Yes, but how do you prove it works?
Mark Earls believes that marketing "communications" is the wrong focus for marketers and that instead, we should be making sure our client/company does things that are worth writing about. He writes:
"Too often communications seek to simulate and fake the interest that companies, products and services are missing. Or distract from the very obvious lack of interest.
No, it's much more about doing things, baking in the interest otherwise faked and then suggesting and encouraging consumers and employees to do stuff together around this."
It makes a lot of sense: people increasingly ignore advertising and PR spin so the effectiveness to sell stuff is reducing. At the same time, if you do something special/interesting/important people can now spread the word for you with a click of their mouse. Even without a PR agency.
But it's not happening very much. Why?
It's hard to demonstrate tangible results quickly. The pressure to deliver results and outcomes NOW is immense for everyone. To do what Mark is talking about requires a significant investment in time and resources.
It involves people across the company to work together in a way that they are not used to. It takes a significant amount of leadership to revolutionise the way you look at marketing.
Anyone who is involved in marketing knows how hard it is to get support for initiatives that are medium to longterm in any case. Especially if you can't provide any proof that it will have a measurable result.
So, to get there, how do we demonstrate that "doing things, baking in the interest" is more effective than doing what we are used to doing? And how much more effective will it be?
I support the idea. I think it's what true marketing is all about. The challenge is to come up with a strategy to introduce this approach that will cut the mustard with the people who are paid to think in revenue and profit. Maybe we should make this a new online project for marketers. It is The Age of Conversation after all.
Update: sincere apologies to the owner of the photo I took off Flickr: I can't find your name anymore so no attribution...
Guest post by David Meerman Scott – The New Rules of B2B Marketing
This is a guest post from David Meerman Scott, thought leadership and viral marketing strategist and the author of "The New Rules of Marketing and PR: How to use news releases, blogs, podcasts, viral marketing and online media to reach your buyers directly".
For decades, B2B marketing and PR has focused on only two ways to get noticed, buy your way in with advertising or beg your way in with PR. B2B marketing and PR people have operated under the assumption that you either had to pay big bucks for ads, tradeshows, and direct mail, or rely on magazines, newspapers, radio, and TV to tell your story. That approach might have worked fine when the only way that people found answers to problems was to search tradeshows, Read industry journals, rely on “experts” (analysts) advice and opinions, and interact with company salespeople.
But now buyers are finding answers to their problems online. They search Google, read online portals and news sites, listen to bloggers’ advice and opinions, pay attention to word-of-mouse from peers and friends, and visit company websites
So what’s a marketer to do? The answer is to think like a publisher and create compelling online content in the form of YouTube videos, online news releases, blogs, podcasts, and online media to reach your buyers directly. Each of these things also has an opportunity to go viral, with others telling your story.
Being successful means, as Yoda said in Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back: “You must unlearn what you have learned.”
Old rule: Buy your way in with advertising
As marketing people, we’ve all learned rules that worked in the offline world. But to succeed on the Web using the new rules, old habits must be unlearned.
“Stop shouting BUY MY PRODUCT” (people turn off overt advertising, especially online). You need to unlearn the marketing habit of constantly pitching your product. Instead create content to help people answer their problems.
Old rule: Beg your way in with PR
- Your buyers are not nameless faceless metrics. They are people like you and me who want to consume valuable content.
- You must unlearn the idea that media and analysts are the only ones who can tell your story. Instead, the web has made PR public again.
New Rule: Publish your way in with great content that your buyers want to consume.
- You must unlearn interrupting people with “messages.” Instead, publish online content they want to consume
- You must unlearn the use of gobbledygook about your products and services. Instead start from the problems and needs of your buyer personas.
- You must unlearn spin. Instead, understand that people crave authenticity and transparency.
- You must unlearn being egotistical and trying to force people to adapt to your terms. Instead create online content people want to consume
- You must unlearn the assumption that you must buy access. Instead, create something that goes viral and let millions of people tell your story for you.
- You must unlearn the idea that the “clip book” is the only way to measure your communications efforts. Instead, consider how you can reach people directly.
- You must unlearn the idea that “leads” are the only way to measure your marketing efforts. Instead, consider how you are engaging your buyers and building a position as a trusted resource.
“The new rules of Marketing & PR”…and book reviews
I must admit, when I was first linked to and offered a copy of "The new rules of Marketing and PR" for review, I was more impressed with David Meerman Scott's clever strategy to create buzz than anything else. I guess it is fair to say that he is "walking the walk" of "the new rules".
Having said that, "The new rules of Marketing and PR" proved to be a surprising read, as it offers both a compelling argument why the rules have changed, and then offers a comprehensive guide how to go to work with these rules.
The point about the "new rules"
The central argument is that now that you have the opportunity to market directly to people online (without having to buy media or influence journalists, under the "old" rules) you can tell your own story and you should.
The style is blog-like, without being light on, and the real-world examples of how various business have applied the rules are interesting and credible.
No shortcuts
When you read David's book you are reminded of the fact that are no shortcuts in good communication; if anything, he advises to invest more time and more effort in what you write, and who you write it for.
For example, David highlights that collectively, as marketers, we still too often fill pages with meaningless or internally focused, egocentric content. Sometimes because it is quicker, sometimes because that is what we believe the CEO wants to read. Instead, he advises, spend some time and find out from the people that matter; your audience of prospects/customers/members etc.
"When I see words like "flexible", "scalable", "ground-breaking" or cutting-edge" my eyes glaze over." he writes. I think we all know that feeling.
The challenges I can see
The biggest challenge is that with this explosion of self-generated media will do to the people we aim to reach. Will they suffer from overload and simply go back to reading a few, leading publications? Like a newspaper? I fear that unless we figure out a way to filter online information, people may simply turn off.
The rules at work
Finally, I think it is fair to say that the fact that I am writing a book review is illustrates that the "new rules" are here. A marketer in Australia, writing a blog with readers around the globe, about an American book I can only buy online.
Hard to argue his point, isn't it? Would I recommend this book to my friends? Yes. So that includes you, and if you have read the book, tell me what you think.
When more is less
I recently had a chat with the CEO of an industry association who showed a great understanding of brand value. Traditionally, membership organisations like this rely on subscription revenue to grow, so it would be logical to simply flog as many memberships as you can.
The problem is that the key value of this brand is that membership represents a higher quality, offering an automatic "seal of approval" to buyers. That is the core value of the membership and of the brand. So what did this guy do to grow?
210,000,000 reasons to get fired…
Firstly, let me state I am a great believer in our capitalist system. It's the best system around as long as it is moderated to control the worst excesses.
Did I say control the worst excesses? How about this: the CEO of Home Depot in the US, Robert Nardelli got fired after growing the company only 1% over five years and severely damaging the brand by alienating customers, employees and investors.
According to my information he got US $210,000,000 to leave...you don't have to be a Home Depot employee to get riled up about that.
The problems global warming and marketing share
Our Australian Prime Minister thinks that tackling global warming head-on will cost too much. Bad for the economy. Too much money and a massive effort. He's not sure it is really needed.
It would mean fundamental change. It would mean we would have to innovate. It would require collaboration between the Federal Government and the State Governments, business, the community in general. He believes it would hurt the economy too much. He is probably worried people will vote him out at the next election. So he does a little window dressing.
Plenty of business leaders feel the same way about marketing. It costs money. Not sure if they really need it. The team are too busy already. Getting sales, development, customer service and finance involved in marketing is too hard. It means trying things that have not been done before.
But if the world around you is changing so radically, what is the greater risk, change or no change?
“Marketing” has a brand problem
The role of "marketing" is one of those subjects that often raises as many questions as answers. Now if people don't excactly know what it is that you should be delivering, it is pretty easy to not deliver to a CEO's expectations.
(I wrote about a related issue, how marketing is rated within an organisation, here in response to an Accenture report with some interesting findings)
THis is obvious from the fact that Marketing Executives have some of the shortest tenures in business.
Eric Kintz from HP (who has one of the most poetic titles I have seen for a while by the way: "Vice President of Global Marketing Strategy & Excellence") writes an interesting article on the subject; "What is Marketing responsible for?"
My blogging friends over at Marketing Profs sent me an advance copy of their new book “Marketing Champions” (Wiley Editions) and I like their thinking. Their main argument is that CMOs have to a great extent failed so far to draw the linkage between marketing and the harvesting of cash flow.
They have developed a hierarchy of cash flow responsibilities that I resonate with at a high level. In their pyramid model, the responsibilities gradually build in their relevance to cash flow.
Level 1: Communications
Level 2: Lead Generation
Level 3: Revenue
Level 4: profits
Level 5: Customer equity (customer acquisition, customer profitability and customer retention)
There are not many companies I know where Marketing is responsible for all of the above.
If you would describe these responsibilities to someone and asked who was responsible, you might hear "the CEO" or "The Sales and Marketing Manager" but not "Marketing".
Not that Marketing couldn't do it. The problem is much more difficult. The problem is that the brand "Marketing" is not associated with it. "Marketing" is associated with communications, advertising, spending money.
And I doubt we can convince people otherwise. We can't re-position marketing.
Time to re-brand. A new term, a new concept. Let's get to work!
Some good thoughts on being successful
davidmaister.com > Passion, People and Principles > Two Entrepreneurs
# Be worthy of trust. #
Everyone knows that you are smart— don’t try to prove it. # You are there to help, not to be right. # Be a concierge – if it needs doing, do it. # Develop services and products that are worth paying a premium price for. # Do business as if you were working with a good friend –
Thanks David Maister and Geoff Considine.
Who’s in charge of “Marketing”?
The confusion of what marketing is, should be, or should do is never going to stop. We'll need a new word. Seth Godin wrote about "The myth of the CMO" (Chief Marketing Officer) on his blog, the myth being the fact that they are in charge of marketing.
I feel sorry for Judy Verses. She's the Chief Marketing Officer of
Verizon, a brand that is justifiably reviled by millions of people.Is Verizon disdained, mistrusted and avoided because Judy's not doing a great job? Of course not. She's doing a great job.
The reason we hate Verizon is they act like a monopoly, have ridiculous policies, a lousy call center, a bad attitude, plenty of outbound phone spam and crazy pricing.
We hate Verizon because of all the things Judy doesn't get to influence or control.
The myth of the CMO is the C part. They don't get to be the chief of the stuff that is really what marketing is all about today. CAO, maybe (Chief Advertising Officer) but not CMO.
He is right of course. The real issue is probably that "marketing" the way it should be covers the entire organisation, from the frontdesk to the person who sends out the invoices, to the engineer in product development. Now who is in charge of those people? The CEO. Is he or she a marketer? Sometimes, but not very often.
The best change marketers with the ambition to influence real outcomes has is to become the "trusted advisor" to the whole team on anything to do with customers.
If old style "advertising" is going to be replaced by an increased focus on word of mouth, driven by customer experience than this paradigm will have to shift. There's no option.
Success defined by your goals, not someone elses
The topic of blogging is not something I spend a lot of time writing about; there are plenty of others that do that a lot better than I could.
Today I read a post by Eric Kintz, Vice President of Global Marketing Strategy & Excellence for HP that talked about something that has puzzled me for a while. The idea that to be successful in blogging you have to post every day. He doesn't think so, and I agree.
At the heart of it is really what you define as "being successful". For some bloggers it is to drive as many people to their website as possible so they can make money with advertising. That's irrelevant to blogs like mine because I don't advertise and never will.
This blog is about sharing ideas with people with similar interests who in the process either teach me something, or learn something. I believe that it will build relationships that I couldn't build otherwise. Simple as that.
His post is insightful; I know I can only read a limited number of posts each day. I run out of time. The greater the number of media sources, bloggers, podcasts, video casts, the more selective I will need to be in what I read, hear, watch etc.
So I probably stick with the ones that give me one great insight a week, rather than five bits of fluff a day. Here is one of his ten reasons why post frequency doesn't matter:
5: Frequent posting keeps key senior executives and thought leaders out of the blogosphere –
My colleagues and industry peers cite bandwidth constraints as the number one reason for not blogging. They are absolutely right:frequent posting is not very compatible with a high pressure job. As an example,not one single blog is authored by a senior corporate marketing blogger
in the top 25 marketing blogs listed by Mack.
It raises another point that relates directly to marketing; setting goals. The strength of Eric's insight is that it links being successful with what you set as your goals.
How often do marketing efforts fail because of unclear, poorly defined goals? How often do companies spend a small fortune on a particular type of media (say radio advertising) because the salesman could show it worked for other companies? (who had different target markets, offers, products, services etc)
I like his thinking.
Syndicate
Subscribe to this site's RSS feed.