The marketing technology underpinnings – growth factors
For long I have been challenging myself to simplify the complexity behind the proliferation of marketing technology and innovation and more importantly learn the art of applying the ever evolving landscape to solve business challenges and change consumer behaviors that ultimately prevent businesses from growth.
In essence two key drivers:
- Brand Driver – Ability to sell more products to more people more often
- Consumer Driver – Ability to buy the best product, at the best price at a time, location and touchpoint of her choice and need
Whether we call these growth factors, guiding principles or basic fundamentals; but these five principles have certainly helped me steer every inch of effort and investment towards the two fundamental drivers beyond which everything else is like a great road show that has no buyers or audience.
Here are the five simple principles:
1. Solve Business Problems & Change Consumer Behaviors that Prevent You From Making Money – Ultimately, that’s the key. It is not about the channel, not about the technology but the fundamental behaviors that need to be changed in order to drive growth as defined above both from a “brand” as well as a “consumer” standpoint. The ability to do that mapping; from technology to behaviors, from technology to business challenges is what drives success.
2. Connect the Dots | From Channel to Consumer Obsession – “United We Stand and Divided We Fall”; if there was a right time for this quote to be applied to technology, it is now. With the exponential growth of marketing technology which is leading to a simultaneous diversification and consolidation of the landscape; the success will lie in connecting these pieces of the puzzle together and using the power of data as the fuel that will make this happen. It’s a mindset shift from being channel focused to being consumer obsessed that will inspire seamless omni channel consumer experiences that are only possible with data moving across touch points, stitching the consumer journey together.
3. ROI – Ultimately it has to impact both the top line growth as well as the bottom line; great technology that does not help business grow and change consumer behaviors are great case studies for labs but not for the real world. Challenge yourself to measure tangible impact of your marketing technology investment; some of this will be by driving efficiencies, reusability and scale while some of it will be driven by new business models, new channels and the ability to deliver immersive experiences that will eventually maximize the life time value of your consumers.
4. Need for Speed is Higher than the Desire for Perfection — Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good, if there is one place this needs to be applied today, it is in the world of marketing. Adopt an always-on mindset where you are in a PERPETUAL BETA; there is nothing better than an agile, test and learn approach where your capabilities and experiences continuously evolve based on data, information and insights. They key is to keep moving forward at the pace that your consumer demands.
5. If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t know it well enough – Need I say more?
