The digital marketing firm Razorfish recently put out its annual Outlook Report, and it pulls together some interesting data on how companies are shifting to digital outreach strategies.  The key finding in the report seems to be that while the use of new media by American consumers grew exponentially between 2004 and 2009, most companies kept to the same approach in their marketing.  They did spend more and more money, but the strategies were often unchanged.  In fact, 70% of Razorfish clients reported not changing their tactics. This is particularly striking when one realizes, as the report points out, that many of the most popular tools and sites for consumers in 2009 did not exist in 2004 (e.g. the iPhone, YouTube).  

When Razorfish asked clients what adjustments they made to their digital media strategy last year, the six top responses were:

More discounting in messaging;

Decreases in overall budget, but with more budget shifting to digital;

Scaling back in ad spends for the year or not running certain campaigns;

Shifts to search and out-of-home display;

Increases in overall ad budgets to grab more share;

Shift in goals -- more focus on return on ad spend.

Yes, there is some incompatibility with these ideas.  Read the Razorfish Outlook Report 2010 here.

We were alerted to the report by Marketing Vox, which has a very useful summation of the report here.