My boss didn't see my ad!

Thought of summarizing the points I discussed with @anandtilak at Digital Marketing Association of Sri Lanka (DMASL) summit held recently. I’ve also added a few extra points as I felt it made sense.

1.???? My boss didn't see my ad. Do we still hear this?

Of course we hear this often. With a show of hands from the audience I figured 80% of them could relate to this line. I have also been in this situation and done what's needed to be done at that time. Back in the good old days at Telco, I had a client servicing Manager from our creative agency, who would take to Beta tape and run across the road to the TV station to air the commercial during the 8 PM news as my CEO watches that. The world has changed, and so should your approach. In today’s digital era, it's important to adapt how you handle situations. As a marketer, when faced with a challenge, you have a task at hand that requires specific actions. Here’s what you need to do:

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a) Have that conversation with your boss. You need to regularly get your boss involved in marketing discussions so they see what activities have been done and, importantly, the results. You are lucky if you have a boss who understands this side of the story – it can make your life easier. Fortunately, I have a boss who is more digital savvy than I am, which means I get challenged more often. These discussions allow you to understand your boss’s expectations and frame what you do as well.?

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b) Use tools to elaborate. You have plenty of tools to slice and dissect digital performance and quantify the impact. Use simple metrics to show case what were your inputs, and what were the outcomes. If you can’t measure what you do (Sales, customer care, Brand impact etc.), you are wasting company resources.

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c) Create a Marketing oriented culture. You need to champion a marketing lead culture in your organization. Honestly, marketing is everyone’s job, not only yours! So how do you build that culture? When I worked for Telco a decade ago, at the launch of the brand, the theme was “How to live the brand”. Basically, each team member, irrespective of their role, was a brand custodian. It takes time to ensure your organization is marketing oriented and even more time to make it Digital Focused.

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It is deemed important to focus on building the digitally oriented culture within the organization. From developing a basic website, implementing a responsive chatbot for customer service to embracing AI evolution is essential.

When social media was at its infancy, the TELCO company I worked for had a cross functional team handling and responding to social media. We took the time to create that culture from within.

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2.???? What are the top challenges for a CMO

The landscape of marketing today, thanks to the digital evolution, is quite a challenge. You need to keep up with it. Learn and explore. I constantly try to bring in young talent to the team and allow them to experiment. This drives me to stay updated, learn and explore new things. In this day and age, you need to be BRAVE. If you don’t take calculated risks, you can’t stay ahead of the game. Some of my most successful campaigns were launched with an element of risk. Of course, I need to thank my agency partners for their brilliant ideas.

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Especially with digital evolution you need to start challenging your status quo. Don’t think 4Ps for marketing. Instead of Product, think Value Propositions. Instead of Price, think of Value for money that your customers are willing to pay. Forget about the Place strategy, but make sure your Products and services are accessible to anyone, anywhere, anytime. And on the Promotional P, do not think of campaigns - think conversations. Building conversations will engage your customers with your brand.

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One of the biggest challenges is managing budgets. When costs become an issue, surprise surprise! The first thing which will get knocked off will be your marketing budget. How do you manage that? I have learned over the years to make the most of what I have. So focus on one or a few key activities than doing everything under the sun. Focus on what the business needs, what makes the biggest impact and work towards that. Learn to show ROI.? If you are unable to show the ROI from your marketing expenses, you are not doing justice to your role. People argue about Traditional marketing vs Digital Marketing, and allocating budgets more to Digital vs. TV. For me, it’s ?all about Marketing in the Digital Era. You need to go back to the basics of “Integrated Marketing Communications”. You are the best person to decide the channel mix, budget allocations, which mediums will play lead role.

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3.??? Are we developing Mobile first Creatives

Connecting to the latter part of my previous answer, first, you need to focus on the purpose of the campaign, and the goal you need to achieve. The goal might vary, ranging from changing perceptions and educating the audience to influencing behavior or driving sales. My experience judging Effie Global Awards showed me brilliant campaigns which were sometimes PR-lead or SEO-lead. So it’s not traditional TV, Radio, Print, OOH etc. On Digital mediums, consider all avenues, such as: Social Media, Web, and Digital Platforms. Based on your objectives, target audience, and impact, decide on the lead medium or mediums.

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When creating films for campaigns, focus not only mobile-first (because your TG is consuming media on their mobiles), but also on the story line. The same flow of the story you plan for TV or cinema may not be a hit on digital. So, during pre-production, plan the plot, story, and product placements carefully. You also need to consider durations of your content. Traditionally we used to do 45 second ads and then edit them down to 30, 15, 10 and 5 seconds. Given the media clutter and impact, now we plan for 20 seconds and then look at other edits. Sometimes, a 5-second version needs to be particularly impactful, especially if the campaign is going to be run on high frequency.

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4.???? Are we future ready?

How many of us truly envision the future? What variables will change? Who saw the pandemic coming? Recently I was involved in a strategic planning session where we went through writing scenarios for the future – a combination of data and imagination. We had to decide what actions to take in each scenario and what competencies were needed to deliver those initiatives. This is crucial for being prepared for the future. Look at how AI has impacted us? How many of you have thought about using AI for competitive advantage?? Most importantly, you need to be agile. Be ready to adjust, to unlearn and re-learn. This agility will define your success. One of the lessons I learned during my MBA which I remember to date is that “Your past successes, can not guarantee your future survival”.

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