Marketing Trends

CMO’s tend to have a mantra when they take over a new job: reorg, rebrand, and restructure. But while the mantra is simple, the process is not. Any time things change, feathers get ruffled, even for the most well-intentioned CMOs.“Being performance driven, it's not always the most popular thing to do when you come into a new company. I pulled back spend in Q2 quite significantly from where we were spending, because I didn't feel it was working. And there were a lot of conversations with my peers, as well as with our CEO, and even the board on some of the risks of doing that. But I really believe that by pulling back a little bit and slowing down in order to get those insights and those key learnings in place, we'll be able to speed up in the future and kind of double down on what's working.”That’s Dana Paris, who is the first CMO of Canidae Pet Food, and she is quick to note that changes and hard conversations are not done in a vacuum. They are calculated risks designed to drive the overall health of the organization. On this episode of Marketing Trends, Dana dives into how having those tough conversations with your C-Level peers can set the foundation for a successful partnership. Plus, she also touches on why alignment across all your touch points, online and in-person, is imperative when you’re building your brand awareness.Main TakeawaysWell, this is Awkward: As a CMO, you have tough conversations. After all, there are KPIs to meet and products to sell. But as a CMO, it's imperative to remember that you were brought in to do a job, which means setting the company up for future success. Don’t be afraid to mix things up that you see holding the company back.A True Symbiotic Relationship: Today brands are not only fighting for awareness for the inventory on shelves, but they are also fighting for recognition online and across all digital touchpoints. Companies must have strong alignment when it comes to their ecommerce sites and their brick and mortar locations so consumers can easily connect the in-store and online experiences. A strong alignment on these things will also help lead the consumer further down the funnel in their purchasing decision. Building Brand Loyalty: When you’re a new brand trying to break into a populated space, you have to find organic avenues to naturally introduce your product to consumers. For Canidae, this process included working with breeders to introduce dogs to its food when they are puppies, and then having the breeders recommend the food to the consumer. This process helps to build consistent buying behaviors, while also helping grow the brand. ---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing. Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

There is one thing that every marketer would say they need: content. But what makes for good content and what makes for the best content? Is it storytelling? Is it authenticity? What content drives engagement, versus what content is merely passable? Kristin Frank is a well-respected and highly-seasoned media expert, and after a 20-year run at MTV, it’s safe to say she knows a thing or two about content.“My biggest advice is to not look at marketing, look at it as content. Make sure the story has quirks, make sure it's compelling, treat each individually as a separate piece of content, and be authentic to the platform. If you do that, you will have a relationship with your consumers that you can then speak to them in any way, and they will trust you.”On this episode of Marketing Trends, Kristin, now the CEO of AdPredictive, explains why after a successful career with Viacom and MTV, she had the itch to ditch her comfy enterprise digs and roll her sleeves up with a startup. Kristin also explains why different forms of content resonate with various platforms, how to attack those different channels and how AdPredictive is playing a role in helping marketers turn insights into advertising. Enjoy!Main TakeawaysNot All Platforms are Created Equal: The way people absorb content differs greatly depending on what channel they are using and the way marketers push their content should accommodate those different behaviors. This means that your content cannot be a one-size fits-all approach. Your content must vary by channel to fit what the consumer is expecting For instance, a piece of video might work really well on TikTok and Instagram, but would not generate the same engagement on Twitter. When you are designing your content to fit within a certain channel you have a better chance of resonating with your audience.Don’t View Content as Marketing: Content should be used in the same manner as how you would tell a story. It needs to have quirks, there needs to be a story arc, but most importantly, you should treat every individual show, blog, or post as it’s own piece of content rather than try to group everything together in a larger push. Can I Get Your ID?: Data visibility and data accuracy are two things marketers need in order to drive business values. When you have both accurate data and easily accessible insights, you can gain a better understanding of who your audience is, what their buying behaviors are, and what pieces of content get them to convert to your product.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing. Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

Here’s a contrarian thought: buying ads doesn’t win you customers. What does win is when previous customers are happy and willing to tell everybody else just how great you are. Now think about this, before you buy a product, what’s the first thing you do? You read the reviews. From influencers, to friends, to referral codes and trade magazines, the way consumers decide what product or service is perfect for them is dependent on who they trust. David Lehman is the President and Chief Operating Officer at Birdeye, and he knows this more than most.“It's all about what research people are doing and who do they trust? Do people trust the brands? Do they trust the articles that they're getting from them? No, they trust their community, They trust their friends. They trust their network. They trust the crowdsourced reviews of both the business, a product. As a marketer, experience marketing is so critical because you've got to fulfill all of those needs for everybody.”So how are marketers flipping the funnel and tying their success to customer success? On Marketing Trends, David answers that question while also providing an in-depth look at how brands such as Blaze Pizza have used Birdeye’s experience marketing platform to put brand advocates front and center. He also provides a unique look at how marketers can supercharge their SEO strategies on Google, Facebook, and more. Enjoy this episode. Main Takeaways:Did You Leave a Review?: Customers leave reviews to help them advocate for a product or service, but they also read those same reviews to help them make an informed buying decision. Customers no longer trust a brand’s messaging to make their decisions, they trust their peers. This is why it's important to seize control of reviews and aggregate them all into a single place. When you have everything in one place, you can identify and resolve common problems as you see them come through and you can also gather and display top reviews easier. Just Call My Mobile: Customers need to be met on the channels where they are most active, which is mobile. In order to have an effective mobile strategy, you must have an always-on mentality. This means that prospective consumers should always be able to get answers to questions in real-time and you can facilitate that through chat, FAQs, or aggregated reviews.Stand-Up, Stand Out: An well-structured and optimized SEO strategy is a great way to make sure that a company does not get buried on the search pages, but it also is integral when it comes to making sure consumers can find you at a moment’s notice.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing. Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

Text message marketing is a powerful tool — after all no other channel provides marketers with the same level of one-to-one communication that you get by sending a simple text. But just because you have the ability to press send, doesn’t mean you always should.“You need to think to yourself before you send any text message, ‘Is this message providing value? Is the person on the other end of this going to look at this and say, yes, I want to save this.’ If it's not the case, you probably shouldn't be sending it because you've got this unicorn right now, and this way to communicate to your customer is so direct, you want to hold it in the highest regard and respect it as much as possible.” On this episode of Marketing Trends, Matt Baglia, the co-founder and CEO of SlickText, dives into the dos and don’ts of text messaging marketing, and touches on the main reason marketers should approach this channel with extreme caution. Matt also explains some of the best practices that will set up any marketer for success. Enjoy this episode.Main TakeawaysSeeking Approval: You always need to know that the information that you are sending to customers is the information that they have opted into. If you don’t have a user's permission to send them content, don’t. If you send materials to a user that didn’t ask for them, you won’t only be breaking privacy laws, but you also run the risk of your materials being perceived as spam, thus creating a negative image for the brand.Set Expectations: When users opt in to your service, you must be explicit about what materials the user is signing up for. This does not mean that you need to provide a long explanation of every message a user will receive, but if a customer is expecting tracking information for a product, that is all they should be receiving.Don’t Hit Send Too Often: Make sure you have a consistent strategy for how often you send your users messages. Nobody wants to read an excessive amount of text messages from your business or organization. A good rule of thumb in most cases is 2-6 messages per month.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing. Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

B2B marketing gets a bad reputation. Some will say it’s boring and you can’t be creative in the B2B space. But who wrote the rulebook that said B2B couldn’t be fun or inspiring? Meredith Stowe Christie, the VP of Marketing at HVR, says that regardless of who your client is, B2B doesn’t have to be boring.“It's B2B, but you're still marketing to a human. Chances are, given the amount of people that are watching the Super Bowl, your target is watching the Super Bowl. If you have the budget and a message that resonates to a lot of organizations, why not do that? You want to be top of mind to these folks when they need to make that decision on your product.”On this episode of Marketing Trends, Meredith explains how HVR is spicing up B2B marketing by putting the customer at the center of everything it does. What does that look like? Meredith says it’s about aligning S sales and marketing efforts to tell the best stories because content is what should be leading prospects through the funnel. Enjoy this episode. Main Takeaways:Know your Story: Make sure you know your product inside and out so you can fully tell the story of your company. When you’re marketing complex products, such as data replication, you have to know all aspects of your product to know what your unfair advantage is and what differentiates you from competitors. Make sure you talk to stakeholders at every level of the company so you can gather that intel in order to best tell the story of the company.Every Last Cent: Digital marketing has made it easier for marketers to track where every dollar and every cent is going, but it’s important to remember that as the company grows, your digital practices should too. This means you have to make sure to experiment with what channels you are spending in to create new avenues for the business.Can I Get an Alignment?: We hear a lot about the importance of marketing and sales aligning their efforts, but it’s important to remember that your content should be a driver to make those sales conversations easier for your reps. Make sure the content you produce opens up opportunities for prospective clients to learn about your product prior to the sales conversations.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing.  Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

Streaming services and connected television sets now dominate living rooms, but what influence has OTT programming had on brands when it comes to content development, strategy, and advertising? “If you can create content that appeals to the kid, but also the overall family and the parents, that's a win-win. You're going to get no pushback from the parents when everyone sits down and says, ‘Let's watch The LEGO Movie because it's fun, it's funny, it's exciting.’ Brands that want to create content, the reality is that some brands have afforded themselves the rights to be entertainment brands and some are just not there or will never be there.”While sitting down and picking a show has become easier, the ecosystem that on-demand services such as YouTube, Netflix and Disney+ offer is changing the game for advertisers looking to capitalize on the influx in inventory. On this episode of Marketing Trends, Charles Gabriel, Head of U.S. Advertising at WildBrain Spark, explores the intricacies of advertising on OTT services, including where advertisers go wrong in the space. Charles also covers major trends that he sees occurring within the industry, including why linear advertising continues to decrease. Enjoy this episode.Main Takeaways:Money Talks: What used to make TV an easy buy are now the same factors that are making it difficult for advertisers to invest in linear television. With more users cutting the cord than ever before, ratings are not only declining, but traditional media options that advertisers have are far fewer than their streaming counterparts.It’s All About Control: One of the biggest factors leading brands to invest in AVOD services is the level of control and frequency they have in picking where their ads are displayed and which audiences those advertisements are targeting. For example, if advertisers only want to reach families that watch children’s programming, AVOD offers better targeting and attribution for those particular audiences.It’s an Entire Ecosystem: Advertisers are now investing in more than just 15- and 30-second commercials. With streaming services, they can now invest in the entire ecosystem, from the actual content, to the advertisements that are played during the show. This is giving brands more influence in the overall product and the message they are able to send to the audience.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing.  Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

Every corner of the world is different, and that means the way consumers buy and absorb media  is different as well. In the U.S., email is a massive channel for brands to reach customers. But what about on continents such as Africa? With a population of more than 1.2 billion individuals, what drives the African consumer? What channels are businesses using to reach them, and where are some of the biggest differences between them and the western consumer?“Over the last five years, the start-up ecosystem has taken off aggressively. People are now building services, products, and services on top of the networks and on top of what the telcos have been able to achieve. The possibilities of what can happen with that sort of infrastructure has taken off. However, the depth of innovation we have seen is really five years-old, and the financial technological system has taken a lead there.”Elo Umeh is the Founder and CEO of Terragon Group, a predictive MarcTech service that is helping African companies connect and reach customers more thoughtfully and effectively. On this episode of Marketing Trends, Elo explains some key differences between the African and American consumer, why email marketing is not a big driver for his customers, and how Terragon is using data and analytics across all channels to help its customers effectively reach its desired audience.Main TakeawaysIt’s a Mobile World: Over the last five years, the startup ecosystem has grown significantly. With more developers building software that incorporates into a tech stack, there is now more of an opportunity for those companies to utilize data and analytics like never before to effectively reach their customers.  Massive Reach: On a continent of more than 1.2 billion people, combined with a landmass greater than other continents, reaching the customer is one of the biggest challenges for African companies. Companies that want to reach their audiences must have an effective data and analytics strategy that is designed to meet their consumers on the go. This means hype-targeting content to mobile devices and social platforms.Different Strokes for Different Folks: Just because a strategy works in the US does not mean that it will be effective for other consumers. In the U.S., email is an effective marketing strategy. But in Africa, you have to account for both web and non-web channels one thing remains true: your messaging must not only be relevant, but it has to solve a unique problem for the customer ---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing.  Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

Sports and brands are synonymous with one another. The Boston Red Sox are known for the famous Citgo signs that resides beyond the Green Monster. The University of Oregon goes hand-in-hand with apparel and shoe giant Nike, and the University of North Carolina is tightly associated with  the jump man himself and the Jordan Brand logo that graces its uniforms. There is no doubt that brands have made a lasting impact on fan bases everywhere thanks to sports.“Brands have a really interesting opportunity to actually create traditions around game day that are synonymous with the brands and finding things that are meaningful to the brands and become great traditions. A carpet company rolling out the carpet for a team to enter the field, or a particular sign being reminiscent of the kind of offering that a company can bring, or a sponsor of a particular segment or kind of content that becomes part of a game tradition.” But how brands become one with a university is a sticky topic. It requires identifying the right fit between brand and school or sport, implementing a proper strategy, and activating the sponsorship at the right time. With another year of collegiate athletics around the corner, Jennifer Davis, the CMO at Learfield, joined the show to discuss how the company brings big partnerships to life between brands and universities. Plus she explains how sports marketing has become a much more integral piece of the overall sales funnel. Enjoy this episode!Main TakeawaysBranding 101: Brands need to view sponsorship opportunities as a way to not only build gameday traditions with fan bases, but also as an opportunity to align your brand with the university and become synonymous with it. By building out these activations, whether it’s a highlight sponsorship, player of the game, or in-game sponsorship, you are creating memorable moments with fans, generating brand awareness, but most importantly, you are organically aligning your product with the university.Let’s Get Specific: As traditional broadcast mediums have changed, it’s afforded brands to take advantage of targeting specific markets with ad inventories. Instead of just placing a commercial spot across multiple networks, schools can now work with companies to identify specific markets outside of their home base to target, which could help lead to future conversions.You’re Now Free to Pre-Board: Any CMO who is about to take on a new role with a company should design their own pre-boarding/onboarding strategy. Rather than stick to the predetermined path a company has always used for onboarding, this could be an opportunity to take the initiative to meet with key stakeholders in the company to understand where you can best serve the company once you start.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing. Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

Kimberly Storin strongly believes that culture beats strategy every day of the week and that you can be the best strategic marketer in the world, but if you fail to build a sustainable culture, your strategy is irrelevant. It’s one of the reasons why when she joined the Zayo Group, she made a plan for her first 100 days, during which she would be relentlessly focused on making sure that within her organization, the sales and marketing teams remain aligned in their vision.“The biggest impact that we're going to have is to get that sales alignment right off the bat so that we can see a great account-based marketing approach. The biggest win that we can have in the next six to 12 months will be to implement account-based marketing.”Kimberly has extensive experience in enterprise technology, having overseen brand refreshes and strategy implementation at some of the world’s biggest technology companies — including Dell, AMD, and IBM. Now, as the CMO of Zayo Group, she helped to implement similar strategies. On this episode of Marketing Trends, Kimberly explains why having a strong ABM strategy is integral to the growth of Zayo Group, she also dives into why every marketing department should devote resources to its own creative services department, and how every new CMO can earn quick wins.Main Takeaways:Building a Plan For a Plan: When you enter any new organization, you have to understand the values and benchmarks the organization needs to hit. A good practice is to start by meeting with all the internal stakeholders of the business to best understand where you earn quick wins. Once you identify these, you can then gain a better understanding of what the key elements and goals of the business are.What Makes for a Good ABM Strategy: A good account-based marketing plan starts with a strong alignment between sales and marketing departments. When both sales and marketing have the ability to leverage market data, combined with the internal data the organization has, it makes for an incredibly streamlined process for identifying the proper prospects to target.Let’s Get Creative: Brand consistency is key, but in order to make sure you are building a strong and consistent message, marketing teams should invest in having their own internal creative agency. When creative services are in-house, it allows you to highlight elements of the brand that matter while building a strong and consistent approach.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing.  Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.

Every company has a secret sauce —it’s the differentiator that  separates one company from the rest of the pack and keeps it successful long-term. For Juniper Networks, CMO Mike Marcellin says that secret sauce centers around how the company is getting its customers to actively engage with its product.“How someone engages with a brand, with a company, is hugely important. 84% of [consumers] said that experience that a company provides is as important as its products and services. If you're a startup going into a completely new space and you're the only game in town, then the features and capabilities are there. But if you're in a mature industry where it's competitive, the customer experience must be there.”On this episode of Marketing Trends, Mike explains how his team has evolved over the last few years to take a more data-centric approach to its marketing efforts. He also dives into how marketers can effectively use A.I. in their decision-making, and how organizations can reduce operational costs to improve their customer experience. Enjoy!Main TakeawaysYou Want a Holistic View of Your Customers: The best way to gain an entire understanding of who your customers are — what their buying habits are, how they like to be communicated with, and what their preferences are— the first step is to make sure all the first-party data you have on-hand about your customers resides in a single place that is clear and easy to read. This will help in organizing customer portfolios while also giving you a better idea of customer trends in real-time.Good A.I. Starts with Good Data: When using A.I. as a tool, whether that is personalizing certain experiences for customers or in your messaging efforts, you have to start with a solid understanding of where your data is coming from. Without good, clean data, your algorithms will give you unreliable results and skew your customer insights.Are you Hearing Feedback? It’s important to create consistent feedback opportunities for your customers to engage with your company, but it’s equally important to make sure you are not chasing your clients to participate in these conversations. When you have active and willing participants, that means you have stakeholders that are invested in the overall product and want to see you succeed.---Marketing Trends podcast is brought to you by Salesforce. Discover marketing built on the world’s number one CRM: Salesforce. Put your customer at the center of every interaction. Automate engagement with each customer. And build your marketing strategy around the entire customer journey. Salesforce. We bring marketing and engagement together. Learn more at salesforce.com/marketing.  Mission.org is a media studio producing content alongside world-class clients. Learn more at mission.org.