Having made the change personally 7 years ago when I was a chief operations officer for a wholesale distribution company I knew that in the near future many other business would soon follow. That is why it was no surprise to me this week when I read the headline that “Outsell forecasts that online spending will overtake print in 2010”
Many Web marketers have felt that their industry is treated like the red-headed step child in the marketing world. Online marketing has always been the marketing that was thrown the leftover scraps of the real marketing budget. Print and TV always got the river rushing blast of money and Web got what was equal to a little brook almost dried up because of the summer heat.
That might not be the case anymore.
When I started my career in Web marketing back in 2004, I knew this day would come. I also believe that this is still only the beginning.
I think that it is safe to say that in the future, TV and print will just be a support mechanism to the “real” marketing that happens online. Companies know that offline marketing will never be able to truly track the way we can online. And that will be how online people will take charge.
I feel pretty confident in this statement because of the simple fact: online marketing can be tracked.
The large obstacle is the way people think. People do not like change. Getting a large business to change its coarse is like getting a blue whale to jump through a hoop in a side show attraction. A recession on the other hand can crinkle the feathers of even the biggest hen in the coop, and can do a lot to get people to move in new directions.