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Marketing needs much better marketing.
Marketing can seem like a world built on mystery and ambiguity. And everybody has an opinion on it. Especially it seems those least qualified to do so.
I have a toe curling memory, of working at a London advertising agency, on a major airline account and presenting to a C-Suite client. After the meeting finished our client invited his PA into the room and asked her opinion of the work. Not that I’m overly defensive, but what was the point of this? I hasten to add she was wonderfully steely character who was revered for the way she expertly managed her busy boss. But in this instance she clearly wasn’t even close to the target audience, so why did a high flying senior executive need to ask that question?
If you required the services of an expert, like a pilot, a physician, or a plumber wouldn’t you want to know they’re qualified to perform their job? Wouldn’t you expect they’d undertaken often years of training, which equipped them with the prerequisite understanding and skills to practice their profession? If their chosen profession had empirically proven best practice, which could be articulated in evidence based laws and principles, wouldn’t you expect then to know this?
There has recently been much debate on LinkedIn about this subject. The always pugnacious, entertaining, informative and bespectacled Prof. Mark Ritson wrote a great article in Marketing Week pointing out the Atlantic sized difference in the effectiveness knowledge between American marketers and the ‘International School of Marketing Thinking’ – well worth a read.
So, why is this the case when the knowledge is readily available and has been for a considerable time? The brains trust Down Under at Ehrenberg-Bass Institute – Byron Sharp – published the seminal ‘How Brands Grow’ over 10 years ago. It has been updated since with even more evidence based thinking from Jenni Romaniuk. Additionally the ‘Godfathers of Effectiveness’ Les Binet, Peter Field and the IPA (Institute of Practitioners in Advertising) originally published ‘The Long and the Short of it’ in 2013. This has also been updated with companion pieces.
And there are plenty of other best practice sources to help strategically and creatively deliver more effective marketing. The media mix work of Analytic Partners. The creative execution and storytelling work of System1. How to write better briefs by BetterBriefs. And the Marketing Week Mini MBA with Mark Ritson. It’s all out there.
So, I’d like to give a generous tip of the hat to Peter Weinberg and Jon Lombardo – of the LI B2B Institute – when I watched their new TV show ‘B2B Edge: Ideas for the Future,’ where they aggregated much of the thinking above into The 5 Principle of Growth in B2B Marketing.
Not sure it’s the new Game of Thrones, but it’s must see TV for marketers who want to do better marketing.