According to Jessica Myers, CMO of The Very Group, to truly differentiate, marketers need to build their strategies around the three Cs: company, customer, and competition.
Understanding all three was one of the first things she did in her 18th month in the business. This required understanding the company and how it makes money, digging into who its most valuable customers are, and tackling its competitors. “Understanding all three will help you break through the sea of sameness,” she said.
But the real success of Very Story lies in its data capabilities. Speaking at Advertising Week Europe today (May 16), Myers explained that Very has 4.8 million customers across 10 different categories and more than 2,000 brands. “The shopper data we have across all channels is incredible,” she said.
She claims to have the UK's largest data assets, particularly with The Very Group model, which collects financial services data information for many customers who use one of its payment plans. “Having all the data at your fingertips is very powerful.” .
Berry's CMO leverages “tremendous” amounts of data to bring more meaning to brands Myers said the marketing department's job is to drive “accelerated growth of the business” and uses data effectively. I think the key is to utilize it. She asked for value-based segmentation and attitude-based segmentation. This allows us to know exactly who our most valuable customers are, how many we have in the UK, where there is room for growth and where they are going. find them.
This isn't just inside information. Myers also entrusts that data to the agency. “That's our problem, not mine,” she said. “Our agency is an extension of our own team. How do we work together to create magic if we don't all have access to the same data?”
The most important part from there is communicating the value of marketing to the board. Myers makes sure that 'every pound' spent is connected to the value it delivers to the business. That worked too. She says it has been 18 months since her appointment and the marketing budget has increased “significantly”.
“And what we most want to hear is that the significant increase came primarily to brand budgets,” she said. “We are now able to paint a picture of how important brand spend is to driving loyal, high-value customers who are receptive to our proposition and incredibly tenacious, and we are now able to balance brand and performance. is undergoing major changes.”
every little thing helps
Speaking alongside Myers on the panel was Tesco Mobile's chief customer officer Rachel Swift. The business has been highly successful over the past three years, giving him double-digit market share in a market where mobile penetration hovers around 98% and Swift admits there is no real room for growth.
How they've done it boils down to having a “clear brand strategy” that's “attractive, differentiated,” and understood by the entire company. “Overall brand and marketing communications play a very small role in pivoting when you consider the brand as a whole,” she said. “It’s important to ensure everyone in the company understands the brand strategy and the role they can play in achieving it.”
Swift also embarked on a transformation journey to transform the brand into an agile business, enabling it to bring products and services to market faster. It was hard to change these neural pathways, but the brand is starting to see “green shoots” and now has an “group of empowered and motivated colleagues” who enjoy working for a growing business. She says there is.
What I learned: Tesco and BBH reveal their award-winning agent-customer relationship Tesco Mobile has also begun to further leverage its relationship with Tesco itself. A review of the company's brand strategy revealed that 'leaning in' to Tesco's benefits and brand characteristics would help it stand out. After all, telcos are a bit of a commoditized market, so it's hard to differentiate, but by relying on the big supermarket-like characteristics of “great value, great quality, great customer service,” brands can She said it really helped her. To stand out.
The nature of this connection may also benefit you in other ways. Swift sees Tesco Group's Clubcard data opportunity as a huge potential avenue for growth, as only a “relatively limited” number of its 24 million customers are Tesco Mobile customers.
“There's so much room for growth,” she said. “There is definitely an opportunity for us to connect the dots, not only from a brand and marketing perspective, but also from a data and personalization perspective.”
