When I run in the morning I listen to Morning Edition on National Public Radio.
And today I heard something that literally stopped me in my tracks.
During a report about three new TV networks targeting millennials, the executive vice president at one of them – REVOLT TV – said this: “We haven’t done any marketing and we have a successful social media platform.”
I spent the rest of my run trying to tease apart this statement. I wondered:
- Has marketing become such a dirty word that it puts off people – especially millennials – to the point where no one wants to admit that what they’re doing really is marketing?
- Do today’s digital natives regard what they do via social media as inherently more authentic than traditional marketing (it is), so much so that it shouldn’t be considered marketing at all?
- Today most ad agencies and PR firms routinely incorporate social media strategies into their programming for clients. How surprised would they be to hear that social media engagement isn’t marketing?
I’m certain by now that my bias is coming through. Marketing today is about finding authentic ways to engage audiences, using the channels that matter to them. That means a successful social media program is marketing.
REVOLT TV launches at 8 p.m. ET today and already has 44,000+ followers on Twitter, 33,333 subscribers to their YouTube channel and what looks to be a very active page on Facebook.
REVOLT TV should be proud to have earned this level of engagement without, apparently, any paid advertising support. But they shouldn’t be any less proud to call it marketing.
