JWTIntelligence (a division of JWT) has released its fifth annual trends report where the company turns its research and predictions into trends for the upcoming year. The 2010 Trends report provides a view of what’s to come in the economy, the culture, the aging population, and the environment. Following are highlights from the report.
1. Searching for stability
The economy continues to struggle and people will look for messages that offer comfort, peace-of-mind and stability in 2010 just as they have been in 2009.
2. Reading the fine print
Is it because people are less naive or more cynical these days that we spend more time reading the fine print on offers and ensuring we’re not deceived? Either way, people will continue to search out all the information and details they can before making decisions, including purchase decisions.
3. Maximum disclosure
Unfortunately, we live in a time when it’s hard to earn trust. People will continue to actively seek out information, companies and brands they can trust in 2010, so messages that are honest and provide full disclosure will resonate strongly.
4. The devil wears packaging
The shift from excessive packaging and environmentally unfriendly packaging will continue as consumers seek out companies and brands that demonstrate they care about the environment by producing goods with eco-friendly packaging.
5. It’s BIC, and it’s bigger than ever
Brazil, India and China have emerged as economic powerhouses in 2009. They’ll continue to grow in economic and political strength in 2010, meaning opportunities abound for companies and brands!
6. Trickle-up innovation
The shift from designing products for developed markets and then trying to assimilate them into emerging markets to developing products for emerging markets and then introducing them to developed markets will continue in 2010.
7. Retooling for an aging world
We’re not getting any younger. In 2010, we’ll see an abundance of products and services introduced for the aging global consumer market.
8. Life in real time
Forget CNN. 2010 will be all about Twitter and real-time information sharing across the social Web. If you weren’t on board in 2009, you will be in 2010.
9. Location-based everything
Advanced mobile and mapping technologies will change the world conversation from “where I am” to “what am I doing” and “what’s on my mind”. Place is becoming irrelevant already, and 2010 will solidify that trend.
10. Visual fluency
Goodbye words, and hello images. The world moves quickly and more and more messages will move from text to imagery in 2010 to speed up content delivery for faster consumption.
What do you think of the trends identified by JWTIntelligence for 2010? Are you prepared to make sure your brand is positioned to take advantage of them?
Susan Gunelius is the author of 10 marketing, social media, branding, copywriting, and technology books, and she is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She also owns Women on Business, an award-wining blog for business women. She is a featured columnist for Entrepreneur.com and Forbes.com, and her marketing-related articles have appeared on websites such as MSNBC.com, BusinessWeek.com, TodayShow.com, and more.
She has over 20 years of experience in the marketing field having spent the first decade of her career directing marketing programs for some of the largest companies in the world, including divisions of AT&T and HSBC. Today, her clients include large and small companies around the world and household brands like Citigroup, Cox Communications, Intuit, and more. Susan is frequently interviewed about marketing and branding by television, radio, print, and online media organizations, and she speaks about these topics at events around the world. You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Google+.
Interesting post. Will be interesting to see whether 9 will be proven true. I suspect location is going to become more important as people want to, not only tell who they are and what they think, but where they are. Consumers will also have a need to know where your business is.
Couple this with an increase in mobile use and location may just become one of the eye-catching developments.
We shall see
What we can expect is that there will be developments which we did not even think of at the start of 2010.