Digital Crossroads

by Alex Shea, Marketing and Project Executive at Freshly Made Content 

I may not be a digital whiz, but if there is one thing I know – it’s planning.  From what I’m going to wear tomorrow, to whether I’m going to have olives in my Subway next Tuesday – I’ve got it sorted.  Therefore the task of organising the Digital Marketing Show launch at the Ivy on 17th June was not all that daunting.  If anything, I was quite excited at the prospect of schmoozing in the Ivy.  After all, if it’s good enough for Kate Moss, it’s good enough for me.

So with my home-made soapbox in hand (constructed from a milk crate and a piece of wood – I’m anything if not resourceful) we prepared for a debate-fuelled evening from a variety of names, including Julie Meyer (Chief Executive of Ariadne Capital and founder of First Tuesday) and Jeremy Waite, Head of Social Strategy, Adobe EMEA. 

This ‘crisis meeting’ was held in order to help stop the business graveyard filling up with any more household names.  The debate was fierce, with a variety of different opinions, but one that was inarguable was that the main culprit of failures such as Jessops and HMV was their inability to adapt to digital.  A crossroad has appeared with digital at its fork, and these companies took a wrong turn. 

The irony was not lost on me – with my lack of digital knowledge - I was almost Jessops.

The youth of today have the luxury of being born digital, similar to the likes of Amazon, ASOS etc.  The next generation of parents will, no doubt, be thinking up their unborn child’s Twitter handle before even naming them.  Unfortunately, unlike this digitally native generation, we have a choice.  So rarely is choice viewed as a bad thing – but when it seems that people would choose the ‘graveyard’ route, rather than the one with the pot of gold at the end – it clearly is. 

So, this is why the Show is so important.  For people like me, who are at the crossroads and absolutely have to choose the right way – the DIGITAL way.

The alternative is ending up in the graveyard (figuratively speaking, of course).