Marshall McLuhan coined the phrase, "The medium is the message." In media theory, he proposed that the subject of focus should be the media's characteristics--not the content it carries--as it is those characteristics that influence how society perceives the message.
I won't get into a sociological dissection of Professor McLuhan's theory. I do feel that medium and message are important. You must factor both while conveying a message and trying to solicit a response from your target audience.
I'd like to focus on the "message" portion for a moment, however.
While attending RampUp 2013, I had a discussion with the CTO of an ad platform company. This bloke was sharp, highly-technical and knew his stuff. After our initial introductions, we landed on the topic of messaging.
Off the gates, he (CTO) seemed to dismiss the value of content and messaging; and instead, placed more importance on the product's technology attributes.
I begged to differ.
A company's product (technical or otherwise) is only as good as how it's conveyed and understood by its customers (users). True, product development is important, but I can almost guarantee that successful companies also understand the importance of identifying a market for that product or service; which, by the way, will need some content or messaging crafted around it. Moreover, the message must not only be clear and concise, but also targeted. It's a balance that content and messaging developers work hard at in order to engage and deliver results.
At the end of our discussion, I feel we were both more educated; he (hopefully) on the importance of content and messaging, and me on the opportunity to further bridge the gap between IT and marketing.
Do you have a similar IT vs. marketing story or experience? Let's hear about it.
