Cell Life

HBR Article review “Advertising Analytics 2.0″

(excerpted from Harvard Business Review article on Advertising Analytics dated March 2012)

HBR has an interesting article on Analytics 2.0 which is driving advertisers and brands to fine-tune their effort allocations to the various media mix. Presented below is the crux of the article by the author Wes Nichols, CEO of MarketShare, an Analytics firm in LA, USA.

Until now, the advertisers are measuring ROI using swim lane tactics, which means that media spend on one channel is measured for ROI independently – it has to do with revenue attribution due to direct impact of that media channel advertising. In reality, the media is more complex, the various media have impact on each other which causes complex mixed media effect on consumer purchase decisions. Eg a TV spot on a Toyota Camry car may lead a user to dish out her smartphone to google search the Camry. The Google search shows a sponsored ad by a nearby Toyota dealer as well as it may lead the user to a sponsored YouTube video ad which plays the motion picture of the car ad. The user is thinking about Camry but purchase decision is still forthcoming. Later when the same person is driving down the highway, she notices the billboard advertising the Camry.  She remembers the sponsored dealer ad and decides to drive by that dealer. This concludes in a purchase decision to buy the Camry.

In the above scenario, each media channel has an impact on each other and it is hard to attribute revenue to one or more media channels directly. As a result, firms do not know how much to spend on various media channels and how these channels cross-impact each other.

Such analysis of one data campaign revealed that swim-lane measurement grossly underestimated the revenues attributable to social-media marketing and display advertising while overestimating PR and paid-search revenue. For firms like Ford, which have a $1 billion advertising budget each year, such analysis is crucial to derive maximum bang for the advertising dollars.

Statistical models that reveal the effect of advertising on consumer behavior and business results must account for hundreds of variables related to market conditions, marketing actions, and competitive activities. A software analytics engine uses those models to attribute each variable’s effect accurately, to optimize the marketing mix, and to guide spending allocation. Data on consumer response and business outcomes feed back into the engine, allowing marketers to fine-tune their cross-media spending in real time.

Analytics 2.0 requires that advertisers assign an elasticity factor between each impacting media – eg Paid search will have an elasticity factor due to TV ad spot and also from other media channels. So each media format is assigned an elasticity factor from every other factor that is likely to impact it, this is referred to as Assist factor. Such factors can include non-media factors like weather, competitive advertising, unemployment rates and like. This leads to a complex cross-dependency scenario across a wide gamut of factors. From here, the advertiser has to assign revenue attribution to each media factor followed by optimization and finally budget allocation. Optimization involves war gaming various scenarios across the factors in question to arrive at optimum marketing conclusions. Finally, this leads to re-balancing budget allocation to achieve the maximum efficiency marketing scenarios.

Factors -> Attribution -> Optimization -> Allocation-> Consumer Response -> Business Outcomes  …….. -> Attribution again

The Business Outcomes influence the Attribution in real time so it is a constant feedback loop.

HBR gives the case study of Electronic Arts (EA) which used the above cycle of Attribution, Optimization and Allocation to increase it’s ad spend efficiency dramatically for the launch of it’s new Battlefield 3 online game. It seems that EA was placing heavy emphasis on TV spot ads for its game launches but these were having only a marginal impact on the success of games sales. An Analytics study led EA to shift advertising dollars to online and paid search, and the game launch revenues improved remarkably for EA.

For the full HBR arcticle, click here.

Add comment May 20th, 2013

The Internet – still an Equalizer ?

Today there is a post in the Wall Street Journal as to how the websites are tracking all user activities, right from location, personal profile, profession, hobbies, likes and dislikes.

Today’s internet is perhaps “too open”, where users information is freely available to retailers, analysts, marketers alike. While this may serve the purpose of “personalizing” offers and deals to consumers, it risks being labeled discriminatory if such information is used to offer different product pricing or search results to consumers. Not to mention the bigger risk of spammers and ID thieves catching hold of such information and launching malicious campaigns against consumers.

A WSJ investigation found that the office products retailer Staples is offering different prices on the same stapler to two different consumers who were just a few miles away.

Retailers are justified in offering different prices to different customers – this is what happens in stores too especially in different stores of the same chain. Retailers argue that local operating costs, real estate pricing, manpower costs and other logistics etc influence local pricing. In that sense, the online differential in pricing is no different than it’s offline cousin.

“But the idea of an unbiased, impersonal Internet is fast giving way to an online world that, in reality, is increasingly tailored and targeted. Websites are adopting techniques to glean information about visitors to their sites, in real time, and then deliver different versions of the Web to different people. Prices change, products get swapped out, wording is modified, and there is little way for the typical website user to spot it when it happens”, says the Journal.

WSJ said that many firms resorted to such price tactics, including Discover Financial, Rosetta Stone, Home Depot etc. Office Depot told WSJ team that they use customers browsing history and geolocation to offer tailored product offers and pricing for online shopping.

Technically, this is all legal, but the boundary line to ethical or discriminatory behaviour is not far. Eg certain racial groups may claim discrimination or local governments may cry foul. It seems that 76% of Americans are opposed to this kind of differential pricing.

But there are advantages too for differential pricing. Eg certain services like movie theatres offer senior citizen and student discounts.

The key takeaways are :

• the fundamental premise of internet being an unbiased and same-for-all internet is bring eroded now as personalization increases and website behave differently for different people. The INTERNET IS NO LONGER AN EQUALIZER.
• while differential pricing is normal and legal, it can raise ethical and discriminatory haggles across sections of the society. So retailers need to tread carefully.

What is CellStrat view : Retailers and web commerce firms need to abide by laws and be careful in offering personalized offers and pricing. Tailoring offers based on user information or their location has to be considered in view of the prevailing laws and user acceptance. Otherwise, the online commerce firms risk alienating the consumers who took to the internet to find an equal society, in the first place.

(Excerpted from WSJ article titled “Websites Vary Prices, Deals, Based on Users’ Information” dated 23 Dec 2012)

December 24th, 2012

Map wars

Since the launch of Apple iOS 6, one is seeing major activity in the world of Digital Maps. Both Apple and Google have been duking it out recently on this front. Before the iOS 6 was released, Google Maps was the default map application installed on the iPhones. But map application in recent times has become perhaps the most popular mobile app and hence substantial customer engagement and media sales get initiated with the map experience. The primary fruits of iPhone mapping app were being enjoyed by Google, until iOS 6 came along. With iOS 6 and iPhone 5, Apple decided to take the Map app internal and worked on Apple Maps for this version of iOS, thereby dropping Google Maps as the default Map app on the new iPhone.

In it’s haste to release the Map App along with iOS 6 launch, Apple mapping team seemed to compromise on reliability and accuracy in Apple Maps. The error proved deadly, as the Apple Maps app was widely criticized after iOS 6 was launched, being that rest of the iOS 6 as well as iPhone 5 was much appreciated. Apple Map Apps shows incorrect placement of landmarks and is frustrating mobile users around the world who rely on smartphone maps to guide them around cities.

This resulted in Tim Cook of Apple issuing an apology to Apple customers. Google, with a guilty pleasure, enjoyed the Apple Map criticism. Google has since announced that they are working on a custom Google Maps app for the iOS 6 platform. It is expected to come out before the end of the year.

Why are Map Apps such a big deal after all ? In an App survey conducted by Wireless Technology Forum, Atlanta, Google Maps was rated as the most popular mobile app. That means that navigation and directions via smartphone maps has become the most key use of these phones. One knew that Mapping Apps were popular and widely used, but who would have guessed that Map App is “the” most popular mobile app out there. Especially Google Maps. Obviously, smartphone users really use this app in their daily movements.

Maps are also used for the most cutting-edge of phone applications, that is Location-Based Services or LBS. LBS refers to finding businesses nearby and guiding customer traffic to those businesses. LBS also enables local advertising and shopping. LBS is key aspect of SoLoMo – Social Local Mobile – a concept referring to convergence between local commerce, mobile phones and social shopping.

Maps also facilitate searches now – Search is more relevant if locational aspects are added to it. Search Advertising has been a revolutionary concept and LBS makes Search even more relevant.

When the iOS 6 Apple Maps app faced ridicule, Tim Cook suggested that iPhone customers download Bing or other Map Apps from App Store. Google, of course, had not planned a iOS 6 compatible Map app, until it realized that iPhone users were clamoring for the Google version, after having experienced the cloogy Apple Map App. Apple Map flap has caused many a casualty at Apple office – with many execs including one of the most senior execs, Scott Forstall, being asked to leave. Just today, Apple fired another manager in charge of Map App.

With the Apple Map app mess, other mapping programs have gained eg Embark and Bing Maps.

Mapping wars are front and centre in the smartphone evolution, the various map providers need to check their coordinates in this new war.

November 29th, 2012

How to enable SoLoMo for a commerce firm

SoLoMo (Social Local Mobile) has become the new fad in town for most commerce firms and retailers, as well as technology providers. This concept refers to the idea of enabling hyper-local retail via mobile convergence and providing a social interaction between users and retailers for engagement, sales growth and loyalty.

What are the technologies which enable SoLoMo ? What products provide best of breed solutions in this space ?

Below is a sample list of some of the leading firms / products which offer solutions in this space :-

a) Digby – Leading Mobile Retail convergence solution. They have potentially the strongest Mobile Retail convergence solution and are considered a SoLoMo specialist - Digby solution provides integration between web store / offline store / mobile commerce / social commerce / QR code solution / real time messaging. Digby Localpoint software enables brands to create geo-fences around their stores and other points of interest and embed those geo-fences into the brand’s app

b) Capillary Tech - leading retail CRM / loyalty solution – one of the hottest startups from India, now a global phenomenon. High quality retail CRM / loyalty / retail analytics solution

c) Facebook Connect and Twitter API – for close Social integration to enable Social commerce

d) Pluck from Demand Media - Pluck is interesting as it allows social engagement, social commerce and social loyalty solutions. Pluck enables these concepts via communities, content generation and gamification.

e) Foursquare Enterprise solutions may offer robust gamification solutions -  Foursquare is considered leading gamification firm around communities.

f) Groupon / LivingSocial / Snapdeal / mydala – these firms are known for the Group shopping experience and offer LBS capabilities. These are not products but full-fledged startups in the area of Social Commerce.

g) Antenna Mobile Platform / IBM Worklight / Sybase 365 - These Enterprise Mobility platforms offer Mobile app development which can enable a retailer to publish engagement and commerce apps for its customers. This includes Mobile POS on smartphones / tablets, mobile wallet and in-store apps.

h) Telibrahma – Telibrahma has solutions in the areas of virtual reality and LBS, which empower the consumer to have a closer interaction with the retailers. Telibrahma LBS relies on Bluetooth or Wi-Fi proximity marketing to allow retailers to engage the audience in the nearby vicinity.

i) ZipDial – ZipDial provides an intuitive missed call voting and feedback system, which allows a retailer to leverage the mobile shoppers in the store to respond to a retailer survey instantaneously. This helps retailer drive business intelligence and customer feedback about the store experience.

Here are some relevant links in this area :
www.digby.com, http://www.capillarytech.com, http://www.pluck.com/, http://www.groupon.com, http://telibrahma.com/, www.zipdial.com

A combination of the above technologies / products will enable the SoLoMo experience for a retailer or service business.

CellStrat’s next conference, the India Digital Forum on 07th Feb in N. Delhi, will address a lot of the SoLoMo topics and technologies outlined above. Be sure to book your seat today and hear from top speakers in the Social Commerce space.

November 27th, 2012

Main Themes from Nasscom Product Conclave (7-8th Nov), Bangalore

(from our Bangalore desk)

I attended this conference in Bangalore earlier this week – it was most interesting with hundreds of company execs, entrepreneurs and thought leaders speaking about product innovation, development strategies and emerging technologies.

I will list some major themes I picked up at this conference:-

• In India, next decade belongs to Product development and these will have major impact on business and social empowerment.
• Hiring best practices and product quality differentiate successful organizations and individuals from all others.
• In the new world, individuals and professionals which take initiative and drive innovation will take their organizations to leadership positions. This applies to large and small firms alike. These individuals will be the ones in most demand going forward.
• Design and Image is crucial in the new world – this translates to User Experience and Engagement in all we do. Think Apple or Amazon.com
• The big opportunities are in Smartphones / tablets, Mobile, Cloud, Analytics, Big Data, Social – all usual suspects. These are all big enablers of new innovation and present opportunities for growth. At the same time, these technologies create a level playing field. As a result, larger firms now find that small startups can cause immense disruption in the former’s usual businesses – hence executives in the larger firms must think like entrepreneurs to create new opportunities and ensure customer delight via superb delivery and engagement.
• India has 900 million feature phones and only 10% of these are smartphones. So Mobile Apps and Enterprise Mobility offer incredible opportunity growing forward – this is true of western markets as well, as Enterprises there adopt mobile in a big way for all their applications. Mobile has truly gone from Mobile Also -> Mobile First – >Mobile Only strategy. Now, major new programs and initiatives in leading firms are planning to do a Mobile only strategy.
• Cloud Computing is the new way of doing almost everything in IT for end clients – IT investments are shifting to Cloud at an incredible space – so much so that most new projects or initiatives are looking at Cloud as a preferred solution over an in-house hosting strategy.
• Big Data is not a fad – with all the Social channels and frenetic transaction activity, Big Data is a problem which is growing in size everyday – as such, it offers major opportunities for solution providers and product developers to slice, dice and analyze, in order to achieve actionable intelligence and business decisioning.
• Open source technologies are now fully mainstream and driving major new development.
• Collaboration and leadership are key aspects in driving success. Most new innovation requires good collaboration and partnership skills as well as passion to succeed.
• Naveen Tewari, Founder and CEO of InMobi, said that the three critical factors for success for a startup are :
  • Thing Big – you can do it
  • Hire the best
  • Focus on product quality. Good products sell themselves
• Naeem Zafar, Founder and CEO of Bitzer Mobile as well as more than a dozen startups earlier, said that for each CEO, the main responsibility is “Don’t run out of money”.
• IBM-mers Peter Coldicott (Chief Product Architect), Robert High (IBM Fellow in IBM Watson), and Daniel Yellin (Enterprise Mobility Chief Engineer) spoke about IBM’s Smarter cities program, Cloud and the new IBM super-computer Watson which is making waves.
• Sharad Sharma (ex-MD, Yahoo India), spoke about product entrepreneurs as transformers of the society.
• Deep Kalra, Founder and CEO of MakeMyTrip, spoke about his entrepreneurial journey and the Indian startup ecosystem.

The event is one power-packed event with almost 1300 delegates which included almost 150+ blue-chip speakers and thought leaders from India and abroad. The presence of so many Silicon Valley luminaries seems to indicate that action in Bangalore is accelerating and many westward folks are now looking east to this part of the world for next revolutions in tech and digital.

Kudos to Nasscom, Nasscom President Mr Som Mittal and all the dedicated NPC volunteers for putting together what we consider is a remarkable show.

For more updates from this event, click here.

November 12th, 2012

Do you want to be part of Social Commerce…& Future???

The ways customers purchase and participate with products is fundamentally changing. The ubiquitous social + mobile connections between people and to their favorite brands has changed the marketplace. Not only are they connected, they’re empowered.

Brands must integrate commerce into social and mobile now or play catch-up later. Because SocialLocalMobile is the future…catch it young or be left out

In this India Digital Forum, you’ll learn the benefits of social commerce,

• Acquire new customers and fans and drive brand awareness
• Increase share among loyalists
• Drive growth by unlocking new customer segments
• Sell inventory across the product life cycle
• Acquire actionable insights about customer behavior, demographics and influence

You’ll also learn about the best practices and emerging trends we’re seeing as brands commit to a repeatable, scalable and easy to manage approach to social commerce campaigns.

So join the forum early on to avail early prices or wait until prices rise. You may follow #IDFIndia on twitter up to the event to be updated on who is going to join us for the event.

October 12th, 2012

53% of luxury marketers surveyed reserve between 20% and 60% of their overall media spend for digital marketing

According to a survey conducted by the Luxury Interactive conference’s research team, 78% of digital marketing executives for luxury brands reported an increase in social media spend for 2012, while 73% of those surveyed said they will increase social media spend again in 2013.

The survey was distributed to top marketing executives at luxury brands like Louis Vuitton, Cartier and Mandarin Oriental, among others, and will be distributed again at the live conference event this October. The Luxury Interactive team worked with ShopIgniter, the company behind social product promotion and commerce for many leading brands, to craft the questionnaire, which covered topics like social media spend, product promotion, mobile commerce andcustomer retention. The goal of the survey is to establish an industry benchmark for digital marketers at luxury companies. Results will determine spending trends and marketing successes, as well as areas in need of further development and investigation in the luxury market.

In addition to revealing statistics about social media spend, the survey also uncovers trends in mobile commerce, overall marketing spend and more. A highlight of the findings thus far includes the following:

• 81% of luxury brands surveyed increased their digital marketing spend in 2012 over 2011
• 53% of luxury marketers surveyed reserve between 20% and 60% of their overall media spend for digital marketing
• 83% of luxury marketers surveyed said if their business was forced to choose only one social media account to manage, they would choose Facebook
• 75% of luxury retailers surveyed said they are using video to engage fans and followers

CellStrat is also organizing India Digital Forum on 7th. Feb’13 in New Delhi, India to answer similar queries for Indian brands and consumers. If you would like a sneak peak into this hot trend, register early before prices go up.

(via Shopigniter)

October 8th, 2012

Social Commerce, the future of commerce…

Social Media is coming of age now. Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter stormed the world in the last few years with a ferocity few could foresee. Everything got “socialized”, right from relationships, data, content, sales and engagement. Companies and consumers alike have taken to Social Media as bees to honey. The implications to businesses, large and small, are truly astounding. Geography and country does not matter. All sorts of boundaries have been obliterated. Businesses must master the sales and marketing on these channels and tackle the phenomenal eyeball storm on these platforms. This is the New Media, which directly or indirectly effects all sales and engagement activity today.

This has been proved by Faceboook. On last Thursday (Sep. 27th., 2012), unveiled Gifts, the company’s major initiative into the world of social gift giving and e-commerce. It’s exactly what it sounds like. Users can choose, mail and pay for real-world, physical gifts — not the lame virtual ones Facebook offered a few years ago — to send to one another, all completely inside of Facebook. They’re tied to the significant event reminders that pop up on occasion — say, a friend’s anniversary, or a birthday. Or even better for Facebook, users can also just buy gifts for others for the heck of it.

It’s a major undertaking for Facebook, tackling an entire new segment of online commerce and adding a brand new revenue stream to its business. And to a degree, we’ve known it was coming for some time — after all, on the same day Facebook went public, it acquired Karma, the social gifting application upon which all of Gifts is based and built.

Perhaps more significant, however, is that now users aren’t limited to just the desktop to send and receive gifts; the entire Gifts program is accessible on mobile phones.

CellStrat’s next event on 07th Feb in New Delhi, the  India Digital Forum 2013 is unfolding at an exciting pace. It will be addressing this topic “Social Commerce” with many more examples. Some big names speakers are lined up to speak, we will announce these in the coming weeks. Social Selling and Social Media Analytics are complicated but exciting topics which marketers and brands are trying to comprehend, for the simple reason that the users and eyeballs are rapidly adopting these platforms, and processing the voluminous data these channels generate is causing jitters to even the bravest of tech and media brethren. Attend the India Digital Forum to derive world-class insights into Social Engagement and Social Data Analytics. Twitter hash tag for this event is #IDFIndia

October 4th, 2012

Child, Brand Marketers & role of Digital Media in Kid’s Marketing

Few days back, I came across “Pitch,” a marketing magazine with the cover story titled “Child is the  father of Brands.” It had interviews of 20 odd marketers, brand experts, marketers, creative brains, media owners and media planners on how kids are redefining the marketing.

Here, I am summarizing the same along with my views on how digital media is playing a key role in connecting with
this young audience. Indian consumer era has just started and thus new age marketers have started creating their own rules to connect with the young generation in turn influencing their parents and guardians in their purchase decisions.

Digital and social media is playing a major role these days for marketers in influencing today’s generation which
is called the ‘Screenagers’. They live on a television screen, console screen or a tablet screen. Within the digital space, while gaming remains the No.1 activity for a 4-10 year-olds, as you move up the age ladder, social media begins to take precedence over gaming. E.g. Dairy company, Amul has been using the digital space for its range of ice-creams and for Amul PRO, the recently launched malt based milk additive for kids in the age-group of 2-15 years. While  it’s Facebook page has close to 500,000 likes, the brand’s websites are also buzzing with activity.

77% kids like funny ads while 60% like ads with their favourite celebrities. In line with this, marketers are vying for tie-ups with animation movies and films targeted at children to leverage the noise created by these Hollywood films prior to their release in the country and cash in on their popularity and exposure. The English animation flick Ice Age-4, for example had associations with seven different brands: MTR, McDonald’s, MCD, Crax Corn Rings, Perfetti Alpenliebe, LG Electrnoics 3D TV and The Mobile Store. For Perfetti, the partnership out  with Fox Studios for its marketing campaign was aimed at bringing alive the ‘irresistibility’ positioning of Alpenliebe etc.

Successful brands will go where the kids are – Touch Screens. Adam Shlachter, Managing Partner, Practice Lead, Digital at MEC (a division of GroupM) call children born in last 3-5 years as ‘Gen-S’ or “Generation Screen.” He says, Gen S will never know a world without screens, without being connected, without touch and swipe, or gesture control, or without cameras to capture, interact, share and connect with others instantly. We have all witnessed toddlers navigating a smartphone or iPad better than we can. Thus, marketers, brands, retailers and publishers need to stay relevant to the audience that expects to transact nearly everything on a touch screen. This means, it has become critical for brands to create and redesign sites to render appropriately and dynamically for different screens and operating systems.

Today, 45% of Fortune 500 companies do not have mobile-optimised websites according to a recent study by Interactive Advertising Bureau. But, now it is slowly happening. A number of apps are being created by companies worldwide to engage Gen S in many innovative ways. Examples include learning and literacy apps from education companies like Scholastic or Penguin books etc.

Now that digital media has emerged from it’s infancy, reaching kids has gotten harder. About 48% of consumers
between the age of 8 and 12 spend two hours online every day, according to eMarketer, while 24% of teens between 13
and 17 spend more than 15 hours online each week and also watch TV regularly.

I would like to conclude here by showing some statistics on How much would parents consider a child’s involvement in a product purchase:

(Data Source: Cartoon Network New Generations India study 2011)

October 1st, 2012

CMO is the new CIO

Recently I am hearing a lot about the fact that the IT budgets are increasing coming from the CMO department. Indeed “CMO is the new CIO”. Why this trend ? Reasons are manifold :

a) Customer touchpoint is the new focus : Customer touchpoint is where the action is now. Whether it is Customer Engagement, Customer Service, Customer Access or anything to do with orchestrating these, these are the hot topics now for enterprises large and small. This essentially means mobile devices, mobile apps, social, local, cloud, analytics etc. To be more specific, the big themes now are Mobile, Social, Cloud and Analytics – all that relate to customer facing technology or orchestrating the customer experience.

Who owns the customer experience – it is the Marketing office and not really the CIO office.

b) Image and Branding : In this world awash with media and content, image is everything. Social and Digital Media are increasingly commanding higher order of CXO focus and budgets. It is now possible for unknown brands and firms to accelerate their visibility overnight via a variety of Social and Digital channels. Traditional firms often find themselves late to this party or reacting to their customers who are already present enmasse on these Digital Channels. Simple 140 character tweets can embarass monstrous corporations in matter of seconds. Image and Branding on new media has become a herculean challenge for large firms and leveled the playing field for consumers, smaller firms and startups.

Who controls a firm’s image and branding, CMO again. So CMO will drive investments in Social and Digital technology which is increasingly important to firms’s reputation and respect in the marketplace.

c) Backend infra is mature : Increasingly, one finds that backend infrastructure in traditional IT departments is mature – the big bang Oracle, SAP and middleware projects are stable and it is increasingly hard to find those big ticket IT projects now. Most of the transformational IT is now happening at customer edge and not in backend tech or networks. Of course, there are exceptions, like 4G and LTE investments by wireless industry and Big Data projects to slice and dice the voluminous data banks that now exist.

However, save for a few big items on backend, backend tech is now mature and even Oracles and SAPs of the world are now developing products for the front-end, where the growth multiples seem better going forward. The customer front-end, of course, is owned by the CMO and not the CIO.

d) Emergence of new tech : Web 2.0 is now being replaced by Web 3.0 – a world of seamless mobility, applications, and front-end use cases. Mobile Payments, Mobile Media, Mobile Devices, SME Cloud Apps, Social Networks, Location Services, hyperlocal marketing are the big glamour areas of tech now where most developers and firms want to focus their energy now. Apple may have started the trend of massive consumer revolution when it created the iPhone, Amazon has brought Web services to SMEs on a massive scale, Google is innovating in search and platforms, Facebook has amassed the largest number of eyeballs around the world. These kind of firms are at the forefront of consumer revolution in tech devices and applications.

Again, tackling this world is in the primary perview of the CMO with it’s mobile strategy, social and digital technology, connected consumer and advertising.

e) Consumerization of IT or COIT : COIT is a popular term now – where consumers walk in into the workplace with their consumer devices and force the CIO to adopt to their devices and apps rather than the other way round. The concept of a Social Enterprise is being adopted by all large firms to drive employee engagement, mindshare and collaboration. Gen Y employees are forcing their employers to change their ways and business practices to make these corporations employee oriented. Talent crunch is forcing firms to adapt to the employees wishes rather than the other way round. Hyper-informed customers are, in turn, pressurizing companies to provide relevant product information and fantastic customer service.

Certainly, CMO is the consumer and people expert and not the CIO. Most of the COIT trends require CMO to play a key role in the tech strategy.

To be sure, the CIO is not going anywhere and remains the bulwark of operational infrastructure and execution framework within the firms. The tech jazz (and related budgets), however, are now owned by the CMO due the macro trends outlined above. Indeed, CMO is the new CIO in the tech world.

September 24th, 2012