However, in many cases, customers need to interact with several functional teams before their query is addressed. In part, Waggener Edstrom’s role has been to educate and persuade our clients into new ways of communicating with their customers and, many times, working out how they adapt or replace internal structures to do this effectively. At the roundtable we considered some of the solutions brands are exploring. For example, appointing a Chief Digital Officer or a Chief Experience Officer, or regrouping around customer segment teams rather than functional divisions. The discussion provoked interesting thoughts on clustering of teams, cross-functional responsibilities and even the merging of CMO and CIO roles.
Brand sentiment is now in part founded on the technical experience customers have online. They have little patience for poor or inconsistent interactions. A comment I’ve heard (and made myself) is ‘why didn’t they (the company) know that? I told them already’ – the customer has a singular view of the brand rather than caring for which part of the organisation they fed information into. Consumers want a far more personalised and seamless experience. With that in mind, marketers need to consider not just point solutions but how they fit into the company’s wider delivery of technology-enabled customer experience.
I’m going to use the ‘C’ word now. Most marketers hate it or at least glaze over when it’s used: ‘compliance’. Considering IT standards, data use policies as well as fitting into legacy infrastructure is critical in generating internal collaboration and in delivering a complete end-to-end customer experience rather than flashes of brilliance. Tim Grieveson, CIO at G4S Risk Management, a risk management consultancy, explained that to deliver a seamless experience it’s critical to engage with the CIO’s team early enough during the design stage of any given customer services initiative. Inclusion of IT can help build systems that meet the business objectives as opposed to just keeping the lights on. The roundtable also raised questions around the future technical knowledge required by marketers – how much will be enough?
Recent research by Accenture on the CMO-CIO disconnect revealed that more than three out of four CIOs think CMO-CIO alignment is important, compared to 57% of CMOs. To deliver joined-up campaigns the savvy CMO will make a beeline for the CIO’s door. CIOs can facilitate access to vast amounts of data that can be used to analyse the success of marketing and PR departments and help identify opportunities and interfaces to the right customers. Anecdotally, we heard that the first time a CEO of a company had understood the value of marketing was when a marketer showed him the online journey of a customer to purchase using data from Google.
The CMOs and CIOs present at the roundtable were unanimous in believing they need to define and understand their business objectives first before adopting any technology. Technology is an enabler for the customer journey – it’s not the strategy in and of itself.
As communicators we need to embrace this moving landscape, collaborate with our new tech BFFs and release technology’s potential.
The dinner was the third in a series planned by The Economist Group and Waggener Edstrom. If you’re a senior marketer and grappling with the challenge of working more closing with the IT function, we’d love to hear your views on what’s working and what keeps you awake at night. Feel free to leave a comment below or contact [email protected] to get involved in a future panel discussion. You can reach Chris Talago directly at [email protected]
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Economist Intelligence Unit Limited (EIU) or any other member of The Economist Group. The Economist Group (including the EIU) cannot accept any responsibility or liability for reliance by any person on this article or any of the information, opinions or conclusions set out in the article.
