Data-driven marketing is something that Australian marketers and
agencies need to be adept at leveraging to be competitive in today’s
media environment. Marketing with data allows teams to produce a larger
volume of creative work faster while delivering consistent and
quantifiable business value. It also tackles a number of challenges
traditional marketing hasn’t yet managed to overcome.
Subjectivity
is the bane of the marketing industry. It turns sharp communication
ideas built on clear insight into mediocrity. It lives in committee
meetings and HIPPO (Highest Paid Person’s Opinion) feedback where
well-intentioned individuals (usually) set their opinions loose on a
piece of carefully constructed thinking. The end result is a shell of an
idea that is not effective in market.
In order to overcome
subjectivity and its associated issues digital marketers need an
objective approach to making decisions about marketing and creative
output. This approach is in use today by some of the most successful
digital businesses of modern times and it places fact rather than
opinion at the centre of its process.
The approach gives quantifiable proof that a certain idea is worth
investing more resources in. It produces evidence as to the particular
variation of the idea that performs the best. It gives us a clear
understanding of how our marketing activities correlate with business
outcomes. The approach is data-driven marketing, something we can all
benefit from using today.
Humans are naturally opposed to change,
however in order to utilise data-driven marketing and be commercially
competitive in an evolving marketplace, the industry needs to start
approaching the way we qualify ideas differently. The core differences
between data-driven and traditional marketing are:
Validation vs the Big Idea:
Producing a ‘Big Idea’ requires a long process that uses a large number
of resources and delivers one creative idea. Marketing with data
involves testing many ideas constantly. Digital marketers identify an
idea that will have an impact on core metrics and condense it into its
simplest format (the start up term for this is Minimal Viable Product).
The idea is then tested in market - if it changes behaviour the idea is
validated and gets to evolve, if not, it dies and we all move on with no
sleep lost.
Learning vs campaigning:
Traditional marketing happens in campaign cycles where media (and
budgets) are weighted at the commencement of a campaign in order to
drive cut through. With data-driven marketing the objective is to
rapidly test, learn and optimise. New ideas are constantly tested in the
market. When an idea is validated, it is scaled and executed in a new
context. Its performance in this new context will determine whether is
extended further or not. It’s a continuous evolution where knowledge of
what does and doesn’t work is constantly built on.
Pessimism vs optimism:
This is an important difference. In the traditional marketing function
digital marketers optimistically believe every idea will work - not
surprising considering the amount of work and emotional capital poured
into the production of an idea, however this belief is fundamentally
dangerous in that it isn’t built on a proven understanding of a market’s
dynamics in relation to the specific creative idea. The data-driven
marketer has no such belief. Everyone’s guess is as good as anyone
else’s until it’s tested in market.
Though there are some
fundamental differences between data-driven and traditional marketing,
ideas and insights are still created, brand values are still
communicated and stories are still told. Ultimately we’re still using
communication to bring brands to life, however the mechanism for gaining
feedback is now faster and more accurate.
Vlad Ivanovic,
Digital Strategist
MassMedia Studios