Web/Tech | Marketing Operations at Work

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(408) 243-7881
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Marketing leaders today are in an unprecedented position to help organizations achieve their objectives in increasingly competitive and dynamic markets. Marketing Operations Partners is one the first services companies focused on changing the MO of marketing by leveraging the emerging discipline of Marketing Operations. To address this significant challenge—and opportunity - Marketing Operations Partners provides a ready-to-go COO and change management team consisting of leading thought leaders in the marketing community. Our team includes subject matter experts in the areas of lead generation and nurturing, customer experience management, process design, strategic planning process facilitation, technology assessment, organizational diagnosis, change management, ROI analysis, business intelligence, and marketing, sales and product alignment. For more information, visit www.mopartners.com.

March 24, 2010

Increasing the Value of Marketing Operations with Predictive Analytics

Today our Marketing Analytics team lead, Creig Foster, dives into the sexy topic of predictive analytics (PA). Why are we so enamored with PA? One of my students, the Marketing Operations leader at fast-growing software company, captured the essence of why PA is compelling in a recent essay: “I have a better chance of my marketing department growing and my personal relevance moving up the food chain if I can predict the future – plain and simple.” So if that’s the case, why aren’t more marketing leaders actively applying PA in their marketing strategies (particularly in the B2B world)? Perhaps they just don’t yet understand the many PA applications that are available to run their Marketing Operations better. Creig’s aticle takes some of the mystery out of the magic of predictive analytics. Gary

Increasing the Value of Marketing Operations with Predictive Analytics

by Creig Foster

A recent blog post by James Kobielus of Forrester Research advances the idea that business success depends on your company’s capability to see likely future outcomes and take appropriate steps now to realize them. He goes on to say that predicting future scenarios successfully, laying plans and deploying the needed resources is critical in seizing opportunities, minimizing threats and mitigating risks. I fully support this view and believe that for a company to be successful these days it must use predictive analytics to its fullest extent.

So what is Predictive Analytics? From the all knowing source, Wikipedia, “Predictive analytics encompasses a variety of techniques from statistics, data mining, and game theory that analyze current and historical facts to make predictions about future events.” You might ask yourself what is the big deal; humans do this sort of thing all the time. Yes, but predictive analytics takes in huge amounts of data, analyzes complex interrelationships, and discerns patterns in the data that the human mind could not possibly see. Besides, the models can do their processing 24/7 without making a mistake.

Kobielus goes on to state that the “grand promise of predictive analytics – still largely unrealized in most companies – is that it will become ubiquitous, guiding all decisions, transactions, and applications.” For a company (large or small) to become a truly predictive enterprise, I believe it will take more than an investment in the technology and people to accomplish this transition. It also takes a change in how a company thinks about its business.

Instead of a reactive response to challenges and opportunities as they are presented, I believe that a proactive and investigative approach to building the business is enabled by predictive analytics. Yes, I know we all plan with the best intentions of positive outcomes. What I am suggesting is using predictive analytics in making decisions about future directions and strategy. In other words, the use of predictive analytics should become part of the way a company thinks about its business and a cornerstone of the overall business strategy.

Read the complete article here.

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February 15, 2010

Marrying Marketing Ops and the Social Web

As I write this, I’ve just celebrated my 26th Valentine’s Day as husband to the love of my life, Melissa.

A successful long-term marriage requires attraction, passion, friendship, communication, commitment, nurturing, growth, responsibility, collaboration, sharing, fun, emotional support, give and take, and so much more.

Two of the hottest topics in Marketing these days are the Social Web (Web 2.0) and, to my gratification, Marketing Operations. The Social Web is the latest channel and playing field leveler for marketing in today’s new world. Marketing Operations is the strategic and operational lever to get the most from Marketing resources, tools and insight — both online and offline.

I’ve written about how Marketing Operations 2.0 is the yin to Web 2.0’s yang in an article that was originally published in the Business Marketing Association’s national newsletter in 2008.

I’m motivated to do my part to advance this badly-needed marriage between Marketing Operations and the Social Web, so I’m proud to announce that Marketing Operations Partners will be a sponsor of the NewComm Forum, one of the most exciting and respected conferences on Web 2.0.

Following is information on 2010 NewComm Forum, as well as a discount code you can use to save money when you sign up as part of our extended family.

NewComm Forum: The Social Web – Redefining Business
April 20–23, 2010
San Mateo, CA
www.newcommforum.com

Don’t miss the premier conference for unlocking the power of the social web for business. Speakers include a who’s who of social media experts and practitioners from leading companies. Five comprehensive tracks include: Online Communications & Communities, Social CRM, Markets are Conversations, Understanding the New Media Landscape, and NewComm Essentials. Early Bird discounts through March 12th.

Use discount code NCF2010MOP to save an additional $100 – register now – seats are limited!

I hope you’ll join us during this special week in April when the Marketing Operations and Social Web communities come together. This is a love affair that’s made to last. (<:}

Gary

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February 4, 2010

What Marketing Needs from IT

Filed under: Catalyzing Change, Marketing Automation, Marketing Scalability, Strategy & Change Facilitation, Web/Tech — Tags: campaign execution, customer lifecycle, database management, database systems, finance, interactive, IT, marketing activity, Marketing Automation, marketing operations, measurement, operations digital, systems — Gary_Katz @ 3:17 pm

Marketing and IT are arguably two of the most overloaded and under-resourced functions in the enterprise. As marketing complexity increases, a key aspect of a scalable marketing strategy is the automation of repetitive, manual processes. In most organizations, Marketing cannot advance these automation initiatives through its own resources. It needs IT. Today, our newest associate partner, Simon Daniels, offers an insightful prescription on exactly what Marketing needs – and doesn’t need – from IT. The following article is republished from Database Marketing magazine — Gary

What Marketing Needs from IT

by Simon Daniels

It’s well known that Sales and Marketing are like cats and dogs in many companies. Constant conflicts take place over the value of marketing activity, the quality of leads and their subsequent follow-up and the appropriate assignment of credit for opportunities that result in new business wins. These issues are much discussed and suggested solutions abound.

What though, of the relationship between Marketing and IT? Technology is crucial to modern marketing in the form of database systems, campaign automation, digital and interactive platforms, analytics and much more. We turn to our IT colleagues for solutions in these areas to help us manage customer lifecycle, campaign execution, measurement and many other aspects of marketing activity. Alongside systems deemed business critical in finance and operations though, Marketing is often afforded lower priority and left to fend for itself.

Continue reading Simon’s article on the Marketing Operations Partners website.

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June 4, 2009

Marketing Operations? In IT??

Filed under: Customer Profitability, Marketing Operations Big Picture, Marketing Operations Community, Return on Marketing, Strategy & Change Facilitation, Web/Tech — Michael Dortch @ 3:17 pm

Today the newest member of the Marketing Operations Partners team is penning a post for us. Many of you may know Michael Dortch from his work as an industry analyst for Aberdeen Group and Robert Frances Group. The old-timers amongst us may even recall his journalism days with CMP publications NetGuide and Communications Week. Michael is uniquely qualified to write about the opportunity for Marketing Operations and IT to align for the greater good, so enjoy the first of what I'm sure will be many great posts – Gary

by Michael Dortch

Should IT be embracing Marketing Operations? Should MO be embracing IT?

Sure!

At its heart, Marketing Operations is about bringing some adult supervision to some of the most highly personal, visceral, and therefore non-standardized activities conducted by any business — not to mention some of the most business-critical. To succeed, therefore, Marketing Operations professionals must do a lot of successful marketing, selling, and evangelizing to multiple constituencies within their own organizations, if their efforts are to show any benefits to the enterprise's external relationships with customers, partners, and prospects.

Oddly enough, highly parallel challenges face every IT department that's striving to be truly business-driven and to supply truly effective business tools and solutions. What's more, almost every business action, decision, and transaction is enabled or supported by some kind of IT. And at many enterprises I've known, the IT departments actually have the most experience in formalizing, documenting, maintaining, and refining key processes and practices.

All of this means that Marketing Operations professional and evangelists should forge good working relationships with IT decision-makers at their enterprises at the earliest possible opportunity. The combination of the two can and should lead to many new opportunities to "IT-enable" efforts at increasing profitability, customer and partner satisfaction, "return on marketing" and IT ROI.

At the very least, it will make for conversation over meals or drinks refreshingly different…

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