On c|net, Tim Leberecht describes the need for convergence of marketing disciplines and the opportunity it creates for the people and agencies capable of making this ideal a reality.
Brand, user experience design, product design, marketing communications, PR, online advertising, etc.–what we’re seeing is an increased convergence of all these creative disciplines. It is not a matter of strategic choice, more a necessity: The truth is that today’s consumers demand that all these disciplines converge.
…brand designers dispel separations that have been artificial anyway, establishing a brand-new equation: brand experience is user experience is user interface design. Digital branding is branding. And your Web strategy is your brand strategy and vice versa.
One of Leberecht’s points is brand managers can’t actually “manage” a brand in today’s consumer-empowered media mix. Thus, the need for “brand design” that reaches across all media channels, and into areas no ad man has ever touched, like customer service.
Doesn’t Wunderman have a Customer Dialogue practive dedicated to that?