Of late, I began to work on the video content to quickly balance out with my articles and infographics side. My recent video interview was with Shahida Azad Jamaluddin, Suria FM’s Head of Digital and Branding. The 14 minutes video was uploaded at the video section a few weeks ago and it’s been shared by out by hundreds of visitors on LinkedIn and Facebook respectively. On a serious note, I learned a lot from that particular conversation with her. But one particular sentence that triggered me the most.
“Yes, continuously creating digital content is important but it is critical for us to bring the content created to our audience out there. We have to go out to the field, reach out to them and bring the content to them.”
That’s Suria FM. A few weeks later, I had a privilege to meet and speak with Faz Kamaruddin, AirAsia’s Head of Talent and her assistant Aisyah at RedQ. Well, if you must know, RedQ is a code name given to AirAsia’s headquarters in Sepang. The visit was commemorated in a video made recently. I told Faz that I’ve been following the AirAsia brand for quite a number of years now and closely observing how they manage to brainwash people to think of AirAsia first when they think about which airplane to book on for their getaway. I shared about how creative their digital marketing and branding games are, but it’s their offline-online integrated marketing that I really admire the most. They’re playing them in balance.
“I can smell that most of the conversions are coming from the offline than the online,” I said to Aisyah and Faz.
That AirAsia appointment was made in the evening a few days ago. Prior to that I had an hour video interview with Zuhaila Sedek, MATRADE’s Head of Corporate Communication. MATRADE or Malaysia’s External Trade Development Corporation is an agency under the purview of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry Malaysia. Somehow in the conversation, she keeps on highlighting that.
“Digital marketing is important, yes however we spend more time also in getting the information out by distributing them via public relations or PR and our global offices through the business networking sessions using the traditional marketing materials.” Again, integrated marketing is being emphasised at MATRADE.
I’m still editing the MATRADE video though, and shall upload it in a few days time.
My eyes open wide when suddenly I realised that one similar Marketing pattern surfaces right after those interviews. Despite the fact that these three well known brands are very active playing their online marketing game, they still rely heavily on traditional methods for conversions. Yes, they all agreed that digital marketing plays a great role in getting the awareness out quick, reaching out more and more people with just a fraction of cost, yet this method is primarily meant for just building awareness and make the brands to be easily remembered only with a little hope for conversions. It’s those traditional ways that really move people to consider the purchase.
Now let’s ponder about that for a minute.
