Why There's More to Marketing than Advertising

Marketing is not all about promotion. If you are an advertising specialist, it does not make you an expert in marketing.

What’s more to marketing than that?

One of my first blog posts was stating that thefirst step in marketing is HR. Your employees are your best spokesmen.

In some odd way everything can come under the big title of marketing. Anything that entails some creative thinking or choice in an organization is subject to the way you decide to present it to your stakeholders, i.e. to market it.

This leaves only a few tasks that do not fall under marketing, and I say “tasks”, as even the most rigid of positions can be subject to “presentation” bias.  Let’s consider accounting for instance: true, there are some very basic entries that you cannot “edit” creatively, but as your role gets more managerial, you handle more responsibility, and you are given more power to influence the company’s overall image.

For instance, in accounting, you may be put in charge to present your company’s profit to the world. You will have to do it right; yet you will also have to do it in the most subtle and attractive way. Whether you look at the income statement and state “we got ourselves in a debt of 2 million dollars this year” or “we have invested in 3 new venues, and expect to generate 10 million dollars in the coming 3 years” makes all the difference in the world! It is all about marketing.  

Needless to say, you may conduct flawless advertising campaigns, yet… if its cost is not set based on the ROI in terms of profits, if your product’s price is not right, if your salespeople are not polite, if your venue is not welcoming, if your operations are not timely in delivery, if your secretary never picks up the phone, if you fall behind your competition in quality control (and the list goes on)… then you have utterly failed in marketing.

The Old School

Marketing strives on evolution:
psychological and technological, but mostly, on communication.

Experience matters in the business world. However, it feels that young fresh new comers are a step ahead in understanding the predominance of novelties and effects of the new implicit regulations that dictate the market. The old school of marketing has a bunch of attributions that in today's world are almost extinct!

The obvious change - the one that even the most conventional do not fail to identify - The Medium
In the book Mavericks at Work the authors discuss whether Google and WPP cooperate or compete, they conclude that they do both at once, quoting WPP's own CEO they are "frenemies". Yes, marketing has shifted, as new modes of communications are being adopted, from targeted sms, to digital marketing, the new technologies are offering various ways to deliver the brand.

Other changes come subsequently - The Delivery
New possibilities open new doors. What was once a one-way delivery is transformed today into an open dialogue. What was entitled "delivery" became, finally, what marketing is all about, "communication". Thus we entered the world of interactive marketing.

What the old school still does not understand, is that with the changes stated beforehand, the most important change took place - The Message
The brand is no longer communicated in emotional statements, as the audience now has the power to retort. Today, marketing is about content, and no longer about fluff. It is about being informative and no longer descriptive. The client seeks, and the marketeer's job is to supply. The line between B2C (business to consumer) and B2B (business to business) marketing is becoming very thin, as the end consumer now almost requires (as the rules in B2B marketing dictate) a rational value added proposition to purchase a product.

Finally, the receiver has evolved - The Audience
The audience has become bombarded with information, with brand names, with slogans, it has finally gained an immunity to the traditional advertising brainwashing. The message can be fatal. The audience has grown to become aware and conscious. It can discern truth from lies and does not like to be taken for a fool. Information is broadly available and word-of-mouth spreads fast.

...So innovation took place in terms of medium, delivery, message and audience. Where do the marketers stand on keeping up?

Measuring Your Marketing Efforts

I have been reading about economics in relation to marketing. In general, the marketing effectiveness is measured as a relation between the marketing budget invested and the sales returns. The formula is simple MR=MC.

Sounds logical? Maybe, but it isn't quite so.

Marketing efficiency depends on the marketing campaign's success. A marketing budget is only relative to the marketing costs (graphic designer, medium, marketing research... etc) which in their turn change under different settings. Meaning? The same marketing budget can be translated in campaigns of different sizes, depending on the market costs. Thus, a marketing budget is irrelevant in the calculation of marketing efficiency.

Moreover, sales in $ is not representative of the response to the marketing efforts. The same amount, let's suppose $3,000 of total sales, can be a sale of 3 products of a value of $1,000 each or 300 goods costing $30 each. Moreover, the profit margin on the products can be different; thus looking at the sales profit makes things even more complicated.

The real criteria that one needs to look into are frequency and reach of the campaign...

Print Advertsing: Critique and Correction

The rules for NGO marketing still conform to the norms. Unfortunately, the people involved fail to recognize the rules as they are often inexperienced in the marketing field.

Here is an advertisement hanged in church targeting teenagers:

It does not take a genius to figure out that it will fail to reach its audience. Here are the flaws:

First of all, it fails to talk to the customers in their own language. Teenagers do not perceive Arabic as the trendiest of languages. They watch American movies, listen to foreign music, and will NOT expect to be targeted by a poster at church… Especially not with that gothic font style; not to mention that it is almost incomprehensible (ineffective for any audience for that matter!!)
Second, the message has to be intriguing. A bulk of words does not come out as the most attractive text to read…
Thirdly, colors SPEAK, they can even shout! …A combination of matching colors is thus crucial. Colors can even identify the person intended for the message, for instance an emphasis on the pink color says “girls only”.
Fourth, the pictures have to match the message. They are not simply decoration tools.
Finally, the message has to highlight the benefits in order to entice a reaction.

Keeping all that in mind, check the renovated posters:


Enjoy!

Play God

All the hype around Web 2.0 and interactive marketing is making me wonder: How good is this in building goodwill? It might generate word-of-mouth, possibly brand awareness... but what happens to the brand name?

If you're already big in the industry then this could be a good solution for you; but can smaller or medium sized companies resort to this marketing means effectively? Contrary to what the experts are saying, I think not.

A brand needs to be seen as an unaccessible superior power of some sort. To create a brand name, you cannot go to the consumer on a one on one basis. You should not come up as "human". Humans make mistakes.

However what the web 2.0 can actually provide is an all-knowing and all-seeing omni-potent presence to the company, that was never there before. Companies can now monitor their environment closely. Knowledge... that's what this information era is all about.

The industry lacks experience with new technologies, and I am afraid that many have gone wrong. Spamming is one offensive and detrimental mean that has previously been used under pretext that it provides measurable results. Pop-ups is another. Those have already been proven to be ineffective.
However, the inclusion of forums on official websites, or the company web logs and personal involvement of the corporation in these are quite demeaning. the brands are being downsized. If such activities are not carefully done, great damage can be caused.

By getting involved, you're making your brand "human"... and thus subject to criticism.

The correct way to deal with interactive marketing is to use it for information gathering, customer monitoring, catering to consumer needs and responding to critics. In two words, play God. Be the good, knowledgeable, capable God who answers prayers not yet formulated.