Write a report of the internal and external environment of WPP (5000 words)

Industry Life Cycle

Thoughts about the Future of Advertising Skeptics who forecast the demise of advertising ignore the fact that business and other enterprises have an innate need to communicate with their public . The real question is not whether advertising will continue to be an important tool of business communication but what forms will Advertising take in the future ? Different geographic markets in advertising industry are in different life stages . For example the US market and Western European markets are mature economies . That implies industrial growth rate is equivalent to economy

growth rate . Similarly Asian , East European , Latin American markets are growing markets . Then we have underdeveloped countries where means of communication are still poor and basic infrastructure is still non-existent . These are the markets where the industry is in introductory stage

Certainly a host of issues related to change face the advertising business . Such issues include the relative importance of the various types of advertising over time , who will pay for what , what controls might be appropriate in light of the changing media environment , and so on . To illustrate , it is inevitable that certain advertising media decline over time (e .g , network television , print ) and others flourish (e .g , data base marketing communication , Internet . In mature economies , this is already visible with viewer ship of soap operas declining in the US and costs of prime slots going up cable TV media appears to lose its charm . However US still remains the biggest advertising market in the world . While Craiglist appears to have hit the print media hard , Internet has emerged as the new champ . The fact is medias change but advertising is forever . Such ebb and flow in terms of the advertising business is predictable and healthy just as the evolution of a species is in the natural world . There are four critical arenas of change regarding advertising industry life cycle (1 ) media (2 ) legal (3 ) consumer and (4 ) creative

In the media arena , while changes and improvements in traditional mass media continue to occur , a massive change is underway which blends the efficiency of traditional mass media and the marketing potential of one-to-one interactivity . Examples of this blending include , most importantly , the Internet , but also personalized supermarket checkout coupons and personal in-flight video screens . These new media mandate an examination of four important and related issues . First , the issue of how advertisers can participate in the development of such media to the benefit of all the parties involved must be carefully examined . Second issues related to audience measurement and who will provide them are critical to the successful development of the new media . Third , the dynamics of how consumers interface with these new media must be studied and understood . Finally , the issue of how to most effectively and efficiently advertise in the new media environments requires thoughtful study

The legal arena faces significant challenges in monitoring and proving illegalities in a high-technology environment . The emergence of new media will increase pressure on legislative bodies and the courts-both inherently...