March 25 2008
Digital Savvy?
Are you a digital savvy organisation? The Interactive Advertising Bureau has mapped out the qualities you need to turn your business from a digital has been, into an digital savvy organisation that’s fit for the future
A new report entitled “Ecosystem 2.0—Driving Growth in Digital Marketing” from the combined brains of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), Association of National Advertisers (ANA), American Association of Advertising Agencies (AAAA) and management consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton looks to the future of media.
The study polled over two hundred and fifty marketers, including seventy-five industry leaders—ranging from operational marketers to agency and media executives to digital strategists to Chief Revenue Officers to CMOs to CEOs and together, they identified the ways in which the complex media environment is reshaping the marketing ecosystem.
And they spotlighted the priorities, capabilities, and partnerships that will be increasingly required
One of the interesting parts of the study is the research into the supposed “Digitally Savvy” organisation or the mythical “digital savvy” organisation as it turns out.
According to the study while all the organizations agree that becoming highly capable in marketing in the digital environment is a challenge and a priority—however, most lament that their organizations have a long way to go. Indeed, fewer than one in four survey participants consider their organization to be “digitally savvy.” Marketers highlighted several barriers.
Over half of them are stymied by lack of senior organizational support and lack of experience in new media. Many bemoan the dearth of digital talent. Although such “hot” digital employers as MySpace and Google are turning people away, other companies are struggling to solve the talent equation. The question thus becomes: How do you get the right team on board and build for the future?
Marketing organizations are answering this in a range of ways: building out new, functional capabilities, adjusting people strategies, and emphasizing flexibility. Functional capabilities have become more important across all sectors. Marketing organizations are adding resources and capabilities to digital, media, and marketing services. Nine out of ten participants agree that digital will become increasingly important.
Recruiting talent with adequate digital knowledge is of top concern. Digital knowledge is unevenly distributed by sector and by age, so some marketers have begun recruiting more undergraduates, and fewer MBAs, into brand management. Junior talent seems to be easier to find, and it can help bring in the desired digital fluency, but it is very difficult to find seasoned management talent that understands the digital space.
As a result, marketers are not only prioritizing internal training for digital marketing, but are also implementing programs to share best practices across departments and geographies. One leading consumer goods company has an “extern” program in their media department: they work with their media company partners to identify high performers and bring them in from outside to rotate through the marketing organization, and naturally share knowledge across the boundaries of partner companies.
The study
will be available at www.iab.net at a later date but a PDF with highlights
can be downloaded here
