Your Organisation, My Organisation, Our Organisation – They are All Digital Media Companies
Today every organisation we know is essentially a tech company – whether it builds gadgets, develops apps, offers legal services or cooks food. Similarly, with powerful digital tools and platforms available to virtually everyone, every business is a media company – it has never been easier and more important for corporations as well as start-ups to communicate with customers and the public. Yet, few are doing so. What is stopping these organisations from becoming great storytellers?

Everyone Has an Interesting Story
Many firms, especially the ones working in traditional and business-to-business trades, aren’t confident that people will find what they do exciting. However, I have yet to find an industry that cannot offer something compelling to learn.

For instance, in the last 30 minutes, I’ve been browsing an Instagram profile of a large shipping company. A shipping company, you ask? Indeed, I’m not someone who spends time researching this kind of content –  as long as my online shopping packages arrive safely. But the beautiful pictures of gigantic liners passing along breathtaking skylines and exotic landscapes drew me in. Before I realised, I was watching videos about complex global supply chains, reading interviews with data scientists who optimise routes, learning about innovative carbon-neutral freighters and discovering how blockchain is used to manage containers. The logistics industry is so exciting that I would love to work in it!

Everyone Can Make an Impression
And that is not all. I’ve been able to lead a healthier life – thanks to information from life sciences labs, discover how new compounds and materials shape the city around me and get solid entrepreneurship advice from law consultancies. It is possible that the curiosity-invoking contents from these companies have taught me just as much as my school and university did – and, at the same time, planted their brands in the mind of a potential client – me.

Everyone Will Do Well to Get Started
It is true that digital media can be confusing with new information constantly calling for our attention, and websites, apps and platforms appearing out of nowhere every day. Yet, the fundamentals of marketing haven’t changed as much as many may think and are still based on a few simple principles.

• Produce content about the industry you know a lot about – in the form of videos, images and the written word.
• Deliver it across spaces where people spend a lot of time – mobile phones are a good place to start.
• Adapt the content to the context.
• Share knowledge and good advice ahead of selling – when customers trust you, they will come.

These rules stay at the core of marketing communications even as technology changes through the years – they were true before the invention of radio and will continue to be true when we spend vacations in virtual reality.

First published in the IT Society Magazine by the Singapore Computer Society