Procter and Gamble Boss declares "'Digital marketing' is dead."

Digital marketing – advertising brands to consumers through mobile electronic devices such as smartphones and computer tablets – has evolved to the point where the term has become outdated, Procter & Gamble’s global brand building officer has declared.

Now, such efforts are so common that digital marketing could simply be called “brand building,” Marc Pritchard said during Wednesday’s closing keynote address at the Digital Marketing Exposition & Conference (Dmexco) in Cologne, Germany.

“The era of digital marketing is over,” Pritchard said. “It’s almost dead. Now, it’s just brand building.”
Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) is the world’s largest advertiser, and the company now spends more than one-third of its U.S. marketing budget on digital media. Research indicates that the average amount of time consumers spend with digital media every day could surpass television viewing this year.

Pritchard said P&G is focused on launching some ad campaigns in the digital sphere rather than following up traditional marketing with a digital component almost as an afterthought.

“This is a mindset that we are trying to infuse in our company, and it’s creating a tremendous shift,” Pritchard said. “It’s freeing up our minds on building creative ideas that come to life through the mediums that we engage with every single day – search, social, mobile, PR, and yes, even TV.”

He cited as an example an ad campaign for a Braun shaver, one of P&G’s brands, that initially ran only online.


“It wasn’t the digital component,” Pritchard said. “It was the campaign. … Start in the digital world, and build your way back to the rest of the marketing mix. It’s an approach that is building our brand equities, our sales and our profits.”

Advances in digital technology have made it easier for companies to reach consumers almost anywhere, but capturing their attention still depends on coming up with the right message.

“We can only do that if we have this one component that has been a constant since the beginning of brand building – an idea,” Pritchard said. “Fresh, creative ideas that are powered by insights – that are powered by the way people think and feel, and are inspired by creativity – always have and always will create great campaigns.

“Digital tools just give us a new way to spread those ideas in ways that we’ve never imagined before,” Pritchard said. “Great ideas matter more now than they ever have before – because with these digital tools at our disposal, we have the chance to be successful widely beyond whatever we had imagined.”

He advised marketers to “try and resist thinking about digital in terms of the tools, the platforms, the QR codes and all of the technology coming next.” Those at P&G, he said “try and see it for what it is, which is a tool for engaging people with fresh, creative campaigns” that make consumers think and feel and laugh.


“So let’s celebrate the end — the death — of digital marketing, and let’s focus on celebrating the great idea of these brands,” Pritchard said.