Comments on: Marketing accountability: Can you link the intangible to the financial? http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2009/11/15/marketing-accountability-can-you-link-the-intangible-to-the-financial/ A blog and forum by Nigel Hollis Thu, 09 Sep 2010 08:23:09 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.2 By: Nigel http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2009/11/15/marketing-accountability-can-you-link-the-intangible-to-the-financial/#comment-12970 Nigel Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:37:55 +0000 http://www.mb-blog.com/?p=1459#comment-12970 <p>OK, now this is interesting. Thanks for the comments everyone.</p> <p>Marc, of course short-term sales are worth shooting for but not every sale is an incremental sale due to some marketing action. Yes, product experience and WOM have a very strong role to play but part of advertising's job is to shape those interactions. Like gravity, advertising may be a weak force but it does not mean that it has little influence.</p> <p>I have bought 7 Audis in a row. I am sure I have been influenced by Audi's offline and online communications as well as their product and dealer service plus WOM but how on earth are you going to assign a value to each contact when my behavior is so consistent? Next time around I may well buy a Subaru. The initial impetus toward that change was a print ad I saw five years ago but only now are the circumstances right for me to act on the information the ad conveyed. Marketing is about creating the potential for growth. To create the predisposition to try or to remain loyal.</p> <p>Greg, interesting thesis and I would agree that the fundamental problem is that there are so many different views of marketing: fundamental growth driver vs inefficient sales tool, investment vs cost, behavioral vs attitudinal, etc.</p> <p> </p> OK, now this is interesting. Thanks for the comments everyone.

Marc, of course short-term sales are worth shooting for but not every sale is an incremental sale due to some marketing action. Yes, product experience and WOM have a very strong role to play but part of advertising’s job is to shape those interactions. Like gravity, advertising may be a weak force but it does not mean that it has little influence.

I have bought 7 Audis in a row. I am sure I have been influenced by Audi’s offline and online communications as well as their product and dealer service plus WOM but how on earth are you going to assign a value to each contact when my behavior is so consistent? Next time around I may well buy a Subaru. The initial impetus toward that change was a print ad I saw five years ago but only now are the circumstances right for me to act on the information the ad conveyed. Marketing is about creating the potential for growth. To create the predisposition to try or to remain loyal.

Greg, interesting thesis and I would agree that the fundamental problem is that there are so many different views of marketing: fundamental growth driver vs inefficient sales tool, investment vs cost, behavioral vs attitudinal, etc.

 

]]> By: Greg Nyilasy http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2009/11/15/marketing-accountability-can-you-link-the-intangible-to-the-financial/#comment-12969 Greg Nyilasy Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:30:06 +0000 http://www.mb-blog.com/?p=1459#comment-12969 I have conducted some grounded theory research in this area in the context of "professionalization theory," a very interesting area in the sociology of occupations. The fundamental proposition of professionalization theory is that there is an inherent "drive" among occupations to elevate their status (however lowly they may be at start). Tthe most important tool they use for this is the development of a "theoretical knowledge base." This drive is fueled by clients' need for certainty for the quality/reliability/validity of services they receive (i.e., so that they appear to "know what they are talking about"). Status and power emanates from this base, which is traditionally developed by university researchers and transmitted/applied/operationalized by consultants, applied researchers and journalists. Marketing/advertising has launched a professionalization project very early on, to build this accountability, by setting up university programs in the US in the early 1900s, later through the use of market research/account planning and the adoption of ever more sophisticated statistical techniques starting in the 1960s. Unfortunately, there are some very strong reasons (philosophical, scientific, practical) why this accountability can only be partial and the professionalization desired only semi-achieved (if at all). At the same time, clients, let them be internal or external ones, demand certainty as much (if not more and more) as ever. This is the inevitable "professional paradox" of the marketing occupation, for which there are only local, ad-hoc, makeshift solutions (which I called 'pseudoprofessionalization tactics'), not overarching, structural, global ones. For more on these studies please see: Nyilasy, Gergely, Peggy J. Kreshel and Leonard N. Reid (in press), “Agency Practitioners, Pseudo-Professionalization Tactics, and Advertising Professionalism,” Journal of Current Issues and Research in Advertising.  Nyilasy, Gergely, and Leonard N. Reid (2009), “Agency Practitioners’ Meta-theories of Advertising,” International Journal of Advertising, 28 (4), 639-668.  Nyilasy, Gergely, and Leonard N. Reid (2009), “Agency Practitioners’ Theories of How Advertising Works,” Journal of Advertising, 38 (Fall), 81-96.  Nyilasy, Gergely, and Leonard N. Reid (2007), “The Academician-Practitioner Gap in Advertising,” International Journal of Advertising, 26 (4), 425-445. I have conducted some grounded theory research in this area in the context of “professionalization theory,” a very interesting area in the sociology of occupations. The fundamental proposition of professionalization theory is that there is an inherent “drive” among occupations to elevate their status (however lowly they may be at start). Tthe most important tool they use for this is the development of a “theoretical knowledge base.” This drive is fueled by clients’ need for certainty for the quality/reliability/validity of services they receive (i.e., so that they appear to “know what they are talking about”). Status and power emanates from this base, which is traditionally developed by university researchers and transmitted/applied/operationalized by consultants, applied researchers and journalists.
Marketing/advertising has launched a professionalization project very early on, to build this accountability, by setting up university programs in the US in the early 1900s, later through the use of market research/account planning and the adoption of ever more sophisticated statistical techniques starting in the 1960s. Unfortunately, there are some very strong reasons (philosophical, scientific, practical) why this accountability can only be partial and the professionalization desired only semi-achieved (if at all). At the same time, clients, let them be internal or external ones, demand certainty as much (if not more and more) as ever. This is the inevitable “professional paradox” of the marketing occupation, for which there are only local, ad-hoc, makeshift solutions (which I called ‘pseudoprofessionalization tactics’), not overarching, structural, global ones.
For more on these studies please see:

Nyilasy, Gergely, Peggy J. Kreshel and Leonard N. Reid (in press), “Agency Practitioners, Pseudo-Professionalization Tactics, and Advertising Professionalism,” Journal of Current Issues and Research in Advertising. 
Nyilasy, Gergely, and Leonard N. Reid (2009), “Agency Practitioners’ Meta-theories of Advertising,” International Journal of Advertising, 28 (4), 639-668. 
Nyilasy, Gergely, and Leonard N. Reid (2009), “Agency Practitioners’ Theories of How Advertising Works,” Journal of Advertising, 38 (Fall), 81-96. 
Nyilasy, Gergely, and Leonard N. Reid (2007), “The Academician-Practitioner Gap in Advertising,” International Journal of Advertising, 26 (4), 425-445.

]]> By: Marc Ryan http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2009/11/15/marketing-accountability-can-you-link-the-intangible-to-the-financial/#comment-12968 Marc Ryan Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:27:21 +0000 http://www.mb-blog.com/?p=1459#comment-12968 I think claiming the long term value of branding is the equivalent of setting up a scenario where some accountability is replaced with the prospect of never being accountable.  When you look at the overall influencing factors in anyone's decision to purchase a product isn't advertising one the weakest influencers?  Personal experience, word of mouth, prior use, those features are key to engendering loyalty and trial.  So if that holds true wouldn't you imagine that short term sales is a good thing to shoot for?  The more hands my ad campaign puts my product into the more I grow the pool of influencers that can drive a significant portion of future purchases.  Doesn't that make short term sales the tipping point for driving long term brand equity? And by that measure doesn't evaluating the financial return in the short term provide an inidcator of future brand success? I think claiming the long term value of branding is the equivalent of setting up a scenario where some accountability is replaced with the prospect of never being accountable.  When you look at the overall influencing factors in anyone’s decision to purchase a product isn’t advertising one the weakest influencers?  Personal experience, word of mouth, prior use, those features are key to engendering loyalty and trial.  So if that holds true wouldn’t you imagine that short term sales is a good thing to shoot for?  The more hands my ad campaign puts my product into the more I grow the pool of influencers that can drive a significant portion of future purchases.  Doesn’t that make short term sales the tipping point for driving long term brand equity? And by that measure doesn’t evaluating the financial return in the short term provide an inidcator of future brand success?

]]> By: Philip Herr http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2009/11/15/marketing-accountability-can-you-link-the-intangible-to-the-financial/#comment-12967 Philip Herr Mon, 16 Nov 2009 12:54:11 +0000 http://www.mb-blog.com/?p=1459#comment-12967 I believe the subtext to the issue is that marketers feel in some way “inferior” to other functions within the organization. Accountability is/was the way to demonstrate that marketers added as much to the health of the organization as anyone else. Our path to accountability was through accounting type ROI measures. It gave marketers a sense of comfort to be able to point to metrics indicating short term gains (and in some rare cases long term gains as well). But are we about to throw the baby out with the bathwater? Are we turning on “accountants” with savagery (Enron, AIG, Lehman – need we say more?) and reverting to the “softer” measures that determined our contributions over the last half of the twentieth century? Pardon me while I climb up on the fence here: I think that we need both. ROI metrics for a sense of accomplishment, and softer measures to truly understand the nature of brand equity and consumer relationships with brands.   I believe the subtext to the issue is that marketers feel in some way “inferior” to other functions within the organization. Accountability is/was the way to demonstrate that marketers added as much to the health of the organization as anyone else. Our path to accountability was through accounting type ROI measures. It gave marketers a sense of comfort to be able to point to metrics indicating short term gains (and in some rare cases long term gains as well).
But are we about to throw the baby out with the bathwater? Are we turning on “accountants” with savagery (Enron, AIG, Lehman – need we say more?) and reverting to the “softer” measures that determined our contributions over the last half of the twentieth century?
Pardon me while I climb up on the fence here: I think that we need both. ROI metrics for a sense of accomplishment, and softer measures to truly understand the nature of brand equity and consumer relationships with brands.
 

]]> By: Erik du Plessis http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2009/11/15/marketing-accountability-can-you-link-the-intangible-to-the-financial/#comment-12966 Erik du Plessis Mon, 16 Nov 2009 06:52:55 +0000 http://www.mb-blog.com/?p=1459#comment-12966 I think one need to start with the question: "Does Marketing WANT accountability versus do they NEED accountability?". Seems to me that when brands do well marketers want accountability, but since brands are mostly stable they often do not really want accountability. If marketing needed accountability then it would have been there. The point was made that marketers should not become the finance department - by Tim. Maybe this raises the issue of reversing the question: Should the accountants not be asked to be accountable? Included in their accountability score should not be only how much cost they trimmed out of the brand, but how much they grew the brand by wise investmjents in marketing?   I think one need to start with the question: “Does Marketing WANT accountability versus do they NEED accountability?”.
Seems to me that when brands do well marketers want accountability, but since brands are mostly stable they often do not really want accountability.
If marketing needed accountability then it would have been there.
The point was made that marketers should not become the finance department - by Tim.
Maybe this raises the issue of reversing the question: Should the accountants not be asked to be accountable? Included in their accountability score should not be only how much cost they trimmed out of the brand, but how much they grew the brand by wise investmjents in marketing?
 

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