Imagine a future where everyday objects – roads, trucks, toasters, water pumps – are equipped with sensors, capturing data about the world around them and sharing it out to create a digital mirror of everything that happens. That’s the vision of the Internet of Things and it’s coming sooner than you think.

Like the social web and location-based services before it, the Internet of Things will send serious ripples through all aspects of business, from manufacturing to supply chain to retail.

But how might brands and marketers get in on the action? Here are a four initial thoughts about how brands and their agencies could get their hands dirty in this emerging arena.

Be the Johnny Appleseed of sensors
The Internet of Things depends on sensors. By spreading sensors to places where they’re needed, a brand could expand the frontiers of this new world: a form of sponsored utility.

Find a territory your brand can own, seed sensors there, then make the data feeds free and open for everyone to use.

Create a media of things
What if physical advertising media could be infused with sensors? If I worked at a media agency, I’d be thinking about how to turn all those bus shelters, mall kiosks and roadside billboards into intelligent nodes in the network of things.

Build intelligence into outdoor and other forms of media, first using low-tech workarounds like barcodes and QR codes, later with increasingly cheaper and smaller sensors and transmitters. Then discover awesome, campaign-specific things to do with it all.

Make your operations transparent
This idea builds on Adrian Ho’s concept of operations as marketing.

In a world of sensor-equipped objects, the day-to-day operations of any company will generate lots of data as a natural byproduct. Making that data transparent could be a powerful way to show how a company is living its brand idea.

Pull together your business’s data – sourcing, supply chain, sales and so on. Then present it in a way that tells the undeniable true story of your brand.

Turn data into wisdom
More sensors in more things means we’ll be deluged with an ever-growing flood of data. That’s neat. But the real magic will lie in finding the patterns, meaning and insight in all that noise. This work could be one of the most valuable forms of utility a brand can offer.

Pick an area of focus that’s right for your brand. Use your resources to apply the intelligence required to transform that raw data into wisdom. Then share that new-found wisdom with your audience.

These are just my first ideas around this. If you have any to add I’d love to hear them.