In a world with increasing choice and supply, where must a marketer focus time and resources to engage audience and grow the brand most effectively? Given the modern marketing repertoire, the marketer has more options to reach the consumer than ever before. And yet, it has never been more difficult to get the attention of the consumer.
With the proliferation of technology, big data and emphasis on personalisation, it’s safe to say that marketing has grown beyond its traditional function and is now more of a science that requires marketers to adapt and acquire new skills. While the duty of a marketer remains to present, advertise and sell a brand’s products or services, the shift towards tech-driven tools, customer personalisation and data centricity cannot be ignored. However, these new practices and trends need to support the traditional creative methods in order to provide real value to customers.
In this scenario, the marketer faces quite a conundrum. Here is my take on some of the predicaments that marketers are faced with today.
Many Technologies
With the rapid increase of martech and adtech tools, there’s no shortage of technology platforms to help marketers understand, target and communicate with consumers. The volume and range of these tools, however, can be overwhelming. There are tools for planning, tools for engaging audience, tools for identity and data management, database tools and tools for consumer-facing platforms. Add to this CRM and adtech platforms and marketers have a wide variety of tech solutions that can be daunting. As a result, technical skills are becoming increasingly important over the creative abilities for marketers. The modern marketer is spoilt for choice but is there a need to implement or use every tech tool available? The trick I think is to find the right combination of tools to help automate intelligent decision-making.
Data or Instinct?
A marketer’s decisions play a massive role in the lifecycle of a brand. So while data might come with facts, in depth reports and surveys, it is the intuition or gut that often helps a brand avoid big blunders. But today, we have more data than ever before to make decisions and new marketing roles have been created to understand and decode this data. The ability to analyze patterns and decipher the highest probability of success has never been more important. Making decisions is now a complex task, involving different processes such as reason, data, brand value and intuition, among others. The solution is not about choosing one over the other, but instead lacing the two together. So, while data is now more abundant and important than before, a marketer needs to have a deep understanding of human psychology, far sightedness and the lessons from practical experience to take a decision best for the brand.
Operations vs Innovation
Marketing is beyond just operational efficiency, it is about innovating how you market, or how you connect marketing with sales to sell your product. As a marketer, it is easier to invest in operational infrastructure meant to make a known process more efficient with a calculable return on that investment. Investing in innovation, however, requires a different mindset. Marketing innovation is an opportunity to find new ways to grow businesses, but it requires a high level of investment in terms of money, people and time. This presents a dilemma to marketers while creating a strategy. A marketer must know that while a well-planned marketing strategy can change how you sell, it a different ball game to make an innovative strategy to improve what you are already doing.
Brand Building vs Demand Generation
A marketer often finds himself/herself in a quandary while deciding on where to focus – building the brand or generating demand for the product or services. The long-term, brand-focused approach is where you invest on improving the brand’s aesthetic or run large-scale brand awareness campaigns. On the other hand in the demand generation approach, you think like a growth marketer and look at the conversion rate. You will often be torn between a strategy that grabs the attention of as many people as possible to increase interest in the brand and one that generates demand to pump sales. While some might weigh budgets more heavily either on brand or demand-specific efforts, the only sustainable marketing strategy might be to focus on both.
Question of Ethics
Ethics and moral dilemma poses a significant challenge especially with the proliferation of big data and invasive technology. The issue of ethics in marketing can be related to market research, invasion of privacy and stereotyping. Marketing practices such as spam or over promotion, overpromising and under delivering, clickbait campaigns, distortion, controversy and fear mongering, among others, often compromise ethical boundaries. However, used in moderation, some of these tools might be effective in reaching targets. So as a marketer, you have to carefully choose the tools and a marketing strategy that is effective and yet does not push the envelope of ethics too far, as it can impact the image of the brand. To overcome this challenge, keep reminding yourself that all marketing decisions and efforts are necessary to meet and suit the needs of customers, suppliers, and business partners.
All these challenges point to a need for marketers to adapt their skills and mindsets to the new marketing practices. Marketers now need to be more agile and responsive to the demand for short-term impact. Technical skills are needed over the traditional creative abilities and the marketer needs to adapt and skill up. However, the art of marketing should not be lost at the expense of bringing the science in. There is no denying that technical competencies, data, martech and insight skills are in demand today, but the value of marketing fundamentals remains.