Karmarama’s Jon Wilkins: Don’t fall victim to short-termism

Do we need to slow down? Brands that have embraced the fast-paced world of digital technology and social media are “falling victim to short-termism”, the chairman of Karmarama has said – and it could set them up to fail in the long run.

“The ability to deliver near real-time communication has dragged a lot of clients into a race where they are constantly evaluating performance, and I think that’s a shame,” Jon Wilkins said during a client and agency panel debate at Media Playground this week (3 November).

“Short-termism has been exacerbated by fast media,” he said, claiming that while technology has sped up the pace of development and innovation, it has also, paradoxically, slowed brands down – because clients often put so much focus on a real-time strategy that they forget about the importance of brand longevity.

“Clients need a real-time strategy for today, but you also need a strategy for tomorrow: What’s your new news? What are you going to do with your brands? What’s your innovation?

“I think that technology pushes things even further down the line in terms of being able to build assets that are really useful for the customer relationship for the long-term. You can start to believe that because you can measure stuff and because it’s right at the end of your nose happening day in day out, that is accountable marketing,” he said.

“And because you maybe can’t measure so easily things that are slightly further down the line, you’re just going to forget about them.”