Linda Ong of TruthCo. on Trends vs. Fads and More -- Charlene Weisler

Linda Ong has worked for both agencies and television since college Now as CEO of cultural branding firm TruthCo she provides strategic guidance helping network brands such as Bravo Animal Planet and Univision become a force on the cultural map According to Ong TruthCo mines cultural trends that can be used to track the relevancy and authenticity of a brand message for a company amp8220Fifty percent of our work is cultural analysisamp8221 she explains amp8220and 50 of it is brand strategyamp8221 There is a qualitative research component to this called semiotics which is the use of symbols and signs to understand the meaning of long term societal trendsIn this interview Ong talks about which societal trends are most impacting our culture at this time the impact of Millennials what types of research metrics her company uses how TruthCo delineates trends versus fads how connected TVs impact cultural change and how the media landscape will evolve over the next few years and much moreCharlene Weisler Can you provide a profile of American culture todayLinda Org American culture today is in a really interesting place We are about six or seven years out of the economic collapse which was very profound and impactful for everyone in the country Probably Millennials have felt it the strongest We call it a postcollapse culture where there is a recognition that something bad has happened something tragic that has collectively affected us all And that forces people in their everyday lives to see the world differently than they did before the collapse So when you are struggling economically to have a job to keep a job to pay bills you see the world differently You process other things that seem equally difficult in the world Everything from a natural disaster like an earthquake or a fire to a manmade disaster like a Bernie Madoff or a Lance Armstrong to social disasters like Ferguson or school shootings All these things become connected in an ecosystem of chaos because people are fundamentally struggling themselvesThese things have happened throughout time but when times were better before the collapse and everybody was focused on making the most money possible having the best plastic surgery having the biggest house for the most money we forgot that there was a human cost to this Now we have a culture that doesnamp8217t trust institutions and an institution can be anything from a media company to the music industry to Wall Street to banking anything that was an established way of thinking and doing things You see a culture that is fueled by a Millennial spirit which is that we need to make better systems So instead of banking you have Kickstarter Instead of Hertz you have ZipCar You see a much more practical way of livingCW What is the difference between a trend and a fadLO A fad to us is something that happens in culture and becomes very popular but has no cultural meaning It really just becomes something that lives unto itself It isnamp8217t necessarily connected to something that has come before or necessarily to anything that comes after Whereas a long term trend is something that sustains over time but also evolves adapts or reacts to whatever came beforeCW So there is a difference between popularity and cultural significanceLO Popularity does not necessarily mean cultural success certainly not sustainable cultural success We see sometimes that the things that are most popular or most numerous in our culture arenamp8217t necessarily considered the highest quality So you have the conundrum now between ratings success which is a numeric measure of popularity vs quality perception in our culture A show like amp8220NCISamp8221 which is the No 1 rated scripted drama is not held up generally in mainstream culture as the highest quality show whereas a show like amp8220True Detectiveamp8221 or amp8220Sons of Anarchyamp8221 or any of those shows that have been widely lauded as cultural successes donamp8217t have the numbers of a amp8220NCISamp8221 and yet those are the ones that people talk about We believe because of our analysis that cultural success is necessary now in order to gain ratings successCW Linda give me an example of how your research is usedLO We have a better real time picture of how things will be received than traditional consumer insights which tend to rely on when consumers have already ingested or articulated an idea Our track record over that past six years has been phenomenal at articulating swings in culture shifts in culture and how things will be received For example we just finished a study on how television news needed to shift to address the new paradigm of viewers especially Millennials Only a few weeks afterwards we saw the Brian Williams story explode and many if not all of the points being debated now in that story are things which we already anticipated in our studyLearn more via TruthCoamp8217s twitter feeds lindaong100 and TeamTruthCoThe opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaBizBloggerscom management or associated bloggers MediaBizBloggers is an open thought leadership platform and readers may share their comments and opinions in response to all commentariesImage at top courtesy of freedigitalphotosnet

Click to Make Your 2025 Contribution to Support the MediaVillage Education Foundation

Linda Ong of TruthCo. on Trends vs. Fads and More -- Charlene Weisler

Author

Publish date

Channel

Charlene Weisler

The Ad Council, Huntsman Mental Health Foundation and Amazon Announce “The Mind Set” to Support Mental Health - Ad Council InSites

More Videos:

Click to Make Your 2025 Contribution to Support the MediaVillage Education Foundation

Linda Ong of TruthCo. on Trends vs. Fads and More -- Charlene Weisler

Enjoying This Commentary? There's More to Love

Charlene Weisler

The Ad Council, Huntsman Mental Health Foundation and Amazon Announce “The Mind Set” to Support Mental Health - Ad Council InSites

The payment was successful

Cookies