Bringing-foresight-to-marketing

Bringing 20/20
Foresight to Marketing
CMOs Seek a Clearer Picture of the Customer

in association with:

© Copyright Forbes 2011 1

Key Findings
• Marketers’ priorities are customer-centric. More than half (52%) cited customer retention as their top
current priority, followed by customer acquisition (38%), and customer profitability (29%). These will remain
top priorities a year from now.

• Marketing budgets mirror these priorities. About four in ten executives (39%) are dedicating the largest
chunk of their funds to customer retention; customer acquisition runs a close second (36%).

• Online tactics will see significant lifts in budgets. Over the next year, 56% will increase their online
marketing spend, 54% will increase their social media spend, and 50% will increase their mobile
marketing spend.

• Greater emphasis is being placed on data-based decisions. Nearly half of respondents are increasing
their spending on business intelligence, and 78% say there is greater scrutiny placed on what works and what
doesn’t than there was a year ago.

• Marketers are challenged to understand the influence of their campaigns beyond the basic metrics
of acquisition and conversion. Top performers are using technology to get at these results and optimize
their channels.

• Marketers are not always clear on what tools they need to meet their top challenges. Respondents
admit being concerned about their ability to get a deeper understanding of customer interactions or obtain an
integrated view of customer behavior. But there appears to be a disconnect in how they solve that issue, as the
tools that could help—reconciling multiple online marketing applications and lack on an integrated marketing
suite—are at the bottom of their list of concerns.

• Marketing is moving at light speed, but most marketers are not watching or adjusting their
campaigns accordingly. Just 9% review their online marketing performance in real time, and only 9% adjust
their campaigns in real time.

• Top performers are more proactive in tracking and adjusting their campaigns. Among companies that
said their investment in marketing technology was “world class,” 27% track their performance in real time, and
39% adjust their campaign performance in real time.

• While nearly two thirds of respondents said they segment and target customers based on an
integrated view of customer behavior, that view is not necessarily complete. Just 30% have a view of
mobile behavior, and just 34% look at social media behavior.


Bringing 20/20 Foresight to Marketing
In a business environment increasingly dominated by metrics, measurements, and data-driven decision-mak-
ing, marketing executives find themselves under more scrutiny than ever. Less emphasis is being placed on
branding—the traditional realm of the CMO—and more on customer acquisition, conversion, and retention.
While top-level marketers agree that the proliferation of customer and campaign data is helping, not hinder-
ing, their efforts to produce ROI, many are at risk of falling behind as expectations and tactics are evolving
at a breakneck pace.
Today’s marketers have a wider range of options available actions of major marketers, Forbes Insights, in association
than ever before for reaching their targets—broadcast and with Coremetrics, an IBM company, surveyed 321 market-
print, online marketing, social networks, mobile media, ing executives at companies with more than $250 million
flash sales, location-based apps… The list goes on with in annual revenue in the U.S. and the U.K. These execu-
more options seeming to emerge daily. Therein lies the tives represent companies in industries that traditionally are
challenge. In a fragmented marketplace, how can market- heavy users of Internet marketing—retail, travel/hospitality,
ers provide a consistent brand experience across multiple financial services/banking, and technology/media/telecom.
touchpoints? And just as importantly, what is the impact Survey respondents were asked about their efforts to
of these multiple touchpoints on giving marketers a truly meet their goals using highly granular behavior tracking,
integrated view of their customers’ behavior? Finally, given instantaneous data collection, social media channels and
the continued emergence of disruptive marketing technol- real-time campaign adjustments. Their answers provide an
ogies, how can companies stay abreast, much less ahead, of insightful glimpse into a fast-paced future fueled by robust
where consumers will interact with their brands? and far-reaching data.
In other words, marketers today need to view the cus- In addition, the data reveals how top performers—those
tomer with 20/20 foresight, but are caught in hindsight by businesses that rate their marketing technology investment
focusing on what’s worked in the past, not what is working as a “world class” differentiator—differ from average compa-
in the present or will work in the future. nies. Marketers may be able to learn from these differences
To gain a clearer picture of the priorities, concerns, and and apply these best practices to their own efforts.


Customer-CentriC priorities Figure 1: What are your company’s top marketing priorities?
With online marketing being driven by transactions, lead
customer retention
generation, and conversion, it is no coincidence that mar-
52
keters are less focused on brand building and more focused 41
on customer retention and acquisition.
customer aquisition
Asked about both their current priorities, as well as what
38
they believe their priorities will be a year from now, respon- 41
dents clearly had the customer in mind. More than half
customer profitability
(52%) cited customer retention as their top current prior-
29
ity, followed by customer acquisition (38%), and customer 27
profitability (29%). (Fig. 1) These remain the top priorities
Branding
a year from now.
28
For marketing leaders, this means keeping an active 24
focus on lead generation and maximizing the value of each
Direct marketing
and every customer.
19
“We track traffic and behavior closely,” said the vice 16
president of marketing at a global media services company.
online marketing
“We optimize search, email [and] display advertising. We
18
even measure and optimize on lead-generation programs.” 23
Across five of its 10 brands, this vertically integrated
traditional print and broadcast marketing
company serves up more than 150 million monthly page
17
views to eight million-plus unique visitors around the 10
world. The focus is firmly on sales—some B-to-C, but
Business intelligence/ data-based decision making
mostly B-to-B. “We probably still don’t do as much as we
17
would like,” the VP added, “but we are always optimizing.” 16

accountability and metrics
Do buDgets matCh priorities?
17
For the most part, marketing budgets mirror these priorities. 14
About four-in-ten executives (39%) are dedicating the larg-
in-store/ brick-and-mortar business
est chunk of their funds to customer retention; customer
15
acquisition runs a close second (36%). (Fig. 2) Yet maxi- 11
mizing customer profitability—a crucial priority—does
social media strategy and tactics
not appear to be a key budget item, as just 19% said it was a
11
top area of spending. 19
Looking ahead to next year, dedication to retention
Mobile marketing
and acquisition will remain strong, as more than half of
11
respondents said they intend to increase their spending on 17
customer acquisition, customer retention, and customer
profitability. (Fig. 3) 0% 50% 100%
Online tactics will also see significant lifts in bud- • Today
gets—56% will increase their online marketing spending, • One year from now
54% will increase their social media spending, and 50%


will increase their mobile marketing spending. Which Interestingly, while marketing needs to move at light
raises an important question: Are these marketers making speed, marketers appear to be increasing their investments
smart decisions by boosting their online marketing bud- only after they’ve been caught off-guard by changes in the
gets in 2011 or 2012, or should these increased investments marketplace. In the survey, respondents were asked about
have occurred earlier, when pre-emptive strikes in these what key developments over the past year surprised them
areas were more practical? most, and many of the most important changes—such as the

Figure 2: What are the top areas in terms of spending in your current Figure 3: Over the next 12 months, how do you expect your spending in the
marketing budget? following areas to change?

customer retention online marketing 1
39 13 43 36 7

customer aquisition social media strategy
36 13 41 38 6 2

Branding customer aquisition 1
34 14 39 40 6

online marketing customer retention 1
30 12 40 41 6

Direct marketing customer profitability 1
30 10 40 42 6

traditional print and broadcast advertising Mobile marketing 1
24 14 36 42 7

customer profitability Business intelligence/ data-based decision making 1
19 11 34 47 7

in-store/ brick-and-mortar business Direct marketing
16 8 34 47 10 2
6

Business intelligence/ data-based decision making Branding
14 13 29 51 5 2

social media strategy and tactics accountability and metrics
12 5 27 57 9 2

accountability and metrics in-store/brick-and-mortar business
10 8 20 53 16 3

Mobile marketing traditional print and broadcast advertising
10 7 18 49 20 4

0% 50% 100% • Increase significantly (10% or more)
• Increase
• Stay the same
• Decrease
• Decrease significantly (10% or more)


Twitter’s strength as a marketing tool, greater use of smart- Figure 4: The pressure to deliver
phones and tablets, and the rise of flash-sale sites such as
Groupon—topped the list. there is a greater scrutiny today of what’s working and what isn’t than there
was a year ago.
At the same time, they were asked to predict what mar-
29 49 15 4 3
keting-related developments would occur in the next 12
months. And while issues such as app overload, growth of it’s harder than ever to cut through the noise online to get our marketing and
advertising noticed.
the tablet market, and the mainstreaming of social media all
18 46 26 3 7
were chosen, there was little agreement as to what would be
most important. • Strongly agree
• Agree
• Disagree
Creating a uniFieD branD • Strongly disagree
Marketing’s biggest challenge appears to be presenting a • Don’t know
consistent, unified brand across multiple customer touch-
points—on the Web, on social media, via mobile devices,
and through traditional brick-and-mortar. This challenge
extends to consistent messaging, a consistent customer expe-
rience, and a consistent, unified view of the customer.
“It’s easy to measure disparate behaviors,” said the vice Cross-Channel? how about aCross borders
president of media, digital marketing and social media at an
Cross-channel marketing is difficult enough. What about cross-
internationally known telecom and wireless company, “but
difficult to aggregate to provide a single view across multiple border? When it comes to multinational efforts, one marketer’s
digital channels. It’s easy to measure—difficult to provide
metric is another’s meaningless node.
actionable insights back to the business.”
The pressure to deliver is greater than ever. Four of five “Different countries use technology in different ways and
executives (78%) said that, compared to one year ago, more
adopt technologies at a different rate,” said the vice presi-
scrutiny is placed on their marketing efforts. (Fig. 4) Nearly
half (48%) report that short-term results are being priori- dent of marketing and business development for a U.K.-based
tized at the expense of long-term goals.
IT solutions and managed services provider. The company has
One-size-fits-all volume marketing may no longer be
effective. While marketers are getting better at synchro- operations in the U.K., U.S., Germany, Latin America, and Asia
nizing their online and offline efforts, it is harder than
Pacific. “That means we have different data sets and metrics.”
ever to measure the sales-effectiveness of digital market-
ing. Increasing the challenge, barriers to entry have fallen for Rather than see these differences as a hindrance, savvy
competitors, thanks in part to cheaper, accessible technology.
international marketers embrace opportunity. Seemingly dispa-
Two-thirds of executives (64%) agreed it’s harder than ever to
“cut through the noise” and be noticed. This could portend rate data points “can all be used in tandem to create a unique
greater “narrowcasting,” as marketers target their messages to
picture,” she said. “Our main effort as a global marketing team
highly specific segments with highly specific interests.
over the past two years has been to present a single brand
image to the world.”


a thirst For Data “but connecting dots, interpreting results, and synthesizing
“Nothing convinces a CEO more than a clear demonstra- meaning is still high art.”
tion of returns and positive financial outcomes,” said the There’s also the risk of creativity being stifled in the inter-
CMO of a $3 billion agency whose client list includes est of “sure thing“ data-based decisions. Six in ten of those
national and international retailers. surveyed (60%) fear that a reliance on metrics precludes
Data has always had its place in the marketing depart- “breakthrough ideas.” Nearly the same percentage of execu-
ment, but the numbers are no longer being used to just tives (58%) said they spend more time analyzing than creating.
confirm (or refute) decisions. Instead, data is increasingly One marketing vice president summed it up: “All this
driving those decisions. The vast majority of those sur- data can be addictive and can be a crutch.” There is a danger
veyed plan to dedicate resources to collecting business in being too data-dependent, she said. ”It’s about knowing
intelligence to aid data-based decision making. Nearly when and where it’s worth optimizing—rather than opti-
half (45%) will increase their spending in the next 12 mizing everything for the sake of it.”
months; just about everyone else (47%) will spend at Today’s best-in-class marketing executives know that
least the same amount. properly interpreted data can actually drive inspiration. For
There is, of course, a risk to having so much informa- one senior vice president at an international travel website,
tion at one’s fingertips. Some marketers slam headfirst into breakthroughs come “when an anomalous data set provides
so-called “analysis paralysis.” As the agency CMO warned, some insight that we weren’t looking at before.”
“there are few enemies to knowledge as great as having
too much information.” The survey results confirm this. investing in tomorrow’s teChnology toDay
Two-thirds of executives are challenged by the prospect of Retention and acquisition may be top online marketing pri-
converting data into action. orities, but marketers are challenged to understand their
Top-performing marketing executives need more than campaigns’ influence vis-à-vis customer behavior. They
numbers. They need connections. “Measuring and moni- also have trouble obtaining an integrated view of customers
toring may have become something of a science,” he said, across multiple touchpoints.

leveraging short-term Data For long-term suCCess
When B-to-B and B-to-C travel sites first appeared online in the mid- and but in drastically different manners. With community forums and an
late 90s, there were few online channels for serving consumers—and even ever-expanding inventory of partner properties, the original portal is con-
fewer means of measuring their behavior. “Back then,” said the senior vice tinually growing. At the flash-sale site, property pages come down when the
president of marketing at one of the early adopters, ”branding was key.” His sales expire.
company built an audience of highly affluent travelers the old-fashioned way: Neither site could operate successfully without robust data collection
by placing ads, forming partnerships and offering great deals. and analysis.
Nearly 15 years later, in conjunction with a major consumer print publi- “Data is great and we love it,” said the SVP. “We’re looking at more data
cation, the agency launched a members-only flash-sale website dedicated to every day. We have the ability to test and iterate quickly, with less negative
upscale properties. The two ventures serve many of the same consumers— impact. Testing and measuring is the only way to really know what works.”


While retention and acquisition are the top online mar- Top-performing marketers are taking a different tack.
keting priorities of survey respondents, many indicated they They’re addressing the foundation that underpins all of
were challenged to understand the influence of their cam- these: technology. Others may be facing more of a technol-
paigns beyond the basic key performance indicators (KPIs) ogy disconnect, as they are challenged to gain an integrated
of acquisition and conversion. (Fig. 5) customer view, but are less concerned with reconciling mul-
tiple applications or a lack of an integrated marketing suite.
“Multi-source attribution just wasn’t possible ten, or even
five, years ago,” said the senior vice president of a U.S.-based
Figure 5: What are your organization’s top challenges related to online
marketing?
consumer website with strategic partnerships on just about
every continent. “The technology required to capture buy-
Understanding the influence of a marketing campaign beyond acquisition ing patterns over multiple channel interactions over a 90-day
and conversion to include the influence of each interaction
26
period was too expensive.” Today, even large data sets can
be analyzed in a timeframe short enough to yield actionable
obtaining an integrated view of customers across multiple online marketing results. “With today’s cloud-scalable systems, distributed
touch points
25
processing and columnar databases, making sense of the data
around an individual is possible.”
Providing a consistent experience across different media and different This makes sense to the COO and CFO of a national mens-
screen types
24
wear retailer. “Today’s multi-channel consumer is neither offline
nor online,” he said, “but all-line.” His company is leverag-
interpreting data to make business decisions
ing technology to gain a broader view of customers, “optimizing
21
retail and direct channel media to stimulate demand based
Reaching customers no matter where they are online on customers preference—as shown by measuring results.”
20 And yet, when asked to rate their company’s technological
Determining which metrics are important support of online marketing, the vast majority (87%) see room
20 for improvement, and about half of those feel they are either
Meeting different reporting requirements for different stakeholders
just adequate or need some significant improvements. (Fig. 6)
19

Data accuracy Figure 6: How would you rate your company’s investment in technology to
19 support online marketing, compared to your competitors?
Maintaining a flexible approach to marketing planning 2%
19
• World class, a clear
competitive differentiator
too much data 13%
14% • Strong in some areas, but
17 we need to improve in
some areas
Fostering online word of mouth
15 • Adequate for our industry,
but we need to improve
Reconciling multiple online marketing applications 30% 42% • We are getting by, but
14
significant improvements
Lack of an integrated marketing suite are needed
11 • We are underperforming
and radical improvements
0% 50% 100% are needed


Moreover, many marketers appear to be stymied by mea- Figure 7: How easy is it for you to measure and interpret data for the
suring the impact of emerging Internet technologies. While following tasks?
one of the benefits of online marketing has been the ability offline customer behavior
to measure results in real time, many marketers are finding 14 38 31 10 8
it not to be as easy as they thought. While offline customer
all channels performance comparison in one view
behavior was ranked as the most difficult area to mea-
10 38 33 11 8
sure, marketers have been challenged to have an integrated
view of their online performance. (Fig. 7) Moreover, with customer behavior across all marketing touch points
new online channels emerging, marketers may not clearly 12 36 40 6 6

understand how customers are supposed to behave on those all channels performance comparison in one view
channels. For instance, more than 40% said it is difficult 10 35 37 10 8
to measure customer interaction via social media. A simi- the value of a marketing campaign based on influence and interaction
lar number said it was difficult to measure interaction via 8 35 38 10 9
mobile media—which can often be a window into offline
customer behavior on social media
behavior. Considering that these technologies have moved
13 30 32 12 13
into the mainstream in the past year, this frustration could
be affecting marketers’ abilities to succeed in these areas. all vendors performance comparison in one view
11 30 36 13 12

Display advertising performance based on impressions 12

7 32 39 11 11
EngagEmEnt Is a movIng, mobIlE targEt online customer behavior over time – multi-visit
How does a rapidly expanding chain of frozen dessert restaurants grow to more than 100 8 31 40 13 8

Mobile marketing performance
stores in less than six years?
11 28 38 9 14
The company’s CMO is not among the 13% of marketing executives who cannot individual channel performance
measure his customers’ behavior on social media. Nor is he among the 14% bewildered 4 30 44 15 7

individual online marketing campaign performance
by mobile channels. Crucial to the company’s explosive success are its legion of loyal cus-
5 27 49 10 9
tomers who evangelize on the brand’s behalf using social media. online customer behavior – per visit/session
“[We are] a very social brand, online and off-,” the CMO explained. “Seventy percent 7 23 49 14 7

individual vendor performance
of our customer store visits involve a group of two or more people.” Leveraging social
7 23 49 14 7
media to create brand ambassadors was a natural fit. “We increasingly rely on [fans] to
help tell our story and introduce new customers to our brand experience.” • Very difficult
• Difficult
But maintaining a Twitter account and Facebook page isn’t enough. “The mobile • Easy
• Very easy
device is increasingly blurring the lines between online and offline integration,” said the • Don’t know

CMO. “We are actively working on innovating mobile technologies that will allow our
customer to engage online as part of the in-store experience.”


personalization DemanDs immeDiaCy Similarly, these world-class marketers are using this data
Marketing is moving at light speed, but few executives to adjust their campaigns—39% adjust in real time and 29%
are watching or adjusting their campaigns and con- indicated they adjust their campaigns whenever they review
tent accordingly. Of those surveyed, the majority either the metrics. (Fig. 9)
reviews their metrics weekly (28%) or monthly (24%). Just But just as collecting data in a vacuum is pointless, so
two in 10 review online marketing performance daily— too is immediacy for its own sake. The true value of instant
a good start, but insufficient for today’s demanding (and feedback, analysis and adjustment is presenting a personal-
savvy) consumers. Fewer than one in 10 reviews perfor- ized experience to the user.
mance in real time. The CMO for the Americas at a major global hotel
That’s overall. But those who are top performers—those chain understands this. “Real-time one-to-one marketing
that say their companies’ investment in marketing technol- is doable provided you have a dynamic system to custom-
ogy is “world class”—are much more proactive in tracking ize offers on the fly,” he said. “We typically do customer
and adjusting their campaigns. More than half of “world clustering where we provide offers based upon city or brand
class” marketers review their campaign performance in real interest, then tailor creative… Our insight and analytics team
time (27%) or daily (32%). (Fig. 8) are a critical and strategic part of our marketing activity.”

Figure 8: How often is your online marketing performance reviewed within Figure 9: How often do you adjust your online marketing campaigns based on
your organization? these reports?

Real-time Real-time
27 39
9 9

Daily Every time we review the metrics
32 29
19 29

weekly at regularly defined intervals (monthly, quarterly, etc)
29
28

Monthly if a metric falls below a certain threshold
0
24 10

Quarterly Do not adjust
2 5
14 5

annually
0
3

not at all
2
3

0% 50% 100% 0% 50% 100%

• World class • World class
• All respondents • All respondents


top perFormers have a uniFieD view easier to interpret longer-term customer behavior—par-
According to the survey data, marketing executives value ticularly in social media and mobile channels.
broad, comprehensive views of their customers. Indeed, “We are really increasing our investment in this area,”
many respondents say they’re focused on customer activity said the vice president of marketing for a global IT services
across multiple touchpoints. company. “We are now designing an extremely compre-
Yet, many don’t actually have a handle on how their hensive 360-degree approach/system to understand our
customers are using these different channels. Too many target customers.”
executives are producing data in silos, and then failing to
connect that data to related information. This lack of unified
view is hindering efforts to deliver brand messaging—and Figure 10: Do you segment and target your customer marketing based on
therefore effectively attract, convert, and retain customers. an integrated view of the consumer’s behavior?
In the survey, nearly two thirds of respondents (65%) said
they segment and target customers based on an integrated
view of customer behavior. (Fig. 10)
Asked what this includes, the top responses were cus- • Yes
tomer service behavior, historical behavior, and online • No
behavior. Just 30% have a view of mobile behavior, and just 35%
34% look at social media behavior. (Fig. 11) 65%
Marketers with a unified view of both online and offline
activity find it easier to interpret data from individual
channel performance. They’re also more adept at analyz-
ing vendor performance and per-visit/per-session customer
behavior. Perhaps most crucially, a unified view makes it

when Does personal beCome private?
Data mining, user-tracking, and behavior-modeling are no longer just buzz- IT services concern, “There is a delicate balance between ‘delivering per-
words for the boardroom. Recently, some in the media have cast a critical sonalized experience’ and ‘intruding personal space’ [and] we, as marketers,
eye on the practice of recording and predicting consumer behavior, and some always need to keep this in mind.” For starters, overreliance on data and
marketers in the survey indicated they believe that privacy backlash—includ- reports can lead to seemingly minor missteps that can damage a brand’s rep-
ing regulations that allow consumers to opt out of being tracked—will be a utation. News of just one privacy breach or intrusion can live online forever,
major marketing-related development in the next year. Yet, consumers fre- thanks to the Internet’s eternal memory.
quently prefer personalized experiences when connecting with a brand via Marketers must never forget that they’re connecting with humans. He
online and mobile channels. Where’s the line between serving an individual’s recommended pairing data with personal interactions, offline observations,
needs and invading privacy? proper sales management, and leadership forums to yield “insights and
For the U.S.-based vice president of marketing of a multi-billion-dollar better customer mapping.”


Figure 11: What information does this integrated view include?

customer service behavior How one Broadcaster serves Up
64
MUltiple cHannels, literally
historical behavior
61
As boardrooms mandate integrated marketing efforts to reach

online behavior cross-channel and cross-brand audiences, how do executives
57
meet their goals without resorting to siloed data, metrics, and
Multi-visit/cross-session behavior
49
campaigns?

search behavior For one international broadcaster, the solution was creating
41
a separate, in-house division tasked with leveraging cross-brand
in-store (offline) behavior
39
marketing data to help advertisers reach demographically differ-

one-time visit/session-based behavior ent audiences.
34
“The research we’ve done tells us that our fans engage our
social media behavior
34
various brands, and the multitude of platforms they live on,” said

Mobile behavior the division’s senior vice president. “As such, properly leveraging
30
that pallet of engagement opportunities, playing to the specific
0% 50% 100% strengths of each, can be a wholly additive, more-than-the-sum-
of-its-parts way to connect.”
The VP is not alone. Other executives reported simi-
Her team does more than just deliver data to outside
lar efforts. And not a moment too soon. Marketers with a
unified view are more likely to easily interpret multi-visit agencies. “Our clients truly want to understand how and why
data. They’re also more able to assess the value of a cam-
things are working (or not), and how and why consumers behave
paign based on influence and interaction, and nearly twice as
likely to find it easy to interpret customer data across mul- as they do.”
tiple touchpoints.
Despite working in a light speed environment, “the mar-
Not surprisingly, companies that rated their marketing
technology investment as “world class” were most likely to keting principles we learned years ago still apply,” said the SVP.
target their marketing based on an integrated view of cus-
“Define what success looks like upfront, design the research
tomer behavior. Nearly nine in ten (88%) said they do this
kind of segmentation and targeting. and metrics architecture to allow you to measure and optimize
At the hotel chain, its CMO is ahead of the curve.
performance in that context. Then take the time to debrief the
“We’ve consolidated our agencies globally for both creative
and media. This has allowed us to leverage our scale more program at the end.“
effectively, and provides a rich knowledge base for what
works by market and customer segment in different parts of


works by market and customer segment in different parts of few—but they’re the ones pushing the envelope, setting
the world.” As a global company, he said, it must serve cus- dialogues, and defining the industry. They’re willing to
tomers reacting with the brand in different channels, with commit, experiment, and adjust. Aided, of course, by
different needs—and from different countries. robust data collected at every step in the process.
“Brand consistency and continuity are critical for deliv- Has the ship sailed, then? Is it too late for the latecom-
ering the best guest experience to drive engagement.” ers to play catch-up?
No, said one SVP. “It’s never too late. Even brands
too late to play CatCh-up? that have a ‘head start’ will need to constantly innovate
To succeed in the marketing, executives must have foresight. in order to keep pace with the ever-changing landscape.”
Yet they seem to have vastly better hindsight. The upside of instantaneous data collection is its immedi-
Marketers can be forgiven for not jumping on—if not ate availability; investments in technology can essentially
foreseeing—radically new platforms, channels, and opportu- be made overnight; and the industry is filling up with
nities. How can someone predict the impact of flash sales or future executives who have never known a world with-
social gaming? out data.
The point isn’t that marketers can’t agree on the future. What’s more, he added, “Brands just getting into this
If there are no longer one-size-fits-all solutions for reach- game have the advantage of learning from the success and
ing audiences, why should there be any for the marketers failures of its pioneers.”
themselves? The point is, progressive marketers are relatively

methoDology
the information in this report is based on the results of a survey and one-on-one interviews conducted by Forbes insights in March and april 2011.

Forbes insights, in association with the coremetrics, an iBM company, surveyed 321 executives involved in marketing or corporate management at large businesses
in the U.s. and the U.K. all worked for companies in industries that are typically major online marketers, including retail, travel/hospitality, financial services, and
technology/media/telecom.

More than three quarters of the companies (77%) had annual revenues of $1 billion or greater, and the remaining 23% had revenues of at least $250 million. More than
a quarter of respondents held c-level titles, including cEo (15%) or cMo (11%), and the rest had senior titles including senior vice president, vice president, director of
marketing, and marketing manager.

Christiaan rizy stuart Feil brenna sniDerman JeFF Koyen
DiREctoR EDitoRiaL DiREctoR REsEaRch DiREctoR REPoRt aUthoR


60 Fifth avenue, new York, nY 10011 | 212-367-2662
www.forbes.com/forbesinsights

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