Unlock the value of creative

Transcription

1 Research findings A global benchmarking study from The Chartered Institute of Marketing, in partnership with Canon Europe

2 A global benchmarking study from The Chartered Institute of Marketing, in partnership with Canon Europe Members 75 Non-members 99 ISBN

3 This study is based on in-depth interviews with 25 senior managers across seven European markets, followed by a quantitative benchmark survey of marketing, brand and communications leaders in over 140 major, international organisations.

4 INTRODUCTION Foreword Contents Doing more with less has become something of a new mantra for brand and marketing professionals more channels, more information and more campaigns, with less budget, fewer people and less time. For some it s a case of continued prudence resulting from the recent economic turmoil; for others it s simply a way of life. When coupled with the growth in information, the explosion of channels, increasing customer empowerment and growing customer expectations borne out of the digital era, it s easy to see the pressures facing marketing leaders: How can we do more with less? How can we become more efficient and responsive? How can we better learn what works and share good practice? In early 2011, questions such as these spurred a nine-month, pan-european investigation into how organisations can get more value from marketing assets and campaigns put simply, how to unlock the value of creative. Originating with 25 in-depth interviews with senior managers across a broad range of industries, this benchmarking report details the insights and learnings from a quantitative research study with input from over 140 organisations. We hope you find the ideas and recommendations in this report of value, and would welcome a conversation to discuss them in more detail. 2 Research methodology 3 Project team and advisory panel 4 Industry research participants 9 Executive summary: Key insights within this report 15 Theme one: Joining up campaigns across channels Key insights and our viewpoint High-performers Recommendations Industry perspective: Knight Frank 25 Theme two: Doing more with less getting more value from investments Key insights and our viewpoint Industry perspective: Cisco High-performers Recommendations 37 Theme three: Improving measurement and evaluation Key insights and our viewpoint Industry perspectives: Royal Mail and 3M High-performers Recommendations 47 First steps: practical suggestions to ignite change Joining up campaigns across channels Doing more with less Improving measurement and evaluation 53 Case studies Capital One Bank Europe Thomson Reuters 71 : a discussion agenda for marketing, brand and creative leaders Agency relationships Technology as an enabler Managing across multiple geographies Building a collaborative, best practice culture David Thorp Director of Research and Professional Development The Chartered Institute of Marketing Gary Horsfall Head of Consultancy Services Canon Europe 85 Conclusions Closing perspectives 89 Find out more About the partners behind this initiative Benchmark your organisation The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 1

5 INTRODUCTION Research methodology Project team We began with in-depth interviews with senior marketing, brand and communications managers in 25 organisations in a range of diverse industries, across seven European markets including the UK, Germany, Finland, Austria, France, Norway and Switzerland. Supported by an experienced and diverse advisory panel, these interviews drove the development of an online, quantitative survey taken by over 140 senior practitioners across Europe and the United States, all hailing from large, complex businesses and operating at a common level of responsibility. Our aim has been to synthesise learnings from the rich base of qualitative insights and quantitative data to provide marketing, brand and creative leaders with valuable information that supports change. The outputs from this study, including our new online benchmarking tool (see page 92 for more information), provide the opportunity to understand current strengths and weaknesses, identify capability gaps and plot a course of action based on insights from high performers across a broad range of sectors. Thomas Brown Gary Horsfall Head of Insights Head of Consultancy The Chartered Institute Services of Marketing Canon Europe Adam Gillbe Simon Longhurst European PR Manager Senior Executive Canon Europe Canon Consultancy Services Advisory panel Niketa Mehta Marketing Manager Canon Europe Heena Patel Manager Canon Consultancy Services Marc Ranner B2B Marketing Communications Director Canon Europe Interviews with leaders: over 25 in-depth discussions with senior marketing, brand and communications practitioners Providing a strategic context to the study and creating industry based hypotheses Advisory panel workshop Quantitative benchmark survey, completed online by senior management at major international organisations Gathering data and evidence to put the science into the study Advisory panel workshop Key findings and case study development Analysis and development of findings and recommendations Advisory panel workshop Launch of findings and online benchmark tool Sharing insights and findings and the launch of our benchmarking tool We are particularly indebted to the following industry representatives, who helped shape this study with guidance and counsel throughout the research process: David Cook Former Director, Corporate Marketing 3M UK plc Damien Dunne EMEA Partner Marketing Director Cisco Brant Long Global Brand Director Jones Lang LaSalle Sydney Kimball General Manager, Global Convenience Retail & Lubricants Marketing Shell Barney Bailey Head of Brand, UK Retail Bank Barclays Bank plc Michael Dick Connections Planning and Media Director Coca-Cola Europe Zoe Harris Group Brand Manager RSA Group plc Stewart Pedler Global Head of Marketing and Creative Services Thomson Reuters 2 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 3

6 INTRODUCTION Research participants: in-depth interviews Research participants: quantitative survey Throughout April 2011, our project team spent time interviewing, in depth, a wide range of experienced marketing, communications and brand practitioners. Our thanks go to these individuals for their support and candid contributions at the formative stages of this initiative: To ensure commonality in the scale and complexity of participants, this study has been conducted amongst an intentionally broad range of organisations, to ensure a rich input to the research. Our benchmarking survey participants break down as follows: Wolfgang Breyer Head of Advertising and Sales Literature BMW Group AG Simon Daggett Vice President, Global Marketing Communications DHL Global Forwarding Vicki Davis Senior Marketing Manager Paramount Home Entertainment Sholto Douglas-Home Group Marketing Director Hays plc Heinz Eissenbeiss Director, Marketing, Industry Sector Siemens AG Sean Emmett Marketing and E-Commerce Director Jessops Dr Anne Filatotchev Marketing Director Aviva UK Life Ville Halonen Global Category Manager Metso Axel Heim Vice President, Marketing Communications, Siemens One Siemens AG Anna Heinsalmi Head of Marketing Etera Osmo Kammonen Senior Vice President, Corporate Communications Neste Oil Aki Koskinen Marketing Director Fortum Marc Lim Corporate Brand Strategy Manager BP Group plc Iris Mautz Senior Marketing Manager Niedermeyer Pascal Perrochon Business Insights & Planning Pernod Ricard Holly Porter Marketing Director Wincanton Ben Rhodes Head of Brand Communications Royal Mail Nicky Rogers Head of Marketing, UK AON Samantha Ross Director, Global Communications SITA Mark Russell Head of Communications Delivery Santander Jens Scharnagl Global Director, Customer Communication and Brand Management, Healthcare Sector Siemens AG Ari Seppänen Commercial Director Amiedu Erkka Suvikumpu Vice President, Support Services Finnair Airlines Ilro Wester Vice President, Brand & Marketing Itella Ana Maria Zumsteg Group Head of Marketing Planning and Metrics Zurich Industry sector Banking, financial services and insurance Technology, media, and telecoms Trade and retail Manufacturing, construction and engineering FMCG Professional services Marketing services Not-for-profit and public sector Travel, transport and logistics Energy, petrochem, mining and utilities Pharmaceuticals and healthcare Consumer packaged goods Hotels, leisure and entertainment Automotive Other 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 4 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 5

7 INTRODUCTION Research participants: quantitative survey Participants management level Scope of company operations 37.5% Director of function 12.5% Divisional or regional management board member 23.9% National 40.3% Department head 9.7% Group or global management board member 57.4% Global 18.7% Multinational Company revenues 30% Participants scope of role 23.9% Global 10.3% Group/central function 25% 20% 15% 20.6% Multinational 45.2% National 10% 5% 0% million million million 1-4 billion 5-9 billion billion over 20 billion 6 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 7

8 A global benchmarking study from The Chartered Institute of Marketing, in partnership with Canon Europe Executive summary Key insights within this report The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 9

9 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Executive summary Introduction This study has explored the views, frustrations, challenges and opportunities of over 140 organisations in seven countries. Our work began with the same questions facing many businesses: How can we get more out of our budget? How can we become more efficient as a function? How can we better identify, capture and share good practice and lessons learned? These questions spawned an investigation involving a combination of in-depth discussion interviews and a quantitative, online benchmark survey interrogating leaders across a variety of sectors. The results of this study, detailed in the following pages of this report, focus on three key priorities: Joining up campaigns across channels. Doing more with less getting more value from investments. Improving measurement and evaluation. In this executive summary, we briefly summarise the key insights and recommendations under each, and encourage you to delve further into this report to understand our learnings and recommendations in greater detail. The burning platform for change We began this study as businesses worldwide were still recovering from the impact of the economic downturn, the long term implications of which being a significant factor in the increasing focus on value for money, greater efficiency and enhanced effectiveness. As we write the closing chapters of this report, we remain in a period of uncertainty both within the Eurozone but also more widely across the Americas and Asia. Chief Executives and Chief Financial Officers continue to press for greater clarity on investment decisions, higher performance and a more efficient and agile marketing and communications function. The economic downturn was a significant factor in the increasing focus on value for money, greater efficiency and enhanced effectiveness. We ve seen strong interest in not only the outputs of this study, but also the questions we ve asked and the process we ve followed over its nine month journey. Marketing leaders across a range of industries and markets clearly recognise the challenges and pressures facing marketing, brand and creative investments and are actively looking for insights and evidence to help their functions improve. Of concern, however, is the backdrop of vulnerability facing a large majority of businesses: 50% of marketing leaders believe they have no support from senior management for initiatives to get more value from marketing assets or campaigns, or that it is inconsistent at best. 85% of businesses believe that their budgets for creative development, production and campaign management are facing the risk of cuts over the next 12 months. Joining up campaigns across channels 85% of marketing leaders see joining up campaigns across channels as a high priority, making it the number one issue from this study. Only one in five organisations achieve high levels of campaign integration. Less than 10% of businesses consistently measure the impact of different communication channels in a campaign. Whilst marketing leaders overwhelmingly recognise the impact of digital media on campaigns, and the importance of joining up activity across multiple channels, the majority of businesses are struggling to achieve this in practice. We believe this is compounded by a lack of insight from measurement, given so few organisations understand how different channels work together. Our recommendations for addressing this include: Invest in building core marketing capabilities standardising processes and budgeting in particular. Map the customer journey and analyse key communications touch points and their relative importance. Establish dynamic measurement to embrace not only traditional metrics but a broader portfolio of KPIs and listening approaches to help understand digital and social media. 10 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 11

10 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Executive summary Doing more with less getting more value from investments Only 25% of organisations have institutionalised the re-use and redeployment of assets. Less than a quarter of marketing leaders see sharing best practice as central to their culture. Only 25% of businesses score positively on their ability to measure investments in creative, marketing and brand assets. As we ve discussed, doing more with less is a widely recognised priority for marketing leaders but our study shows the barriers still facing marketers. Businesses often fail to make use of opportunities to re-use or adapt existing assets for new campaigns or markets, and overlook good ideas and practices from within the organisation. As a consequence, duplication and wastage can occur. Further compounding this, where organisations do make efforts to re-use past assets, a lack of measurement capability could result in the redeployment of underperforming creative. Our recommendations for addressing this include: Consolidate and get back to basics ensure you have a strong grasp of the current situation (what assets, where and what campaigns). Improve marketing asset management exploring tools such as digital asset management to help enable transparency and sharing. Integrate robust digital asset management with wider marketing resource management efforts, providing a total view of how, where and why marketing resources are marshalled. Evolve supplier sourcing exploring strategic options such as de-coupling and process outsourcing. Improving measurement and evaluation Only 15% of organisations consistently present marketing effectiveness metrics to executive management. Less than 10% of organisations have consistent collaboration between marketing and finance. Only 15% or businesses consistently ensure campaign ROI informs future planning. Measurement and evaluation is a long-standing challenge for marketing leaders, yet our study reveals some concerning weaknesses in leadership and finance engagement. If executive management isn t regularly discussing the impact of marketing investments and how campaign ROI has little impact on future planning, one can understand the lack of support and budget pressures mentioned earlier in this summary. In addition, the apparent lack of dialogue between marketing and finance to solve measurement challenges together creates a worrying picture. Our recommendations for addressing this include: Develop closed-loop marketing ensuring evaluation is hard-wired into campaign management. Become a listening organisation ensuring the marketing function, as well as colleagues in sales and service, build a deep understanding of performance across a range of metrics. Get the right portfolio of metrics exploring collaboration with finance to ensure alignment between KPIs in marketing and the wider business. Explore customer lifetime value understanding the longer term impacts of marketing investments on customer or segment value. From good to great Alongside the three key issues highlighted by leaders in this study, we also discuss four key priorities facing leaders to help them not only solve some of the challenges highlighted above, but take their function from good to great. These include: Agency relationships. Technology as an enabler. Managing across geographies. Building a collaborative, best practice culture. Within this report we discuss observations from our study and recommendations as how addressing each of these priorities can help drive greater impact. In closing Throughout this report, we provide a combination of evidence from our research, reflections on the barriers facing organisations; our recommendations for the medium and long-term change journey as well as practical, road-tested first steps to help marketers embark on a programme of change. We hope you find this report valuable and would welcome the opportunity to discuss this with you further. 12 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 13

11 A global benchmarking study from The Chartered Institute of Marketing, in partnership with Canon Europe Theme one Joining up campaigns across channels Theme 1 Theme 2 Theme 3 T The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 15

12 THEME ONE State of the nation 82% Viewpoint To what extent are businesses able to integrate campaigns across both traditional and online media and communications channels? 29.3% Campaigns are integrated throughout the business with few exceptions To what extent are businesses able to measure the relative impact of different communications channels in a campaign? 21.5% Frequently 16.5% High levels of integration with supporting planning structures and campaign management tools 11.6% Consistently 12% Very low ability 42.1% Some integration in pockets (ie within certain businesses or markets) 16.5% Never 50.4% Occasionally of research participants scored this issue of high importance, making it the number one priority for marketing, brand and creative leaders Joining up campaigns across channels escapes most businesses Fewer than one in five organisations achieve high levels of campaign integration with supporting planning structures and campaign management tools. How can you move towards greater campaign integration if you can t measure the impact of different channels? Just over 10% of organisations consistently measure the impact of different communications channels in a campaign The logic behind joining up campaign activity is widely accepted and the potential benefits of getting it right are broadly understood, both in terms of efficiency and effectiveness. Putting this into practice however, isn t that straightforward. The evolving digital landscape has redefined the communications challenge: customers are empowered by unparalleled access to information and real time communications whilst businesses are often left playing catch up, scrambling to reshape campaign management and get the right skills and agencies in place. Common challenges Visibility: marketers, especially those in central functions or regional theatres, often lack line of sight across the business. This opaqueness prevents a holistic view of channels and campaign implementation and relegates these marketers to a potentially frustrating existence with local markets and the chance only to have an impact in pockets. Structure: businesses are rarely organised through a customer lens, and marketing functions themselves are equally siloed. Truly customer-centric campaigns transcend marketing specialisms and often require implementation across different products, services and business units. Few businesses have the processes in place, or sufficiently empowered people, to navigate the internal complexity and power-bases required. Skills: the disruption (and indeed opportunity) presented by digital is forcing businesses to redefine the skills they need from both their agencies and their own marketing teams. Understanding how to articulate this and where to find it however, is a dilemma for many CMOs. Pace: traditional media is accompanied by planning and development cycles unsuited to digital media yet in truly integrated campaigns the two need to work in harmony. Developing and placing a TV advert typically carries an week cycle; developing content for YouTube or 140 characters for Twitter sits at the other end of the spectrum. Reshaping campaign management to handle both is the first challenge; resourcing appropriately for the level of dialogue which accompanies digital and the level of responsiveness it needs, is the second. Suitability: with a view to being efficient and saving costs, many businesses mistake repurposing for integration. Placing a printed brochure online as a PDF, or putting the latest TV advert on YouTube, doesn t necessarily constitute a joined up approach. Content designed for traditional media often needs adapting or even recreating for digital channels, but the ability to engage with a customer consistently across multiple channels can yield significant benefits. 16 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 17

13 High performers Characteristics of high performers 86% say plans are developed consistently or to a common schedule and process 77% have developed the flexibility to respond to changes to plan with little disruption 82% use technology positively to support management, governance and sharing of creative, brand and marketing assets 62% have developed strong marketing and campaign planning capabilities To understand the factors which contribute to high performance, we looked at high-scoring organisations and analysed the characteristics or investments which they had in common. For those businesses with strengths in integrating traditional and digital media and joining up campaigns across channels, the following factors stood out most: Strategic alignment. Planning. Flexibility. Transparency. Technology. Strategic alignment High performing organisations typically have strong alignment between business strategy and marketing strategy, or as one research participant referred to it starting on the right foot. Whilst synchronising planning and objectives across complex (and in many cases diverse) organisations is challenging, the potential value to the marketing function is positive: Aligning marketing strategy with business strategy can foster positive dialogue between business leaders and senior marketers, improving an often fraught relationship. Synchronising planning and creating the right rhythm between business strategy and marketing can increase the pace and therefore the efficiency of planning. Alignment often leads to more relevant metrics and greater accountability, which themselves can support securing marketing budgets and investment decisions. Planning Planning is a stand-out factor in enabling campaigns to be joined up across channels. From our analysis, high performing organisations invest in developing: Consistency of planning timing, schedules and processes. Flexibility More than three quarters of high performing organisations shared strength in their ability to respond to changes to plan without suffering significant stress or cost to the business. The ability to identify, interpret and respond to an ever-increasing variety of signals (both internal and external) is clearly an important characteristic of a marketing function. Consider some of the following sources and their potential impact on campaign management: Customer based metrics (ie satisfaction, complaints). Product/proposition performance (ie sales revenue). Competitor activities (ie new product launches). Changing macro environmental dynamics (ie currency movements). Transparency High performing organisations are progressive in breaking down silos and ensuring visibility of marketing and campaign plans across multiple brands, businesses or geographies. Ensuring transparency across an otherwise counter-intuitive marketing structure can be a powerful tool to help marketing leaders build efficiency and good practice across the function. This becomes particularly pertinent in the context of aligning activities across multiple channels and potentially products, services or lines of business. Technology High performing businesses use technology in ways beyond merely archiving past assets and content. For these businesses, technology becomes an enabling tool in efforts to integrate activities across channels. Are you using technology effectively to govern, manage and share creative, brand and marketing assets? Is there scope for consolidation of systems or greater automation of planning and measurement? Could technology help you to handle the pace of digital channels relative to traditional channels? Characteristics of high performers 57% have full visibility and transparency of plans and campaigns across the business, and a further 38% say it s good in pockets 82% have good or high visibility of asset deployment 76% have strong alignment between business strategy and marketing strategy 77% are proactive in reusing assets Marketing and campaign planning skills and capabilities. Responsiveness to change. Have you got the right process, planning rhythm, and timetable and is this applied consistently across the business? Have you got the right people and skills to manage this?

14 THEME ONE Recommendations Customer centric organisations think beyond joinedup marketing and focus on the customer experience. They recognise that a customer s experience of a brand is formed across a number of different touch-points and at key moments of truth during the customer lifecycle. Multi-channel marketing forms one part of the customer experience which needs to be led by the organisations vision for branded customer experience. Successful customer experience programmes coordinate across marketing, sales and service functions. Marketing leaders are focusing on the basic marketing capabilities as well as developing the core foundations to become more customer centric. Four recommendations follow. Invest in core marketing capabilities A core capability in developing joined-up marketing is to standardise and consolidate strategy and marketing planning in order to gain visibility across all channels. By breaking down silos across marketing functions (eg above-the-line, below-the-line, social media, cross-channel), organisations typically achieve the following benefits: Alignment of strategic priorities with marketing objectives across channel. Opportunity for consistent planning activities across brands/products/services. Line of sight to provide a consistent customer experience. Ability to tie strategy to tactics across campaigns and activities. Practical steps to invest in core marketing capabilities include: Standardising process and timings for marketing planning. Defining templates to ensure consistent planning. Centralise reviews and alignment of marketing plans. Successful customer experience programmes coordinate across marketing, sales and service functions. Map customer journeys The first stage in developing multi-channel customer experience is to map how customers currently navigate across multiple customer touch-points referred to as a customer journey. This approach identifies the key moments of truth, a point at which the organisation can strengthen or damage customer s experience of the brand. Core actions to map customer journeys include: Identifying which customer journeys to map in order to make the greatest impact, using analysis such as transaction volumes and complaints data. Interviewing front-line staff to understand processes from the customer s perspective. Use workshops to map the multi-channel customer journeys working with sales, service and product groups. More advanced organisations invest in voice of the customer programmes. They listen to customers using traditional feedback mechanisms (eg transaction volumes and customer satisfaction data) as well as listening to social media. This understanding enables organisations to differentiate the customer experience by channel. Optimise the customer experience Customer centric organisations think beyond multi-channel marketing enablement (ie the need to provide all things in all channels) and focus on customer needs. By definition, these organisations think about delivering personalisation: the right message, to the right customer, through the right channel at the right time. Key questions when defining their multi-channel experience include: How do customers interact with our partners or intermediaries across the customer lifecycle? What are the key moments of truth in the customer journey? How can we deliver the greatest value at these touch-points? Which activities have the greatest return? Using the current customer experience as a baseline, organisations can then: Map the future customer experience and identify key treatments. Prioritise treatments by customer and business value. Define a roadmap of activities across marketing, sales and service. 20 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 21

15 THEME ONE Recommendations An industry perspective Marketing decisions should be driven by customer insight and analysis of what is cost effective by channel. Leaders typically begin this journey by prioritising investments to optimise one channel, they then assess the impact to design future treatments based on learnings. Integrate customer experience with analytics Customer-centric organisations combine voice of the customer data with insight to develop treatments. This insight enables organisations to differentiate customer experience based on value over the lifecycle allowing them to drive loyalty over time. More progressive organisations use real-time customer behaviour and propensity modelling to develop predictive analysis. This identifies individual customer treatments and personalised marketing offers. Typically: Tracking individual responses and refreshing offers/communications based on customer behaviour. Employing solutions which are based on up-take of personalised offers and messaging. Notably, this is founded on access to customer data and deep analytics. Customer-centric organisations combine voice of the customer data with insight to develop treatments. Nick Hughes Global Head of Marketing and Communications Knight Frank The old saying that just because you can, doesn t mean you should is particularly apposite at this point in the evolution of marketing communications. I am bombarded by organisations offering marketing products, services and solutions that apparently, without purchase, will lead to our brand withering on the vine. Twas ever thus of course, although the sales patter from those foolish enough to get through to me invariably revolves around how essential their product/service is within the mix and without it, apparently, our campaigns will be incoherent and disjointed. Of course it is the opposite that is true: creating and rolling out truly joined-up campaigns is contingent upon clarity and relevance, not employing mass channels where the single proposition risks being distorted and off-message. For Knight Frank, choice and range of channel is determined by relevance to our audiences and our brand values. We must also ensure that clarity of message can be established within chosen channels. All a bit obvious? Perhaps, but in this day and age where the menu runs to several pages and the description of the dishes is seemingly interminable, the diligence process is half the art and most of the result: you don t want to miss out on that part of the mix that may deliver ROI to the max but neither can you be spread gossamer thin. Business school professors up and down the land espouse the value of first mover advantage but when it comes to new marketing communications channels it is quite often the second mouse that gets the cheese. We have seen several organisations amongst our competitor set herald innovation within their campaigns seemingly without relevance to their offering; often it is their failures that highlight the opportunities. So the challenge for marketing and communications teams everywhere is to resist the urge to be neophiliacs: do your diligence, go to school on others and stick to your values. In doing so, you give yourself every chance of delivering coherent campaigns across multiple channels. Nick Hughes Global Head of Marketing and Communications Knight Frank 22 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 23

16 PRIOR A global benchmarking study from The Chartered Institute of Marketing, in partnership with Canon Europe Theme two Doing more with less getting more value from investments PRIO Theme 1 Theme 2 Theme 3 Theme 1 Theme 2 Theme 3 T The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 25

17 THEME TWO State of the nation How would you rate your organisation s ability to measure investments in creative, brand and marketing assets? 3/4 How does your organisation approach initiatives to identify, capture and share good/best practice? 50% 40% 30% of research participants scored this issue with high importance, making it the number two priority for marketing, brand and creative leaders 14.9% Institutionalised across business 5.8% Central to culture 4.1% Does not occur 67.8% Occurs in pockets 7.4% Occurs at leadership level only Is a lack of learning from successes and mistakes holding up your progress? Less than 25% of organisations institutionalise the sharing of good/ best practice or see it as central to their culture. 20% 10% How would you describe the ability of your organisation to reuse or recycle past creative, brand and marketing assets? 0% Low capability High capability Is a weak measurement capability a barrier to unlocking value? Only 25% of organisations score positively on their ability to measure investments in creative, brand and marketing assets. 26.8% Culture and working practices support reuse of assets 16.3% No visibility of assets 56.9% Assets referenced when developing new creative Is limited reuse and redeployment of assets preventing you from doing more with less? Little more than ¼ of organisations say their culture and working practices support the reuse of assets. 26 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 27

18 THEME TWO Viewpoint An industry perspective Efficiency and the concept of doing more with less has formed at the heart of this research study from the outset. The combination of internal budget pressures, intersecting with a proliferation of channels and accompanying resource demands, puts a significant pressure on marketing, brand and creative practitioners. Consider the following, common questions: How can we sweat the assets and get more from that which we ve already developed? Can we get slicker in our processes to reduce the time and cost of development? How can we better share good practice and avoid repeating errors? Can we identify synergies in activity across the business? Common challenges Briefing: unstructured, informal or inaccurate briefing can add both cost and delay to creative development, production and campaign implementation. According to our research, only one in five organisations follow structured and consistent briefing with standardised templates, processes and review cycles meaning four out of five businesses still have room for improvement. Inconsistency: identifying assets, campaigns and practices which work well and are repeatable, scalable or transferable is difficult to achieve if there s no commonality in the processes followed by different teams. Our research revealed that fewer than 15% of organisations have consistent planning processes and timing, with the supporting standardised frameworks and templates. Manual processes: according to our research, less than 25% of organisations employ end-toend workflow management processes which are used consistently by all relevant parties, meaning three quarters of businesses rely on limited and disjointed manual processes and risk a lack of discipline and inconsistencies in their creative development, production and campaign management activities. Visibility: in this study, less than 10% of businesses have high levels of visibility (and supporting governance) of where and when creative, brand and marketing assets are used. In addition, a surprising 20% of businesses don t benchmark creative development or creative production costs, and only an average of 10% of businesses excel at measuring either. Culture: for many businesses cultural challenges can inhibit the creative process. To maximise investments in marketing, brand and creative assets, organisations must rely on a culture of openness, collaboration, trust and sharing. Two thirds of organisations in our research acknowledged room for improvement in their approach to sharing and collaborating to improve performance. Damien Dunne EMEA Partner Marketing Director Cisco Sharing ideas, experiences and marketing assets across geographies can make you more efficient, improve brand consistency, improve campaign effectiveness and reduce the cost of creation. In reality, many companies don t walk the walk. Common barriers to progress include: Creative is the fun bit Everyone likes to be involved in creative. It s the fun bit. The concepts, the designs, the big ideas we all have opinions on what good looks like and we like to get our hands on the building of a campaign, as well as its execution. When companies take more ownership of this from the centre of a regional hub, you often find resistance when it s taken to the markets, something known as not made here syndrome. Quite often, particularly in a global business, this manifests itself as the localisation argument it ll never work here, we re too different. Knowing what you don t know Big companies have a lot going on. I ve seen in many companies that the barrier to managing assets across geographies appears to be internal resistance, but more often than not it s about awareness. Finding real-time, practical ways to make sure people across multiple markets know what they have access to; what s coming from the centre; what s going on in other markets; and what s been done before that could be reused or recycled, is key. Practicalities of localisation Centrally created campaigns frequently need some form of adaptation for local execution. Collateral for North America won t necessarily work in Northern Italy or in Russia for instance. Translation is an obvious requirement but it can also extend to the use of imagery, tone, and other subtleties. What many companies overlook is the resource implications of this the cost of adaptation is one issue which many budgets may overlook, but time is another. To co-ordinate a campaign to go live at the same time across a region or globally means that a lag factor needs to be built in the time it takes to translate, localise and test content before implementation. This can often be missed which leaves the campaign being rushed out before ready, or a campaign launching out of sync in some markets. In an increasingly global world, pan-company campaigns can have a greater impact. And in an increasingly prudent world, we have to recognise that it s not always economical to allow campaigns and creative to be completely devolved to local markets. Damien Dunne EMEA Partner Marketing Director Cisco 28 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 29

19 High performers Characteristics of high performers Those organisations performing highly in their auditability of assets and decisions 64% apply strong governance of creative, brand and marketing assets and processes 78% have advanced approval and sign off processes 81% ensure high levels of adoption of approval and sign off processes 89% use technology positively to support management, governance and sharing of creative, brand and marketing assets To understand the factors which contribute to high performance, we looked at high-scoring organisations and analysed the characteristics or investments which they had in common. For those businesses with strengths in getting more value from their investments in marketing, brand and creative assets, the following factors stood out most: Auditability. Re-use of assets. Consistency and transparency. Best practice and collaboration. Auditability Getting more value from investments is contingent on understanding how and why investment is currently allocated, where assets are deployed and campaign performance. For high performing businesses, strong governance and auditability lie at the heart of doing more with less. As the findings on the sidebar (see left) show, organisations with strong auditability share the following characteristics: Strong governance of asset development, production and deployment. Approval and sign off processes with high levels of sophistication and adoption. Positive use of technology to support asset management, governance and sharing. Re-use of assets Sweating the assets is a common call across industry sectors. For high performing businesses, before arbitrarily cutting budgets, making better use of marketing, brand and creative assets already in existence is a key opportunity to reduce costs, without necessarily having to reduce campaign activity or effectiveness. Consider the following opportunities: Can image assets be shared across geographic markets? For example, generic photography could be redeployed. Could past campaign artwork or creative be repurposed? Replacing copy of previous collateral and reusing, perhaps for different products or customers, could reduce creative development costs and also potentially offer an upside in that creative consistency could have a positive reinforcing effect on brand recognition or recall. Can creative or collateral be extended across geographic markets with only limited adaptation or translation? For some organisations, centralising key campaigns or mandating the use of certain assets has been used as a lever to reduce costs and improve consistency. How do high performing businesses improve reuse and recycling of assets? Consistency: 85% say plans are developed consistently or to a common schedule and process. Technology: 85% use technology positively to support management, governance and sharing of creative, brand and marketing assets. Culture: 75% cultivate a culture where marketers are open to sharing good ideas and practices. Collaboration: 81% say their marketers work collaboratively and openly with colleagues from other business functions. Consistency and transparency Identifying synergies and consolidation opportunities across a complex business is the key to consistency of campaign management and visibility of plans across businesses and borders. For high performing businesses, as the findings on the sidebar (see right) show, organisations that have established visibility and transparency across the business share the following characteristics: Consistency in planning. Consistent and structured briefing processes for agencies. Proactive use of technology as an enabling tool. A culture where mistakes are OK. Best practice and collaboration Do your leaders and your practices support a culture of trust, openness and transparency amongst your marketing population? Are you overseeing a function or fostering a community? The ability to identify, capture and share good practice is a key lever in the ability to get more from investments in marketing, brand and creative assets. High performing businesses share the following characteristics: They invest in approaches to sharing and collaborating to improve performance. They build capability in measuring investments in creative, brand and marketing assets. They ensure strong levels of support from senior management for initiatives to unlock the value of creative. They ensure high visibility of where and when creative, brand and marketing assets are used. In addition, of those businesses which have successfully institutionalised best practice into working practices, or hard wired it into their culture, two thirds see a low or very low chance of reduction in budgets, suggesting that this could be a powerful tool for doing more with less. Characteristics of high performers Those organisations which have full visibility and transparency of marketing and campaign plans across the business 92% say plans are developed consistently or to a common schedule and process 72% have comprehensive or structured, consistent briefing processes for agencies 72% use technology positively to support management, governance and sharing of creative, brand and marketing assets 68% cultivate a culture where marketers are open to sharing mistakes and lessons learned

20 THEME TWO Recommendations Doing more with less is more than a tactical response to cutting costs. Marketing leaders invest in operations, based on a clear vision and strategy aligned to business priorities. They develop capabilities to support the future of the business, collaborate with their peers in finance to define the right metrics and use insights from measuring the The journey to achieving marketing effectiveness is often years for large multinationals. Common hallmarks of successful marketing initiatives include: executive sponsorship, stakeholder alignment and phased implementation. Sustaining this journey is often a challenge in a world where average Chief Marketing Officer tenure can be so short. return on investment to inform future strategy and planning. Marketing optimisation journey The marketing optimisation journey can be outlined in four steps from consolidation to evolution. Consolidation Foundation Integration Evolution Consolidation and getting back to basics Standardised and consolidated strategy and planning functions are central to driving marketing effectiveness. Practical approaches include: Top-down marketing planning to provide marketing leaders visibility of campaign plans in order to steer activities. Bottom-up planning to inform executive thinking based on previous marketing outcomes and their experience of delivery. Standardise marketing briefs in supporting multi-channel marketing which clearly outline objectives, the customer experience and metrics to minimise the cost of re-work. Lay the foundations By getting the basics right, marketing leaders are able to use digital asset management to improve efficiency. The typical benefits include: Access to real-time spend in order to track and address disparities within campaign budgets. Visibility of campaign start dates and availability of materials to avoid unnecessary duplication and cost. Simplified re-planning programmes allowing users to modify plans supported by an audit trail, instead of the manual processes. A shift in mindset: re-use and re-purpose Benefits Reduced risk of non-compliance Reduced maintenance of legacy system Maturity Better marketing decision-making result of enhanced marketing intelligence Clearer visibility of project and marketing campaign performance Less time spent managing project operations (interactions with agencies) Less time spent managing and searching for digital assets More effective campaign as a result of better understanding the drivers of customer behaviour Creating the right content at the right time can be an intensifying challenge in marketing. A broadly accepted principle to increase pace, drive efficiency and reduce cost is to re-use and re-purpose content. Create once, use many This is one approach whereby marketing leaders are reviewing creative concepts, artwork and messaging at the start of the creative process and are constantly leveraging content rather than creating it. This approach is most successful when mandated by marketing leadership. Asset lifecycle management Another approach to drive efficiency is to develop content to support the marketing lifecycle of a product/service, whereby campaigns are classified into a number of pre-defined categories. For example a high-priority campaign would have an extensive set of multi-channel assets ranging from a television commercial to four-page brochure. This approach provides foresight when negotiating fees for digital rights. 32 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 33

21 THEME TWO Recommendations The following investments are a starting point in order to capitalise on the benefits of implementing digital asset management: Optimise marketing processes to establish a common framework and accountability whilst minimising the cost of re-work. Define categories to optimise the search of digital assets promoting re-use and increasing cost savings. Implement collaboration tools in order to breakdown siloes across marketing functions to drive consistency and shorten lead time. Implement workflow to provide transparent audit trails for regulatory, legal and brand compliance (eg Sarbanes Oxley). Whilst the optimisation of marketing process has a clear impact on the cost and pace of creative development, the benefits achieved also impact the entire marketing landscape. This frees up resources, whilst enabling the marketing function to become more agile and provide the ability to speed up response to market conditions. An example of this includes being able to respond to a competitors campaign within hours of a launch. Integrate with broader resource management Marketing leaders use resource management to connect all elements of strategy, planning, creative development, production and management. This provides: Access to real-time performance and status of marketing activities. Centralised repository of assets and supporting tools enabling brand consistency and re-use. A collaboration platform with agencies enabling real-time review and document status. Automation of lead management to close the loop between marketing and sales. Core people, process and technology enablers are required to support the implementation of marketing resource management. Practical steps include: Carrying out a quick audit to understand the current approach. Identification and capture of business and functional requirements. Vendor selection based on functional and technical specifications. A change management strategy and communications plan to ensure buy-in. Evolve strategic sourcing Sourcing is an enabler in optimising cost. Whilst most marketers routinely evaluate suppliers, benchmark costs and negotiate rate cards, market leaders maximise efficiencies by incorporating the following value drivers in their marketing procurement: Make strategic decisions on agency models, including in-house, hybrid and full-out-sourcing and number of agency partners. De-couple creative concepts from production allowing strategic agency to develop concepts and using low-cost agency networks to manage production. Incorporate effectiveness measures in contract negotiations such as payment by results. Invest in collaborative process improvement with suppliers (eg global process, local execution). Pre-plan re-occurring content to get the optimal cost efficiencies on production. Create-on-demand using pre-defined templates to tactically create content. Produce-on-demand producing materials as needed (ie particularly when producing collateral with shorter shelf life). This frees up resources, whilst enabling the marketing function to become more agile and provide the ability to speed up response to market conditions. 34 A global benchmarking study The Chartered Institute of Marketing in partnership with Canon Europe 35