Hi Friend,
Before speaking to CMOs and their teams at a recent Morningstar event I dug a bit deeper than usual. I talked to financial services CEOs and P&L executives.
I asked one question only: "What do you want from marketing?".
You know they pay the bill and all, so I was curious. Shouldn't we all be?
To be honest I didn't expect such COHERENT answers. Crystal clear in fact. Three simple things.
Conclusions? 1. It's not that hard. 2. Sh*t we better get this right.
So what did they say?
MEASURE
CEOs expect marketing to be measured. It's pretty essential to know if what they are spending is working. Or not. Either is fine (really). Just tell me.
LEAD IN DIGITAL
No, no, NO. I didn't mean get US to lead the way. I meant marketing should lead us through digital. Because we don't necessarily get it. We want to, we do study tours, we throw big words around. But Marketing? It's your job to show us why, how, what and the cost. And return. Traditionally laggards in the space, CEOs now want digital.
ALIGN SALES AND MARKETING
In fact, align the whole damn organisation around the customer. Could you do that by, like, Thursday? JK.
Slightly more seriously, sales and marketing do need to be aligned, if not fully integrated. And sales are not stepping into that - they're too busy selling. So Marketing... guess what? Step up.
The wonderful people at Morningstar have a video of the whole event. UGH. Once I've reviewed it it MAY be available.
Let me know if you'd like it, just the slides OR for a more coherent version see the blog from our head of Marketing, Danielle, on getting the best ROI on your content marketing in Asset Management.
Best,
Carden