Modern advertising

The emergence of digital media has created some very fundamental and important changes in the goals for advertising today. Digital technologies have empowered advertising in unique ways and provided a wide range of new possibilities for two-way communication and measurement. These changes should fundamentally redefine expectations for advertising in the digital age.
Capture interest and attention
Advertising is, of course, a specific communication strategy designed to shape consumer action towards, or opinions about, particular products or services. Advertising, like every other communication strategy, will not and cannot work unless it finds an audience and actually delivers its message. We live in an increasingly crowded media environment. The average consumer is exposed to thousands of different advertising messages every week. Many of those messages are repeated with a frequency that deadens the senses. Even finding the right potential customer and placing the advertising message in front of him or her does not guarantee interest or focus on what the ad message is trying to communicate.
The new media consumers have been taught that they are in charge of what, where, when, and why they will pay attention to an ad message. Nevertheless, capturing interest and focusing attention remains the prerequisite for a successful advertisement.
Reaching the customer where they are, where they spend their time, and where their attention is already focused requires advertising to consider many more simultaneous channel and platform executions than ever before.
Mobile, advergaming, social networks, and interactive sweepstakes are all gaining new currency as ad channels. These channels have increased appeal where the target market is a younger demographic, generally more web-savvy, more web connected, and more prone to multi-tasking. However, they are also more aware of their prerogatives to control the when, where, what, how and why they will consent to view an advertisement.
Intrusion, lack of express or implied "permission," and violation of online "etiquette" are all new or heightened sensitivities of the digital media user that have to be carefully observed when using these new channels to deliver ads.
Integrated advertising strategies and cross-promotional concepts that focus on placing advertising messages in multiple channels are increasingly being recognized as essential for success. Also, advertisers are learning to pool their resources to interest and capture the attention of a consumer with combination messages that build on the brand equity and interest in two or more products or services.
The power of promotions to cut through clutter and capture interest and attention is also beginning to blur the line between advertising and promotional marketing strategies. Increasingly, these two separate budgets are being considered as part of one single integrated strategy, with digital technologies and media being used more and more in concert with more traditional media approaches and media channels.
This trend will undoubtedly continue to increase as the battle for interest and attention is waged by competitive brands through new media channels and promotional concepts, since consumers  brought up online -- do not necessarily consider advertisements a mandatory part of their media. 
By Msele Musa
BAPRM42626