Cool --> Critical

5 Take-Aways From Day 1 @ #FCIF12

and the one thing that was missing at Forrester Customer Intelligence Forum

1. Cool to Critical

I love the theme of the conference, from COOL to CRITICAL. That’s exactly what Marketing Technologists need to focus on. There’s too much focus on the new shiny bauble — what’s the next Instagram or Pinterest?!?  Sure, it’s important to understand what new technologies and sites are coming to the forefront, they show us what new dynamics are coming to market, but these technologies are worthless, or even worse a distraction, if they are not connected to the core business and marketing strategies.

2. Brand Activation

There are 4 pillars of brand equity

1. Credibility
2. Leadership
3. Uniqueness
4. Relevance

But the pillars are crumbling from an active consumer who has high standards and is empowered by social media. To guide your brand you need three things.

3 things to guide your brand

1. Brand North Star

• Your brand North Star guides your internal and external vision of the brand
• North star has to be honest, strategic, inspirational, concise

2. Brand Map

Update your brand experience map:

1. Actions – How will our brand interact with the world
2. Products – Align and augment offerings with actions
3. Messages – shape and share the brand message

3. Brand Compass

1. Trusted – earn trust by guiding the brand to be more transparent and accountable
2. Remarkable – disrupt the market in a way that inspires people to talk about the brand
3. Unmistakable – become known as the one and only at what you do
4. Essential – become more irreplaceable in the lives of your customer

Cristina Bondolowski, Global brand manager for Coca-Cola, shared brand strategies on how it uses a message of hope and optimism to keep Coca-Cola at the top of the list of global brands. You want to see brand happiness? Check out this viral hit.

3. Customer Intelligence Landscape

Forrester Analyst Dave Frankland gave an update on the customer intelligence landscape and cajoled CI professionals to “do better”.   CI needs to deliver more than analytics, the future is in contextual relevance.  Dave covered three types of context.

Three context areas for customer intelligence:

1. Behavioral context - engagement, transactions, propensity
2. Business context -business drivers, customer value differentiation, yield management
3. Emotional context – sentiment, preference, perceived value

4. Using Social and Mobile to Drive B2B Customer Retention

Forrester Analyst Michael Greene shared insights into how B2B companies can use social and mobile to drive customer retention. I support the focus on customer retention because research shows social efforts don’t currently do a great job of gaining new clients, however, social/mobile can give your current customers a valuable touch point.

Some notes from the session:

• 39% use social platforms on their mobile phones
• Many B2B marketers aren’t equipped to market to addressable customers
• Expectations of a 14.4% CAGR in interactive marketing spending over the next 5 years
• One of the challenges to executing social and mobile is they are often  disconnected from the normal B2B process of driving leads to Sales, and that can be okay
• Mobile’s value is consistent access. Customers are not always at their desk waiting to take our call. And even if they are at their desk, some don’t want to take the call.
• Social gives marketers the ability to act like sales and account management teams by creating conversations with and between customers

5. Marketing Technology Roadmap

Forrester Analyst William Band discussed what a Marketing Technology roadmap is, why you need one and how it helps you.  There were a ton of great information in this session. I loved the topic, but also useful is how to create a roadmap – something I only had a loose understanding of.  Here’s how to create a roadmap:

How to create a roadmap:

1. Current environment
2. Industry trends
3. Marketing goals and metrics
4. Future vision – target state
5. Capabilities gaps
6. Significant changes/major programs
7. Create road maps at various levels
8. Dependencies and interconnections
9. Implications of actions and consequences of inaction
10. Business and financial implications

[notice]But something was missing – Content Strategy[/notice]

A lot of Marketers I talk to are struggling with  content strategy.

Content Strategy challenges:

• How to optimize content for  different segments?
• How to organize content assets?
• How to change traditional processes (print, ad, display, PR) and adapt to digital channels (social, mobile, interactive)?
• How to measure content effectiveness?

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