Archive for the ‘Marketing Strategy’ Category
The Future of Market Research: 5 Innovations to Watch for in 2012
The great David Ogilvy once said, “I notice increasing reluctance on the part of marketing executives to use judgment; they are coming to rely too much on research, and they use it as a drunkard uses a lamp post for support, rather than for illumination.” Those words from the great David Ogilvy are as true today as they were then.
Market research professionals, firms and organizations from IBM to Forrester Research are projecting the next trend in market research to be “making the transformation from research to insight.” If you ask me, that’s what market research has always been. An effective market researcher should be able to plan, conduct, analyze, and report actionable market insights and solutions to clients.
If you can’t do that, you’re probably just sharing stats that you found on eMarketer. I’m not discrediting eMarketer, which is an excellent research provider, but I see many advertising and marketing professionals searching for and relying too much on the latest stat or trend instead of taking that data point and translating it to something of value. Does that trend even make sense for your client’s unique situation? Or are you simply trying to impress them? This is not a problem with the research provider, but the researcher himself.
Instead of projecting the next trend in market research to be “making the transformation from research to insight,” which should already be innately infused into the mantra of the market researcher, I project the future of market research to be the convergence, or mash-up, of emerging technologies and lateral creative thinking across industries with the discipline of market research.
We are all living in a perpetual state of beta. We all have the ability at any time, to analyze our past and present to optimize for the future. And for market researchers, now is the perfect time to seize the opportunity to innovate the industry in ways George Gallup could have never imagined. So borrow from other competitors, borrow from other industries, borrow from culture – use lateral creative thinking to expand your potential and create new methodologies to reveal new insights and solutions. Below are five examples of this approach, which will continue to grow, especially in 2012.
Continue reading The Future of Market Research: 5 Innovations to Watch for in 2012
Better Marketing Through Personas
It’s no surprise that advertising has gotten more complex in recent years. With the emergence of unique digital opportunities, mobile, and a more competitive, complex marketplace, brands need to do a lot to avoid getting lost in the crowd. One of the simplest, most effective ways to make products and communications efforts stand out is by understanding the target audience. One way we examine and define the target audience at the Adcom Group is via persona development.
Outlaw Email Best Practices
In the past few minutes I have received three promotional emails in my inbox. Companies are deploying more emails than ever, which creates heavy competition in the media world today. I constantly find myself over-thinking methods to counteract that competition. Continue reading Outlaw Email Best Practices
The ‘Wow’! It isn’t about the homepage.
Three seconds if you’re lucky. It’s all you’ve got.
You only have a few seconds to gain the interest of your visitor. It’s important to make those few seconds count when making a first impression. However, those few and precious seconds don’t always happen where you believe they are going to happen. Continue reading The ‘Wow’! It isn’t about the homepage.
Content Marketing White Paper – In case you missed it the first time.
Not too long ago, we posted a discussion around content strategy and the growth and changes taking place in the content marketing world.
Our recent white paper written by Clyde Miles, Partner of The Adcom Group of Companies, The Contented Marketer: Insights into Content Strategy from a Marketer’s Perspective discusses the importance of creating real connections for your brand and creating relevant content that connects your audiences across all paid, earned, shared and owned media platforms and channels. While helping to educate and encourage customer interactions through consistently delivered, valuable content, you will build brand loyalty and equity, which will translate into sales. Continue reading Content Marketing White Paper – In case you missed it the first time.
Vertically Integrated Marketing Stream Of Consciousness
Kendall Allen calls it “Ad Hoc Digital”. Tom Schick calls it the “Duct Tape Approach.” What ever you call it, the non-strategic, non-integrated and non-connected -together injection of tactically employed digital “media” into an overall marketing strategy continues to stunt the growth of many marketers.
Personally, I like the concept of vertical integration as a metaphor for building effective marketing integration: In classic vertical integration in manufacturing, there is upstream vertical integration (like Ford owning steel and rubber companies). There is downstream vertical integration (like American Apparel owning its own retail outlets), and balanced (both upstream and downstream) vertical integration where the company owns or controls the whole process, from raw material to final distribution.
For my metaphor, think about your owned content as your upstream vertical integration, and your owned or borrowed channels as your downstream vertical integration.
Unlike classic vertical integration, which can be visualized as a linear path with a beginning and an end (the one way stream), great integrated marketing now should be seen as a never-ending circular whirlpool-like stream with analytics and ROI measurement built in along the stream to allow for flexibility, speed, scalability and precise addition and subtraction of tactics throughout the continual process.
Like classic vertical integration, this approach is a strategic initiative with a lot of moving parts that requires a strong partner and organizational commitment and resources.
If you are currently doing the “Ad Hoc” or “Duct Tape” toe in the water approach, it’s time to jump into the stream.