BACK TO THE FUTURE OF MARKETING

A public relations professional’s take on the future of marketing.

Marketing is undergoing a sea change due to the dominance of digital media and the rise of data analytics. Just how different marketing will look in the next eight years or so is the subject of this short, entertaining and somewhat fanciful book by a PR veteran. Kotsolios’ approach to the subject is unique: He compares a marketing staff to a soccer team, contrasting players on the 2010 team with those on a prospective 2022 team. Some of the players overlap, but the new positions on the 2022 team show the author’s perspective on marketing’s future. On that team, he includes “Big Data Analytics,” “Pranding” (a combination of PR, branding and advertising), “Shopper Marketing” and “Marketing Innovation Chief,” whom Kotsolios labels “the Pranding of the future.” He makes intriguing observations about how marketing in the future will look to consumers, who are increasingly becoming marketing’s driving force: “In the future products will talk directly to consumers….[I]n fact each product will speak nearly every language spoken anywhere in the world.” He shares similarly futuristic views about grocery shopping, which he says will feature talking shelves, and the overall retail environment, which he believes “will move online completely.” Kotsolios also provides an interesting global perspective, as a Greek who works in Dubai. Clearly, he’s targeting this book at marketing professionals: “The challenge for marketeers will be to evolve together with the changing landscape,” he writes. Still, readers with a general interest in the subject should find the content compelling. Other prognosticators have reached similar conclusions, so there’s nothing highly original here, but the way the author packages his argument makes it an enjoyable excursion. He writes passionately about a subject he knows quite well and conveys an appropriate sense of wonder about the evolution of marketing.

A light but stylistically engaging riff on marketing’s future, featuring a professional’s personal forecast.