Over the past week, CMO.com has engaged several leading European marketing executives in comprehensive conversations about digital marketing. Focusing on a different theme each week but give each executive an open forum to talk about it in a way that describes how he or she handles it within their own company. That perspective then becomes borne from the customer point of view, presents as a rich discussion with different twists, and turns around that common theme. These exclusive articles and interviews are published on CMO.com daily under the European region listings, with one exclusive article is published each week day.
Last week’s focus was on the customer experience. There is a common agreement within the marketing community that improving and personalising the customer experience will drive marketing strategies well into the future. The increasing maturity of marketing technology is at the root of this revolution of digital strategies as the ability to learn more about the customer at the individual level grows exponentially over time. That fact, coupled with companies developing better technology that produces more fresh and engaging personalised content at the blinding velocity of customer interactions over the ever-increasing digital channels available, is transforming digital marketing into an enterprise effort that dictates the dismantling of isolated corporate organizational silos into a better internally connected and integrated team.
Simon Gill, Chief Creative Officer at UK DigitasLBi, and Simon Michaelides, Marketing Director at UKTV, began the week’s discussion on one of the hottest topics of the day, the role of creative design in the marketing process. Both men provided a powerful one-two punch highlighting internal organisational transformations that must take place to make creative “design thinking” an integral part of the brand storytelling process. The strength of their view is borne out in the documented performance of design-led companies evidenced in the Simon Michaelides observation, “However, design continues to be a distinguishing factor, as design-driven companies have outperformed the S&P Index by 219% over 10 years.”
The Jeremy Corenbloom, Marketing Director of Match.com for the UK and Ireland, exclusive interview was eye opening in two respects. First, the efforts to provide a positive customer experience aren’t limited to online digital efforts. The omni-channel experience must extend to offline channels in his line of business. The personal, physical connection is key to his company’s success. Second, people recognise that the world is not perfect and neither are they. In his case, part of delivering on the expectations of the customer is to “love their imperfections” as part of the matching process. That is an interesting customer insight.
The final two exclusives of the week were contributed by Katz Kiely, Director of Strategy Consulting for Cognifide, and Shane Murphy, Marketing Director EMEA for Adroll. Katz was extremely articulate and diplomatic in pointing out the customer centricity has to implemented internally and completely within any company that wants to succeed in meeting the customers expectations. It’s the only way to ensure that your marketing message is seamless, consistent, and relevant across all marketing channels while recognising that changing the corporate culture is no easy task. Shane, on the other hand, clearly demonstrated that change couldn’t stop there. Digital innovators are needed in every marketing organization that challenge the status quo and moves beyond it in presenting the marketing message in an enlightened and unique way that entices the customer to engage and interact with your brand.
We invite you to our intimate and highly engaging place on CMO.com. Read our exclusive engagements with the most enlightened digital marketers in the European region. Connect with us and let us know what you think.
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