Marketing 4.0 in the Digital Economy
In one of our meetings Doğan Taşkent, who has an essential role in the development of technology, has said that “Industry 4.0 has come to cut the problems created by the first 3 of the industrial revolutions of the last 250 years. So, listen to us as the people who created the first three of today’s problems, but do not apply what we say.” about the concept of Industry 4.0.
When I heard the phrase “Do not listen to us, we destroyed this world.” I was shocked because he is someone who has achieved dozens of projects for technology transfers to universities.
I wonder if the concept of Marketing 4.0 has come to solve the problems created by the first three, and more importantly, should we throw away the traditional world of marketing that taught us?
They were considering that the main factor that sustaining life is the human being and the economy he created; we can all say that the economy has become digital. Our salaries and the money we earn are now just numbers in our bank accounts. Credit cards, payment methods, cryptocurrencies, and financial technologies are changing people’s relationship with money. Behaviors turn into numbers 0 and 1 in the digital world. We can call this world, where our monetary behavior changes, Digital Economy.
In a world where the economy became digitalized, we cannot expect companies to be indifferent to digital transformation.
We Must Redefine Marketing in the Digital Economy
Marketing 4.0 means combining online and offline interaction between companies and their customers. In this respect, we can say that digital marketing will replace traditional marketing is wrong.
The purpose of marketing 4.0 is to make the customer defender of the brand. Therefore, marketers should use traditional marketing to create main lines such as brand positioning, differentiation, and 4P while using digital marketing and technology to create a customer community, manage interaction with them, and make them defenders of the brand.
I am aware that I have entered a little philosophy of the subject. Let’s take these issues a little more understandable.
Acts that Companies Should Do Before 2021
1. Bring Together Sales and Marketing with Single Growth Funnel
In my marketing history of more than ten years, I had lots of experience in terms of a brand during my service period while working with agencies. One of my conclusions is that brands still fail to establish measurable, optimized, and scalable flows between the Marketing and Sales departments.
Accurate and unbiased feedback in the sales and the information of which marketing activity developed which sales channel not directed to the marketing. Therefore, beyond Turkey, in the United States and the UK per year, the 140 billion dollar advertising budget, human resources, and income source are going to waste.
Problems such as Excel data, import, export, API, data send and receive, tracking the process with manual methods, divided data, and superficial microdata, determining performance standards through each department’s goals is an issue for each brand.
The leading cause of this problem is some technologies that Marketing 3.0 has introduced to our lives, such as CRM, ERP, Call Center Tools, Accounting and Stock Tracking software, Digital Advertising Tools, Web, and Mobile Tracking tools. Also, the data used by marketing and sales teams during the day are on different platforms, cannot be singularized, and cannot be seen as a whole.
The potential to blame each other between the sales and marketing departments, constant excuses, and troublesome handicaps for companies and business owners are, of course, the extra of all these.
The Solution: Growth Funnel
The subject became more apparent when I heard the question “Would you rather be right or be happy?” from Serbay Arda Ayzit.
It is not about what I want but about what the company wants.
The purpose of the company is neither to produce qualified products nor to do good marketing. The only goal is for the customer to purchase the product or service and then become the brand’s defender.
Hence, companies need to turn their Marketing and Sales Funnel into the Growth Funnel in 2021.
For a better understanding of Growth Funnel, you can read Jean de La Rochebrochard’s post.
2. Adapt to Omnichannel Marketing Management
It is getting harder and harder to get the attention of customers. The new type of customer differs from other markets we have seen before with their tendency to be mobile. They travel a lot, live fast, want everything to happen instantly; they are not patient.
For example, when they are interested in something they see on TV, they immediately start researching a mobile device or doing a price/performance research in-store before deciding to buy something from a store.
They can decide whether to buy anytime and anywhere. But so many internet-lover people still love to have a physical experience.
All these behaviors make it difficult to manage an increasing number of ways. Omnichannel Marketing tools get there at this point.
You have to transform many channels from website visits to live support, from call center to recording opened in your CRM system, from store purchases to after-sales support. From the emails, you send to digital advertisements, into a Single Customer Experience.
3. Build Platform and Build Community
Web or Mobile or both, it is time for brands to build a platform. The reason for this is because the concept of customer trust is not vertical anymore, but horizontal.
While marketing campaigns easily influenced customers in the past, for example, when the belief in the toothpaste recommended by white-coat dentists on TV was steadfast, the balance is now changing.
Research shows that most customers rely on 3f (friends, family, Facebook — it is a metaphor for the trilogy, of course) rather than marketing communications.
From the perspective of marketing communications, customers turn into communication intermediaries for brands, not just segments or targeting standards. The conclusion from this whole explanation is that there are three crucial reasons why brands have a platform where they can manage their interactions with their customers.
Profile Data: Who is the customer is defined. In addition to demographic information, behavioral information such as using different digital channels is also used.
Historical Data: The past transactions of the customer are analyzed. Based on the traces, the probable troubles or the actions can predict.
Conditional Data: This shows what the customer is currently experiencing, the value change, and the value-related benefit. Pieces of information such as day, time, location, and device he or she uses reflect the customer’s current situation, and they are used to understand the customer’s view.
Let’s summarize some of the technologies to help you in 2021;
a) Customer Data Platform (CDP): It manages all interactions between the customer and the brand in one place and makes them available for the marketing department.
b) Customer Experience Platform (CX): It is necessary to build the right experiences to manage the customer’s cycle. That is what Customer Experience Management platforms do.
c) Growth Management Platforms (GMP): It aims to reach growth by using customer data to set up multi-channel media and communication operations with the right strategies at each growth step.
