February'11/Advertising Age

Why Lovemarks Are More Valid Than Ever, or Welcome to the Age of Now

An article by Kevin Roberts in Ad Age's first Relationship Issue, exploring relationships of all kinds – marketer/consumer, agency/marketer, manufacturer/retailers. Kevin also discusses the past, present, and future of Lovemarks.

...The Age of Now is all about the mastery of emotional communication; not manipulation, but of having relationships, perfect "rules for the road" for the social-networking miasma that has grown around and through us. In the Era of New marketing, it was all about your product. In the Age of Now it's all about the single question consumers have of you: "How will you improve my life?" Answering this is to deliver priceless value.

Every company is bent on building the relationship with its audience, because Next is about deepening the feeling, not just extending the reach. Lovemarks is a universal guide to relationships. What more potent triangle than mystery, sensuality and intimacy might you need to build long-term love? Teach that, Harvard Business School.

The way the world is heading, the future looks less calculating/reptilian, and more connective/emotional. We are seeing national indexes of happiness, insurrections against control, and revolts against materialism.

What will Lovemarks look like in five years? Here are three ways Lovemarks might expand to change the world:

Read the full article at AdAge.com