I've been to a few “summits” in the last month, and I've seen the glib, irrelevant statements marketers have used to belittle themselves played out on stage time and time again. I felt like laughing and crying at the same time. I'm a business leader and marketer. Prior to my current role, I spent my career working in businesses run by marketers. I wasn't taught to differentiate between business and brand realities.
A brand and a business are two frames that represent the same reality. We live in a time when more changes are occurring than ever before, and in a shorter period of time than we ever imagined. Disruption is no longer a violent and catastrophic change, but a daily occurrence that emerges from hitherto unexpected territory. Marketers need to understand, drive, and deliver innovations that create value and, if possible, are disruptive.
The seeds of disruption lie in innovation. Innovation requires disciplined experimentation. But before you experiment, you need a hypothesis – can your marketing team generate enough volume? Are they trained in consumer footwear? Are you open-minded? Are you acting today with the logic of tomorrow or with the logic of yesterday? Progress, like a river, only moves in one direction. The same goes for time. Therefore, the only scientific basis for proving progress is experimental validation of ideas and consistency of results.
You need to experiment with what is essential to your business. Only then can we expect to adhere to the results. Reveal trusted results at scale. You can't race speedboats in a bathtub. In the spray-and-pray model, success is still a lottery, a cosmic lottery in which a lucky few survive.
For many companies that aren't brand conscious, marketing can be seen as extravagant, peripheral, and unserious. Digitalization has made it more tactical and temporary. Obsessed with clicks, swipes, and likes without considering the path back to actual business results.
Without a business agreement, much of today's marketing goes down the rabbit hole in a frenzy of activity. And because they are detached from business and talk about purpose, authenticity, and empathy, they appear disinterested and complacent. On a voyage without a destination, these “somehow boats” inevitably make their way to the coast, which doubles as a cemetery. Leaders exacerbate this dysfunction through chronic underinvestment and understaffing.
Good marketing balances both art and science and creates a resonant connection between businesses and consumers. Bad marketing relies on guesswork and superficial cleverness without a deep purpose. This disparity has fundamental implications for everything from profits to brand sustainability to lasting relationships with consumers.
Every business leader today has a responsibility to promote marketing excellence. And marketers need to invite criticism, challenge, and rejection. They need to drive business results and perform all functions of the business, rather than living in a small echo chamber. Inviting opposing views when analyzing and generating options may be the right way forward.
Much of the marketing criticism is also about “hype today, never heard of again,” so internal communication is important to bring objective closure. Good marketers take a long-term view and anticipate future needs, rather than simply responding to immediate demands. They understand the difference between activities and results. Rather than chasing short-term wins like social media milestones, we focus on driving important key performance indicators (KPIs) like pipeline generation, customer acquisition, and revenue.
Cisco CEO John Chambers once warned his employees: “I don't confuse effort with results.” Chambers understood that pointless activities are meaningless without results. Superficial advertising strategies should not hide the substance of marketing. When initiatives don't deliver tangible strategic benefits, companies need to reprioritize rather than celebrate superficial progress.
Unfortunately, a frivolous, jargon-filled, trend-driven, misguided movement of “light marketing” dominates external communication about what matters. It is celebrated with great fanfare, so important campaigns are replaced by less important activities during daily fire drills. Short-term fixes override long-term goals. Departmental silos stifle customer needs. But this culture thrives because bad marketing disguises modern priorities. It thrives on imitating forms of strategic marketing such as dashboards, slogans, and buzzwords without substance.
But Chambers' wisdom has an answer, and it allows you to connect all your marketing directly to measurable business results. Ignore the drama and align your culture and leadership to this standard. Then, focus your resources on work that creates pipeline, revenue, and acquisition success, rather than short-lived buzz.
“The most common cause of mismanagement is not a failure to find the right answer; it is a failure to ask the right questions,” wrote Peter Drucker.
In fact, the only question that ultimately matters concerns the consequences of the outcome.
When in doubt, ask “why” rather than “what” and “how much” rather than “how.” You need to practice a data-driven approach and conduct A/B testing. Marketing leaders are also data controllers and information leaders. Actions without testing lead to failure.
The dangers of “bad marketing” come not only from wasted budgets and missed opportunities, but also from mediocre human resources that undermine customer trust. Pixar's Ed Catmull said: “If you give a mediocre team a good idea, they'll ruin it. If you give a good team a mediocre idea, they'll either fix it or come up with something better.” If you get your team right, chances are they’ll get your idea right.”
Trust is at the heart of the brand. In an era where businesses have unprecedented access to consumer data, marketers have greater responsibility for issues of transparency, privacy, and consent. But headline after headline reveals brands overstepping their bounds with questionable data practices and manipulative targeting. Such ethical mistakes have dire consequences that outweigh the short-term benefits.
Authentic branding comes from listening to your stakeholders' needs, rather than interacting with them with one-sided messages. It comes from building a community both inside and outside the company's walls, based on inclusivity, diversity, and care for all those affected by the brand. And it comes from a leader's resolute determination to rein in where legality and ethics diverge.
Finally, a word about risk avoidance. It is an endemic problem. It's safest to do what others have done or have done before. No wonder the marketing collective falls prey to the carnivores of circumstance. Opportunity is just as important as risk. Risks won't kill you or your project if any upsides appear. In the case of fat tail risks, it is important to identify and eliminate the hazard at its source. Successful MarketingHis leaders focus every day on not losing, while always keeping an eye on the prize.
In marketing, as in all business, the adage “shortcuts lead to long delays” is true. Lasting success depends on taking the harder but rewarding path of building relationships through trust earned step by step over time.
Shubhranshu Singh is Vice President, CVBU, Domestic and IB Marketing, Tata Motors. He writes the column “Simply Speaker'' for Storyboard18. The views expressed are personal.
