success in digital marketing: dealing with root causes of failure

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Lecture given to MBA students at UNC Chapel Hill in 2014. What does it mean to succeed in digital and how to avoid industry traps. Also, why does digital marketing fail even when we think it succeeds. Generously invited by the wonderful Professor JoAnn Sciarrino - http://www.jomc.unc.edu/directory/faculty/joann-sciarrino

TRANSCRIPT

Success in Digital

Social, Video, Mobile & Utility

04/17/2014

Me• Digital Producer

• Started in entertainment for MTV / VH1

• Agency side in ‘digital production’

• Pure-play digital, creative agencies and in-house

• Brands like M&M’s, Snickers, Pedigree, GE, Nike, and MAC Cosmetics

• Digital advertising (content, ads, contests, microsites), brand websites, web software, mobile apps, internal sales systems, web-connected products, and installations

My assumptions

• You will work for brands that are regionally, nationally or globally-recognized (this is not geared to SMBs)

• Most of you will work on the client-side in some kind of marketing capacity

• You have some experience actually trying to market in a real-world setting

• B2C

We aren’t covering• Media planning

• Production dos and don’ts

• Measurement / metrics

• Stuff you already know (eg. the O continuum)

• Storytelling

• Organizational structure and change management

• Branded entertainment

Digital is kind of a big deal.

strategy for digital… content

communications products services

experiences …?

Current trend… OMNICHANNEL

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram / Tumblr

Youtube

Apps

Websites

Web-connected products

TV Commercials

Brands online

Our digital lives

EXERCISE - INFORMAL POLL Immediate recall -

Something you enjoyed and/or passed on 1 person = 1 answer = 1 sticky

Use different color stickies for answers

Success is upon us

Question you should be asking

Who is really succeeding here?

For example: Brand Awareness

–GE President, Olympic Sponsorship and Corporate Sales

“If you can’t find a link to driving company profits—don’t do it!”

An Illustration

Video - keynote only

An Illustration

Video - keynote only

We did everything right.

GE 2012 Olympics

15

responsive websites

(on NBC, ESPN)

dynamic banners

data viz. yelp integration

116 videos

celebrities

rich media ads

Facebook app Sponsored stories

live twitter visualization

–Global executive director of digital advertising at GE

"This is not just a 17-day (social-media) goal. The Olympics are step one."

The problem with ‘success’

• Campaign-centric planning and interruption-based thinking as foundational for all work

• A complicit industry (metrics can be misleading)

• Marketing as science (feeling of control)

Most successful digital marketing fails for customers.

!

Deliverables are a misdirect. !

We’ve got to change our foundations.

AUTHENTICITY Not ‘what to do’

!

HOW TO BE !

‘what to do’ follows

How did we get here? success vs. value

SUCCESS

Brand manager

SUCCESS

Brand manager

Boss(s)

SUCCESS

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

SUCCESS

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

CustomersEyeballs

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

CustomersEyeballs

Agency Partners

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

CustomersEyeballs

Agency Partners

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

CustomersEyeballs

Agency Partners

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

CustomersEyeballs

Agency Partners

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

CustomersEyeballs

Agency Partners

IT / IS

PRODUCT

RETAIL / CHANNEL

ECOMMERCE

Brand manager

Procurement

Boss(s)

‘Digital’ floater(s)

SUCCESS

CustomersEyeballs

Agency Partners

VALUE

VALUE

THE BRAND (YOU)

VALUE

THE BRAND (YOU)

Customers

VALUESilos

BRAND COMMS IT / IS

PRODUCT RETAIL

THE BRAND (YOU)

Customers

VALUESilos

BRAND COMMS IT / IS

PRODUCT RETAIL

THE BRAND (YOU)

Customers

VALUESilos

BRAND COMMS IT / IS

PRODUCT RETAIL

THE BRAND (YOU)

Customers

Agency Partners

CREATIVE SHOPPER MKTG

SOCIAL RETAIL

VALUESilos

BRAND COMMS IT / IS

PRODUCT RETAIL

THE BRAND (YOU)

Customers

Agency Partners

CREATIVE SHOPPER MKTG

SOCIAL RETAIL

VALUESilos

BRAND COMMS IT / IS

PRODUCT RETAIL

THE BRAND (YOU)

Customers

Agency Partners

CREATIVE SHOPPER MKTG

SOCIAL RETAIL

VALUESilos

BRAND COMMS IT / IS

PRODUCT RETAIL

THE BRAND (YOU)

Customers

Agency Partners

CREATIVE SHOPPER MKTG

SOCIAL RETAIL

‘SUCCESS’ VALUEVS.

Brand-first

Campaigns

Fast

Metrics to prove value

Listening to write a case study

Execution is easier

Marketing department only

Person-first

Commitments (can have campaigns)

Slow

Metrics to learn and change

Listening to listen and act

Execution is harder

Whole organization involvement

Obvious right?

Obvious right?Easter / seasons!

Obvious right?Easter / seasons!

New product release

Obvious right?Easter / seasons!

New product release

Earnings are down

Obvious right?Easter / seasons!

New product release

Earnings are down

Industry pressure

Obvious right?Easter / seasons!

New product release

Earnings are down

Industry pressure

KPIs & bonuses

Obvious right?Easter / seasons!

New product release

Earnings are down

Industry pressure

KPIs & bonuses

Bad press

Obvious right?Easter / seasons!

New product release

Earnings are down

Industry pressure

KPIs & bonuses

Bad press

Fiscal year end

Budgets don’t roll over

How to avoid shiny objects, sure things, and rabbit holes

Problems vs. symptoms

• Everything is connected

• Question things- metrics are the opiate of the marketers

• Human psychology is key to understanding industry-wide failing at marketing effectiveness

Tactical Rigor

Strategy

Values

Getting to values

• Be honest about your brand

• Who do you serve?

• What matters to them?

Be honest about your brand• Field research

• Fly-on-the-wall observation

• Surveys and cultural probes

• Extreme Interviews

• Existing research, social listening

• Internal performance metrics (bottom-line figures) and SWOT

• Information radiators

Who do you serve?• Field research

• Walk-a-Mile Immersion

• Interviewing / contextual inquiry

• Existing consumer research, social and CRM data

• Stakeholder and Empathy maps

• Personas

What matters to them?• Field research

• Camera journal

• Narration / Contextual Inquiry

• Unfocus group

• Journey Maps

• Affinity diagram / card sort

• Information radiators

Make lots of friends

• Strategic Partnerships

• Channels

• IT

• eCommerce

• Retail

• Product

Your values become real

• Your baseline for digital marketing is colorful, specific and full of insight:

• A true brand ‘SWOT’ with real life examples and participants for future test & learns

• A nuanced, deep and wide understanding of your target with data to inform partners and internal friends

• Specific ideas for the things your audience cares about and the factors that influence their behavior

Transformation is hardBut it is worth it

What if you were Walgreens?

• What if I don’t have an authentic place in the channels? (what if I’m Walgreens?)

• Entertainment as value?

Workshop

• Group up

• Review the brief together

• Do empathy map

• Decide on a few commitments

Things silos are doingPharmacy chat

New Point of Sale

New loyalty program w/ fitbit

Order prescriptions from your phone

Developer program (open API)

Workshop • Parents (choose the mother or father; younger or older)

• Situation (examples)

• Child gets burned / has rash for longer than normal / warts in strange spots …etc - not sure what to do

• At a new doctor; need to select a pharmacy to send prescriptions to

• Spouse wants pictures from the weekend getaway printed for get together with friends tonight

• GOAL: What can we do with digital marketing to change our image?

Some of what happened• Youtube

• https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=walgreens

• Twitter/Facebook/Instagram

• https://twitter.com/search?q=walgreens&src=typd

• https://www.facebook.com/Walgreens

• http://www.snapsbywalgreens.com/walgreensluv/

• Other

• https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/walgreens/id335364882?mt=8

• http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=walgreens

• https://developer.walgreens.com/

• Mobile

• https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/printicular-print-instagram/id570103834?mt=8

Does this mean

• I shouldn’t do [insert deliverable]?

• Classic metrics don’t matter?

No• The problem with failing to succeed isn’t execution or failure to

measure - its strategy and the communications paradigm

• Marketing fails to build the brand and business because it isn’t values-first. It has no insight and is not primarily concerned with the customers. We need marketers who will go to the mat for the customer.

• That will change strategy and its connection to the tactics through the line. Sometimes it will mean heavy social media and branded entertainment. Often it won’t.

THANK YOU

marceminor@gmail.com

Appendix. My thoughts on…

How to use…social

• Use it mostly for listening, learning and responding. Its a customer-service tool for marketing, not for entertainment.

• Only a few brands have the right to be entertaining socially (eg. use it as a channel for pushing content). Be honest with yourself.

• Take the ‘O Continuum’ seriously

• Question the marketing science with social as media; have meaningful metrics

How to use…video• Depending on your brand, entertainment-based content may be your best

bet for serving people. Most brands think it is but its only right for a few. Its a crowded space. Consider content from other angles.

• If you are a content-brand (eg. CPG), put all your eggs in this basket. Focus entirely on creating wildly entertaining content that is participating in the existing dialog online. Ignore utility.

• Don’t start with your brand. Start with what people are enjoying and go from there. Hire lots of awesome partners and take lots of small bets until you have clear sight for a big bet.

• Make CSR (corporate social responsibility) your business; align with a cause

How to use…mobile/utility• Be as close as you can to purchase intent - retail and POS is really

wonderful and mostly unexplored

• Find ways to improve customer experience with unexpected small ‘digital’ bets. Mobile is very popular with brands but few use it right.

• Get back to the basics - use ‘digital’ to help grow revenue and that doesn’t always mean targeting your consumers directly with promotions or campaigns (eg. consider sales tools)

• Don’t make an app unless your solving a real problem. If you do make an app, dedicate yourself to it beyond a campaign. Commit to solving the problem, not to your campaign cycle.

How to use…brand sites

• See previous slide on mobile (ex…they are the same thing).

• If you have eCommerce, don’t be scared of them! Its amazing how often the marketing and store teams have near zero engagement with each other.

• Reconsider what a ‘brand site’ is. Create a joint task force to serve the customer. You serve the same person.

…knowing what to do doesn’t make a great marketer

!

Relentlessly focus on values and the rest follows

Tactical Rigor

Strategy

Values

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