The best social marketing turns corporations into trusted friends for consumers. But are companies ready to ditch immediate returns for âyoutilityâ? Penn alumna Lisa Niver thinks not.We are now all in the marketing business. As Jay Baer has pointed out in his book, Youtility: Why Smart Marketing Is about Help Not Hype, âcontent is fire and social media is gasoline!â Baer says, âSuccess flows to organizations that inform, not organizations that promote.â
Many companiesâ knee-jerk reaction has been to promote how great they are and do little else but repeat platitudes about their own company without regard to engaging their community.
After working with over 700 companies, Baer knows what works. He describes âfriend-of-mine awarenessâ as one strategy that makes a company stand out.![175563453-(1)]()
âIf you are useful without engaging in an immediate quid pro quo, your business will be trusted the same way consumers trust their friends and family members,â Baer writes. The new magic is to âfocus on solving problems, answering questions and creating long-lasting customer relationships by doing so.â Companies that figure this out will be rewarded with all types of success.
Friend-of-mine awareness is based on the reality that companies âare competing against real people for the attention of other real people.â When consumers trust a company as they would a person, the reward is that customers and prospects then will do more of its marketing for the company.
I was astounded by an example in Youtility about the Twitter feed @HiltonSuggests. I started following it and Vanessa Sain-Dieguez, director of social media planning and integration for Hilton Worldwide, on Twitter. Hilton has taken the idea of being a friend to a whole new level by sharing local knowledge with anyone in a city where the hospitality company has a local team member online.
My first thought was to share this with a family about to go to Prague, one of the 25 pilot cities for the program. I love San-Dieguezâs quote in the book about how some of the experts are not from concierge or social media but âtheyâre just hotel employees who love their city and want to help visitors better enjoy it.â
âWeâre not looking to win your stay on this trip. Weâre looking to make a real, authentic connection with you and hopefully gain a customer for life,â says Sain-Dieguez.
I love that they are building friend-of-mine awareness and understand that the new ROI (return on investment) is a return on involvement.
Is your company ready for youtility? Many companies are not. Offering assistance without expecting immediate return âis in direct opposition to the principles of marketing and business deeply ingrained in practitioners at all levels,â writes Baer.
This was a major issue with several hotels when I organized a speaking tour called the âFestival of the Pacific.â Many hotels have asked me about how they can grow their followings and show up better in searches, yet most of them are not ready to shift to the new ROI (involvement). I was surprised when one major chain declined to host a speaking event but did host me for two nights in a suite with ocean views in Oahu. Hotels customarily host writersâbut not events. The hotel that chose to host the event had over 40 people show up who loved the hotel, the restaurant and the event, and the hotel was able to introduce these guests to its latest Thursday night happy hour promotion. I got to stay in the penthouse as well (where the Black Eyed Peas stayed when in town for a concert!).
The social media buzz on the event was such that the general manager asked when I could fly back and give another talk.
I wrote an article for the first hotel, but it failed to generate the interest produced by the talk and the subsequent video. When you resort to traditional promotion and stay away from providing information, that bond of trust with consumers âevaporates,â as Baer puts it.
Another example from Baerâs book is Holiday World and Splashinâ Safari, which offer their guests free parking, refreshments and sunscreen. â[It] is creating more waves as that is the conscientious treatment your friend would give you at their house,â Baer writes. People want to feel like they belong in your community. They want to feel like they matter and that a company is treating them as relevant.
Customers and prospects are responding to the youtility trend. As Baer explains, 60 percent of consumer decisions are made before a company even has a consumer on its radar.
âCustomers are ninjas now. They are stealthily evaluating you right under your nose,â Baer writes.
So, what are you doing to make a difference for your tribe?
âIf you are useful without engaging in an immediate quid pro quo, your business will be trusted the same way consumers trust their friends and family members,â Baer writes. The new magic is to âfocus on solving problems, answering questions and creating long-lasting customer relationships by doing so.â Companies that figure this out will be rewarded with all types of success.
Friend-of-mine awareness is based on the reality that companies âare competing against real people for the attention of other real people.â When consumers trust a company as they would a person, the reward is that customers and prospects then will do more of its marketing for the company.
I was astounded by an example in Youtility about the Twitter feed @HiltonSuggests. I started following it and Vanessa Sain-Dieguez, director of social media planning and integration for Hilton Worldwide, on Twitter. Hilton has taken the idea of being a friend to a whole new level by sharing local knowledge with anyone in a city where the hospitality company has a local team member online.
My first thought was to share this with a family about to go to Prague, one of the 25 pilot cities for the program. I love San-Dieguezâs quote in the book about how some of the experts are not from concierge or social media but âtheyâre just hotel employees who love their city and want to help visitors better enjoy it.â
âWeâre not looking to win your stay on this trip. Weâre looking to make a real, authentic connection with you and hopefully gain a customer for life,â says Sain-Dieguez.
I love that they are building friend-of-mine awareness and understand that the new ROI (return on investment) is a return on involvement.
Is your company ready for youtility? Many companies are not. Offering assistance without expecting immediate return âis in direct opposition to the principles of marketing and business deeply ingrained in practitioners at all levels,â writes Baer.
This was a major issue with several hotels when I organized a speaking tour called the âFestival of the Pacific.â Many hotels have asked me about how they can grow their followings and show up better in searches, yet most of them are not ready to shift to the new ROI (involvement). I was surprised when one major chain declined to host a speaking event but did host me for two nights in a suite with ocean views in Oahu. Hotels customarily host writersâbut not events. The hotel that chose to host the event had over 40 people show up who loved the hotel, the restaurant and the event, and the hotel was able to introduce these guests to its latest Thursday night happy hour promotion. I got to stay in the penthouse as well (where the Black Eyed Peas stayed when in town for a concert!).
The social media buzz on the event was such that the general manager asked when I could fly back and give another talk.
I wrote an article for the first hotel, but it failed to generate the interest produced by the talk and the subsequent video. When you resort to traditional promotion and stay away from providing information, that bond of trust with consumers âevaporates,â as Baer puts it.
Another example from Baerâs book is Holiday World and Splashinâ Safari, which offer their guests free parking, refreshments and sunscreen. â[It] is creating more waves as that is the conscientious treatment your friend would give you at their house,â Baer writes. People want to feel like they belong in your community. They want to feel like they matter and that a company is treating them as relevant.
Customers and prospects are responding to the youtility trend. As Baer explains, 60 percent of consumer decisions are made before a company even has a consumer on its radar.
âCustomers are ninjas now. They are stealthily evaluating you right under your nose,â Baer writes.
So, what are you doing to make a difference for your tribe?
More than 50 years have passed since Corning Inc. launched CorningWare in 1958, its most important consumer product since the 1915 introduction of Pyrex brand bakeware. With pre-World War I homemakers marveling at the concept of baking their cakes in clear glass, Corning believed that 1960s housewives were sure to spark to its newest ceramic advance. Imagine being able to fry in a beautiful opaque dish placed directly on an open flame. Made of space-age Pyroceram, CorningWare astonished saucer-eyed housewives with its ability to move directly from freezer to flame without cracking because of extreme temperature changes. At the end of this shocking journey, CorningWare could be conveniently brought, in all its appealing whiteness, directly to any formal table setting.
Corningâs veteran marketing director assigned me, a newly arrived Wharton MBA, to accompany him on the test-marketing phase. Left on my own, I immediately set off to prepare all the materials. I checked off dozens of itemsâaudio-visuals, easels, fact sheetsâeverything needed for our introductory meetings with department-store buyers and housewares distributors. With only one week remaining before our departure for the New England test area, I sat him down for a run-through and tightened my buttocks while awaiting his response.
His appraisal of my efforts came as a surprise.
âFor years, my father has been deeply supportive of the Boy Scouts of America,â he began. âEvery Christmas he sends the same card. It features a Boy Scout on the cover.â
Where he was he headed, I had no idea.
âThe words inside never change,â he continued. âThey say, âFind a need and fill it.â â I relaxed when he added, âThatâs exactly what youâve done here. Youâve filled our need for organization.â
Iâve carried those words with me for a lifetime and have tried to instill them in my children and co-workers. They originated with Ruth Stafford Peale, wife of the Rev. Norman Vincent Peale, author of The Power of Positive Thinking. Whether in the form of an acronymâFANAFI!âor in their unassailable six-word counsel, they clearly demand positive action. First, find! Next, fill!
[caption id="attachment_26046" align="alignright" width="281"]
Ruth Stafford Peale, wife of the Rev. Norman Vincent Peale, who coined the phrase, "Find a need and fill it." Photo credit: National Council of Churches.[/caption]
Of the two commands, finding the unfilled need may offer the harder challenge for Wharton entrepreneurs. After Corning, I started using a technique called âproblem detection,â a marketing research method developed to uncover consumer needs for General Electric, my ad agencyâs client. Identify a problem, the theory went, and youâve taken the first step toward finding a need.
Sometimes the problem we discovered was tangibleâdials too large for a womanâs hand. Sometimes the problem was intangibleâdifficulty in cleaning. Other times the problem was latentâconsumers didnât know they had the problem until they were offered a solution.
It was a latent problem that brought out the need for the GE smoke detector. Research showed that people had a serious fear of a home fire breaking out at night. But the problem lay hidden until they saw a solution in the form of an affordable smoke- detecting device.
Discovering a problem that leads to a consumer need is a sure way for an entrepreneur to start a business. When, like the smoke detector, the problem is serious and frequent, the chances for success increase substantially. And if another marketer isnât currently filling the need, well, Wharton entrepreneurs have a business on their hands.
Serving as "chicken" on marketing technology projects is one way for CMOs to build a relationship with the CIO.[/caption]
âAs part of a data-driven organization, my relationship with our CIO is mission critical,â Thacker said to me. âKnowing that I have the right technology and best data at hand gives me the confidence to make better business decisions that are not only good for me and the marketing department, but for the entire organization.â
What made Thacker successful (besides time and hard work) in fostering this long-standing relationship?
Below are five techniques he used to get the most out of the relationship:
What is an accidental brand? Firstly, letâs define what we mean by the word âbrandâ itself.
My definition of a brand is "a promise to deliver a product or service on a consistent basis and then to become associated with that promise." Therefore, a brand is the essence of your corporate being, identified in terms that are relevant, attractive and compelling as seen through the marketâs eyes. It is the essence of the company, and senior management must live its brand consistently through every function and activity.
Many people mistakenly think that a brand simply means a logo, color or icon. Although these may symbolize the brand, they are not the brand itself.
Others believe that a brand is big awareness made possible by big budget advertising. This misguided view is a main reason why smaller companies have accidental brands. They pay less attention to defining and living their brand, even though itâs important for them too. Smaller companies often believe that branding is just for the "big boys and girls" who have the big bucks to generate awareness. A brand is a promise and is valuable even when a smaller universe of people know about it. In fact, the world is full of business names people know, ones they pass by on the way to doing business with lesser known but more appealing companies.
Still others believe that a brand is image. Many of these adherents reason that because image doesn't generate traffic or leads, spending effort on a brand is not good business. It's a warm and fuzzy luxury that they feel is a waste of time and resources. Although awareness and image are important components, they are far from being the brand.
Every company has a brand, whether it sets out to identify one or not. A brand is most frequently the essence of the company as seen through the eyes of the market. In other words, the promises the company consistently makes that are most important to customers and to the market as a whole. That a firm decides not to pursue a brand strategy is no admission that it has no brand. It will have an accidental brand, and that accidental brand is probably not the promise that the company really wants to project.
Many companies donât even realize that they have an accidental brand, but they most likely do if:
PC (John Hodgman) and Mac (Justin Long) from Apple's "Get a Mac" advertising campaign. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons.[/caption]
Competitors can also define the companyâs promise. Sometimes it is a good thing. For example, if your brand promise can appear favorably next to that of a lesser competitorâs, you may find yourself with an accidentally superior brand. Conversely, your competitor can try to define your brand promise negatively for competitive reasons. For example, if your company defines itself as a cutting-edge technology company, your competitors might define you as a niche or nerdy company that is out of touch with the market (e.g., Apple versus Microsoft).
Although a true brand is virtually always positive, an accidental brand can be positive or negative. This is a key reason a company wants to control its brand to keep the message positive and relevant.
Every business has a brand, whether you're the one developing it or it is accidental. Take control of your promise to the market or you may discover you have a brand promise that you never intended.
The Hella Bitter team, with Jomaree Pinkard on the left. Photo credit: Hella Bitter.[/caption]
That was last year.
Now HB is riding the latest wave in the consumer goods startup industry by attaching the product to engaging customer experiences: Donât just buy the product but, rather, get a kit and make your own batch at home. Add your own ingredients to make yours unique and personalized to your preferences. The kit comes with those little apothecary tubes they had at the launch event and other tools that are going to make me feel like a 1920s pharmacist, preparing the finest elixirs for my friends or for my Kitchensurfing clients. It comes in an iconic box, which to me looks like the foreshadowing of a jump-onto-the-subscription-box trend.
Looking for innovation in a bottle? I think weâve found it.
So, why should the lovable, well-liked CMO pair up with the by-the-books, by-the-numbers, budget-buzz-killing CFO? While it may seem like an unlikely duo, the CMO-CFO pairing could be a team for the ages, the Turner and Hooch or C-3PO and R2-D2 of the 21st century business world. Now, thereâs a buddy movie Iâd pay to see.
But seriously, why the CFO? In a recent study by Active International, 77 percent of CMOs and 76 percent of CFOs indicated that the alignment between the two departments is important for business success. AÂ 
1. Take a âFinance For Non-Financial Managersâ class. You wouldnât go to Japan (or any non-English speaking country) without learning some basic words and phrases, would you? It only makes sense, then, to learn the finance language before walking into the finance office. Being able to use the CFOâs language in discussions is key. Before you know it, youâll know the difference between amortization and capitalization.
2. Talk financial impact when discussing program initiatives. Gone are the days when you can ask for âa couple million dollarsâ without promise of financial return. These days, you need to know exactly how much youâre spending and what impact it will have on revenue. Make sure you understand the financial trade-offs of your programs, and know exactly why you recommend this course of action.
3. Be flexible with your budget. Marketing is the easiest place to add and remove budget when it comes time for the quarterly earnings call. Be open to maintaining flexibility as itâs the best way to win the CFOâs favor. I usually try to keep as much as 25 percent of my budget flexible, meaning youâll have to change your planning strategy. Trust me, it will be worth it. This way, if the CFO needs the budget to hit the quarterly number, then he/she can have it.
4. Know how to account for your expenses, understand the general ledger. Letâs say youâve just spent $100,000. Does this money hit this monthâs budget or is it spread across the next 12 months? Is the expense considered a cost of goods sold or is it below the gross margin line?
The answers to these questions have a significant impact on how much money you can ask for and how receptive the CFO will be. Chances are you have a controller or bookkeeper assigned to your department. Befriend them, too. This person will be more than happy to teach you the ins and outs of the general ledger. Iâve stretched my budget by thousandsâand even millionsâof dollars by understanding the nuances of this process. You can as well, and your CFO will appreciate you more for this.
5. Save money when you can. Your new website project is under budgetâno, youâre not dreaming. What do you do with the excess cash? Offer it back to the CFO. Thereâs a fear that if you give the budget back, you wonât get it again. First, thatâs not necessarily true. Second, this is about proving that youâre a team player and fiscally responsibleânot about establishing a fiefdom. Any flexibility in your department could help him do his job. By expressing your interest and appreciation for the big picture, you will quickly earn the CFOâs trust.
Iâm not going to lie; this is a long, hard road. But trust me, it will pay dividends.
Following these five simple steps could potentially make your job a lot easier. For instance, youâll find the budgeting process easier and greater support when accruing expenses. Heck, you may even find more budget to use for your experimental pet projects. In other words, you will find Nirvana awaiting them at the end of the journey.
Thatâs all I have to say on this topic, but tell me what you think. Are there any strategies I forgot or ones you disagree with? Personal CMO-CFO buddy stories you want to share? Let us know below in the comments section, or email them to us.
Editorâs note: Read David's explanation for why itâs crucial to connect with a CFO in Part 1 of â
Art credit: Peter and Maria Hoey[/caption]
Peter Fader has shared his revelatory research with many students, alumni and readers of his book, Customer Centricity: Focus on the Right Customers for Strategic Advantage.
Are practitioners listening though? If so, are they understanding what theyâre hearing?
Or as Shilpa Patwardhan, connected learning director for Wharton Executive Education, puts it: âCustomer centricity is fine as a concept, but if I were a CFO or CMO in a company, the question for me would be, âHow do I actually implement this?ââ
Customer centricity involves identifying a businessâ best customers, the tendencies that those customer segments share and what they might have in common with potential customers. It can help calculate âcustomer lifetime value,â a prized marketing metricâbut in practice or just in theory?
From March 3 through April 27, Fader, the Frances and Pei-Yuan Chia Professor and co-director of the Wharton Customer Analytics Initiative, answered that question for a group of nearly 50 executives participating in Whartonâs very first online-only Executive Education program, Strategic Value of Customer Relationships.
The online platform developed by the Executive Education team may sound similar to MOOCs, the massive online open courses offered by such sites as Coursera, but Fader emphasizes that the Exec Ed program is more accurately characterized as a SPOCâa small private online course.
Unlike a MOOC, a SPOC offers a tailored educational experience to a highly specialized audience. In addition to the rigorous course content appropriate only for experienced executives with decision-making responsibilities, Exec Ed has put special care into building the learning environment, particularly the community aspect.
âWe facilitate interaction among [the global participants] to make sure that the learning can be shared across study groups, just as we would if these executives were coming here to Philadelphia,â explains Maria Pitone, Câ88, GEDâ98, Wharton Executive Education practice leader and director.
Fader is particularly enthusiastic about this. He offered virtual office hours each week âto facilitate face-to-faceâor at least camera-to-cameraâinteractionsââ which is a notable deviation from the Coursera setup.
âWhen I did my MOOC, I was actually talking to the camera as if it was my class,â recalls Fader. âThatâs the beauty of a SPOC. I have this outlet to put things out there that are more provocative, and I can inquire a bit more and offer clarification.â
Along with the intimate delivery methods, the small number of participants and careful program design allowed for the overall experience to embody the qualities for which Wharton Executive Education has become renowned.
âEverything we say about our campus programsâhigh touch, active learning experiencesâthatâs exactly what theyâll have here,â Patwardhan notes.
Hereâs another important distinction from MOOCs: Course participants have gone through a screening process before they were allowed to enroll, ensuring that all students have the experience and decision-making responsibilities to guarantee a rich learning environment and peer dialogue. SPOC attendees spanned myriad professional sectors. Pharmaceutical executives and CEO s learned alongside seasoned marketing professionals. Fader often found himself working with participants from Bahrain, Australia,Switzerland, China and Mauritius, all at the same time.
âItâs just amazing. It really is more than who they areâitâs where they are,what they do,â says Fader, who agrees that the course was enhanced by the select group of participants.
Perhaps viewed as an experiment at first, a SPOC for paying customers has proved to be a delivery model with legs.Applications for Faderâs next Strategic
Value of Customer Relationships cohort are being accepted on a rolling basis through Wharton Executive Educationâs website. The eight-week course will run from September 29 through November 23.
âKaren A. Boedecker
Art credit: Stuart Briers[/caption]
When I enrolled in business school, and even later on when I first entered the marketing workforce, I had grand thoughts of being the next Don Draper, rising up the ranks of the marketing ladder and becoming a rock star CMO. Who doesnât want to be a rock star, right?
But I entered a very different world of marketing. Instead of sipping cocktails and dreaming up high-concept campaigns, I was tasked with execution-oriented marketing jobs, such as creating the next piece of sales collateral or crafting a nurture email campaign. While it wasnât badâyou have to start somewhereâit wasnât the post-grad life of building brands I dreamed of. Sure, the harder I worked, the quicker I rose. Yet at the top, I faced a new set of challenges. Instead of high-profile brainstorming sessions, I dealt with corporate politics, egos, budget constraints and the full gamut of upper management malaise. At times I felt as though my dreams couldnât be further away.
The reality for meâand no offense to those of you who are striving for marketing degrees or MBAs or just joining the workforceâis that business school didnât prepare me as well as I had thought (or hoped) for the fierce new world of marketing.
Donât worry, itâs not the professorsâ fault, and itâs not the Universityâs fault. Modern-day marketing just isnât as sexy as itâs taught in the classroom or Mad Men glorious as seen on TV. Itâs a little ugly and can seem downright dirty when you feel like you spend more time battling in the budget trenches than dreaming up the next Super Bowl ad. Todayâs marketing is all about execution, execution, execution.
So far in my career, no one has ever asked for my opinion on the brand logo or the type of font used for our corporate name. This is partly due to the fact that my superiors are too concerned with hitting the revenue numbers in the coming quarter.
Thatâs right, ladies and gents, itâs not about the curvature of the âeâ in your brandâs name; business is about revenue, profitability and shareholder value. Period. Furthermore, itâs driven by the company executivesâ âwhat have you done for me latelyâ culture.
I thought this urgency would change with a companyâs size, but it really doesnât. Regardless of how big or small, new or old the company is, elements within always push you forward. In startups, for instance, youâre worried about how much marketing you can do before running out of budget. In larger enterprises, youâre worried about how much marketing you can do before you hit the end of the quarter.
Hopefully, Iâm not scaring or dissuading anyone from following their business aspirations or marketing dreams. Trust me, that is not my purpose here. If I didnât truly love what I do, I would not continue along my chosen path. Iâm just trying to shed some light on the realities and challenges that business and marketing leaders face.
Business school may not have preached all of the necessities and nuances, or prepared me fully for the down-and-dirty world (the real world) of marketing. This amazing educational foundation, however, did instill in me the knowledge and ability to learn on the job, excel at my work and become a thought leader in the marketing space.
I often think back at my Organizational Behavior class, where I learned about the inner dynamics of groupsâhow to work with the different personalities on a team and still be productive. I continue to use the skills Professor Stuart Diamond taught me in my negotiating class to ensure I donât get into a âwinnerâs curseâ scenario by putting out the first offer. And my Problems in Financial Accounting course taught me how to read beyond the numbers to see whatâs really going on inside a company.
Then there was the marketing department. Guys like Len Lodish, now Samuel R. Harrell Emeritus Professor, who actually taught me cutting-edge brand marketing so I could walk the talk and learn the secret handshake to get a job in the first place. And Peter FaderâFrances and Pei-Yuan Chia Professor and co-director of the Wharton Customer Analytics Initiativeâwho believes marketing should not be viewed as a âsoftâ discipline. They are breathing new life into an old curriculum by crafting classes that dig deftly into the reality of marketing to train students on the tactical aspects of marketing. For instance, I had the opportunity to guest lecture in Faderâs Marketing 775 last year, during which I taught practical principles of lead generationand customer acquisition to his students, many of whomexperienced some of this in their previous jobs.
These are the classes and the instructors who helped reinforcewhat I love about marketing.
I love that marketingâreal marketingâis about amplifying thetruth about the company and products, which is a good thingand allows me to get as close as I can to the customer withoutactually having to sell him something. Marketing right nowis a pretty thrilling place to beâa beautiful blend of creativityand mathematics, a meshing of qualitative and quantitativeapproaches. It is challenging and exciting and caters to the needsof both traditional and modern marketing approaches.
With the next generation of marketing already here, I believethere ought to be a time and place for honest dialogue about thedisciplineâs direction.
The time is now, and the place is the Wharton Magazine website, where Iâm launching a regular blog series called â
There is nothing subtle about an exclamation mark. It sings and shouts. It anchors and amplifies. Whatever the sentiment, expression with an exclamation mark is never shy.
When effecting organizational change, the goal is to build to that point of change! when people heed the boarding call with positive intention, behavior and action. The emphatic exists not only at the end of the journey, but at points along the way when ideas and solutions are generated and milestones achieved. Nevertheless, much of the change process occurs through subtlety, nuance and incremental brick-by-brick construction of plans and perspectives.
And along the way, there will be bumps in the road; in my many years as a change communications strategist, Iâve learned that itâs a certainty. As such, Iâm always on the lookout for professional development that will help me to mitigate issues and smooth things over. Imagine how delighted I was to learn of the Wharton Schoolâs inaugural offering of âAn Introduction to Marketingâ via massive open online course (MOOC) format, taught by professors Peter Fader, Barbara Kahn and David Bell.
This course, which is part of the Wharton Foundation Series on Coursera, was the perfect complement to my on-the-job experience to date. While I was familiar with many of the marketing concepts covered in the curriculum, it provided me with new thinking and fresh perspectives on old challenges. In particular, the exploration of experiential branding components, customer acquisition, social capital, and network and community affects is of tremendous value in helping me to develop better content with better tactical positioning.
In marketing and change management alike, youâre looking to influence thinking and incent behavior, whether itâs about buying or buying in. It all comes down to knowing the intricacies of your target audience and the end-state branding that will inspire ambassadors to act. Transparency and authenticity are the two fundamental aspects of a change strategy brand mantra. People need to believe in the change â its purpose and meaning â and leaders must live it along with them. Leaders must also believe in what their own people can bring to the process and be inclusive of them. The influence of colleague-to-colleague and group-to-group networks cannot be underestimated, either. If there were a way to access the flurry of personal texts after a left-field unintelligible corporate memo, it would no doubt yield dizzying amounts of data on actual sentiment.
âLouAnn Buhrows
LouAnn Buhrows is a Toronto-based communication strategist and writer whose career has focused on supporting change initiatives in the public and private sectors. She was a participant in Whartonâs âAn Introduction to Marketingâ via MOOC format. She holds a B.A. in English Literature from the University of Waterloo and an M.A. in Criminology from the University of Toronto.
We often talk about the importance millennials have in influencing others with similar purchase habits. These âMillennial Mindset Consumersâ are influenced by millennialsâ every day choices. Who do you think taught that 50-year-old woman how to use her phone to pay for her drink at Starbucks?
Likewise, many companies and HR departments are changing everything from benefits to company culture. You might even know someone who goes into the office at 10 a.m. in sweats, gets free beer, and rides a four-story slide to the conference room.
While some of these perks are extravagant, the idea remains the same: When your millennial employees show love for your brand, they become your strongest brand advocates.
The key factors that drive profitable modern brands also inform the thinking of companies trying to engage their millennial employees. Letâs take a look at a few.
1. Embrace the participation economy.
Just as we have reimagined the definition of a brand value by adding participative benefits, we can now see the same can be said for the value in the workplace. It is no longer good enough to be able to work for a company and receive a salary (functional need) and enjoy what you do (emotional need). Brands must now allow their employees to help co-create everything from the culture to opportunities to give back.
Allowing your employees to help build your brand not only creates an environment for them to excel, it builds trust.
Remember a few years ago when Dominoâs Pizza tasted like cardboard? They decided to listen to their audience and fixed the problem. Their CEO publically admitted that they had made a mistake in neglecting the quality of their pizza and then promised change. Not only did the consumers appreciate the change, the employees did, too.
2. Create experiences and adventures.
When it comes to creating experiences and adventures for your employees, donât overthink it.
Google is one of the most loved brands by millennial consumers and also the company millennials want to work for most. The fact that Google tops both of these lists is no coincidence. Millennials appreciate the fact that Google provides employees with all sorts of experiencesâfrom creating top-notch facilities and hosting unique company events to providing seminars and education opportunities outside of the office. You donât have to throw a parade to create experiences that will make a difference in your employeesâ lives, so start small and theyâll notice your efforts.
3. Stand for more than your bottom line.
Finally, millennials love standing behind something they truly care about.
A company can make a huge difference when it inspires its employees to stand for something bigger than the products or services sold. By providing this inspiration, companies can not only improve their company as a whole, but also improve their workplace culture for their Millennial Mindset Employees.
So the next time you assume all millennials are sitting on the couch in their momsâ basements, you might instead look at ways to embrace your millennial employees, ask them to help foster your culture and ideas, and create a space where they can help your company excel. Because if not, you might find that your greatest brand ambassadors are leaving for another company.
Editorâs note: Brendan Shaughnessy, a millennial account coordinator at FutureCast and a social contributor at 
You could break from the pack and employ a bottom-up approach using a customer lifetime value (LTV) calculationâthe dollar value of a customer relationship. LTV is not a new approach by any means, but it is becoming more popular today due to the emergence of new analytics tools.
If using the LTV is the path youâd like to take, here are the five stages youâll need to figure it all out:
1. Determine your customerâs lifetime value
For example, say that the average contract is  a one-year agreement and the average fee is $20,000, then your annual LTV, or ALTV, would be $240,000. If you think customers will sign up for more than one year, then you can calculate a full LTV. For instance, if your customers have a three-year lifespan, you can assume your LTV is $920,000 per customer.
However you come to this number, it will need to be agreed upon by key stakeholders in the business (i.e., your finance team, or the board if youâre a startup).
2. Determine the CAC
Growth-oriented companies would argue that you can justify spending the full ALTV to acquire a customer if youâre confident you can keep the customer beyond the first year. Most companies arenât and instead use the 20 percent rule. So if your LTV is $240,000, then your customer acquisition costs (CAC) would be $48,000.
Or ... you can just trust your gut.  For one company I consult for, I immediately felt that a one-month CAC would work. One month of revenue is a reasonable amount to be successful with an optimized marketing program. For other companies, an entire yearâs revenue is a good CAC budgetâsuch was the case when I worked at AT&T.
3. Build the CAC model
So what costs goes into the CAC? It can include things such as marketing employee expenses, marketing program expenses, sales employee expenses and even allocated overhead. I usually only consider the direct marketing dollars because its the cleanest way to measure expenses and determine lead attribution.
4. Calculate your cost per won deal (CPWD)
After campaigns begin, youâll need to calculate your CPWDâ the actual cost to acquire your customer. Luckily, this is a straightforward calculation. If youâre tracking your marketing expenses, you should know how much you spent to win the deal. The bigger question is whether that number is over or under your target CAC. You canât improve what you donât measure, so measuring this number is a great start.
5. Develop a strategy to bring CPWD and CAC together
When you compare the CPWD to the CAC, youâll typically see a difference. Your goal is to find a way to bring these numbers together. There are several ways to make this happen, but here are two approaches to consider:
Some organizations treat social media strictly as a communications vehicle. They use social media as another outlet to push out messages or as a customer service hotline. But social media has the potential to do much more. With all of the data that social media generates, other companies are turning to social media as a source of customer intelligence, treating posts as valuable insights into the voice of the customer.
This sounds great, right? Social media will be the solution to all of our business challenges, helping us measure customer satisfaction, respond to complaints and design better products based on customer opinions. So whatâs the problem?
First, thereâs more data than many of us know what to do with. In my opinion, even the leading social media monitoring platforms are struggling with this. Second, often what social media metrics tell us donât align with our offline intelligence. In a recent study published in the 
Some of what P&G considers to be its "leadership brands." Photo credit: P&G.[/caption]
In fact, it could represent the early stages of whatâs been termed a âprofitable-product death spiral.â The idea originates from Driving Customer Equity, a book that I use in my online Wharton Executive Education program, 
Alan "A.G." Lafley, chairman of the board, president and CEO, P&G[/caption]
Itâs also interesting to note that the product-centric logic behind the impending brand cuts is not the logic manufacturers like P&G use when theyâre trying to get retailers to stock their products. They often tell retailers some version of, âWe just did a market basket analysis and found that consumers who buy product X tend to be the most profitable consumers for you.â In contrast, however, thereâs no evidence that manufacturers use that same logic to decide which products to get rid of. The inconsistency in their approach to selling versus dropping products is remarkable.
So what should P&G do? First, the company needs to recognize that it is operating under the faulty assumption that products generate profits. In reality, profits come from long-term customer relationships, and products work together to build and strengthen those relationships. Instead of focusing on its most profitable products, P&G should be looking at its most profitable customersâand ensuring that product-pruning decisions donât impact these customers very much.
A lot of people are seeing P&Gâs move as one of desperationâit seems to indicate that the company is in serious trouble. But itâs actually something companies should do more routinelyâas long as theyâre using the right criteria to make this kind of decision. Some of the products P&G will cut could very well be genuine âloss leaders,â but if they help to attract and retain the right consumers, they might have enormous value despite the lack of profitability they might have on their own. Thatâs value that P&G doesnât seem to fully recognize, and thus it risks losing itâand much more in the long run.
The Unpredictability of SEO
I donât recommend search engine optimization for lead generation because its primary function is to increase your siteâs ranking in ânatural searchâ results. This means it is very unreliable because the placement of your website is largely out of your control. You can work on SEO for months, and your site may still not get the ânatural searchâ traffic that you want. Search engines like Google constantly change their algorithms so that search results canât be fixed or manipulated by savvy marketers. This makes SEO a cat-and-mouse game that you can never be sure of winning. Search engine marketing, on the other hand, is more within your control because youâre choosing the keywords and paying for the ads.
The Question of Attribution
Itâs very hard to quantify search engine optimization as a lead-generation tool because you canât be sure how many leads actually came from your SEO efforts. Suppose someone visits your website and signs up as a lead. How do you tell whether that person found you on a search engine or visited your site after hearing about your company from a friend? Perhaps a combination of these factors led the person to visit your site. On the other hand, measuring the number of leads you get from SEM is more straightforward.
A Second-Place Winner
Search engine marketing is one of the few areas where finishing second place or even third place can be just as beneficial as finishing first. Say you have an ad on Google. After a week, your ad is consistently showing up in search results in second or third position when using the keywords youâve chosen. If so, you may be compelled to spend extra money just to gain that top spot. The fact is, search engine users will often consider clicking on the second- or third-position ads just as seriously as they would consider the first-position ads. Why?
May the Best Ad Win
Often, an SEM ad works on the basis of how well it is written or how good the offer or call-to-action is to the potential customer. If you have a good ad or a great offer, you can often save money and still get a great result.
Search engine marketing is one of the most flexible, scalable and cost-effective lead generation tactics. Although search engine optimization can be used for lead generation, you will get quicker results and generate more reliable leads using search marketing ads.
Apu Gupta, WG'05, co-founder of Curalate[/caption]
WHARTON MAGAZINE: Where does Curalate stand now?
APU GUPTA: Curalate continues to grow rapidly. In May 2014, we completed our Series B financing, raising $8.6 million. Curalate now has 50 employees and operates out of Philadelphia, New York and Seattle. Most recently, Curalate launched its newest product, Like2Buy, which makes Instagram shoppable.
WM: Are you at a comfortable spot with Curalate?
GUPTA: I donât ever want to be comfortable with this. I am super happy with how the company is growing. ... There will be multibillion dollar companies based off of understanding pictures.
WM: Have you had a moment when you realized you were prepared because of Wharton, or something you wish you would have learned more of at Wharton?
GUPTA: I often think about, how does an MBA prepare you for being an entrepreneur? Does it prepare you?
There are some things that donât prepare you wellâthat make you more risk averse. The single most defining characteristic of a tech startup is growth. Youâre growing something as fast as possible with little or no information, and youâre fundamentally disrupting the market. There are not a lot of comparables. I worried about analysis paralysis as a MBA.
[caption id="attachment_26431" align="alignright" width="400"]
The Curalate team[/caption]
However, as Curalate has grown and has more data and a greater operating history, some of the fundamentals of my MBA are starting to become much more usefulâthings like finance and accounting, for instance.
WM: What are the goals for 2014?
GUPTA: Prove that itâs a truly scalable business. Once you do that, the path to becoming a multibillion business is in sight.
WM: You say you aim to, âProve that itâs a truly scalable business.â How do you actually go out and do that?
GUPTA: To get to scalability, you have to get to repeatability. My focus right now is on running lots of small experiments that we can use to learn from. We want to get to a point where we can say, with reasonable confidence, that for a given input we can produce a given output. If we can get there, it's just a simple matter of adding more fuel in the tank and stepping on the gas.
WM: Whatâs the next frontier for visual analytics?
GUPTA: Curalate is enabling brands to drive engagement, traffic and revenue with the hundreds of millions of consumers that elect to communicate in pictures rather than words. The byproduct of our work is a data stream that is rich in consumer insights. We know, for example, not only what products people like but how they prefer to see those products.
Social media signals this rich never existed before, and we believe these signals can be transformative to businesses. Now, you can make smarter decisions about what you buy, how you merchandise, what creative you display in ads and how you display content on your website. If we can get this data used by multiple parts of the organization, Curalate will truly change how social media is perceived by organizations.
Editorâs note:Â Read our two other update interviews with innovative Wharton startup to watch: with Indian social enterprise 
Developing a Management Strategy and Setting Goals
Your goals should define how much you wish to increase your lead-generation efforts, by when and at what cost. Itâs amazing how many organizations plunge into lead-generation campaigns with no idea of what theyâre shooting for, how many leads theyâre trying to bring in or what level of cost-effectiveness they need to observe. When their campaign is over, they have no idea how well specific tactics are working to provide them with the leads they need or even if their tactics have provided a positive return on marketing investment. Often, companies have gone over budget or have executed a campaign that has provided them with a minimal number of actionable leads.
The goal for lead-generation marketing should be to use as many tactics as possible. In defining a management strategy, you should focus your goals on three areas:
An integrated lead-generation marketing campaign is a campaign that uses two or more lead-generation tactics at once. I recommend that you use seven lead-generation tactics: email, search engine, social media marketing, banner advertising, direct mail, cold-calling and trade shows. If all seven tactics work for your business, try to use them all. If only four or five tactics are appropriate, use those.
You can, of course, use lead-generation tactics individually and create separate marketing campaigns for each tactic, but what I love about integrated marketing campaigns is the halo effect. This occurs when the positive effect of one marketing tactic provides a performance boost for other marketing tactics.
Time and again, marketers have proven that when it comes to marketing tactics, one plus one equals three, not two. The more you target your customers through different marketing media, the more you create an impression of your brand and company in customersâ minds, and the more inclined they are to consider your products or services.
Another benefit of using your lead-generation tactics in an integrated campaign is that it allows you to plan and coordinate your efforts around common themes and goals. To begin with, you can do all your upfront planning for the campaign in a single stroke. Once you determine your target audience and its demographics, you can coordinate tactics toward gaining leads from that audience.
If you do an integrated campaign of multiple tactics, you can create a common message and build your creatives for each tactic around those themes. You can create one brief that each of your internal marketers can work from in developing collateral for each tactic. Or you can share this creative brief with agencies, consultants, interns and other participants, who can then do the work for you.
If you use a series of tactics, you donât necessarily have to spend equal budget, time and energy on each. You can spend the bulk of your time and money on a primary tactic that you know will work well for you, while devoting less to secondary tactics. You can even test one or two tactics against a baseline primary tactic to see how well the test tactics work.
For example, say target customers read an article about one of your companyâs vice presidents of sales in a trade magazine. A few days later, they see a display ad for your company on a website. A couple of weeks go by, and a customer gets a call from one of your salespeople. They remember seeing your company name in the article they read and in the display ad they saw online. So they listen to the salesperson and sign up as a lead.
In this example, your use of several integrated tactics created a halo effect that added value to your lead-generation marketing campaign. At first glance, you might think your display ads didnât work because the cold call captured the lead. But the display ads and the article about your executive caught the customersâ attention and helped to create an impression of your brand. When your salesperson called, this initial impression was enough to spark interest. If customers had not seen your display ads, they might have dismissed the sales call.
When I combine multiple lead-generation tactics, I often see a measurable lift in overall performance. For instance, a search engine marketing (SEM) campaign may be humming along at a 2 percent click through rate. Then I do an email marketing push, sending out 50,000 emails. In addition to the traffic generated from the email campaign, Iâll also see at least a 50 percent increase in my SEM performance. People who received the email may not have clicked on it, but some will search for the company on Google and Bing to find out more about it. A percentage of those people will click on the search engine ad.
You can also build momentum for your brand using nurturing campaigns. Using a âdrip bucketâ strategy, you keep sending emails to qualified leads over time, keeping them informed about special offers and company events. The more they see of your brand, the more they will take you seriously. Using a variety of lead-generation tactics in an integrated marketing campaign helps to accomplish this same goal, and integrated lead-generation marketing works as well, if not better, than nurture marketing.
When it came time for Mary Beth Minton, WG â82, to introduce herself at our monthly Wharton Alumni Fairchester Business Development Group a few years ago, she reached down into her tote bag and pulled out a stuffed bear. The bear was irresistibleâ18 inches high with moving joints, wearing carefully sewn clothes and carrying a bag.
We had just met