Every online business starts out the same way: as just an idea. The idea may be to bring something totally new to the marketplace or perhaps the idea will disrupt a market by offering rock bottom prices or a new spin on an old favorite (essentially wha...
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In any industry, there are companies that are admired for the way they’ve built their business. When it comes to ecommerce, The Honest Company is one such enterprise from which entrepreneurs and business owners alike can learn valuable best business practices for scaling and building a loyal customer base. At this year’s SXSW Interactive Conference, ... Continue reading
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Sales aren’t increasing and traffic has plateaued. Leads from PPC are holding steady, but your conversion rate just isn’t improving. What’s an ecommerce marketer to do? First, don’t panic –– and don’t leap to increase your PPC budget just yet. Take a deep breath and review these five ways for increasing traffic. You may discover ... Continue reading
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You have great products, a beautiful website design and a smooth checkout process. You’ve also done everything recommended by conversion rate gurus out there to increase your online sales. Yet, does your company have a compelling and recognizable brand experience? Branding your company is a serious undertaking, but doing so reaps bountiful rewards. Creating a ... Continue reading
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On the road to properly scaling your online business, it’s essential to solve for a major business concern: the need for processes. This is true for all roles within an organization, but when it comes to content marketing, setting up strategies and processes is nuanced at best. From SEO, for which Google and Bing almost ... Continue reading
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In a 2014 study, IDC found that 51% of CMOs at tech companies have held their position for fewer than two years. We predict many new CMOs again this year. How can a new executive start right? IDC interviewed 10 wise, seasoned, CMOs for a glimpse into their first hundred days playbook.
Transitions are vital moments when even the smallest executive actions have a disproportionate effect on outcomes. It's a risky time for a new CMO who starts with neither the knowledge nor the alliances necessary for success. Fail to build momentum during the first hundred days, and a CMO will struggle for the rest of his/her (probably short) tenure. Job loss is not the only blow that may be suffered by a poorly conducted start. Many more CMOs fail to reach their full potential in their current position, thus putting a promising career on a slower track.
Success in the first hundred days, on the other hand, sets the stage for a brilliant performance. The 10 heads of marketing interviewed by IDC collectively recommended these six plays.
Marketing is very closely tied to business context. A new CMO must assess quickly what work is really needed. Does the company need more awareness, a brand refresh, or a full product portfolio transformation? Each of these strategies requires a radically different approach from marketing.
Peter Isaacson, Demandbase: "What are the business goals of the company and the expectations for marketing? What are the business priorities and where is the company going? Get this straight from the mouth of the CEO. What is expected of you? Are there any unrealistic expectations that you need to set straight [such as] build a new category in the first two months? Get on the same page right from the beginning."
Elisa Steele, Jive Software: "There is a big opportunity and a big problem. No CMO in any company has exactly the same responsibility [as another CMO]. You know what a CFO does, what sales does, HR, etc. CMOs are different. Are they responsible for communications? Strategy? Product? Customer service? CEOs can create a spec of their own definition. But that requires a very mixed pool of candidates and it's difficult to understand what any candidate's power skill needs to be."
Greg Estes, NVIDIA: "Building an executive team is like building a sports team. Different players are good at different things. [CEOs] might find they hired a great shortstop when they needed a good first baseman."
The amount of information that needs to be absorbed in the first hundred days is prodigious. It's best to approach learning in a direct and methodical way.
Paul Appleby, BMC: "To remain relevant, our number 1 priority must be to drive a new level of engagement with our customers. We are headquartered in Houston, Texas. However, our customers are based globally. As such, we need to engage with them globally. In my first three months, I travelled the globe and met with over 500 of our largest customers to understand the dynamic impact of digital disruption on their businesses. I also met with our teams in every major city where we operate. We listened and pivoted our engagement model, market positioning, and service delivery model based on what we heard."
Waste little time in building a crackerjack team. Make tough decisions on whether existing team leaders should stay, go, or be repositioned. Make great hires quickly, too, as leaders will need people to achieve early success.
Christine Heckart, Brocade: "First, get the right people in the right job. I meet everyone on the team if I can. For key people, it's one on one — all direct reports, all top talent, all people in key roles. I meet the rest in group reviews at least once. [In these group reviews] everyone gets two to three hours to present — What are you proud of? What's working, what's not working, what's broken? Think of the future, what does success look like? In parallel, I run a change management process. The result is a new org structure, roles described, a people plan (gaps, promotions, etc.). You would be shocked at how often I've found that attention to the right organization has been ignored."
Jonathan Martin, EMC: "The first few weeks in any role should be spent assembling a new team and listening. In the first conversations, nothing makes sense, but after a while you see the same challenges. You need to be creative about finding solutions. With a large global team, it's likely that someone somewhere has solved those problems. Use the scale of the organization. Raise up the super capable in the regions. I found a social expert in India and a guy in Italy who used Twitter to set up CEO meetings. Then, overcommunicate. I tweet. I blog internally. I hold a TV town hall once or twice a month."
Early wins create momentum. Promote early wins widely and loudly so that the CMO and the marketing team are seen as the heroes.
Andy Cunningham, Avaya: "You need a few small wins. Before you can get the big jobs done, you need to earn your credibility. During the first hundred days, you are mostly focused with getting the organization to a place where they will follow you. The small things must be meaningful. Earn your way into the fold. Then you have a chance to get the big jobs done. The more the organization sees you having an impact, the more likely they are to take you under their wing.
"You have to pick the right initial wins. For example, building the funnel or repositioning might be really important, but it will be months before the company sees the impact. At Avaya, I focused on the corporate narrative first because it was really needed, progress could be made fast, and having it would be transformative. It was and now I can focus on longer-term issues."
Identify the five-to-eight must-do initiatives that will create the needed business value that the CEO really wants. Institute a culture of operational rigor. Overcommunicate. A mantra, such as "Jive Forward", can to be a container for the change that is coming and will energize the company.
Christine Heckart, Brocade: "You've got to think big — most companies are looking for a new positioning. But you need to start small. It's hard to get the whole thing done on the first turn of the flywheel. Identify the small number of things that will establish marketing as the growth engine. Establish a rolling two-quarter plan and keep relooking at how it's working."
CMOs will never be successful without forging alliances and coalitions to support initiatives. The CEO is the most important, alliance. His/her support will make or break the CMO's success. Alliances are also needed with the CFO, the head of sales and, especially in this era of digital transformation and data-driven marketing, the CIO.
Lynn Vojvodich, Salesforce.com: "Build relationships with key stakeholders. What are the common objectives? Where is the ROI? These are the areas that need transparency. Everyone feels they don't have enough resources. It's important to be up front about marketing investment and performance so that people understand why necessary trade-offs are made."
More recommendations for the road ahead.
IDC believes that great CMOs will continue to seek, and to be poached, for plum opportunities. These shifts will set in motion a domino effect. Therefore, CMO turbulence will continue. Turbulent environments favor the brave, the persistent, the resilient, and the lucky. While there is no checklist for success, IDC recommends that CMOs and CMO wannabes keep their eyes on the changing landscape and their resumes and networks current.
Kevin Iaquinto, JDA: "The turnover issue is all because of the pace of change. As I look at my own career, I have been in seven different tech firms. I've been acquired four times! This type of change inevitably means change in the management team including the CEO and, following that, other C-suite executives."
Lisa Joy Rosner, Neustar: "This is the golden age of marketing. With the constant innovation of new technology the focus has centered on the CMO. Some CMOs jump to a different company because they want to continue to innovate. 'I've just built out my stack and I want to do it again based on what I learned and with newer/better tools.' This is how they get recruited away. There are very few CMOs who really 'get' digital — so they are in demand. If you are really, really, good, your work is visible and the headhunters call — then each time you move, you get a new opportunity to build a better team and you get 'more tools in the sandbox' to build the perfect marketing machine."
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Before the days of simplified ecommerce set-up, wholesaling was an entrepreneur’s best bet for success. Through the wholesale model, an entrepreneur could source and craft quality products, build a brand reputation and then use that reputation to place their items in larger chain stores through which they could build a loyal clientele, and help said ... Continue reading
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Are your ecommerce promotions performing as well as you had planned? It’s possible that even if you feel you’re doing well, your numbers may indicate otherwise. A little ecommerce education, even if you’re a savvy business owner, can help to make sure you’re working smarter, not harder, to grow your business. We’re finding through many client ... Continue reading
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What does IDC predict for tech CMOs and their teams in 2015 and beyond?
Our recent report IDC FutureScape: Worldwide CMO / Customer Experience 2015 Predictions highlights insight and perspective on long-term industry trends along with new themes that may be on the horizon. Here's a summary.
1: 25% of High-Tech CMOs Will Be Replaced Every Year Through 2018
There are two dominant drivers behind the increased CMO turnover over the past two years. One driver centers on the cycle of new product innovations, new companies, and new CMO jobs. The second (but equal) driver centers around the required "fit" for a new CMO in the today's tumultuous environment and the short supply of CMOs with transformational skill sets.
Guidance: Everyone in the C-Suite needs to "get" modern marketing to make the CMO successful.
2: By 2017, 25% of Marketing Organizations Will Solve Critical Skill Gaps by Deploying Centers of Excellence
The speed of marketing transformation and the increased expectations on marketing have left every marketing organization in need of updating its skill sets. In the coming years, CMOs will not only have to recruit and train talent but also create organizational structures that amplify and share best practices. Leading marketing organizations will become masters of the centers of excellence (CoE).
Guidance: Get out of your traditional silos and collaborate.
3: By 2017, 15% of B2B Companies Will Use More Than 20 Data Sources to Personalize a High-Value Customer Journey
Personalization requires a lot of data. CMOs do not suffer from a lack of data — quite the contrary. Today's marketer has dozens, if not hundreds, of sources available. However, companies lack the time, expertise, and financial and technical resources to collect data, secure it, integrate it, deliver it, and dig through it to create actionable insights. This situation is poised for dramatic change.
Guidance: One of your new mantras must be – "do it for the data".
4: By 2018, One in Three Marketing Organizations Will Deliver Compelling Content to All Stages of the Buyer's Journey
CMOs reported to IDC that "building out content marketing as an organizational competency" was their #2 priority (ROI was #1). Content marketing is what companies must do when self-sufficient buyers won't talk to sales people. While it's easy to do content marketing; it's hard to do content marketing well. The most progressive marketing organizations leverage marketing technology and data to develop a buyer-centric content strategy.
Guidance: Remember that it’s the buyer's journey – not your journey for the buyer.
5: In 2015, Only One in Five Companies Will Retool to Reach LOB Buyers and Outperform Those Selling Exclusively to IT
IDC research shows that line-of-business (LOB) buyers control an average of 61% of the total IT spend. LOB buyers are harder to market to and are even more self-sufficient than technical buyers. To succeed with this new buyer, tech CMOs must move more quickly to digital, incorporate social, broaden the types of content, and enable the sales team to maximize their limited time in front of the customer.
Guidance: Worry less about how much video is in your plan and worry more about your message.
6: By 2016, 50% of Large High-Tech Marketing Organizations Will Create In-House Agencies
Advertising agencies have been slow to recognize the pervasive nature of digital. While many digital agencies exist and many have been acquired by the global holding companies, these interactive services typically managed as just another part of the portfolio of services the agency offers. Modern marketing practitioners realize that digital is now in the DNA of everything they do and are ahead of their agencies.
Guidance: Don't wait. Take the lead.
7: By 2018, 20% of B2B Sales Teams Will Go "Virtual," Resulting in Improved Pipeline Conversion Rates
Buyers won't talk to sales until late in the game. But for B2B companies, a completely digital solution may not be answer either. Some solutions are so new, so complex, or customized that a human concierge must intervene. Enter the "virtual" sales rep. This emerging hybrid of marketing, sales and tech service is a far cry from the historical "me and my quota" sales rep. Think of them as a B2B Genius Bar. CMOs must equip the virtual sales rep with success tools.
Guidance: Find the fledgling "virtual" reps in your company and make them heroes – and make yourself one in the process.
8: By 2017, 70% of B2B Mobile Customer Apps Will Fail to Achieve ROI Because they Lack Customer Value-Add
Apps are maturing rapidly into utilities that can greatly enhance customers' personal and professional lives. Brand value is being redefined by value-added services such as monitoring, reporting, best practices, communities, and guidance. Nearly every brand has an app today. But not all apps are created equal. Some apps provide tremendous value, and others will end up on the island of mobile misfits.
Guidance: Allow your competitor's app to be the "go to" resource and you are essentially locked out of that consumer's life.
9: By 2018, 25% of CMOs and CIOs Will Have a Shared Road Map for Marketing Technology
The CMO and CIO relationship will shape the future of both roles. CMOs must accept that their infrastructure is more effective when it is integral to enterprise IT. CIOs must reinvent their missions to support unprecedented innovation in line-of-business IT. CMOs and CIOs must work together for vendor selection, data governance, backup and recovery, security, and a host of other issues.
Guidance: CMO and CIO should jointly lobby the CEO to overinvest in marketing technology.
10: By 2018, 20% of B2B CMOs Will Drive Budget Increases by Attributing Campaign Results to Revenue Performance
With the sharp lessons of the Great Recession still fresh in their minds, CEOs and CFOs want to make sure every dollar leads to results. If marketing can achieve full revenue attribution promise, this will not only to satisfy demands for accountability but will result in budget increases. But marketing's path to full attribution requires a complex orchestration of technology, data, and marketing skills and can't be accomplished without partnerships with IT, sales, and finance.
Guidance: Start with attribution of individual campaigns and tactics and eventually you'll build this Holy Grail.
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Starting your own business is no easy feat and there have been countless articles on finding a mentor, understanding your analytics, using data to figure out who your audience is, and so much more. Thing is, though, there is no easy route to success, otherwise, everyone would have already taken it. No one knows this ... Continue reading
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