Is technology forcing marketing off-course?. The Drum Network meets Professor Alan Tapp of Bristol Social Marketing Centre and Maxwell Painter, CEO of Unrival, to discuss whether the dizzying array of technological tools now available to marketers are actually improving anything… Do you feel the quality of content and targeting is better or worse today than it was 20 years ago? This was back when direct marketers, charities and mail order companies were very good at targeting by using segmentation to try and improve their response rate and to differentiate their offers. Contemporary marketers also have the advantage of a range of new technologies that allow direct contact with consumers in real-time. Maxwell Painter (MP): I understand that people find segmentation time-consuming in today’s fast-paced world, but marketers still recognise that segmentation is a fundamental aspect of marketing planning strategies. It’s a key element of our offering at Unrival. I agree that new technologies have enabled marketers to contact target individuals directly and quickly, however, as there are now so many channel options for content distribution, it can be hard to know which is best for your target audience. The reverse of this is in the use of inbound marketing, where the growth and evolution of ecommerce has truly changed the world as consumers can now browse and use Google to make decisions based on what they believe is their own judgement. MP: I can understand how mass targeted e-marketing may be perceived negatively due to security risks and spam, but I also believe that if it is personalised and appeals to target individuals’ key business interests and/or concerns, it can, and is, an extremely powerful marketing tool when used productively. MP: I believe the future of targeted marketing lies with the use of marketing automation platforms which are key to reaching customers at scale with personalised targeted content and messages.
The Drum Network meets Professor Alan Tapp of Bristol Social Marketing Centre and Maxwell Painter, CEO of Unrival, to discuss whether the dizzying array of technological tools now available to marketers are actually improving anything…
Do you feel the quality of content and targeting is better or worse today than it was 20 years ago?
Alan Tapp (AT): In regards to targeting, I feel that segmentation used to be far more predominant in the 80s and 90s than it is today. This was back when direct marketers, charities and mail order companies were very good at targeting by using segmentation to try and improve their response rate and to differentiate their offers. So if anything, it’s probably got worse.
However, that said, marketers are in a much more powerful position now within their companies than they were back then. Contemporary marketers also have the advantage of a range of new technologies that allow direct contact with consumers in real-time.
Maxwell Painter (MP): I understand that people find segmentation time-consuming in today’s fast-paced world, but marketers still recognise that segmentation is a fundamental aspect of marketing planning strategies. It’s a key element of our offering at Unrival.
I agree that new technologies have enabled marketers to contact target individuals directly and quickly, however, as there are now so many channel options for content distribution, it can be hard to know which is best for your target audience.
There are a few ways to get around this – at Unrival we create bespoke relationship maps and decision maker profiles to help define the client’s audience, their interests, pains, priorities, and motivations, and the channels that they’re most active. Why waste effort and budget on a great social campaign that only reaches 2% of your target audience?
Do you feel that the technological advances that we have today have helped or hindered marketers, particularly in the quality of content and targeting?
AT: There are a range of problems that come with advances in technology. The first is that tools and platforms that were once the ‘next big thing’ soon…
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