ASSIGNMENT TOPIC: THE FUTURE OF MARKETING

SUBJECT: 20MBT203 MARKETING MANAGEMENT

SUBMITTED BY: P.SANTHOSH KUMAR

REG.NO: SIT20MB017

THE FUTURE OF MARKETING

Marketing is changing… How and Why?

Digital marketing has been evolving during the last 4 years dramatically and
some people are not paying attention. The changes have been coming in
different waves for almost 10 years between 2010 to 2020, and these changes
are not going to settle down easily. The marketing future is going to be brutal in
the coming years more than any time before. We have been seeing strong
indicators of this major shift in digital marketing, yet we have been consuming
it slowly or resisting it.

However, I did learn a great fact during my years of leading marketing teams
and consulting brands, and by speaking to my fellow marketers across different
industries and regions. This fact is straightforward and simple; “Management
doesn’t care about how you the digital marketing executes; it is all about the
results”. Any given CMO at any given day is looking at one thing only; how is
the performance doing? Don’t get me started!

What marketers can do while they are becoming the front line for businesses?
And as we all know that business is getting competitive and aggressive towards
growth. Ahh, growth is the word that you hear day and night everywhere, from
big corporates to startups to even vloggers. Growth, growth, growth…

In all honesty, the growth concept is going to fully lead and fuel all the aspects
of marketing and will mostly reshape the marketing definition in the near future.
With that being said, the question I am trying to resolve here is not only what is
the trends that are going to hit soon, but how marketing is changing? What is
going on?

1)  Marketing methodology: What’s going on with marketing?

In the beginning, I had to do my homework and explore what is top marketing

experts are predicting. Dr. Dave Chaffey’s in his latest blog the six big
2020 trends, indicated several major areas including lifecycle marketing,
conservational marketing, and marketing technology. After exploring Chaffey’s
theories, I explored a few more articles by marketing opinion leaders. My
conclusion that marketing predictions are mainly focused on technology,
platforms, and channels. I believe we have been in years of jumping between
trendy channels and tools without having a solid vision or understanding the
strategic objectives of digital marketing.

With the advantages of data and effective tracking of digital marketing,

companies started centralizing the marketing department as the ROI factory. It
is becoming aggressive and marketers are shifting from the creative side to the
executions side of the corporate with more tasks of sales, customer relationship
management, and growth.

The complexity of ROI measurements is left to marketers to handle. Gradually,

the marketing role is under the fire of making money with less interest in
measuring other marketing roles such as brand positioning and visibility.
Whether we like it or not, this fact about marketing is going to lead in the
future. Hence, the future of marketing is going to be focused on ROI metrics.

I believe in data and performance, but this new role of marketing which is going
to dominate more is showing a huge impact on marketers we have been seeing
lately such as the intolerance from top management which resulted in a high
turnover as they are measuring marketing performance based on ROI mainly.

According to LinkedIn analysis, marketing roles had the highest turnover rate of
any job function—an impressive 17%. That’s more than 50% higher
than marketingweek survey in 2018, 81% of respondents suggest they are likely
to change jobs within 3 years, while 38% of which will do so by the end of this
year.
Even CMOs are hardly able to survive more than a year or two. Performance
growth, quick catches, short term plans are more important than long term
strategy and investing in brand value, quality content, and creative campaigns.

Therefore, everyone is under the stress and the marketing is shifting towards
improving the present ROI not building a brand that can generate future ROI. 
In conclusion, marketing in 2020 and coming years is going to focus on quick
wins strategies and the marketing positions will continue to the highest turnover
without a stable ground to flourish.

That’s why I am not considered about sexy trends such as micro-influencers,

interactive emails, conversational marketing, etc. These are great and attractive
methods to implement, but we all know as marketers, that setting up a solid
marketing strategy requires a deeper understanding of the consumer before
encountering channels and setting up technology.

2)  The change in consumer: Are we ready for Generation Z?

Whether we already or not, marketers in 2020 have to deal with the latest
consumer group, Generation Z. Those are turning 18 and entering the workforce
and fueling the internet consumer are going to be a whole different story. 
According to some of the market estimations, Generation Z will make up 40%
of all consumers in 2020. Woohoo!

What is the impact of this shift? Well, we could have hints about their behavior
but that’s is not a clue yet. The reason is simple; You can’t predict the nature of
a consumer group that is shaping and will take time to fully mature and shapes
its behavior and purchasing habits.

Eventually, a scary fact about Gen Z that they are quirkiest, with constant
change in their tastes and content consumption. This means that marketers will
need to catch up quickly with not only their creativity but also with a solid data
infrastructure to be able to attract this segment.

Tip: Gen Z is sensitive to phonies tactics and cheesy styles. Marketers have to

shift into more authentic and original ideas to be able to convert. Wink wink,
social media marketing is going to take a hard turn and the honeymoon years
are over. The social media engagement is going to be revolutionized since Gen
Z humor is absurdist and less-polite. So, if you don’t get their ways of
communication, leave the space for younger marketers who are able to
understand.
3)  Marketing management future: CMOs vs top management

Back in 2014, Betsy Holden, the senior advisor at McKinsey outlined the major
issue of a marketing consultant, I found that while they have a lot of great
platforms and technology but yet the issue is all about humans. The complexity
of technology is double-edged.

This leads us to understand a precise point which is, marketing technology is the
trend and it is going to impact how we conduct marketing, but it is at the end of
the day related to the skills and ability of human skills. Using marketing
automation to segment the customer is going to enhance the targeting but who
sets the roles and design the consumer journey based on strategy and specific
objectives.

In conclusion, while technology is science, using it is a matter of art and this

could vary based on human skills. In 2020 and upcoming years, access to
advanced marketing technology will not be a critical concern, but the mind that
manages it will be always the matter that will shape the relationship between the
presence of marketing technology and its execution.

4)  The change in marketing skills

As we discussed the effect of technology, we have to tie it with data.

Eventually, understanding the demand in the market we had to review in the
previous points how marketing is moving forward in order for marketers to
understand the environment they serve at.
 Apparently, all the trends that are rising in the marketing will continue to be
affecting the marketers. I have the habit of regularly checking the job
descriptions on LinkedIn posted by companies from different regions and
different industries. There are few facts that draw my attention which can
summarize the change happening in marketing roles.

 Encrypted titles: There are no standard titles for the majority of

marketing jobs. For marketing analysts some companies might call it
“Marketing Intelligence Manager” or “Data Analysis Manager”, and several
more titles based on the company culture. We have been into that conflict since
years ago when it comes to performance titles as some people use the term
“PPC” and some call it “Paid search” and some call it “Performance manager”
and so on. HR is even borrowing the title “Marketing consultant” for recruiters
who are specialized in marketing hiring. I have no idea why they are doing
this!! It is a big mess when it comes to titles and the more the platforms and
tools we have, the more the titles are diversified. Sometimes it takes a while to
understand a title with encrypted title and a strange combination of duties.
Startups are reinventing the titles of marketing and setting new titles that are
nonspecific and more flexible to match their diversified needs.
 Broader tasks and specific technologies: The description of marketing
jobs is getting broader in terms of duties but very specific in the required tech
skills. Companies tend to get marketers who fulfill their current needs even if it
is a blur and cross-departmental with less aim for specialization. Some of the
roles are fully customized due to a lack of a structured marketing department or
instability in their marketing strategy with short-term plans and
micromanagement. However, the companies need at the same time to be a
superhero in their platforms and technology. The vast growth in the number of
marketing clouds and tools is making it harder since every company is looking
for candidates who are strong in their tech stack no matter how uncommon it is.
Recruiters and their software who are filtering and scanning resumes are
sometimes incapable of understanding that major automation platforms are
conducting the same functions, and they filter people out because they are only
reviewing based on very specific keywords.
 The demand for data jobs: Everyone is hiring data experts in their team
since the data-driven approach is taking over. This trend will continue to rise in
2020 and the coming few years till eventually, things will change. My
prediction that this trend will decrease at some point for two reasons. First, the
future marketers would adopt data skills and it will become an essential skill
the same as any admin or management skills the marketer has to acquire to
proceed with his career. This already did happen before when the traditional
offline marketers had to learn digital marketing to survive. The same scenario
will happen with data analytic skills. It is going to be a must. Second, with the
increasing competition business will understand that data is telling what is
happening and why it is happening? but the missing part will be what we need
to make it happen? I expect in the coming years, creativity jobs will return to
rising and take over the top trend of skills demand. We can see a quick hint for
that happening already in the below stats. According to Altimeter report of
2019, Data Analysis is considered the highest demand for marketing skills,
however, there is a huge rise for skills in video editing and production. This
fact outlines how creative skill such as video production is becoming one of the
major needs for the marketing industry.

The Future of Marketing

While the marketing trends in 2020 are going to bring some heads-up of hot
new channels and interesting tactics we need to adopt, the future of marketing is
considerably uncertain.  There are many crucial facts happening in the
background and we need to dig deeper in order to be prepared. The business
environment and technology are going to reshape the industry as well as
marketing skills. Therefore, we should reconsider the ongoing evolution in
business and learn the lesson. The future of marketing is going to be challenging
in terms of educational programs, marketing skills, and the marketing industry.