Chaque nouvelle année, c’est l’occasion des bilans et de l’exercice de prévision.
Voici un extrait d’un article que j’ai préparé pour une agence anglaise, il regroupe ce que je pense être 5 tendances majeures de société qui impactent le business et le marketing.

Ego-craving

Today, people – and consumers – crave for recognition and differentiation. Individualism has been a massive trend through the last decades and the end of the era of mass/undifferentiated-consumption has created a demand for more personalization. In the meantime, the rise of the Internet and the social networks has pushed democracy and the freedom to express ourselves to its boundaries. Everyone is now someone.

How will this change the consumers’ attitude?

Firstly, keep an eye on Customization as a massive trend. We’ve already seen the premises in the natural “status” industries such as fashion or automobile. Other sectors will follow.
Secondly, more and more customers will ask for status symbols or stories. Objects that help create a personality. That help them feel special and different from the masses.
Lastly, people now want to talk to companies and be treated like individuals. See Twitter, Facebook Connect, etc.

How to be and appear as an individual in a world where everyone has become a mere Facebook page ?

• Being different is praised. Nike’s latest print advertising in France is a celebration of the rebel attitude. Football star Eric Cantona is pictured with the tagline “Please disturb”. A controversial figure such as Cantona is the best ambassador of an individual way of life as opposed to the politically correct and the mass of non-differentiation.

• Technology will enable companies to identify the customers. Facial billboards in Japan identify gender with 85% accuracy, changing the message accordingly.
• Interactivity will be highly valued. Europcar has drawn interactivity to the cinema in a revolutionary ad showing the watchers on the screen.
• Every sector will be segmented as long as it is financially viable: the Lords South Beach is a gay-focused hotel in Miami.

See: customization, crowd sourcing, fashion peacocking, art and design everywhere, the rise of services marketing, blogs & consumer advice, eco-iconic, status-yielding stories & experiences, generation G…Everything that satisfies the need to build one’s ego and identity.

Expect: customers valuing brands that show a true personality, more stories that shed a new light to the world.

Infant-theism

The world is becoming more complex and multipolar and it goes round at a much faster pace.
With the triumph of the free market, change and adaptation are the new universal mottos, which lead to an increased feeling of insecurity. Insecurity in the employment, as recovery will be slower in the employment field; and insecurity on more personal levels, as divorce rates are higher than ever and sex is now related to performance.

Hence a growing number of people from the rich countries now perceive childhood as a lost paradise. Expect an ever-growing cult of king child, the boom of adult toys, everyday objects designed as toys with childish colors and shapes, baby talk, game frenzy (e.g. Foursquare, corporate serious games), etc.

Some experts, such as Seth Priebatsch, in its TED presentation, even talk about building a « game layer, » a pervasive net of behavior-steering game dynamics that will reshape education and commerce.

More and more businesses also address kids as a rebound market for adults willing to share their lifestyle with their children: fashion (e.g. Baby Dior), kids-centered magazines, kid’s activities in museums, etc.

• SCVNGR is a location-based gaming platform for mobile phones that has been used in alternate reality games for campaigns ranging from the New England Patriots to Dexter. They scored $4 million in venture capital late last year.
• Wii Fit is a best-selling game designed to lose weight while having fun in one’s living room. There are multiple sites spawning on the web to track the efforts made.
• A relatively expensive car (Mini) becomes an eye-popping toy when covered with a retro Space Invaders print.

Also expect: an opposite trend highlighting responsibility.

« Off » = « On »

“Internet Everywhere”, the tagline of a famous telecom operator is so accurate.

The frontier between reality and the online world has never been so thin: one has to look no further than internet of things, virtual reality, augmented reality, 3D, among other technologies.

Watching a science-fiction movie like Minority Report is like watching the near future…or even sometimes the present!

Ordinary things can become digital and be linked to the Net:

• Ballantine’s has designed music equalizers on its bottles, leaving a strong impression on the club and bar’s prospects.
• Anyone with a smartphone can scan and read QR codes with the click of a camera, and anyone with access to a computer can generate QR codes themselves. By scanning the codes, you can access images, websites and text. By creating the codes, you can produce your own messages.
• Things can also be linked through RFID technology. Stickybits is a free app you use to scan barcodes on all the stuff you love, instantly turning it into even more stuff you love.

All of this raises the question of the invasion of the private sphere and all the ethical problems that it may cause. Expect an opposite trend of suspicion.

People can also be linked to the Internet:

• The Face.com-powered app from Comverse can recognize a friend or colleague and automatically show you links to their profile or pictures and let you message them without accessing your contact list.

The Digital World inspires designers and its codes are translated in the Real World. Expect more and more new jobs such as experience designers, ergonomists, information designers.

• Ambient Devices and Nabaztag produce devices that adapt and illustrate digital information.

• When the virtual becomes a reference for reality…This website sells Google Maps envelopes. And an advertising agency designed real-world Google Maps signs.

We virtually “check-in” in real places. Geolocation services such as Foursquate, Gowalla and Facebook Places update reality with a virtual comment or notation and allow for new and creative marketing services in the local area.

• Foursquare’s new frontier isn’t just newspapers, but media companies as a whole. Case in point: Bravo and Foursquare have entered into a must-see TV relationship integrating show personalities and their city tips, as well as a Bravo badges, into the game experience.

We will also project a virtual reality on digital things:

• Samsung was the first to introduce a large-scale commercial 3D-Outdoor projection in the Netherlands, at the Beurs van Berlage in Amsterdam. The public was able to view the addition of a new dimension to this historic building.

We augment reality. As we now tend look at reality through a digital screen, the concept of reality is blurred:

• Augmented reality applications embark us in a more precise world, filled with digital information.

Expect everything offline to become a part of the online world. The “On” will upgrade the “Off” and corporations that do not embrace the trend will be excluded from a part of the future world.

Nowism

The online revolution has changed our perception of time. Real-time technology has created real-time consumers that want to be informed quickly and thoroughly. They do not want to wait anymore, desire instant gratification and transparency; they want to live their lives fully.

Brands have no choice but to embrace this trend and to offer real-time services, conversations, distribution, etc. This sometimes means a deep reorganization of all of the corporate processes. This also means that the company must beware of what’s being said about it. Thus, new jobs have been created: community manager, e-reputation consultant, communications planning, etc.

See also the embedded opposite trends:

• Vintage frenzy that shows nostalgia for an idealized and permanent past is still going strong. Mad Men is becoming a society phenomenon, The Chap Manifesto is a best-seller, Freekade offers iPad retro arcade games.

• The slow movement: Slow Food is an international movement promoted as an alternative to fast food.

• The need of a “tech etiquette” will arise. As more studies show the benefits of taking time away from the multi-screen environment, look for more employers, schools, media outlets and parents to endorse digital downtime. These de-tech breaks will be intended to fester creativity or relief from stress. Brands should take advantage of this need on the rise. Expect new “de-tech” services, hotels, trips, trains, technology.

Extremely local

Globalization and new technologies have turned the world into a village. Distance has disappeared and time has shrunken. And this has deeply affected the expectations of consumers.

Take geolocation for instance. It brings to your mobile all the local services and places that you could be interested in without asking. We’ve heard a lot of buzz around Foursquare, Gowalla and the likes, but 2011 will see an increasing number of brands offering coupons and services to customers checking in at their local outlets. All of this fuelled by Facebook Places and the promising growth of the local online advertising market.

Increases in price of oil and raw material are also likely to boost local economy in the near future.

However, extremely local presence is difficult to obtain for all the brands, due to real estate prices and evident space constraints. Hence the success of POP-UP stores.

Some more examples:

• Noma in Copenhagen, a Danish restaurant that forages for much of its food in the local countryside, has been named the best in the world, in an influential survey of chefs and critics around the world.
• Groupon, the social buying site, is pushing ahead with its first public offering. It is a debut that could value the company at $US15 billion or more.
• Even the best-selling casual game on Facebook (Farmville) is about local farming with your friends !

Expect more brands to turn local and to offer custom-made services for local customers in the next few years.