Chairman and Chief Marketing Officer, Redenvelope Inc.
There's a growing realization that we're all becoming victims of the technological devices that were supposed to make our lives simpler. The proliferation of laptops, PDAs, and pagers means that we're working harder and harder to keep up with our own inventions. The price of being available 24-7 is the loss of time for reflection, creative thinking, and connections with our loved ones -- the things that are really important for our emotional and spiritual lives.
Recently, I'm encouraged by people in high-tech fields -- the digital elite who are closest to those devices because their jobs require them to be accessible anywhere, anytime -- who are now starting to step away from that constant availability.
At my company, we're constantly thinking about that balance, because we sit on both ends of the spectrum. We want to preserve the human element of connecting to someone you care about, but we realize that a lot of what enables our business is technology. As we grow, our challenge will be to sustain the simple hand gestures. For example, we've made a commitment always to have hand-tied bows. We also have to find a way to enable that high-touch element to scale with our business.
My take on 2003? This is the year that we'll begin to assert control over all of our technology. We'll use it to enhance our lives instead of allowing it to rob us of our time, peace of mind, and human connections.
Chief Marketing Officer, TBWA\Worldwide
If the 1970s to the 1990s were about being self-actualized, then now and into the future will be about being "self-actionable." People want the ability to have the tool set -- the information that they need in order not to depend on anybody else. They want to be armed with what they need to take action, whether they're making a purchase or choosing the right political candidate for office.
When it comes to marketing, 2003 will be about two things: permission and preferences. In the next two to three years, we'll begin to see the effects of permission marketing as Seth Godin defined it. That's because technology has finally caught up with consumer demand. Look at TiVo, video-on-demand, the ability to have your own personal television network: They're all happening.
Permission is related to preferences. It's all about having what I want -- when and how I want it. Consumers will increasingly navigate their lives based on these questions: Who am I going to give permission to come into my life and be part of my day? And how do I want them to do that? Because life's too short to sift through all of that other shit.
What does this mean for advertisers? Only everything that we've been talking about hypothetically for the past decade. The ability to have interactive TV, to have branded content that's customized for individual households. All of that technology is now catching up and being deployed.
So the more that you as a marketer deliver on my preferences, the more permission I'll give you. Say you're an airline. If my ticketing experience is fabulous, if you can call me when my flight's going to be late, if you respect my preferences, I'll give you more and more permission to enter my life. I'll even let you log into my calendar and see when I might be traveling next.
But the minute you blow it, the minute you take advantage or invade my privacy rather than delivering on your promise, you're history.
Director, Institute for the Future
The events of the past couple of years have revived an ugly tradition of American culture. Public fears and overboard governmental responses have made this nation of immigrants extremely hostile to new arrivals: A Sikh gas-station owner is murdered by a September 11 - crazed yahoo. A senior vice president of a major Silicon Valley company is pulled off a plane for questioning because he "looked suspicious." (Suspicious? He was wearing $500 shoes and a $4,000 suit! But he was Hindu, and to the ignoramus in the cockpit, he looked like an Islamic terrorist.) We have yanked America's welcome mat, and we will pay a heavy price in the loss of skills and entrepreneurial spirit.
Consider Silicon Valley: More than one-third of the Valley's software engineers come from the Indian subcontinent. Cut off this flow of professionals, and the Valley may as well tear up its office parks and return to growing prunes.
A decade ago, the United States was one of the few places in the world for such talented people to pursue their professional passions. Not anymore. In entrepreneurial centers from Bangalore to Dubai, the word is out that the best and brightest are no longer welcome here.
Here's the lesson for 2003: We can't afford to deport our future. Our country cannot sustain the technology sector -- much less emerge from the current downturn -- without brilliant minds from all over the planet. If we stay on our current path, we will enjoy an illusory sense of security, but it will come at the cost of strangling the nation's technological and economic future.
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