Data Doesn’t Fix Dysfunctional Industry Dynamics
In the 23 years since I first started talking to organizational marketers about the wonders of web-based marketing (2000), then the special digital flavors of mobile and social media (circa 2008), then responsive, paid media, DMP/DSPs and RTB/programmatic (2010+), then OLV/CTV/OTT or whatever term the industry tried to confuse buyers with — in all that time — the promise of the data sitting behind all this digital media leading to “better” marketing has always been there.
But that promise has still not been delivered.
I’ve earned expert status in digital marketing, digital analytics and the broader ad ecosystem through this tenure and the accompanying experience: providing services to marketing leadership in over 20 major brands and pitching to many, many more, holding responsibility for over $100MM annual omni-channel media spend, and other measures of accomplishment (developed the first course on Digital Analytics in Northwestern University Integrated Marketing Communications Master’s program and had 2 editions of a book published, still earning royalties). And as an expert, I stand here to say:
I have not seen marketing get “better” in 23 years by any standards except those of the people selling all sorts of stuff to marketers.
Marketing has gotten “better” for the ad sellers, agencies and adtech firms because spending on agency fees (including increased content creation to avoid message “wear out” and to serve programmatic “personalization”) and ad tech increase along with all the new forms of “inventory” that ad sellers bring to market each year.
Sure, there’s always very creative content in new formats that shows that some marketing and advertising can be interesting and entertaining.
But there is no hard evidence jumping out to any practitioners I engage with to show that marketing is becoming increasingly both more efficient and more effective (regularly generating more with less) — which is the measure of “better” in: Every. Other. Function. In. Business.
And why is every year better than the last to be selling to marketers? Because marketers want to buy.
Organizational marketing leaders and their lieutenants spend everything they’re given each year in an organizational game to get bigger budgets for the next year, so they find ways to spend. They can very seldom prove, with real “caused a sale” measurement, what the increased spend is delivering. But they can continue to foster FOMO of NOT getting into more and more things that everyone else is trying, and that seems to justify the increasing spend, especially with the ever evolving number of ways to spend (also FOMO).
And when the CMO or Brand VP or whoever gets a bigger budget next year, that’s the measure that marketing was successful in the business. (Delivering highest possible ROI for the business is another question.)
What a toxic ecosystem.
- Businesses that scrutinize every other dollar are stuck just putting their thumb in the air for big chunks of marketing budget because the people selling to their (probably newish) CMO or Digital VP or Brand VP insist they’ll fail if they don’t spend on all the new things.
- Knowing that something in the spend must be working but not knowing what exactly is working, they feel compelled to try and buy it all (or hire a new CMO who does it different from the last CMO).
- Ad sales, agencies, data providers and ad tech line up to sell a spectrum of inventory and services and software and data sets granulated down to all the different ways you can spend (influencer agency, creative agency, digital agency, paid media agency, shopper agency, affiliate agency all with their recommended CRM, CMS, CDP, DSP, location-based, data lakes, clean-room deduplication, identify solutions, consumer data sets, proprietary algorithms…)
And it all happens because first marketing decides to spend a bunch of budget, then goes out to find ways to do it.
And there’s a huge codependent industry built on not having businesses think more clearly about this approach, because then all the fun would end.
But marketers — come on. Didn’t you sort of want to be a business-building person at some point? Deep down, wouldn’t it feel good to know you’re generating a return for your organization on what you spend, that you’re being efficient with costs and measurably effective with strategy? That you’re not creating a ton of waste (time, money, energy, spirit/soul, CO2 on travel and just over-production of stuff)?
It’s ok to break the cycle. There’s a better way (and growth leads in companies under $100MM are leading the way). The revolution in making marketing smarter through data is not coming if marketing practice does not fundamentally change.
Old school marketing is sitting in comfortable seats on a plane that no longer has a pilot because everyone wanted to be in the cabin sipping cocktails. It may stay aloft a while longer, but it’s headed for a crash.
Disruption is coming. Reclaim your critical thinking skills. Reclaim your soul. Join the disruption now.
(Lucky for you, there’s a “how to” coming in the next post).
