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Guest Times: Real time marketing – First ask what the outcome is

Harish Nair, National Director – Digital Strategy, GroupM India, writes that an increasing number of brands have committed to 'real time' strategies in an attempt to create and amplify assets, but 'rhythm' is more crucial than 'speed'

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Guest Times: Real time marketing – First ask what the outcome is

Guest Times: Real time marketing – First ask what the outcome is

Harish Nair, National Director – Digital Strategy, GroupM India, writes that an increasing number of brands have committed to 'real time' strategies in an attempt to create and amplify assets, but 'rhythm' is more crucial than 'speed'

Mumbai | September 29, 2014

Harish-Nair Harish Nair

The always moving, always new, always-on digital and mobile screen experiences that are prevalent today constitute a new media phenomenon. An increasing number of brands have committed to “real time” strategies in an attempt to create and amplify assets with the greatest possible currency and relevance. This represents a significant new evolution in how we market.

Speed is important in this fast paced digital media era, but even more crucial is rhythm. Rhythm is the timing of events on a human scale; of musical sounds and silences, of the steps of a dance, of the multiple and different marketing efforts that marketers engage in - and, how they all come together is very important in engaging with the consumer. Consumers have adapted better to today's intuitive, streaming, collaborative and interlinked digital world than marketers.

For marketers, rhythm and speed will come in when there is clarity on each and every step of the consumer engagement – when you can quickly decide your next step and also execute the same to keep the engagement flowing. That clarity will come in when you ask hard questions on what you want to achieve. That clarity will come in your marketing efforts only when you have a clear distinction between output and outcome. Too many marketers are caught in the output driven metrics (like GRPs, Clicks) while in reality they should just be milestones in the journey. Chasing output driven metrics will honestly be, most certainly, a lazy first step. The outcome you really want is brand awareness or consideration or affinity.

This year, more and more marketers will take a hard look at media investments through the lens of outcome and not output. The effort will be to create a matrix of outcomes and then decide outputs that help brands achieve those outcomes and improve over a period of time.

  • For paid media: Advertising matrix across media, mapping outcomes to outputs
  • For owned media: Asset matrix which tracks change in delta w.r.t visits, stickiness, repeats, purchases whether in store or on the site
  • For earned media: Social matrix which tracks brand health; and enables trend spotting/owning

This will have many implications. For a start it will most certainly lead you to invest your time and money in mediums where customers are engaging heavily. CMOs will not have to compartmentalise digital media as a silo and insource investment decisions to junior colleagues or digital specialists who “get” outputs. Not anymore. Outcomes are not dependent on the media type, only the outputs. Clarity on outcomes will ensure that all your media investments and efforts are working in sync to help you engage with your consumers across screens in today's multiscreen world. And that will surely result not just in returns but more importantly relationship with your customers for your investments – the best ROI possible!

To read more please download copy of India Digital Playbook at http://www.indiadigitalplaybook.com/

Info@BestMediaInfo.com

Info@BestMediaInfo.com

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