Imagine if Amazon decided to build bookstores in all the malls across the country. How successful do you think they would be? Not very. The simple truth is an online brand doesn’t translate into the brick and mortar world very well and visa versa. Starbuck’s doesn’t work online but is a great place to buy a cup of coffee. (I use their website to get coupons for a mocha Frappuccino.) The site becomes a support channel for them.

But what about brands that are about to be extinct due to a change in business methodologies? Companies like Blockbuster are probably not going to be around in another ten years and the simple reality is that online brands have the power to change how, when and where we do business. Netflix caught Blockbuster sleeping and I don’t see them catching up anytime soon. Their target audience still likes to drive to a store to pick out a movie. It’s a family event.

And that’s not half of it. Online businesses just don’t have the overhead therefore they run more efficiently. In the design field, labor is the number one cost to doing business. In a web-based business, the server can handle many of the problems that a decade ago were handled by several employees. This gives Internet Brands an advantage over their more sluggish real world only brands.

Take a look at Tower Records. The Internet changed the way we buy music. No longer do people want to buy an entire album. $.99 gets you what you want. It’s sad for me. My generation would buy a record album, bring it home and sit on the floor, reading and absorbing the artwork while the music played. It was an event. Sad to say, that era is over.

But just in case you are worrying about your own brand, ask yourself this question: Is my brand an online brand or a brick and mortar brand? If it is already successful where it resides, keep it there, but pay close attention to any online company that might be changing the way you do business.

The next twenty years will change our business world for good as we step into a cashless, ebook, wired, virtual reality, technology driven society. Maybe then we can have the same brand working in multiple channels. I’m sure someone will come along and change the way we do business, again. Until then, stick to one arena, but be very guarded before some internet brand comes along and changes your industry.

Thanks for reading,

Brad

Check This out:

The day music died? No, but Tower Records is
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