Business | General
IAA needs to re-brand itself
The largest-ever gathering of the International Advertising Association has been told that the organisation has "fallen behind" and must "re-brand" itself to stay relevant.
- By Daniel Bardsley, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:32 May 3, 2009
Dubai: The largest-ever gathering of the International Advertising Association has been told that the organisation has "fallen behind" and must "re-brand" itself to stay relevant.
Joseph Ghossoub told the 40th IAA World Congress the group needed to adapt to developments in technology and do more to attract young people.
Ghossoub, the Dubai-based chief executive of The Holding Group, took over as the IAA's Chairman and World President, earlier this week.
In a speech yesterday morning, he revealed there were 2,000 registered delegates from 67 countries both of which were record figures. But he warned the bumper turnout was no cause for complacency, saying: "The IAA needs to reach out and move faster with the times."
He said although the IAA was the largest grassroots international organisation of its kind with chapters in more than 75 countries, it was losing relevance.
"We have fallen behind in staying current, and keeping abreast of the latest developments.
"My generation used to read books, magazines, go to the movies once a week. The current generation has everything at its fingertips: WAP-enabled phones, Bluetooth, SMS, video iPods, wireless broadband, Blackberry, blogs, podcasts, TiVo.
"This is one of the biggest challenges for our industry," he said, adding that the IAA had to "re-brand and stay relevant to its membership".
"We need to engage with the world of communicators in a direct way and bring together all of its various disciplines advertising agencies, advertisers, media, publishers, public relations, direct marketing, corporate identity, research firms and academia all within one community that enriches itself from challenging dialogue and action.
"The name International Advertising Association is a bit of a misnomer. The IAA is not advertising only it involves everyone who is working within communications. And we are going to address this issue in our work in the coming months."
He said the IAA was faced with "the challenge and opportunity of youth", saying there was a "huge reservoir" of educated young people it had to attract.
"Our challenge in the industry is how do we train them, teach them, bring them into the fold. How do we make the communications profession an interesting and rewarding career choice for these young people?" he said.
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