Driving analytics against big-data is causing marketers to rethink what they do from the ground up.
As far as it goes, that's a familiar proposition here at Internet Evolution, with Rich Luciano, for example, drawing the connections between analytics and commerce in the Corner Office Executive Suite. But I've rarely heard the fundamental changes spelled out as lucidly -- especially in a B2B context -- as in a recent talk by John Kennedy, IBM's VP for Corporate Marketing, at an AdClubCMO breakfast series event, held at Manhattan's Bloomberg Center. (IBM sponsors Internet Evolution.)
Kennedy's talk, which was followed by a sit-down with David Rich, Senior VP of Planning and Strategy, Worldwide, at George P. Johnson, argued that marketers, from the CMO down, need to change in order to deal with a "highly instrumented, highly connected, highly intelligent world economy."
Marketing used to base itself on three principles:
Know your customer.
Know what to market, and how to market it.
Protect the brand promise.
Essentially, these principles survive in a data-driven economy, but each is transformed by contact with analytics.
Firstly, customers are no longer a faceless mass, the behavior of which can be more or less predicted and understood using classic market segmentation techniques. Online activity, not least over mobile channels, has made behavior so transparent that consumers emerge as individuals, demanding a specifically tailored commerce experience.
Secondly, analytics allows us to systematize engagement across across multiple channels -- from call centers to apps -- so as to maximize the value for the consumer at every point of contact.
Thirdly, the benefits -- and risks -- of social media provide ample motivation for brand and culture to be authentically one. In other words, an organization's culture should be such that it's organically represented by all employees engaging with real and potential markets over social channels. Brand value can live or die in the global, social conversation.
Predictive analytics can point the way to the next offer, the next action, and the next customer need, in a way that feels more like providing a service than marketing a product.
Kennedy admitted that the B2C sector is way ahead of B2B in learning these lessons. For B2B marketers, the target is no longer "the account." It's the person, or group of people, behind the account, engaged with as individuals. From the need to automate such engagement, another important principle follows. IT is no longer a cost, but a strategic investment.
The discussion with David Rich indicated that this transformation is just the beginning. Marketers, armed with this view of customers as integrated individuals, are actually well armed to decide which customers they ultimately want. Beyond that, as Rich observed, they can begin to think about what they want their customers to become.
Good points, smkinoshita. I actually remember the newton as well.
You reinforce Kim's point, that you need to better understand the customer so that you can "solve their problem" versus selling them something. The ability to use customized analytics and find the right timing, the right solution, and the right way to solve their problem becomes key.
As Kim points out, the focus is truly the customer and I agree that B2B is far behind the B2C. Therein lies great opportunity!
Apple tried to market the Newton -- the ancestor of the iPhone -- back the late 80's to 90's in the form of a PDA. The market just wasn't ready for it, but stripped down versions of the same device became successful in forms like the Palm Pilot.
It's not really a matter of predictive analysis as much as it is asking the right questions. If the question was "Do people want a PDA?" back in the early 90's, the answer would have been "Yes" -- but it negelcts some critical points like the features desired. Perhaps the better set of questions would have been "How easily do people want to access their data? When will our networks be able to distribute this data in a way that's affordable? What is 'affordable'? What market segment are we talking about?".
So yes and no. "Yes", I think the technology is there, but "No", we don't know how to ask the right questions yet.
Yes without a doubt we have come along way from the salad days during the heyday of the Etruscans when attempts at reading the future meant inspecting the entrails of newly sacrificed animals - haruspicy. I am waiting to see a job listing for a Haruspex. What are the chances?
"Predictive analytics can point the way to the next offer, the next action, and the next customer need, in a way that feels more like providing a service than marketing a product."
I know that has to be the ultimate goal of predictive analytics but are we there yet? Arewe certain of predicting the next offer, the next action and the next customer need? Is it fair to say that this burgeoning marketing revolution hinges on the success and credibility of the results of predictive analytics?
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