InsightIQ Blog

"Marketing" versus "Engagement"

Jul 1 2010

One of the things that struck me most at the recent Unica MIS conference was how far some of the participating organizations have gone to create a progressive and expansive approach to marketing. They have consciously and deliberately invested in strategies, analytics, processes and technology that move them away from broad-based outbound marketing to a more real-time and interactive mode of customer engagement. That contrast between “marketing” and “engagement” came across very clearly to me and I believe is something that all organizations should be thinking about.

Marketing at many companies still plays its traditional role of bringing a company’s products to market, creating the necessary bridge from “factory” (whatever form it takes) to customer, using awareness and brand building as the primary tools to encourage customers to buy. However more progressive companies are realizing that while every customer interaction is (and must) represent a value exchange, that does not mean that every interaction is necessarily a sales opportunity. The difference is the essence of “engagement” – maintaining a multi-channel, ongoing and two-way dialogue which may lead to a purchase or may simply re-enforce perception of your company’s ability to understand and fulfill customer needs by providing excellent service or answering a question promptly and efficiently.

I can hear the skeptics out there saying that engagement is all well and good, but it won’t keep the lights on. That may be true in the short-term (which is why there is so much short-term’ism in marketing planning) but there are companies out there that are already realizing the benefits of even modest changes in how they go to market. For example being able to present truly relevant and timely offers to a customer who is browsing online, has already been shown to deliver large incremental gains. However to be able to do that you need to invest in your strategies, analytics, processes and technology. My prediction is that companies who use those ingredients to shift from “marketing” to “engagement” as I have described it above are the ones who will thrive as our economy turns around and customer confidence increases.

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Niall Budds
Director, Client Management

Niall Budds is Client Manager for Quaero, a CSG Solution. In his role, he focuses on building and maintaining executive-level relationships with his clients, and helping them shift from traditional campaign-drive marketing to cross-channel…