I was fortunate enough to get to visit the future of media and marketing this past week. The vision was very clear, powerful and strong; and I felt very ill-equipped to tackle all the opportunities and challenges ahead. Juli Metzger and John Strauss were kind enough to open up the hallways inside the David Letterman Communication and Media Building to give me and three others a tour of the Unified Media Lab at Ball State University.
Ball State University is probably not the first,and certainly not the only university taking on this holistic approach to media, marketing and journalism instruction in the country. But they are certainly making a difference and creating cutting edge learning opportunities for students that will have them ready for real world opportunities on the traditional and emerging media front.
The world that they are training journalist for features one news team feeding multiple media channels. A student has a news story, and they are learning to tell that story multiple ways to fit into a number of outlets; newspaper, online, social media, broadcast TV and radio. I think back to my first job out of college in radio or some of the new reporters I've hired over the years; and I remember being taught and having to teach them so much that was never covered in school. In the future I envision these students walking into a newsroom and within a few days teaching the experienced staff some of the things that they should be doing. Talk about role reversal.
The future laid out to me this past week also was very clear for marketing and sales. One sales staff selling everything, and not being overwhelmed with the new product knowledge. Because to them, the wave of digital products is not new.
http://cms.bsu.edu/academics/collegesanddepartments/ccim/unified-media
That link takes you to the Unified Media page for Ball State University. I'm not doing the program justice explaning the vision that was presented to me and others last week. The video on this this page is a great starting point to watch and learn. How much different would a local newspaper be if they had some of the same comments that are made by the students on that video?
By the way, the young man in the suit coat and tie is Nikko, a selling machine. I actually had a chance to meet with him on the tour as well and listen to his passion for sales. His experience, and he just completed his junior year of college last week, is enough that I would offer him a job on the spot at nearly every newspaper I've ever worked. Nikko understands the importance of integrating a marketing message into multiple channels, understands the strengths of the various channel audiences and understands the sales process very well.
The reason for this commercial for Ball State University? I see so much practical application today in media outlets across the world. While the experience and learning by the students about integrating stories and advertising across multiple channels is wonderful, there is no reason that this learning cannot take place at media outlets today.
Station managers and publishers need to demand newsrooms plan for content across multiple audience channels. Sales managers should be demanding sales to sell multiple channels. All of us need to be pushing the envelop!
The future of marketing and media will take shape based on the concepts these students are being taught. I'm not ready to be labeled a dinosaur, and I'm ready to adapt to the changes and challenges that are coming. The future for the industry, while very different than what we've seen in the past is very exciting.
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