Episode #8. The topic in this episode is marketing competencies. Abby is joined by Gemma Butler, Marketing Director for the Chartered Institute of Marketing, the world’s leading professional marketing body. Gemma discusses the biggest competencies needed for today’s marketer, what we can learn from brands such as Netflix, McDonalds and Dollar Shave Club on great marketing practice and how marketing is evolving.
Resources/brands mentioned in this podcast:
https://uk.dollarshaveclub.com/
Sponsored by Labyrinth Marketing
FULL TRANSCRIPT (with timecode)
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This podcast is brought to you by Labyrinth marketing.
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Hello and welcome to the Whole Marketer podcast.
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Today’s topic is technical skills and not one specific but as a whole I’m shortly going to be joined by Gemma Butler the marketing director of the CIM.
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But before we do let me just tell you why I think its so important. Marketing roles are ever changing the company orientation has moved from being sales production or R&D led to being customer and consumer focused. Marketing has always held the voice of the customer and consumer. But now with that benefit understood by the wider organization we are now responsible for a much broader remit. Not only do we have to still communicate that product or service in a variety of different activation platforms in an omni-channel approach but we also have to set the long term strategic direction own the commercial agenda full P&L management.
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Take data and mine insight. Develop the proposition whether that’s brand or product and look at the communications or to bring that to life as well as ensure that every piece of investment that we make can be measured monitored its effectiveness shown and return on investment calculated.
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Today’s guest is Gemma Butler the marketing director for the CIM. She leads the marketing function that leads the world’s leading professional marketing body. It’s no small feat. I first met Gemma when she headed up the product management function at CIM and prior to joining CIM. She has held management roles at Sony, Xerox and she is passionate about increasing awareness of mental health in the workplace. Gemma welcome to the Whole Marketer podcast.
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So big question upfront Gemma, what would you say is the biggest changes you’ve seen in marketing over the last say 10 or 20 years?
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Big big question as you say. I think you know the three things have not necessarily changed in marketing but what have changed how marketing operates and I think you know marketing has got broader
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All of the different things that go into marketing and its remit has just got wider and wider over the years. The pace at which marketing works has got faster and the number of things to think about is just off the scale these days you know. So I think marketers have to just move so much quicker and be so much more agile. I hate that word but be so much more agile than they used to be you know and turnaround times and everything have just increased and it’s really driven by the environment in which we operate and live in.
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You know there’s technology which is getting ever more complex and keeping up to date with that is a huge ask. We live in an always on environment you know 24/7 people want to order and have access to things whenever they want as real fast in a pace of life the pace of life and the pace in which people operate in society is just increased and we have this on off instant want not one mentality. Consumers have more information which means more knowledge that they can make more informed choices and social platforms have made things more transparent and you know whether we like it or not they’ve given everyone a voice.
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So you know it’s so noisy out there and I think you know internally if you look at the marketing functions and we did some needs research where we did some qualitative interviews with 16 companies from across an estimate and corporates and you know they said the challenges and the things have changed for them is the growing number of roles within marketing. I mean you only have to scan linked in to see
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The sheer volume and types of titles that people have and that is mainly driven by digital. But with that brings the challenge of you know building in the right structure. What skill sets do you require if you can’t you know put together what roles you want and then articulating that in terms of developing marketers is it becoming you know quite complex. And then there’s the process. You need to be more agile to keep up with this ever-increasing pace of life.
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You did a podcast with Daniel Rowles a few weeks ago. He was saying you need to be learning all the time within digital just to stand still and that’s you know that’s quite worrying.
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Now we’ve got this broader remit. We’ve got increased pace we’ve got digital platforms that we cannot stand still with that we’re constantly having to evolve. We’ve got new technology and the vast array of roles that marketers now have to understand and do. You mentioned about the competencies. What would you say are kind of the new competencies or competencies as a whole that marketers have to have or do to focus on in today’s climate?
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I mean obviously you know coming from what the people CIM talk to conversations we have in the research group out there digital is still the number one driver in terms of skillsets people need. But at a broader level we did some research with PwC a couple of years back and we asked the question around you know what are the skills that marketers need in the future. And it came back as relationship building skills, communication skills, management and strategic thinking. And
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And I think he know it’s it’s all very well having a specialist digital skills and doing that role which is quite sort of narrow in terms of its remit and thinking but takes a lot of skill. But as you navigate your career through marketing as you go up through levels of seniority I think it’s really critical that marketers start understanding the importance of relationship building skills and communication because that you know marketing has to effectively not only communicate externally with its customers but it’s equally important that marketing communicates internally with other functions across the business because they all are inherently linked together if you’re going to grow and move forward.
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I couldn’t agree more. I think soft skills in office is one of the areas I cover in the whole marketer as well because you know we all lead in the commercial agenda but we’re also leading the people as you say internally within the organization to be aligned behind that strategy. We’re also having to get buy in took more board level in all of those leadership and management skills absolutely vital. Also if I may add the understanding about you and this type of leader you want to be or need to be in today’s world.
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For me being you know I have a Department of 21.
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And don’t forget that one twenty one. Yes.
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And you know leadership is it is a skill that it’s really difficult you know you have to get people to want to follow and or want to work with you and this is where relationship building comes in because you know people are more likely to want to be led by someone they like.
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And I think it’s I think it’s really important but it’s not it’s not a skill that I think you can just pick up and do. I think you have to learn as you move forward and I think that will comes with navigating yourself through your career.
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Yeah and that alone the appreciation of what it takes to be a great leader is a whole other topic in itself.
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You know people want to work for someone that they like that they respect that inspires them that listens that has empathy that’s authentic. You know these are all skills that that take time and energy to learn and build awareness of.
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Absolutely and you know you’re going to make mistakes along the way and you can only sort of learn these skills by doing them and seeing what works and what doesn’t work.
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I mean it’s quite complex really best not to think about it for too long.
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No it’s not it’s not necessarily what you do it’s how you do it right.
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Yeah absolutely and I think you know one of the other things is because digital is so prevalent and such an important part of marketing I think sometimes people forget that that broader marketing knowledge is sometimes sort of not seen as important but actually it’s the sort of the sum of the whole parts that that turn a good marketer into a great marketer.
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Yeah I agree the one that can see the long term vision and strategy and has that commercial goals from one that is focused on just activation I think people that kind of gets overlooked over time.
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Absolutely and I think I think it’s been really interesting time during lockdown.
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I think you know during the period where where organizations had to essentially change a lot of how they do things which we’ve seen sort of innovation come to the forefront you know where organizations had to change products and services. You know Pubs turned into takeaways yoga classes went online and everyone had to change how they went to market.
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Aldi training home delivery, Deliveroo, Brewdog you know making hand sanitizer I think lockdown is also you know really pushed marketing to the forefront of the importance of it as a role and a function to be taken seriously because it’s through marketing that those messages have continued to go out there and continue to engage with people at what is a very strange time.
And a speed that potentially marketers haven’t had to be working at before you know you said Agile is it.
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Yes it’s cringy but it is the word isn’t it pivot as quickly as you can with bravery with pace to turn it around into the marketplace being able to short circuit everything that you do in terms of your processes because you have to.
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For me it’s been really exciting.
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CIM did face to face training you know that was within our training arm was the fundamental primary thing that we how we delivered and within days we were moving to virtual delivery and through that process know that the last 14/15 weeks whatever it is I forget it’s been so long we’ve side to hone that down and refine that and learn from it.
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And it’s been so interesting to be able to do that.
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And from being you know the train that’s delivering those courses it’s also been interesting how much the students have enjoyed that because they’ve been in that you know the safety or in the relaxed environment of home. So as opposed to having to come to the classroom they’re being able to kind of take training and new knowledge on an a way that almost is more comfortable and more enjoyable. It’s been interesting to see their acceptance of it as well.
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Yeah and we’ve had you know we’ve had feedback from people who come on the virtual courses.
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And it’s these people suffer from anxiety and therefore they would not walk into a classroom with people they didn’t know to learn. So having that that ability to deliver in a virtual way has opened up a wider audience. And as you say it made them feel more comfortable in their own home. And that’s great because it means more people are learning.
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Yeah it removes that barrier to learning if it’s there for some which is amazing. So on top of kind of the new areas of development so digital leadership skills long term strategy what are some of the challenges you think marketers face. I think some of the challenges they face are quite simply staying up to date and that’s that staying up to date in themselves and their own skill sets
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Obviously formal training is only 10 percent of how people learn.
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You got 17 2010 really haven’t you. Most people learn on the job by having conversations with with colleagues or being shown how to do something and then 20 cent comes from social learning. And I think you know it’s a real challenge to find the time when you’re working in a profession that has such a broad remit that is moving so fast and is incredibly noisy to find the time to actually develop yourself. And I think that is a huge challenge for marketers who want to move up and want progress throughout their career really especially given all of the broadened roles that we now have to take on as marketers as well.
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Absolutely. I think you know other challenges for marketers is to you know cut through the noise.
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We’re been bombarded every day from all angles with messages as consumers which we are with the with the lockdown digital has become an even noisier channel in which to get your messages forward and through to people say you know there are so many challenges facing marketers. And it’s I think it’s just how many plates can you spin at one time really great analogy for thinking about kind of industries.
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Obviously you’ve got more consumer facing brands, recognized for being more likely to be consumer orientated or customer orientated. What industries do you think are leading the way in really utilizing marketing to its full potential?
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Interesting question that because it’s something that came out in Daniel Rowles’s benchmark assessment was when you looked at the industries who were say really good or really effective at digital marketing as a whole. Actually, there are no real industries that as a whole that are really driving leading the way it actually brands within industries that are leading the way. Those ones that kind of you believe then that the entire industry is doing really well. Actually, that’s not the case.
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And I found that really really interesting but I think in terms of you know you’ve got folks who got the big brands so Netflix when it comes to you know streaming which during lockdown has absolutely taken off. I think you know Netflix has used all parts of marketing it started off with a very simple subscription model you know the price was right cancel at any time and now it invests some insane amount billions of dollars in content creation and it’s actually developed its content and how it creates its content and what content it wants to put out there by by learning all the time making more films.
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Now for example having a lot more original content in order to attract its customer and I think it’s those brands who embed conversations they have with their customers in what they do. They’re really going to lead the way. I think for me also fast food seems to be leading the way in terms of using marketing as a whole whether it’s through the advertising whether it’s through their menus.
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It’s probably not the healthiest example but you can’t take away from the fact the likes of McDonald’s they do great marketing from start to finish.
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Yeah I agree with you. McDonald’s always use that as an example in my training because they take everything from tailoring the message in a true omnichannel approach. So as you say from above the line advertising to billboards to on journey they really understand that consumers all the way through to tailoring that messaging on the latest product that they’ve launched or the right day part to get that right all the way through whether that’s drive through or even you know walking in. So yeah you cannot take that away from them even if it’s not good for the waistline.
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Absolutely and I think you know even regionally or by country that they adapt their messaging and I think it’s it’s almost like it’s become less about the actual burger or whatever it is itself and they’ve attached that emotional message you know the way this segment that customers buy you know not by age demographic or or gender but by the time of day that they generally go into them. I think this it’s just really really interesting and clever stuff. And I think another organization that I recently looked into for a presentation was the Dollar Shave Club.
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That organization that you know has started with content you know and it has nailed that. And and you know then built a subscription model that works for its customers by listening to them. And you then see Gillette trying to reverse its way into that subscription model. And it didn’t work. And I think you know I think that’s those leading source start-ups that suddenly just take off because they they’ve listened to their customers and they know what they want. Everything is great.
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Yeah and they’re using tribe targeting as well. They’re leveraging that social want to be part of something and harnessing that in their communications talking back to your Netflix example. I love how they say you know here’s the top 10 things that are streaming the everyone else in Britain or the U.K. is watching right now and that makes you feel quite intrigued. It’s almost like which. Which group do I want to be part of? Which program or cluster is do I belong in? How do I be part of the current theme or the current topic that people are watching and streaming right now.
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And they do that really really well. They’re not just listing and use next to their propositions but they’re actually almost like co-creating with you. So you feel part of the process.
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Yes. And they feed that conversation down through social well they get everyone else to recommend and you know you look at the trends within that and you can see the patterns of what people are watching why. And it’s interesting you talk about this sort of social part of it now being part of something because you know sustainability is it’s gone up and up and up the agenda over the last decade and it’s it’s really about what brands can do for society and to make society a better place you know and that’s something that I think more and more consumers are now thinking about and making more informed choices on who they engage with and who they part with their money with based on what they’re doing for society.
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Consumers are choosing brands that they feel reflects them reflects their aspirations and the life that they want to live and if sustainability is something that they are passionate about they are going to choose those brands that reflect the life that they want to live without a doubt especially the values behind that of kind of giving back thinking about the greater good and so on.
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Yeah and I think again this is where marketers.
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We’ve not only got all of these sort of technical things to think about like PPC and SEO how are we going to do our social but we also have to think more broadly about you know what’s going on in society in the environment and trust and it’s so much bigger in marketing its role is ultimately to engage with people and to sell and buy products but then over the last 18 months certainly CIM we’ve been talking a lot more around organizations who who do good you know sort of do good get good mentality.
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So I think in terms of society and marketers now have to look at society and have a broader understanding of what society want and what’s important to them.
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Marketing’s role is slightly evolved from you know engaging customers because you want them to buy some from you to informing and educating consumers on things on the planet. So
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So plastic campaigns you know there are whole learning and education of people to not buy something because of the negative impact that has on the planet. And you know thats been going on for quite a long time with what marketing has done for obesity and raising awareness on smoking the dangers of smoking and I think that social marketing is starting to come back and that’s very different because it’s a very long term sort of burn and it’s something that you have to keep talking about because you’re trying to change people’s behaviours.
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By informing and educating them first and foremost.
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And it’s changed the way in which we targets and communicate as a whole. We’ve moved from looking at purely the age location demographics mosaic type of targeting and then moved on to actually what is it they’re passionate about or that they want but brands that they want to choose reflect who they are as a person and thinking about how we inform and educate and now understanding actually who are they as a human you know what are their values what are their beliefs what do they aspire for their life to be like understanding them on that kind of psychological deep rooted level and I think that’s where the magic happens.
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Yeah its almost like a tribal thing isn’t it.
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Yeah. people want to be part of something and if you can educate them and inform them and show them what you’re doing is for the greater good then yeah you can get people on board and then with that movement is a movement as you say with that movement you get more more people engaging with you. And
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And I think that’s that’s been a really interesting movement that I think marketers more marketers need to engage with and be more aware of.
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I agree I agree. Stop thinking about people but what they on a surface level is not thinking about who they are.
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Deep deep down.
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So Gemma you haven’t got an easy job leading the marketing function of the world’s leading organizational body for marketing. What would you say has been your biggest challenge in role?
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Wow
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that is a big question. Well I think I’ve had I’ve had many challenges.
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I think my biggest challenge internally was to get the right structure for my own marketing department which I’ve changed around a couple of times because I didn’t know you can sit still with within your marketing department and have the same things happening all the time.
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You know for years and years and years I think every couple of years I think you have to reassess look at the skill sets you have.
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Look at the sort of the way that the department is broken up and I think you have to have a change around. And I think the other thing for me the other big challenge that I had was really trying to get people who work for me to have that sort of test and learn sort of mentality in terms of test new things. Don’t be afraid to try stuff because only by trying stuff will you actually learn how people want to engage with us and what your customers want.
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And I think that’s something we we talk about it all the time at CIM about how great other organizations are doing things but then taking what we talk about as the professional body for marketing and applying it ourselves which is you know is a huge challenge because you know we’ve done it with billions and billions and billions of dollars and then you’ve got CRM which is a not for profit organization.
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So how do you how do you practice what you teach. I guess it’s the biggest challenge we have. Yeah I completely resonate.
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It’s so important to you know unless you unless you can take what others do in taking the best bits of what other organizations do and apply them you know the principle to yourself and your own your own organization then you know it shouldn’t be you know doing what we do and I guess if we don’t do that and I think that makes it more interesting and more dynamic and I think it keeps people interested.
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I agree I agree. So thank you so much for our chat. So far I’m going to ask the one question I ask everyone at the end which is what is your one top tip you’d give marketers for today?
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My one top tip is don’t be afraid to test new things. Absolutely test whether it’s PPC, social, partners that you want to might want to work with different channels test things. Because unless you try new things you are never going to know if they work and you are never going to be able to learn from them. So I say to my team all the time test stuff if it doesn’t work it doesn’t work. At least we know it didn’t work.
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That’s great. Thank you so much drama for joining us on the Whole Marketer podcast.
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Thank you for having me. Thank you for tuning in to the whole market here podcast. If you’ve enjoyed today’s episode, please do click follow below for more weekly podcasts. Thank You.
