Memo to CEOs: Your Future is Shopper Marketing

Neighbor CEO Jim Holbrook challenges CEOs to recognize that shopper marketing's multi-disciplinary approach has the most potential to drive sustainable sales growth.Download the attached file at right to read the full report.DATE: April 15, 2011SUBJECT: Your Future is Your Shopper Marketing OrganizationYou know that business is getting more complex. Competition is growing, and the stakes are getting higher. CEOs like you need the marketing staff to step up. But how? And more importantly, who?Eighty percent of CEOs says growth is the No. 1 priority, but fewer than 20% of you are satisfied with their organization’s marketing efforts. CMO lifespans are short, and structure is ever-shifting: 70% of marketing organizations reorganized within the past three years. How long has your CMO been in place? When did you reorganize last? And when is the next reorg planned?For your marketing department, it’s tough to know what you want. Fewer than 25% of marketers say that information flows freely within their organization, and over 75% of decisions, once made, are second- (and third-) guessed. Only about one-third of marketers believe that strategic decisions are quickly translated to action in their organization.Where is your company’s new “center of gravity”? Customer service? Resource allocation? Brand-building? As you navigate the shifting landscape, one constant remains: Success is ultimately measured by sales results. The transaction is still the linchpin. For brands that do business at retail, Ground Zero is the cash register ... and the cash register should inform the corner office.The most direct impact on sales comes through Shopper Marketing: 73% of CPG manufacturers and 86% of retailers rank shopper marketing as the No. 1 activity that delivers meaningful return on investment.Shopper Marketing is the only discipline where it all comes together -- advertising, promotion, customer service, consumer insights, R&D, trade relations -- all focused relentlessly on driving sales. RecommendationIt’s time to promote your best Shopper Marketers into senior management roles, asap!Who better than Shopper Marketers to understand the growing complexity of business and navigate it successfully, in a collaborative way? Who better to bring the cash register into the corner office? Who better to help the CEO and the CMO do better marketing?Like a jack of all trades, Shopper Marketers are the only ones in the organization to touch all aspects of marketing and coordinate with all stakeholders: brand management, sales, retailers, shoppers. Shopper Marketers work closest to consumers, with a unique vantage point and authentic insight that comes from working in the trenches.Do Better Marketing -- Today and TomorrowThe expertise of Shopper Marketers matches the current -- and coming -- needs of the CEO as businesses adapt to changes in consumer habits and attitudes; heightened expectations for brands; and increased competition from all sides, in every avenue of communication.Former CEO of P&G A.G. Lafley said, “Effective marketing is the key driver of future cash and shareholder value.” In the emerging marketplace, Shopper Marketers are the orchestra conductor of effective marketing. Shopper Marketers are the key drivers of future cash and shareholder value.Shopper Marketers are closest to consumers and best-positioned to talk, listen, and observe shoppers ... then build that insight for the CEO, the CMO and the full organization to do better marketing.Peter Drucker said, “The final question needed in order to come to grips with the business purpose and business mission is: ‘What is value to the customer?’ It may be the most important question. Yet it is the one least often asked ... What a company’s different customers consider value is so complicated that it can be answered only by the customers themselves. Management should not even try to guess at the answers; it should always go to the customers in a systematic quest for them.”As Shopper Marketing expands beyond the aisle, past the First Moment of Truth, to embrace the Shopper Mindset whenever and wherever it happens -- the Shopper Marketer will continue to be the vanguard of consumer insight and retail relations, integrating all marketing elements to crystallize the moment of transaction. That, in the end, is the best way to do marketing.About the Author Jim Holbrook is chief executive officer of Neighbor, Santa Monica, CA, and chairman of the Promotion Marketing Association. He's done management and marketing at Procter & Gamble and Ralston Purina (now Nestlé-Purina). He was president of Zipatoni, and an executive at IPG. Jim can be contacted at jim@neighboragency.com.

Memo to CEOs: Your Future is Shopper Marketing

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