How can the marketing industry keep up? With nour attention turning away from the traditional advertising and towards our electronic devices.
A transformation of marketing is underway as we spend more time on our mobile’s devices. The challenge for brands is to connect with customers. Through in real time and create campaigns that work across social media, display advertising and e-commerce.
The real-time conversations brands have with people has changed the nature of marketing. The modern-day marketing department needs to combine the creative side of the discipline. Using for example powerful narratives to tap into people’s wishes and aspirations. With the technical side of data, digital engineering and analytics. The two areas do not always sit easily together. Getting creative marketers to work alongside technical staff can be a big challenge.
Three areas of marketing which have been transformed by digital are the speed, relevance and reach of campaigns. Digital marketing has also greatly increased relevancy. Messages can be targeted with a laser focus to very specific groups offering them relevant content.
Meanwhile, the reach of campaigns has also increased greatly. With so many different ways that customers access media, whether through Facebook, YouTube, news websites, via mobile or tablet apps, a strong idea can quickly gain huge scale.
Marketers need to update their skills in order to make the most of these fast-moving, and highly relevant campaigns through digital. They need to work closely with data specialists, web developers and social media professionals.
Just as marketers need to become savvier about technology, data and analytics, so the technically minded staff on the digital side have to get more creative. A vital quality for marketers in the fast-changing digital environment is curiosity, rather than any specific technical knowledge, said Adobe digital marketing director John Watton.
For brands to work effectively together in the digital world, chief marketing officers and chief information officers must work in unison. But this is hard to achieve for many organisations and the two sides can end up in conflict. Pure digital players such as Net-a-Porter that have always been digital are structured for the digital age.
Having a mix of millennials and more experienced staff was important. Paddy Power’s David Singleton said it was a struggle trying to hang on to good staff, who might go elsewhere. And Adobe’s John Watton said: “You need a balance, you need experienced people who have learned some of the pitfalls. We re-skill people on the job, we move people from traditional content roles into web content roles and spot opportunities for people to move towards more data roles.”
