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As spending on digital real estate and marketing grows, businesses must adapt their traditional models to make sure that their investment is worthwhile.

Where that budget should be spent is widely debated but what’s undisputed is that every business, small or large, private or public, needs a website – the most important digital asset of any organisation. And the backend to that website is the content management system (CMS), the unsung hero, where digital content can...

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I should make it clear that I am a sincere unbeliever when it comes to buzzwords in my industry. Neither is there a ‘jargon agnosticism’ for me; purely an atheism towards the very concept of waffle and piffle that permeates media as a whole.

I take great delight in hearing comprehensive mocking of the way I talk – it’s important to identify our professional flaws, and terms like ‘screen agnosticism’ serve only to confuse the audience into...

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The modern marketer’s greatest challenge is using emerging media to lift metrics across multiple platforms. For every opportunity presented by new media channels, marketers must overcome internal resistance and logistical challenges to transition away from traditional platforms.

Digital media constitutes one of the fastest-growing segments of advertising, making it a must for any campaign. Brands must aim to integrate desktop, mobile, tablets, and even...

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Before we make any predictions for the future, let’s examine the lessons of 2016. If the mainstream media’s obsessions match those of the public - which is their job - then privacy became an increasingly important in the last 12 months. Fears over the sovereignty, security and privacy of personal information were rarely out of the news.

The year 2016 taught us that intrusive marketing, Big Brother-style surveillance and irresponsible data losses are big issues with the...

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“How do we win more business in 2017?” This question will be rattling around the boardrooms of marketing companies and ad agencies across the world, even as you read this. Throughout January – and beyond – directors, business development teams, and planners will put their heads together to think about the strategies and tactics they need to adapt, adopt, or prune to make the next 12 months...

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Editor’s note: The first part of this two-part article, available here, explained the concept of ConOps – the concept of operations – in a marketing communications program to communicate the quantitative and qualitative system characteristics of the effort to the brand, as well as prospects, clients, and customers. This piece expands on the need to keep marketing efforts simple with various...

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Marketing budgets continued to rise in 2016, advancing to 12% of company revenue, on average, according to Gartner. This ongoing investment in the profession has left the majority of marketers optimistic about the year ahead. However, with increased spending power comes heightened scrutiny from those holding the purse strings, and an even greater focus on ROI.

So, whether...

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Huge quantities of data pass through the marketing department. While collaborating with colleagues, ad agencies, agency partners and marketing tech providers, marketers are often required to share confidential information, from strategic presentations to brand images. As flexible working explodes and marketers handle major campaigns from both the office and home, we need to consider how this information is being shared and controlled over time.

Consumer grade platforms such as...

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Editor's note: This is the first of a two-part article on ‘simplicity’ in marketing: the second piece will appear on MarketingTech later this month.

Opinion A question to kick off 2017: have you ever thought how complex marketing has become?

I think about that all the time and attempt to relay to my client base that simple is better. I also emphasize a few of the fundamentals of marketing that need to be followed when developing a marketing communications plan. A tenet that I follow,...

Programmatic is marketing’s biggest buzzword. It’s been discussed and rehashed time and time again; covered by every half respectable marketing publication, blog, and social media page trying to stay relevant. On the one hand, this coverage is warranted because programmatic represents the next big industry shift in communicating with customers. However, it has also brought on a sense of confusion with an underlying tone that programmatic is a complex approach for marketers of the future. The...

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There’s a big difference between simply being a boss verses being a leader – good leadership has the power to energise, engage and motivate staff to go the extra mile.

In this article, we’ll look at five key things that every good marketing team leader needs in order to fulfil the role.

Think strategically and learn to self-critique

One of the most important parts of leading a marketing team is the ability...

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The days of relying on the 30-day post to find best-fit new young marketing talent are numbered. It might do the job, but it’s less likely to attract contenders with matching values, for whom a sense of purpose and company culture is getting more important than the role itself.

For firms without big budgets, finding another way to connect with, inspire and engage millennials all year round is becoming a priority. New jobs are emerging all the time, and when they do emerge,...

There is always talk of brands being almost blind to the opportunities that their customers pose through their habits. This is reinforced by increasing demand from customers for personalised and flexible modes of engagement.

The rapid rise of millennial purchasers has left brands constantly rethinking their marketing strategies. It is clear that the consumer base has become far more varied and unpredictable.

Thus brands need to find a way to integrate the customer experience into every step of their...

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The UK currently operates under the Data Protection Directive, which allows a “soft” opt-in approach. Under the current rules, data collected from communication with customers, tradeshow meets, business card exchanges, a checkbox for signing up to communications from a company, all count as a soft opt-in, allowing organisations to market to this data.

With the arrival of

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Tech giants such as Uber have expanded their offering with the launch of UberEats, and some famously online-only brands have made a U-turn and set up physical stores, take Amazon opening bookstores for example.

The business transformations these brands have undergone this year should make marketers question what is right for their own company’s strategy. Should they be experimenting with new technologies?

Are there new markets that they should be considering? Many may even be...

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Many tech companies are immersed in an invention culture: Build it and they will come.

A new business initiative group at a technology Fortune 100 used this mindset to develop a clever idea for an app store marketplace. The tool would compile robust automation software for energy co-ops.

Information and software would be available at the swipe of a thumb. It was a unique concept that would dramatically simplify the sales process for both business and consumer.

Moments of Truth

This group was chasing...

We all like to think that we are rational human beings. However, ironically, science has proven that we are not – we are all much less rational and much more unpredictable than we think.

As science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein once said: “man is not a rational animal; he is a rationalising animal.” In other words, we always try and explain our behaviour without knowing why we did it.

This unpredictability is what makes understanding the consumer psyche so important to marketers.

This...

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The UK Digital Skills Gap remains a blistering topic, this crisis affects organisations across all sectors – no one is safe, including marketing, and yet many sectors are unconscious to the issue, because these ‘digital skills’ sometimes come in the shape of periphery tactics, such as website monitoring, CRM management and search knowledge.

Despite people thinking that digital marketing would be the industry that remedied this skills gap a long time ago, sadly figures show that...

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At Salesforce our mission is all about driving the success of our customers. As a B2B company it’s something we can all easily identify with. And it’s very clear how to do this with products and services. However, as a marketer it’s not always so obvious.

For me, I think one way that marketing can help drive our customers’ success is by enabling a journey that provides truly valuable insights.

Valuable in terms of helping them engage with their own customers more...

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The use of predictive analytics has increased steadily over the past few years as marketers see the value in investing in this trend.

A study by Forrester Consulting reported that predictive marketers are 2.9x more likely to report revenue rate at a higher than industry average. These marketers are also 2.1x more likely to hold a commanding leadership position and 1.8x more likely to exceed...