Marketers on the Road as Role Becomes Increasingly Important

Changes in technology and the way companies operate will make marketers more important over the next ten years.

WPP chief executive Sir Martin Sorrell believes that during the coming decade, factors like people spending more time online will result in marketing playing a more crucial role within a business.

“We see significant over-capacity in virtually every industry we work in,” Sorrell said, adding “If there is too much stuff that means that marketing becomes even more important.”

Marketing has always been an integral part of a company because with successful marketing the right audience is reached, conversions are made and revenue is boosted. But it seems the changing nature of technology, fueled by the rise in smartphones and tablet devices that leads to people increasingly communicating and shopping over the internet, means the role of effective marketing is all the more vital.

In terms of consumers’ time, 32% is spent online including accessing mobile content, Sorrell tells Marketing Week. However, international digital budgets are only about the 17% mark for 2011, and “too much is spent on newspapers”.

Data insight is vitally important to ensure a company remains competitive and agile, which is why Awardaroo provides this service to SMEs. Over time, this need for data will increase yet further as audiences shift more and more of their time to online – which means real-time analytics will be a necessity rather than a luxury, allowing businesses to market accurately and relevantly to customers.

Consumer insight leads to operational responsiveness which, in turn, lets a company adapt to changes in the market and target their audience with information they want to receive – thereby increasing profits and reducing waste.