Be agile, or be out...

Today, two years after having written an eBook about the 2017 perspectives on marketing (read here), and despite all technological advances, I still see a few organizations using some of those advanced marketing techniques in a broader perspective. Especially when we are talking about medium and small businesses.

Agile marketing, one of the six highlighted hot topics in that summary, is becoming more than a “philosophic” concept, a requirement in my opinion nowadays. And the reason for this is simple: be agile in your market, or you’re out. Never have consumers had so many options, and more importantly, never have we had so much information to allow us to formulate our buying decisions.

Agile is a software methodology that many business articles have been describing and conceptualizing, especially throughout 2018. It is important to remark that agile does not necessarily mean velocity or establishing a frenetic execution motion. For me, a simple definition about agile marketing is to have a multifunctional and orchestrated team working to guarantee that all marketing functions (and silos) operate in line in different activities to target key stakeholders based on a solid and synced narrative using all marketing tactics in successive measured iterations.

Many elements reinforce how important it is to orient your mind based on all agile aspects. First and the most important, the old method to “develop-present-approve-execute” marketing plans is completely dead – this iteration is far away from our contemporary reality, isn’t it? When you think about your next great idea, probably by just “googling” you will find some similar items on the web. No idea or offering is purely new today. Second and equally important, the key difference today for many companies is that they rely on their capacity to execute and introduce ideas in a fast pace in the real world. That is a key element today – and naturally it is not at all related only to marketing. Many companies now have their own agile teams for R&D, production, etc., etc.

On top of these aspects, it’s simple to conclude that all processes around innovation and solving complex problems could be improved by adopting this new agile perspective.

Agile marketing: more than a methodology associated to velocity, it must be considered a state of mind.

Agile marketing, more than introducing a new dynamic when you are launching marketing campaigns, programs, products and new content, will guarantee that your company builds and tells a story in the same pace in which consumers shape their buying decisions. Even in the context of corporate sales, the old buying processes that dragged for months or even years no longer exist, the market dynamics do not allow this. And I'm talking about the decision-making process. Just ask yourself: who will be waiting to face a new security flaw to decide to invest in new security capabilities?

Many technological architectures for the different marketing disciplines have advanced and are now accessible for all types and sizes of company. What is lacking in my opinion is a pragmatic approach to execute and implement ideas (campaigns, programs, implement tools/techniques, etc.).

You can introduce many marketing initiatives, programs and technologies, but without pragmatic and disciplinary approach that comes with this agile mind set, you will keep running behind the tail and will get stuck and be out of the game. Now, out in the near future…

No complaints, agile yourself…

In the next weekly post, I will be talking about my view around ABM (Account-Based Marketing).

See you then…

#marketing2019 #marketingtrends #allaroundmarketing #agile #agilemarketing