Building a marketing effectiveness culture in an organisation is not something that will happen overnight. From setting the direction and securing buy-in to implementing changes and putting everything into action, it all takes time.
TSB’s marketing performance and planning manager, Owain Jevons, describes it as a “journey”.
The bank is currently in the process of shifting its view of effectiveness to “look at the next three years, not just the next one”, he said, speaking on a panel at Kantar’s recent Ignite event.
TSB is also now “looking more intently” at the role of customer advocacy and CRM as a means of driving ROI alongside media implementation.
Jevons admitted TSB had been “behind” the curve when it comes to implementing an effectiveness culture, referring to Kantar’s marketing
effectiveness maturity curve, which is split into three stages, with the first being “establish”, the second “develop” and the third “realise”.
He said TSB currently sits somewhere between the first and second stages, but predicted this year will see “transformative” progress for the brand in building its effectiveness culture.
Virgin Media O2’s head of planning, insights and effectiveness, Ruth Pignal-Jacquard, said the business was further along on its journey, putting its progress somewhere between the develop and realise stages.
She said Virgin Media O2 has made real progress and its effectiveness culture is now “very strong” in in the marketing team. But the organisation is now looking to establish the same culture in other commercial teams. Aligning the whole organisation, particularly finance, around long-term effectiveness goals is “an ongoing process” of education rather than a one-time conversation, she stated, partly as different stakeholders within the organisation will be at “different stages” of understanding. “Effectiveness means different things to different teams,” she added. For the finance team within Virgin Media O2, effectiveness can mean efficiency and a focus on ROI, for example. With the easiest way to improve ROI being to cut media spend, marketing must look to build “confidence” in longer-term measures, she suggested
