Okay. Now that I have your attention, let me rephrase the title to: Why all strategies and tactics fail to maximize results in yesterday’s and today’s marketing environments. Answer: It’s about the corporate culture and until that is fixed, marketing, sales and customer service will fail to communicate and connect with most customers and clients.
Valeria Maltoni, a smart marketer who gets it, recently penned a post called How Big Brands can Start Testing Social Media. The sentences that carry the most cache for me are these: “You probably read it in many of my posts – we’re tired of being sold to, but we do like to buy. It’s the push/pull tension. Social media, when executed well, is perfect for what marketers term inbound.”
I commented:
“I have been screaming to the hills with very few echoes returned: In today’s world, we marketers should be placing most of our efforts and our budgets on Inbound Marketing. But first we need to fix corporate cultures.
“According to just-released CMO Council data, “83 percent of marketers say they face change-resistant corporate cultures, conflicts and competition between internal constituencies, and a resistance to operational accountability, visibility and measurement.” And that is a problem.
“Until alignment of customer touchpoints and accountability plus measurement become top priorities, no strategies or tools will be effective or efficient. Keep up the great thinking Valeria.”
And that’s the bottom line. It doesn’t really matter how we approach marketing. Until we align the data, analyze it and use it to predict consumer behavior, Inbound Marketing can only deliver mediocre results. Apparently, those of us criticizing CMOs for not getting it owe 83 percent of them an apology. They do get it. Silos exists primarily because of the “change-resistant corporate cultures, conflicts and competition between internal constituencies, and a resistance to operational accountability, visibility and measurement.” Those were the reason 30 years ago when I first entered the corporate world, 11 years back when I left it, and today as I attempt to serve it as a consultant.
CMOs and their current marketing operational models face “significant challenges from entrenched corporate cultures, inter-departmental politics, and a lack of adequate data and information systems,”
The research, entitled Calibrate How You Operate, tells us that marketers face “a lack of corporate mandate for alignment and integration.” Forty-one percent of the 400-plus marketers audited “point to siloed data and limited cross-functional feedback loops as major internal challenges subverting the marketing operational process.” The CMO Council believes that “The study underscores the critical need for marketing to drive operational effectiveness and optimally structure, resource, and run today’s digitally driven, customer-centric, and globally distributed marketing organizations.”
Can cultures be changed? Not easily and not quickly. And the change can’t happen at all without the leadership of the President, CEO, COO, CFO and the Executive Leadership Committee. That’s too bad, because external marketing at it currently is practiced is going the way of the dinosaur; it is becoming extinct, although it is fighting to hang on. Inbound Marketing will eventually save the day because it is cost-effective and customer-driven. And when that day comes, social media will have a seat at the table alongside the CMO. Meanwhile, all this talk about social media’s value isn’t worth much when it is placed within a contextual vacuum. Instead, social media must be discussed within the context of Inbound Marketing, which as Valeria correctly says is about the simple fact that “we’re tired of being sold to, but we do like to buy.”
Tags: alignment, CEO, CFO, CMO, CMO Council, Conversation Agent, COO, corporate culture, customer-centric, digitally-driven, External Maketing, Marketing, metrics, operational effectiveness, President, research, silos, Valeria Maltoni
You’ve said many important things in this post, Lewis. If anything, the current economy and the basic need for survival may spur some companies to begin to change their cultures. Separate silos and “interdepartmental politics” don’t work and never have, but strong economic cycles can do much to hide some of the problems inherent in this structure. That’s why the “leadership of the President, CEO, COO, CFO and the Executive Leadership Committee”, as you put it is so crucial to pushing an internal integration forward. If you noticed in one of my recent posts, customer interactions are directly suffering because systems, data and management are not integrated. This is a major problem, and as you say, until it is addressed, every marketing initiative is ineffective.
Lewis, I cannot agree more on the fact that only with a strong endorsement from President, CEO, COO, whatever they are called, it’s really tough to get heard by marketing dept.
This is like decades of experience in 1 single post.
Amazingly as always.
From “Customer Management Systems” on, the only problem is and remains how employees understand their company and marketing.
Any CMS, social-media or whatever fancy buzz fails if you focus on technology and do not consider people.
Lewis,
Great post, and you’ve hit on an interesting and challenging transition in marketing. Both the corporate mandate, and the internal skills and discipline to eliminate data siloes and optimize marketing operations are often missing. This is a major cultural shift both within marketing and throughout the general organization.
Ted,
I wonder about this: “If anything, the current economy and the basic need for survival may spur some companies to begin to change their cultures.” Might the current economy also cause executives to tighten borders around their tiny empires in an effort to increase the perception of how important their silo is? I hope you are correct and I am wrong.
Gianandrea,
Marketers are often seen as the fluff side of business. Presidents and CEOs must eliminate that perception by ensuring sales, marketing and customer service work together as a profit center.
Dusan,
There are a few advantages to aging and one of them is all the knowledge and experience we have been exposed to.
When Starbucks first came under the influence of Howard Schultz in the ’80s, he understood that, “the only problem is and remains how employees understand their company and marketing.” He believed and practices marketing, sales, customer service and branding from the inside/out. Employees were always told first and trained to grow the brand. It worked.
Steve,
You discover the Jewel in the Crown: “This is a major cultural shift both within marketing and throughout the general organization.” It is major, scary and unknown territory but essential to maximizing effectiveness and efficiency.
I’m in hog heaven. Two business intelligence related posts in one day at the Fix.
As far as I can tell, Lewis, you’re spot on. In order to make the best of consumer behavior, companies must first have the data organized in such a way that they can act on it appropriately. In order to get the data in such a form, they’ve got to build a structure to manage it, which requires the cooperation, if not the evangelism, of many of the same people you and Ted mentioned.
Great work.
Wow, this post couldn’t be more timely as I try and help my President understand why change is needed, especially now.
Terrific post, Lewis. I, too, have been frustrated for years within corporate environments, for many of the same reasons you cite here. I’ll say this on your post, as I did on Paul Barsch’s: I fail to see how permanent cultural changes can occur in any company without total commitment from the CEO to make it happen. Patience and diligently working at this goal as Howard Schultz did initially at Starbucks is key. People’s attitudes do not change overnight. Employees have to be shown that a new culture that is truly customer-centric will make working for the company a source of pride and value that will breed success for everyone involved. Everybody has to feel that they are stakeholders. . .or else they will not buy into the whole idea.
Cam,
Thank you. Ted, Paul and I are pretty much on the same page with you. Without the right data, understanding consumer wants and needs is not possible, no matter the tactics (including social media).
The CEO and CFO must get it and they must lead the charge. But first the CMO, CIO and VPs of Sales and Service must get on the same page and educate the CEO and CFO.
Krista,
Your task is so important that I am compelled to volunteer my services to help you educate the CEO. How can I help?
Claire,
You are wise indeed. Changes is scary and saying we must change the culture doesn’t make it happen, although it is a necessary first step. Culture change requires an ongoing effort to make everyone feel that they are on one team, and when one succeeds or when the business succeeds, everyone benefits and prospers.
Lewis, as always, you hit the nail on the head. I thought this dilemma was mostly pervasive in the nonprofit and public sectors. Looks like I was wrong big time!
A positive, customer-focused corporate culture is at the root of success. And when I say “customer-focused,” I mean both internal AND external customers. It takes happy employees to live the brand internally before they can exude it externally.
Elaine,
Not only is it pervasive across sectors, it exists within all sizes of business. It is a model that has it roots in cement.
Great points you bring out in this article. Although I am and always have been a small business owner, some of my clients hailed from corporate environments before going out on their own in business. Many times they have shared the frustrations of corporate life and getting things done expecially when it comes to this very topic of social media and marketing.
Thanks so much! gotta tweet about it soon.
Regards,
Heidi Richards Mooney, Author, Entrepreneur, Business Strategist
This post takes corp-speak cliches to the next level. But the underlying point is valid: change is difficult.
Great article, but I think the big companies do get it. They see word of mouth spreading from people they don’t know in ways they can’t control producing results they can’t predict with completely unknown impact on what is often their most important asset…their brand. Would you want someone talking about your wife/husband on social media you didn’t know? The brands as far as they are concerned are their identity.
The only big industry to use social marketing well is the drug industry which of course has to route their messages through doctors. These relationships are built over time and carefully constructed. The influencers can be easily identified and the message will be carried by people who genuinely care about the outcomes of their patients. What makes social media so risky is everyone is at the location for a different reason. One person’s social network to hookup on dates is another person’s business network is a company’s marketing campaign. It’s as tough to trust people in a social media environment as it is people on the street you do not know….even the ones in your network.
The first thing that must be established is a tier of influencers below celebrities and sports stars. These folks must be recognized in some way which makes them credible to the audience. This audience must have credibility with big businesses and consumers alike…social media stars if you will with who people can identify and admire.
Without a way to route their message through a credible source big businesses probably equate social marketing with handing out flyers on the street. Sure it can spread the world, but how and to who?
I saw some beautiful shirts at a recent fashion conference and logged onto kaboodle and saw some guy who looked like an out of shape slob who loved it. Does this help or hurt the companies image. For every one cool guy who tells his friend, how many guys or girls nobody wants to be like are saying the same message?
It has it’s place, but social media marketing for big businesses may seem to them like a step down.
I personally think that now more than ever, the quality of a company’s product matters more than the marketing campaign. People want quality and that’s what they are passionate about. Great food. Great clothes. Great diets. Great whatever.
The more a company knows about who likes its products and which specific products will make their customers wildly satisfied will be marketing over social media channels without trying. The bridge is better market research and market testing. It’s the quality of the product and knowing who likes it that matters; not engineering a sophisticated campaign over facebook and the web.