Hi everyone,
Hope the monsoons have brought some much needed chill in all our lives. I stay in Bangalore, so I can’t really complain about weather, though the heat got to Bangaloreans as well this time :/
Moving on to a topic that is heating up just like the Indian Summer: the growing difference between two schools and philosophies in the marketing industry.
Ever since digital has disrupted the way marketing is done, two distinct worlds and philosophies have emerged. A Classic marketing world which is Stories, Culture, Consumer Behavior led and a New age philosophy which is Optimisation, Tools/Tech, Performance Ads led.
Till digital happened, marketing has always been a function which couldn’t fully measure and rationalise the impact it had on business. With digital media, marketers could now measure output (metrics) for a given input (marketing activity). While this was good news for the Industry, this also started to change a creative industry which is subjective and dynamic into a more a straight-jacketed and objective function.
This then created a new breed of practitioners who came into the industry and got exposed to the input-output world of marketing. A world where marketing is mostly about faceless customer profiles being optimised for clicks and engagement.
There is nothing wrong with this new breed of marketers but they need to integrate the very essence of marketing in their activities: which is embedding a brand narrative in culture. And this requires one to understand more subjective topics like brand, culture, storytelling and more.
Now, the question is whether a pure bred classic marketing philosophy can exist on its own without integrating the new world tools and techniques.
The answer according to me, is a resounding no!
The classic marketer needs to realise that data is a friend and tools can only help make marketing more impactful. They need to get their hands dirty and experiment with tools, observe the data and tweak their tactics accordingly.
The best path seems to be a one in the middle where both worlds collide and learn from each other.
We at GuruQore, surely believe that striking a balance is the need of the hour. Our Modern Marketing philosophy is a very good example of that where we mix classic and new age philosophies seamlessly.
For example, we believe that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is a brand promise first and then a powerful tool :)
We have to be aware that while we can add a lot of objective parameters to marketing, we have to be comfortable with the subjectivity of it. Just like life :)
Thanks for reading this. If you liked this POV, please forward it to a fellow marketer and help the community grow.
Also, if you want to be part of our Modern Marketers community on whatsapp, you can sign up from here. This is the place to be if you want to network and learn dynamically with a bunch of like minded marketers.
Until next week, ciao.