The Wall Street Journal recently spotlighted the changing nature of client-marketing firm
relationships, citing example after example of agencies & firms walking away from client companies because of increased client demands to see the bottom-line ROI of
creative/media execution. Advertising, public relations, brand and design firms are fed up with the constant pressure to financially perform and change their strategic approach - and they are
just saying "no more" to those paying the bill.
This is a problem that
all marketing-related consultancies face these days. It's come down to math, not
just creative, and that's simply not as satisfying to those who value most
conceptual progress or artistic output. Today all marketing - strategies,
programs and creative - needs to link to metrics that measure positive forward
revenue movement, growing customer adoption of products-services, improved
customer satisfaction barometers and increased company valuations. If you can't
measure it in some way, I can tell you the client won't fund the marketing program.
On one
hand you can say that the spirit of thinking in new ways will be lost, or that
involved marketing parties will always feel restricted by inherent spreadsheet
constraints. However, a new way of thinking about marketing needs to emerge -
one that is championed by truly strategic marketers who understand the market is
our bottom line and that no one, no idea, no program is above it. We need to
stay close to our markets and diligently demand that we approach markets in
grounded ways.
It's not that marketing needs to become sales - which is
so often the "Achilles heel" decision made by scared companies. But marketing
does need to reestablish its role as the function that only matters if it is
influencing market thinking, generating the right customer leads and triggering the customer buying cycle.
This reality has propelled the importance of all online marketing & search engine marketing, two areas that Innuity focuses on and excels in. Increasingly, potential buyers are going online to investigate and research what they want to buy and companies, large and small, need to be sure they are able to grab these online seekers. It's no longer just the creative or the most clever marketing strategy that will bring these online consumers to your business. What will really drive bottom line results are effective online marketing programs. For more information on Innuity's online marketing solutions, contact us at 866.814.4080.
Shivonne Byrne, Innuity CMO
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