Effectiveness is the key measure by which all marketing should be judged, but what is the secret to creating effective marketing? While it clearly depends on the brand and its objectives, there are threads that run through the best marketing, whether it’s a clear strategy, a creative idea that stands out from the crowd or results marketers can measure.
With the Marketing Week Masters Awards now open for entries, we speak with judges on how they view effectiveness.
Zoe Clapp — Chief Marketing Officer, UKTV
The very best campaigns have three things: a simple strategy, meticulous delivery, and results you can measure that show how they made a difference.
The strategy should be clear and simple, with a big idea that gets to the heart of the issue and that can be articulated in a single sentence that everyone can understand and get behind. The delivery needs tremendous effort and as much time as you can create. Inspired media choices and the best creative possible will truly make the idea. Most importantly, great campaigns will have a measurably positive impact. Otherwise, what’s the point?
Lisa Wood — Chief Marketing Officer, Atom Bank
For me, a campaign is only effective if it packs a punch – does it stand out from the crowd and cut through to the audience it’s targeted at? So much marketing is formulaic and sales driven, that while it’s doing a job, it doesn’t necessarily have stand-out. If it’s going to have cut-through for its audience, then it also needs to talk to them in a personal way and be relevant at that moment in time. The beautiful paradox is that, at the beating heart of many of the most truly effective campaigns is that wonderfully unquantifiable thing: creativity.
Dan Brooke — Channel 4
Are you bringing to life real insight or a truth in a way that makes me stop and think, re-evaluate what I thought I believed, or create an unexpected emotional response? There’s lots of different ways to do this, but real creativity sticks in the mind and has a lasting impact. Marketers often think about use of technology when they think about what makes something innovative, but I think of it more as being unexpected. The most innovative campaigns are those that have a way of making you stand-up and take notice because they’re delivering a new way of looking at the world, a different perspective.
Ben Rhodes — Group Marketing Director, Royal Mail
Marketers are operating in an increasingly complex environment in today’s world. With slow economic growth the pressure on costs for businesses and solid quarterly results have never been greater. Growth in digital consumption continues to fragment traditional media choices, while offering more opportunities to communicate.
Innovation, Creativity, and Packing a Punch: What Makes Marketing Effective. (2018, April 17). Marketing Week.