The rise of the digital market means that consumers have more power than they ever had before. Consumers can easily compare prices, find coupons or discounts, net a free shipping offer, or some other bonus

But this is no longer relegated only to online commerce, writes Gian Fulgoni. Consumers have also become accustomed to using the Internet to root out the best price for any product before they buy in a retail store. And, the rapid emergence of smartphones which are now being activated at the rate of nearly 1 million per week has made these pricing tools mobile, giving consumers the ability to use them in brick-and-mortar locations in addition to online. As one retailer recently proclaimed to me ‘I never thought I’d be competing with Amazon in my own stores!’.

This trend forces retailers to compete with offerings online. The opportunity in this for advertisers is potentially large, as marketing becomes a way to counterweight these advantages for online retailers.

Advertising’s role in this new world becomes not just a demand driver but also a counterbalancing force to price as the main determinant of consumer choice, writes Fulgoni. Ad spending trends certainly support this conclusion: TV ad sales rose 9 percent in the first quarter of this year, while the IAB just reported a 23 percent growth in online advertising. Tellingly, in 2010, display advertising grew faster than search — for the first time since the IAB began reporting its data — driven by a 35 percent increase in spending on video ads.

This brand focus could help lead to focus on ad creative. Controlling a brand’s behavior over several different levels could become a key component across different media channels.

In an age of consumer pricing power, we need to remember that advertising plays a key role in building consumer demand and creating the willingness for consumers to buy a more expensive ‘premium brand’ rather than a lower priced alternative, or a generic, or private label brand. In fact, research conducted by comScore ARS has shown that TV creative is responsible for 52 percent of the changes over time in a brand’s market share, four times greater than the impact of other elements of the media plan, notes Fulgoni. That said, it’s vital that marketers make sure that their creative is doing its intended persuasive job by testing it. I wrote about this in a blog post entitled ‘Four times zero is still zero,’ pointing out that even dramatically increased spending behind poor creative will not move the needle. That’s the bad news. The good news is that it’s been proven time and again that great creative helps build great brands . and great brands don’t have to join pricing’s race to the bottom. Today, especially, that’s a vital point for marketers to remember.

Source: AdAge.com