Last night I saw Hot Tub Time Machine on DVD. I don’t think I’m spoiling anything by revealing that the main characters travel back to 1986. It got me thinking about marketing and advertising back in 1986 — when I was just a young copywriter at my first job at a big ad agency in New York.

Back then if you were a larger company, your marketing vehicle of choice was network TV — since you could reach a large majority of consumers by placing ads on the big three networks (Fox was just starting in 1986). If you were a small business, you’d most likely use local newspaper ads and Yellow Page ads to drive business.

Nearly 25 years later, there’s been a dramatic shift in media usage. Fewer people are watching network TV (due to the splintering effect of niche cable TV), TV commercial production and media costs have skyrocketed, local newspapers are closing left and right as their readership plummets, and the only demographic group that still regularly uses the Yellow Pages are senior citizens.

Instead of “pushing” marketing messages at unwilling consumers, many smart companies are trying to “pull” consumers towards their brand by offering  content that their target audience might find of value. I touched upon this idea in a previous post.

If your company is still trying to get its mind around this concept, think about shifting from being “Shillers” to “Helpful Experts.” By this I mean that today it’s becoming less and less less effective to blantantly shill your product or service. But if you publish your expertise in various formats (blogs, online videos, tweets, Facebook messages, email newsletters, articles, etc.), customers will find you. In essence, you become The Helpful Expert in your field. The more you help your prospects, the more likely they wil turn into customers.