Localize to Optimize Sales Channel Effectiveness
Despite the homogenization of markets, media channels, and brand experiences globally, localization of messages, images, creative executions, offers, deals, and interactions is still critical to marketing effectiveness and customer relationship building across many business categories. It is enabling marketers to truly localize and customize campaigns by community and to accommodate factors such as climate, geography, ethnic composition, demographics, shopper-graphics, psychographics, politics, and even neuro-sensory influences. Clearly, localized marketing is becoming a critical area of strategic focus and competitive advantage for brands. "Localize to Optimize Sales Channel Effectiveness" reveals that the majority of national marketers surveyed intend to look for ways to better modify, adapt, and localize their marketing content, messaging, and prospect engagement practices, as very few feel their campaigns are highly evolved on a local level. This report focuses on helping marketers optimize the delivery of localized marketing support through multiple media channels to best meet consumers where they are.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Despite the homogenization of markets, media channels, and brand experiences globally, localization of messages, images, creative executions, offers, deals, and interactions is still critical to marketing effectiveness and customer relationship building across many business categories. While the Internet may have eclipsed the trusty Yellow Pages book as the primary go-to resource
for finding things locally (and providing third-party validation), consumers still desire a very local buying and service experience from a trusted community participant and presence.
The advent of multi-channel, digital marketing is transforming customer engagement,both globally and locally. It is giving local businesses a global presence, and it gives global businesses a local face and pipeline into micro-populations,prospects, and continuity customers. Local marketing
automation platforms and solutions are enabling national or regional marketers to produce, package, distribute,and digitally repurpose multiple versions of content, collateral, advertising, direct mail, promotional, and in-store merchandising materials very cost-efficiently and effectively.
It is enabling marketers to truly localize and customize campaigns by community and to accommodate factors such as climate, geography, ethnic composition, demographics, shopper graphics,psychographies,politics, and even neuro-sensory influences.
Media companies in the cable,broadcast,print, mobile, Internet, outdoor display, and digital signage sectors are introducing more targeted zone, ZIP code, and even location-based messaging and media-buying capabilities. And the same is true at the point of sale, with behavioral targeting leveraging the transactional histories of loyalty and rewards club members shopping
at supermarkets, drug stores, and mass merchant outlets. Downsizing the World Wide Web to a neighborhood locator network is transforming the classified advertising and local listings business and bringing localized search marketing innovations to the demand-generation and traffic-building capabilities of field networks, sales channels, service locations, and merchant outlets of national brand marketers. These include local agents, dealers, franchisees,branch offices,manufacturer reps, consultants, brokers, restaurants,hotels, and retail stores. Localized social marketing is also harvesting the audience reach and viral value of hundreds of millions of active and addicted social gamers, personal content publishers,brand and personality fans, as well as community networking enthusiasts.
Advances in media, buying, tracking, and reporting systems using the Internet are also introducing higher levels of transparency, accountability,reporting, and measurement to co-op,localized,
and network marketing programs on a grassroots level. Centralizing the origination of localized marketing content and programs also delivers significant cost savings, assures greater brand integrity,reduces errors, and improves time-to-market. In addition,localized marketing support drives participation,interest, and enthusiasm in the field,boosting sales effectiveness and closure.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OF KEY FINDINGS
The "Localize to Optimize Sales Channel Effectiveness" study by the CMO Council reveals 86 percent of national marketers surveyed intend to look for ways to better modify, adapt, and
- localize their marketing content,messaging, and prospect engagement practices. Clearly, localized
- marketing is becoming a critical area of strategic focus and competitive advantage for brands.
Most do not rate their capabilities very highly, and many are exploring new channels and modes of localized marketing content delivery. Only 52 percent of marketers are satisfied with the leadership, innovation, and effectiveness in this area. At the same time,marketers recognize the value of localized market and community engagement and how it can drive lead flow, differentiate brands, and create more lasting relationships for their channels, field agents, and sales representatives.
Just 12 percent of marketers believe they have highly evolved campaigns and analytics on a local level in contrast to nearly 50 percent who see themselves as underperforming or needing new strategic thinking and capability development in local marketing. Findings from the online survey of 300-plus members across all leading industry sectors indicate traditional print and broadcast/cable media are losing ground to more targeted, personalized, interactive, and measurable forms of local engagement across diverse audiences and communities.
The most preferred channels for localized marketing are experiential and relationship-building events, direct mail, localized websites, social networks, and electronic messaging. These were far more popular selections than cable and broadcast television, radio,local magazines, and even daily and weekly newspapers. Surprisingly, the Yellow Pages (online and offline) and local online deal delivery networks, such as Groupon and LivingSocial, lagged behind all channels of localized marketing choice for national brands.
Significantly, the study found that:
Nearly 49 percent of marketers believe localized marketing is essential to business growth and profitability,particularly as it relates to demand generation and sell-through of products and services.
Just 30 percent of marketers have embraced local marketing automation platforms, resources and tools compared to 62 percent who either don't have them or only now evaluating these options.
A sizable 23 percent of marketing respondents allocate over 50 percent of their marketing and merchandising budgets to local programs; another 41 percent spend between 20 and 50 percent of the budgets on local marketing.
Only 36 percent of marketers have a formalized process or system for tracking the impact of national brand advertising on local market development and customer acquisition. Some 61 percent either don't measure this or have an ad hoc system for tracking national advertising effectiveness.
For those who do track the impact of national brand advertising on local business performance, the most common methods include response to offers or deals (45 percent); awareness and recognition studies (41 percent); lead and prospect flow (37 percent); web site analytics (37 percent); field and channel feedback (31 percent); local inquiries and calls (30 percent) and share of market data (28 percent).
Cable and broadcast television,local magazines, and radio reportedly deliver the lowest return on spend, compared to top performers like local events, direct mail or FSis,local partner or channel web sites,social networks and electronic messaging.
Factors that most influence localization of marketing messages include demographic (45 percent); geography/location (44 percent); socioeconomic (28 percent); psychographic (27 percent); cultural (22 percent); shoppergraphic or buying history and behavior (19 percent); as well as language (19 percent).
Major obstacles or challenges to marketing localization include understanding local market dynamics or variables (30 percent); determining the right cost/benefit models when it comes to spend (24 percent); and measuring and evaluating campaign effectiveness on a local level (23 percent).
- Top benefits and competitive advantages from localized marketing strategies and programs include:
- greater customer relevance, response and return (67 percent);
- better customer conversations and connectivity (39 percent);
- improved loyalty and advocacy (29 percent);
- brand differentiation, distinction and preference (27 percent).
Marketers are looking to make significant changes and improvements in how they implement local marketing activities. These changes include efforts to:
• Automate the development and delivery of local marketing materials and content
Explore and test localized marketing approaches and strategies Embrace more localized channels of targeting and market access Expand localized marketing budgets and programs
A good percentage of respondents believe localized marketing platforms and systems can be most beneficial in areas like:
- Handling the logistics and intricacies of localized marketing Creating relevant and meaningful versions of content Controlling brand assets and uniformity of brand messaging
Measuring and evaluating campaign effectiveness and content usage
Ownership of localized marketing programs and budgets tends to be fairly distributed across different functional areas. Just 33 percent of CMOs personally direct and control local marketing efforts, while in the main cross-section,middle managers take responsibility for local marketing. These include those with ownership of channel/field marketing or merchandising, key accounts, district/territorial sales, business development,regions/countries, communications, marketing operations, and lines of business.
This CMO Council engagement program reveals huge upside potential for brands implementing localized marketing strategies that enable their sales and customer-facing networks to be more adept in connecting and communicating with consumers and prospects on a more personal and relevant level. Early adopters of hosted platforms and cloud-based services in this area will gain competitive advantage in their ability to execute campaigns more effectively, provision their channel and field organizations more efficiently,better control their brand assets, and track the performance of their marketing content investments.
Source: http://www.cmocouncil.org
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