomplish," says David Lemelin, In-Stat analyst. "But, it's possible that a new generation, dubbed Millennials, bringing to the workplace communications habits formed in their early years (text messaging, social networking, blogging, etc.), portends more rapid adoption....