I’ve been reading loads of blogs about the election, all scrutinizing the marketing campaigns of the leading parties (most of which has been pretty unoriginal and unexciting I hasten to add). The big debate so far: is this a new media or old media election? See here for a recent example.

After the 2008 U.S. election people predicted that this one would be led from the bottom up, online and over social networks. But then when they announced that we would be getting the leaders debates on TV, the emphasis shifted to the power of television and how historically this has been an indication of the winning party.

The truth is this is the same old hackneyed debate that has been going on for some years but applied in new context. To discuss which is the most effective is entirely missing the point. Where people attribute the rise of the Lib Dems in the opinion polls to the TV debate, they are blinded by the fact that this was a TV first and missing what was going on online at the same time. Let’s not forget that this was also a first for Twitter which recorded a record number of tweets.

Moreover, people weren’t just tweeting from their phone or PC away from the television, they were watching the debate at the same time. Following the excitement of the event and over the course of the next couple of days, thousands of people joined the group “We got Rage Against the Machine to #1, we can get the Lib Dems into office!” on Facebook, fuelling the poll rise even further. It seems completely clear to me that the two are not working in parallel universes of old and new media. Where TV works to raise the profile and awareness of a cause, online is effective at generating discussion, intensifying buzz and cementing opinions.

A great editorial article from Brand Republic in response to Mckinsey’s recent “A new way to measure word-of-mouth marketing” piece. If nothing else, proof that it is possible to pick apart any WoM measurement methodology.

Measurement based on such disparate discussions is a necessity of our marketing world, but it will never be perfect. It’s an approach that tries to add control to the uncontrollable. I mean, we’ve been OK with the fuzzy logic of brand tracking and TV ads for decades, and yet marketers now have to be held accountable for tracking sentiment? They might as well say “measure society” and look at the mess governments make of that!

So, instead of continuing to approach word-of-mouth with some kind of control as our raison d’etre, which leads trying to measure and quantify impacts, do we acknowledge that in an open setting, meaningful participation is our raison d’etre? After all, that’s what customers ultimately appreciate.

Suggesting the future of advertising is “integration” is a little like suggesting the future of personal computing is the floppy disc.

In reality, the most progressive people and agencies in our industry were tackling integration 10 years ago and things have come a long way since.

And my reference to 10 years is not a convenient round-number.

In 2000 our industry (along with most western economies) was in the throes of dotcom mania and although the ensuing crash caused a lot of pain it also witnessed an emerging divide between the agencies who genuinely understood how to integrate ideas across multiple media touch points and those who slapped a web address on their TV ads as an afterthought and called it “integration”. That’s not “integration”, that’s “matching luggage” and a well trained monkey with a set of crayons can probably do a similar job.

I can make that assertion with more than a little confidence a) Because I was working at a large London network agency at the time and more importantly, b) Because 2000 was the year inferno opened its doors for business, as a genuinely integrated agency intelligently blending traditional advertising with DM, SP and of course, digital.

Back to the point.

I guess I have two main beefs.

The first is the simple difference between capability and ability, and they’re too often confused when it comes to integration.

Brother and sister agencies with funny names who take care of the non-TV work are far too often the way traditional agencies “integrate”. Too many agencies continue to simply bolt-on integrated campaigns to their TV ads and try and use retrospective logic to justify it.

In truth, real integration involves the talent, the agility, the willingness and (perhaps most importantly) the ability to execute great thinking in whatever mix of media best solves the client’s business problem. Without media bias, and well beyond simple capability.

Integrated agency groups with multiple P&Ls often present a very compelling set of capabilities to prospective clients, but we all know that once the initial briefing meeting is over and Mr or Mrs Client has left the building, a nasty scrap kicks off as the different group agencies battle for creative leadership and their share of the budget. Which probably isn’t in Mr or Mrs Client’s best interest really.

Which leads directly into my second point:

The future of the advertising industry isn’t integration, it’s ideas. Ideas that can run anywhere from a supermarket promotion to a global sponsorship – not just TV scripts. And just as importantly, those ideas need to come from agencies that can make them exciting and effective in those myriad environments.

The most seamlessly organised and integrated agency on the planet won’t last very long if its ideas are inflexible, short sighted or media biased.

And finally; we need to be prepared to share our ideas with consumers, the media, anyone. Technology has seen off the days where advertisers can simply shout their ideas at consumers and sit back and hope for the best.

Smart advertisers are welcoming not only feedback on their ideas and beliefs, but involvement in the very shaping of them.

I’ll be watching the groundswell series of articles “How to unleash empowered workers without creating chaos: The HERO Compact” with interest. It deals specifically with the conundrum of getting employees closer to customers for large companies. A minefield of considerations, risks and interdependencies for big B2C operations, nevertheless, engaging customer issues directly can be entirely advantageous, done right.

It strikes me that the right people are essentially Product or Brand Managers, that is, anyone who acts as a hub for key information about a product or service within an organisation. They need to know about what they are selling down to the minutiae. However, these employees would also need the customer-savvy outlook of a PR person or perhaps Customer Services. PR people can mean too much spin, at least from a customer’s perspective, whilst a Product Manager can be too ‘honest’ or blunt. With training, and a solid set of operational guidelines, select employees could be allowed into the wilds of the Internet. They would be backed-up by a cross-functional ‘rapid-response team’, including PR, CS and tech people, to allow decisive and useful answers to customer input.

Too often issues circulating the web pertaining to an unprepared brand result in a knee-jerk response amongst top brass, who then push for action across the business, rather than from the right people - the results often proving counterproductive to ongoing efforts at dialogue in the space. Conversely, an organisation might put its metaphorical fingers in its ears and keep schtum. The Eurostar ‘wrong snow’ debacle should be a lesson to the follies of that approach.

It will be interesting to see how groundswell shows how to gear up teams and build an operational manual for social media engagement.

And for something completely different…what’s the moment when something that was cool became uncool? Can it be pinpointed? Take the humble tattoo for example. Formerly the preserve of rogues and the misunderstood and now the subject of a 6-minute R/GA video exposé.

Predictably enough, we do an annual predictions presentation and blog. And it’s nice when something comes to pass.

We had a bit of an epiphany (steady!) watching Nick Griffin squirm on Question Time, and us Twittering in real time. The ‘augmented reality’ - or perhaps ‘augmented virtuality’ would be better? - of a big social event with real time online social media interaction felt like it could be huge during this year’s major events (winter Olympics, World Cup, the inferno party). We blogged about it here.

Then, just last week the BBC went and branded it Social TV. Or maybe we were a little behind the curve? I don’t know. But we do think it’ll be huge, and the race will be on now among brands eager to exploit the new platform opportunities.