Marketo Chief Marketing Officer Sanjay Dholakia discussed the importance of data and social media for marketing professionals during his presentation at the 2015 Chief Marketing Officer Leadership Forum: Spring Event in Chicago on March 3. In his presentation, Dholakia noted that data and social media can help marketers transform customers into advocates.
1. The New Era of Engagement Marketing
Five Principles for Building Lifelong Relationships
Sanjay Dholakia
Chief Marketing Officer
@sdholakia
2. Marketo Company Overview
#1 independent marketing platform:
• Innovative digital marketing platform
• Fastest growing marketing technology company
• Customer system of record, 1B leads, 220B+
activities
Top rated by Analysts including Gartner,
Sirius Decisions and Forrester
Marketing First
• Helping marketers master the art and
science of digital marketing
• Unparalleled expertise
3,800 customers across
20+ industries in 39 countries
6. A Transformation in Customer Engagement
Mass
Marketing
Focus on the
message
Transactional
Marketing
Focus on the
upfront
transactions
Engagement
Marketing
Focus on
long-term
relationships
7. Buyers are Self-Directing Journeys
66% to 90%
of a Buyer’s Journey
Today is Self-Directed
(Forrester, 2014)
We have a number of marketing executives on the webinar today, some from B2B and others from B2C businesses…now each one of us regardless of whether we are in B2C or B2b, small or large, have the same quest: How do I acquire new customers faster? How do I grow their lifetime value? And, how do I convert as many of them as possible to become advocates? How do I build brand advocates who in turn can influence new prospects? In other words, create this virtuous cycle of customer success.
But, today’s mobile, social, digital world has made this really hard to create this virtuous cycle of customer success. First of all, there is lots of noise out there - buyers are being bombarded by more than 2900 messages per day; they can recognize about 50 and remember maybe four.
But, today’s mobile, social, digital world has made this really hard to create this virtuous cycle of customer success.
First of all, your buyers are more empowered than ever before. They have 2900 messages per day that are vying for their attention so there is are lots of places that they can get information. And armed with this info, they are forming opinions and drawing conclusions well before they choose to interact with your brand. In fact if you look at some data points, from folks like Forrester, they say that anywhere from 66-90% of a buyers journey is self-directed before they interact with you. When they are interacting with your brand, at every stage of interaction, 87% percent of them demand something that is a meaningful, contextual, relevant experience (based on a recent report from Edelman).
Given that there is lots of noise, the customer is self-directing their journey and the customer wants a personal interaction at every point of their journey, it’s now up to marketing, more than any other business function, to become the steward of the customer journey. In the past, sales was empowered and customer service interacted with the customers a lot, but given these trends, marketing is taking the lead, building a bond with customers and becoming the steward of the customer journey.
Visual Note:
Chevron and movement. Engagement Marketing bigger.
But this noise has also created a world of information abundance - buyers are more empowered than ever before. And armed with this info, they are forming opinions and drawing conclusions well before they choose to interact with your brand. In fact if you look at some data points, from folks like Forrester, they say that anywhere from 66-90% of a buyers journey is self-directed before they interact with you
Let take an example of buying a car. You see the purple steps as “buyer-driven” vs. the orange steps as “seller-driven.”
Just ten years ago, if you bought a car, the you would’ve seen a lot more orange than purple on this slide – sellers has all the power. Today, the information abundance has empowered the buyers and made them self-direct their journeys more than ever before.
Let take an example of buying a car. You see the purple steps as “buyer-driven” vs. the orange steps as “seller-driven.”
Just ten years ago, if you bought a car, the you would’ve seen a lot more orange than purple on this slide – sellers has all the power. Today, the information abundance has empowered the buyers and made them self-direct their journeys more than ever before.
Rule #1: Marketers need to shift from mass marketing to engaging people an individuals, in a 1:1 way.
Engaging People as Individuals:
New Rule #3 is that marketers need to make a shift from engaging people based on just who they are (demographic and firmographic) to actually what they do (behavior driven).
What I do is much more important than what I say or who I am…. What I *do* tells you a lot about what my interests and intent are – well before I ever express anything explicitly
I can tell my friends and colleagues anything I want about how much I am working out, but this Nike device on my wrist actually *knows* and can
Think about Amazon in this context – they are playing close attention to what I like and don’t like….not making assumptions about me based on who I am, how old I am, or where I live….it’s that behavior that they are using to think about what will be most relevant and useful to me…<Next slide>
New Rule #4 is that marketers need to shift from point in time campaigns to continuous conversations.
Campaigns are disconnected puzzle pieces – and therefore never form any kind of cohesive thread or picture – to communications that form a continuous relationship that gets deeper and deeper over time.
Traditionally as marketers, we’ve been focused a lot on the transaction – helping close the deal with the customer. But the end of the transaction is the beginning of a long-term relationship with a customer. And brands that win engage people early and engage them over time continously in a personalized way; this is critical in a world where a customer has lots of choice and the switching costs are low.
Rule #5: Marketing is an outcome.
Rule #2: Marketing is an outcome.
As marketers shift from talking at people, and focusing on transactions, to engaging with people – to build meaningful, life-long, and personalized relationships.
We call this engagement marketing.
Engagement marketing is about creating meaningful interactions with your customers, based on who they are and what they do, continuously over time. It’s marketing that engages people towards a goal, wherever your customers are. It’s marketing that is backed by both creative vision and hard data. Finally, it’s marketing that allows you to move quickly, shortening the time between idea and outcome, so that you can create more – and better targeted – programs.