Manoj Khatri
Research and Coordination Editor
Elementary,
My Dear Watson Elements of Effective Marketing Campaign,
JOHN WANAMAKER, pioneer of department stores in the US, once
confessed that he knew that only half his advertising works;
the problem was, he didn’t know which half. But today’s
marketers cannot afford to makes such a confession. With marketing
accountability becoming the motto of the top management, companies
are increasingly looking for return on every marketing rupee
spent. Developing effective marketing programmes is now the
most important objective of marketing practitioners. But what
exactly does the term marketing effectiveness imply?
Economics
and Effective Marketing
In Economics, we were taught that money has no
inherent value. It is simply some printed paper or some numbers
in the account books, unlike air, water and other basic necessities,
which are indispensable to life. The value of money lies in
the function of serving as a medium of exchange. Money, then,
is what money does. Twist this statement a bit and replace money
with marketing and you get another universal truth: Marketing
is what marketing does. Marketing tactics (including advertising,
sales promotions, product development and brand management)
are useless, unless they serve the purpose for which they were
designed. That purpose, the endpoint of all marketing, is sales.
No matter how brilliant your marketing strategy, if it does
not ultimately result in sales, then it has failed.
EFFIEs
and effectiveness
Every year, the
New York American Marketing Association gives away EFFIE awards
to the most effective advertising campaign of the year in the
respective country. In the words of a recent winner, “Effective
advertising is advertising that sells; advertising that builds
market share. The EFFIE award is the symbol of effective advertising
and a tribute to the client and agency partnership that strives
to create it.” Of course, there are no absolutes in the
world of marketing, no formula for marketing effectiveness.
Every marketing challenge is unique and requires a distinctive
approach. Having said that, there are certain best practices
in marketing that have stood the test of time. These practices
have a few factors in common, all of which are inter-connected
and must be considered carefully before embarking upon any marketing
programme. Surprisingly, these factors lead us back to the basics.
So let’s re-visit these basic principles.
Essential
Ingredients of a Successful Marketing Campaign
CONSUMER INSIGHT tops the charts. Every
sensible marketer knows the importance of relevant consumer
insight. The consumer is the king around whom the world of marketing
revolves. And that makes consumer insight the single most important
factor that shapes a successful marketing campaign. According
to Sunil Lulla, “Consumer insight is crucial if you want
to be effective in your marketing efforts. Post that it’s
the ideas and the execution that make all the difference. For
instance, Sony Entertainment Television’s marketing campaign
for ‘Jassi Jaissi Koi Nahin’ was truly differentiated
and innovative and was driven by a very strong consumer insight
– that people tend to judge others by the way they look.
Hence we launched a campaign, which never revealed the protagonist
but only built her attributes and character.” Lynn DeSouza
adds: “I believe it’s hitting on the right consumer
insight, which is an outcome of good planning and knowledge
of consumer behaviour. Touching the right chord in the consumer’s
mind and/or heart can actually lead to faster results requiring
lower investments and ad budgets. The anti-FD campaign of Franklin
Templeton is a great example of a hardworking consumer insight
translated into interesting creative execution that required
much lower ad spends than competitors to win great results for
the company.” But consumer insight alone is a necessary,
and not a sufficient, condition. Rohit Srivastava says, “Consumer
insights are interesting because they can often define
the opportunity or create a strong leverage for marketing the
brand; not as an end in themselves. However, a competitive leverage
for an effective marketing programmecould come from other sources
as well, such as a price or distribution advantage, a product
edge or a service differentiator.” THOROUGH PLANNING plays
an instrumental role in the success of every marketing effort.
Planning enables marketers to get a complete picture of where
they stand, where they want to go, and the paths available to
them to reach there. Planning helps obtain relevant data relating
to consumer preferences, market and competitor activities, economic
trends and prospects and other such information that is necessary
to make informed decisions with respect to available options.
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