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Gold Nugget Advice from Leading Technology Marketers

Takeaways from 6P Marketing’s trip to CES 2018 in Las Vegas

While most of the 180,000 visitors that descended upon this year’s International Consumer Electronics Show were focused on the exhibition trade floors, – our team from 6P Marketing team was focused on the two days of seminars hosted by world-class authorities in marketing and technology.

Here are six key takeaways that really rang our bells and have stayed with us as we continue our work helping clients in the Technology sector move their business forward:

  1. The ‘most assisting brands’ will win – insight from Google’s President for the Americas
  2. Much of the buying process has occurred before customers ever meet you – insight from head of marketing for Hyundai USA
  3. Digital marketing is only part of the answer – stats reveal that non-digital advertising and marketing still account for more than half of the global advertising spend
  4. Spock is not your customer – Wisdom from Intel (people who know something about marketing tech)
  5. Online advertising is a three-legged stool – Super-hot digital property follows age-old advertising equation
  6. Consumers are fans to their passion, NOT your brand – Stop talking about customers being your brand ambassadors – it likely won’t work

The first three of our six takeaways are expanded on below and we’ll explore the rest in a future article.

1.) The ‘most assisting brands’ will win – insight from Google’s President for the Americas

The central idea here is that the most effective communications, marketing materials and tactics actually help buyers get to where they want to go. The days of advertising trickery and manipulation are behind us. A mark of quality marketing is that it sincerely helps the buyer in the vendor selection, service or product acquisition process.

Offer your assistance and share your expertise in such a way that actually helps a buyer make the purchase that truly fulfills their need – this will make your brand more appealing, credible and ultimately lead to your product getting purchased more frequently by people who will act as ambassadors for your brand.

2.) Much of the buying process has occurred before customers ever meet you – insight from head of marketing for Hyundai USA

Given the move towards self-driving vehicles and ever-increasing car tech, the line between technology companies and car companies is almost gone. It’s time to look at global vehicle leaders as tech leaders.

Hyundai’s recent research has shown that a few years ago, the average vehicle buyer would visit 5 dealerships before making a purchase decision. However in 2017 they saw that number reduced to only 2 dealerships. Our takeaway is not that people are viewing the purchase as any less risky or that they’re doing any less research before buying – on the contrary, buyers are conducting far more research, before they ever step onto a car lot.

If the in-person shopping experience has been reduced from 5 to 2, this is a 60% reduction. Taking a few liberties in extrapolation, this suggests that 60% of the shopping is now taking place behind the curtain, before customers ever speak to salesperson or representative from your company.

This puts an emphasis on just how important it is to have brand awareness and a strong, easily researchable online presence – enabling your potential buyer to include you in their selection process before they ever meet you or anyone from your organization. Are your competitors outperforming you in the pre-visit and pre-call marketing game?

3.) Digital marketing is only part of the answer – stats revealing that digital advertising still only accounts for 40-45% of the global advertising spend in the USA and globally

Of course, digital marketing is an excellent opportunity and can help many organizations reach their audience in an unprecedented and cost-effective manner. BUT it is only part of the marketing picture. The fact that both the global and USA spend on online advertising is less than 50% of the total reinforces the idea that digital is not the exclusive answer.

Ultimately, successful marketing is about developing awareness, credibility and relevance with a buyer – enabling them to reach the conclusion that you are their best choice of provider for whatever goods or service they need to purchase. Much of it mirrors the creation of relationship.

So don’t depend 100% on digital communications in order to establish this relationship – good old-fashioned signage, billboards, printed handouts, direct mail, samples and in-person interactions still have a role to play. Be sure to leverage the best of both worlds.

By Brent Smith, Brand Developer & Marketing Strategist

 

We’ll expand on takeaways four, five and six in a future article. Stay tuned.

NOTE: our six nuggets came about as a result of having listened to some global leaders but they’re our own interpretation of what we heard and our own implications. We don’t want to attribute anything in this article as being a direct quote for concern of misrepresenting a speaker but we do offer our thanks to what we learned from the following speakers / leaders:

Google: Allan C. Thygesen, President, Americas
Hyundai Motor America: Dean Evans, Chief Marketing Officer
Dotdash: Neil Vogel, CEO
Intel: Teresa Herd, VP Global Creative Director
Mastercard: Raja Rajamannar, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer and President, Healthcare