In another AdAge.com article this week (‘Industry Unleashes Flood of Studies to Prove Its Worth: Harsh Times Demand (Even) More Concrete Evidence of Effectiveness‘ by Jack Neff) Accountable Marketing is getting more press. As economic fears increase, advertisers are demanding more and more quantification that their media dollars are working – in response, a bevvy of media companies, agencies research firms and marketers themselves are conducting elaborate studies to prove that their efforts are working.
The trend excites me, because we all win when accountability is demanded from marketing / advertising activities. What concerns me is that the studies ask the right questions, enough data (of the right categories) id collected to support immediate and long term analysis needs and that the studies ask the right questions and the marketers themselves are prepared to adopt a continuous improvement model to benefit from their learnings. If the goal of the studies is to simply placate the accountability requests of marketers or validate that the media is working, I fear that the true impact of Accountable Marketing is lost. If you start with the premise that everything can be improved (or even replaced) then performance / accountability studies are used to identify opportunities for improvement and then implement them through a continuous improvement change / test model – all parties involved will benefit from sustainable long term improvement and competitive advantage.
Accountability is more than an economic necessity and ALL Marketers should look for ways to not only Quantify Benefit but continually Quantify Opportunities for improvement throughout the marketing value chain. What do you think?
B.
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Copyright 2008 Gra MATR, LLC 5257 Shaw Avenue, Saint Louis, MO 63110
Categories: Accountable Marketing · Marketing Database
Tagged: Accountable Marketing, AdAge, Advertising, Economy
In an article published yesterday on AdAge.com (“More Marketers Want to Get to Know You: CRM Surges as Brands Demand Measurable Results” By Michael Bush and Rupal Parekh )the venerable advertising publication notes that more and more advertisers are turning to CRM as a way to increase customer intelligence and quantify results. I couldn’t agree more – Accountable Marketing is bigger than just Direct Marketing and is becoming a more and more important component of the overall Advertising Mix.
While I am encouraged to see that general advertisers are looking to database tools and analytics to help them improve their customer insights; its important not to abdicate goals, objectives or control to the CRM vendor but rather leveraging the vendor’s expertise and establish an accountable marketing discipline that fits your business. In an earlier post I discuss the importance of data quality and integration, it is important to note that with the increasing spend on CRM that the AdAge article mentions – all of that investment can be put at risk if the basics are not followed. And beyond setting up a CRM solution – What do you plan to do with the data? What questions are going to be asked? And how equipped is your organization to implement any findings that you glean? If you look at Marketing / Advertising Accountability as a systematic approach to continuous improvement rather than a point in time project your chances of success increase dramatically. Good luck…
B.
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Copyright 2008 Gra MATR, LLC 5257 Shaw Avenue, Saint Louis, MO 63110
Categories: Accountable Marketing · Marketing Database
Tagged: Accountable Marketing, AdAge, Advertising, Analytics, CRM, Customer Insight, Direct Marketing
