In spite of all the unemployment and recession woes, marking and branding are necessary as the Earth continues to spin on is axis. 2010 will most likely be the year we at least begin to pull ourselves out of the doldrums of what has been a pretty harsh environment. Certainly, more jobs will be lost before it is all over, but we’ll come out of it stronger because and not in spite of it all. Going forward, for localized, internal marketing, there will be three necessities that must be implemented into your bag of tricks for 2010.

Mobile Marketing

No longer is mobile marketing about SMS alone. No, the mobile phone has increasingly become the pocket billboard. Mobile marketing will certainly lose its effect as the years move forward, much like email spam has, but it will continue to be a driving force for future campaigns. Opt-in messaging and localized traffic driving can be done very easily with a cell phone campaign.

Digital Signage

I, of course, have a little more reason to promote this specific market niche (I write fairly regularly at the digital signage blog), but it will continue to be a growing segment of internal and external marketing and advertising campaigns. Digital signage’s capabilities and applications are wide and expansive. They will continue to be installed rapidly into restaurants as menu boards, corporate lobbies, transportation vehicles, libraries, schools, fire stations…I could go on and on. Simply put, digital signs will, in the near future, literally inundate our lives.

Internet

Whether it’s Pay-Per-Click, organic search, or local listings, getting your business recognized on the web can be as hard or as easy as you make it out to be. In many cases, lack of knowledge here is the biggest barrier to getting things done. For instance, I have a friend that runs a homeschool site. I spent 3 hours with him one Saturday a while back, talking about how we could improve his site in the rankings and literally double his companies revenue–which is already fairly significant. Whether it’s local search or targeting your specific long-tail keywords, web marketing will be essential going forward.

These three fairly new and innovative digital marketing mediums can and must implemented in 2010. It’s not an “everybody else is doing it” mentality, but more of a “necessity is the mother of invention” take on what should and should not be done to promote your brand.