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Monday, May 18, 2009

Topic:  Marketing Management

Reference: Patterson, Laura. “Bridging the Gap: Does Your Marketing Team Have the Right Stuff?.” ManageSmarter: http://www.presentations.com/msg/content_display/publications/e3i27bb879e5719e29c0c7a2f16d997b844. April 23, 2009.

If you are still looking for ammunition to use to retool your marketing operations, a good place to start is in the use of data and metrics for product development, service validation, as well as customer feedback. Many companies are using experiential marketing initiatives and voice of the customer campaigns to improve customer relations and extend the relationship to as many areas as possible. 

Monday, May 18, 2009

Topic:  Marketing Management

Reference: Patterson, Laura. “Bridging the Gap: Does Your Marketing Team Have the Right Stuff?.” ManageSmarter: http://www.presentations.com/msg/content_display/publications/e3i27bb879e5719e29c0c7a2f16d997b844. April 23, 2009.

If you are still looking for ammunition to use to retool your marketing operations, a good place to start is in the use of data and metrics for product development, service validation, as well as customer feedback. Many companies are using experiential marketing initiatives and voice of the customer campaigns to improve customer relations and extend the relationship to as many areas as possible.  While these concepts are important and can play a vital role in adding meaning to your marketing efforts they do not go far enough.  What is needed is a commitment to analytics, operations, and continuous improvement. In the referenced article the commentator makes very strong arguments for taking marketing to another level of impact and analysis.  “For many organizations this means acquiring new skills related to marketing performance measurement and management, analytics, benchmarking, and customer engagement.” The commentator specifically makes it clear that marketing can fall into familiar patterns and thereby fall out of line with sales, products, and services.  She sees the need to use business intelligence to anticipate the future and the development of new markets.  “Progress doesn’t come without missteps, misfires, and failures. Winners look for ways to overcome challenges and continuously improve. They seek outside help, new ideas, and new skills.” I believe this to be great insight and an imperative for making marketing more relevant in the future. The difficulty is getting marketing executives to see this reality clearly, to move rapidly, and too embrace these changes as quickly as possible.  Few can translate this vision on their own.  The real question therefore is where is it supposed to come from? My thought is that it has to come from the very top, be included in performance plans, and specifically measured for impact. Anything short of a full program is ineffective.  Let me know what you are doing to re-engineer marketing to meet new performance objectives.