The Mediavita team recently spent the day in London at the Marketing Nation Live Roadshow (hosted by Marketo) to expand our knowledge and learn about the industry’s exciting new game changers. Over the previous 8 weeks, the event had travelled across 4 continents, covering North America, Australia, Japan, and the UK, so we knew this was the roadshow we had to attend.
Over 700 marketing professionals attended the event which featured expert marketing speakers and business people from across the globe, talking about the engagement economy and the shifting trends that are impacting the industry. So in case you missed it, we have recorded what we believe to be the key takeaways to share with you all. Don’t worry, you can thank us later…
Winning in the Engagement Economy
To kick things off, Greg Wolfe (Chief Operations Officer of Marketo) shared the idea behind the Engagement Economy, where the relationship between buyers and sellers has radically shifted. Today’s buyers are overwhelmed with too many messages and seek more personalised content and authentic relationships with brands. With 66% of customers expecting their interactions with brands to be personalised (Marketo), the engagement economy is essentially about making people feel ‘they know me’.
Nowadays, sending the same email to everyone in your contact list is damaging your brand, and businesses need to prove they know lots about consumers in order to give them relevant content. Marketers have had to rapidly transform their strategies, methods, and tactics in order to stay authentic and increase engagement. And with 79% of buyers stating that they only consider brands that show they understand and care about ‘me’ (Wunderman), we can clearly see that relevant and personalised content = increased engagement.
So what are the key steps to succeeding in the engagement economy, I hear you ask? Greg spoke about three vital factors that will get you there:
- Listen to your customers
- Engage with them
- Learn from customer data in order to stay relevant
The importance of ‘Wantedness–led’ marketing
Next up, Richard Dunn from Wunderman EMEA went on to present their latest research into customer loyalty in an engaging session named ‘ is customer loyalty really the right goal?’.
After discovering that 79% of buyers think that the best brands should care about them, he explained why businesses today must embrace a ‘wantedness-led approach’ to marketing. Wantedness explains how in the current era of decreasing trust, brands must do more than just sell. Instead, firms have to prove they want you as a customer and do this at every step in the customer journey. Rather than defaulting to big brands, consumers are seeking out niche brands that are right for them, with 89% of people saying the ‘best brands’ must share their values. This marketer must therefore focus first on servicing the client by:
- Knowing your customers intimately
- Delivering utility and value above sales
- Being original & true to your values
- Understanding the needs of your customer
- Exceeding expectations with personalised and authentic experiences
Summary
So to summarise, after a day of passionate marketing talk from the most trusted experts, we learnt that in order to win in the Engagement Economy, today’s marketer must focus less on volume and more on value. It is all about pushing out highly personalised interactions and content at scale to retain and delight customers across the buyer journey. Focus on making the consumer cycle an easier, convenient and memorable experience. That way, you can’t loose.
