Marketing Tips - What Comes After the Web?

The number of new websites that go up daily and the increasing number of dollars generated in Web commerce should convince anyone that the face of business-to-business marketing, in fact all marketing, is changing. As many companies and clients emerge from a state of incredulity about the value of the Web and begin their first forays into cyberspace, the difficulties inherent in any revolution are becoming apparent. As the old order tumbles, the new order needs a workable infrastructure to replace it. Until it is developed, a degree of chaos ensues and true progress is hindered.

 

For starters, there is the process of creating the internet presence; determining content, selecting vendors, tackling the need for ongoing maintenance and the like. In a sense, all that is just a question of engineering. Tactics. I don't intend to dwell on those issues here. I think the real challenge presented in this changing environment is not opening the door and inviting the world in, but planning your trip to their doorstep with these new technologies as a vehicle. In developing useful strategies for employing technology to acquire a competitive edge in gaining and retaining customers. But where do you begin?

You begin with a plan. An analysis of the situation, an assessment of the opportunities and the development of measurable objectives and actionable strategies. Next, you integrate your "electronic" plan into the overall sales and marketing plan for the company. Boilerplate stuff, right? You do it every day. But there is a key difference between your online program and every other marketing or sales vehicle except the personal sales call. These wired messages don't play to the many, they play to an audience of one. It's just you and your customer at his or her PC. In a business that grew up around mass communication, we know precious little about managing an audience of that size.

Recently, I ran across materials relating to something called "TERM," an acronym for technology-enabled relationship management. That about says it all. As we continue to develop and deepen one-on-one marketing, the necessity to nurture and grow that one-on-one relationship increases as well. This customer-centric approach necessitates changes not only in marketing, but in sales and customer service as well; any place where there's an opportunity for customer interaction.

As marketers, it is essential to understand what technology brings to sales, customer service and marketing. If we don't, our opportunity to be the successful architects of an integrated marketing program is greatly diminished. In a nutshell, here's what technology-enabled solutions mean in the sales or customer service environment. In sales, it means collecting and moving business information closer to the customer, allowing sales people to deliver better, more accurately focused presentations and proposals, thus enabling customers to make decisions better and quicker. In customer service, the issue is developing an informed call/support center which provides a focal point for all prospect or customer issues. A need for information linkage is self evident. Sales needs to know what customer service does and vice versa. Everybody needs to be on the same page.

Marketing's role in this brave new world is to gather, manage and disseminate the information required by sales and customer service, and to manage the electronic marketplace. The first function is fulfilled by developing electronic presences and processes that capture inbound customer data, analyze it, categorize it, enhance it and pass it along. It means using technology as a lever to address rising customer expectations and shorter response time frames. Those who have read Lauterborn, Schultz and Tannenbaum's "Integrated Marketing Communications" (and if you haven't, you should) know that this customer-centric approach reflects a shift from the old Four P's... Product, Price, Place and Promotion... to the Four C's. The Customer, not your product, becomes the transactional pivot. Cost has replaced price, because buying doesn't end spending; there are additional costs for inventory or maintenance and application to be managed. Convenience supersedes place. Since they can get almost anything "overnight," they choose the seller who makes it easiest. Communication has replaced promotion because, without dialogue, we can't see the customer's needs through their eyes. They'll keep looking until they find someone who can.

The second role, managing the electronic marketplace, is a bit dicier. This is where we're breaking new ground. Interactive technologies don't just provide a new medium, they provide a new channel for customer interaction. Not only must we create a presence, but we have to make it easy to find, simple and effective. That presence may encompass not just a web site, but a combination of utilities, like extranets, virtual supply chains, electronic malls and some things we haven't even dreamt up yet. We need to perform the traditional task of providing basic marketing information while functioning effectively as an unassisted sales conduit at the same time.

Using interactive technologies to establish and enhance customer relationships is not an option. It is a must. Marketers must take the lead in capitalizing on this electronically-enabled ability to identify, acquire and interact with customers. Call it a new kind of MIS...Marketing Information Systems. Our job? To develop an integrated set of marketing applications for our entire enterprise, including sales and customer service, that utilize the availability of information and changing technology to develop, nurture and prolong customer relationships and maximize profitability.

Being a winner in a technology-enabled world requires new ways of thinking about a company's organization and the traditional roles of the various structural components. Changing established structure is never an easy thing to do. Inertia, or worse, turf-protecting politics, are formidable impediments to progress.

With some reflection, though, on the implications of electronic technologies, very few would disagree that change is necessary to keep competitors from passing us by.

Reduced to their basics, interactive technologies boil down to innovative ways to deal with information and communication. As marketers, we're supposed to be the innovators and the communicators. If it isn't our job to get this integrated show on the road, who's is it?