Perceptint Musings

When I took the dive this time, I swore my goal in starting this business was to keep myself smiling. My background in start-ups educated me to the level of work and dedication it will take to make Perceptint real and ongoing. What I was
striving for mentally was creating a job with a perfect blend of excitement, engagement, execution, and open-ended flexibility.

When I posted the bullet list that kicked the business idea for Perceptint into a reality, I believed I knew how my model would play out. I would begin an engagement with an ongoing client, dive in deep with them, and then resurface three months later, ready to take on another client or two. Basic risk analysis said my need to get more than one client was very high and should be acted upon with haste.

In the reality of those three months working as a digital marketing advocate for my first client, the client and I realized the engagement we had needed to grow. My time was proving to have more of an immediate impact than expected because I was providing more benefit to the team in the short term as an operational medic, helping stave off a world of fast moving bullets.

The digital marketing strategy of the client is in pretty good shape. It needs some sculpting, but overall it’s running on a well defined track. The world that is bleeding and suffering most is the internal pipeline tasked with getting all the digital marketing projects out the door. Second behind that is a need to tie together a vast mountain of campaign reporting data into a more digestible, public facing team data point.

The client employs well over 150,000 people across a variety of regions. As more of the organization wonders about digital marketing tactics, the need to satisfy those demands grows even faster. A group that a few years ago was managing fifty to one-hundred projects is now pushing close to one-thousand projects through a pipeline that has not scaled as much as needs.

My background in project management and delivery in the agency world means I am bringing new ideas about running production and forecasting into a group where these concepts can have a very rapid impact. If we implement it correctly, it should help them scale to meet ongoing demand, and help build a clear picture of the groups’ immense value within the very large world of the organization.

These are near real time additions to the work that I defined early in the client engagement. Some of the elements we identified for me to work on are coming to fruition now that we’re through the deep dive – building a centralized knowledge base using wiki technologies and creating the Vision Report for this group to help broadcast success, failure, what we’re learning and where we’re going.

The core information offering I put forth is also proving to be a helpful addition to the team. Technology reviews, being a better ambassador to IT, and helping them better understand their agencies and their need to better lead them are all becoming topics I am no longer selling internally in conversations.

At the same time that we knew the first engagement needed to grow, I also knew that my need for diversity in my business wouldn’t be served with another direct client relationship. My scalability in the consulting side would only be to add more hourly based projects for myself or begin hiring other consultants. I’m not ready to hire and I’m not ready to triple my workload, so…

Since I have the freedom to do it, I can toss the first growth model in the virtual waste bin. Sizing up the next chapter of the business, writing, publishing and speaking more - the true core of what will keep me smiling - are to be attacked
with haste and urgency.

The satisfying part is that I’ve laid out this plan with my client and they are whole-heartedly onboard. Part of their perception of my ongoing value is my presence in the organization as an outside thought leader.

Developing this flexible model of the insider/outsider within the organization engages both sides of my brain in a way that I was not expecting. Being an ER stabilizer and a surgeon in the same day pushes my thinking, keeps me nimble, and forces me to focus in ways I am just now discovering.

I’ll keep you in the loop as to how it all develops and give you tips from what I’m learning as they come along. As always, your thoughts and comments are welcome.

© 2008 Keith Boswell

Last time I explained the thinking behind the digital marketing advocate, and the situations that led me to create the role. This time I want to start exploring the actual deliverables that I work on for clients and what they are, how they are produced and what their value is. Over the next few posts, I’ll map out quick sketches of several of the core services and what I believe they offer my clients.

Vision Reports 
The Vision Report is a quarterly state of the union for the client. Report data comes from the client as well as any third party vendors that can contribute to the Reports value.

It begins by reiterating all current marketing goals and any new or in process hot items that are still in play. Given that goals within large organizations can change quarter to quarter and year to year, it is intended to be a current and historical snapshot for the organization of all digital marketing activities.

Next is a section on current channels that are in use supporting the various goals. This is a matrix of goals, activities and basic campaign reports - a marketing map of activity, helping the marketers better understand overlap and potential integration value from multiple campaigns supporting a single goal.

The Vision Report then focuses on current political challenges or opportunities that are being tracked. Current tactics in play as well as anticipated goals/timelines for these relationships is documented to help ensure people issues aren’t impeding marketing goals.

Moving into a section on competitive updates and tracking gives my clients a view of things happening in their market that they may or may not be aware of yet. The goal of creating this section is to ensure that clients have as much visibility as possible into their top competition’s site features, content, campaigns and channels they are using. Any metrics that are being tracked for competitive measure are also included in quarterly reports.

The report closes with coverage of emerging trends or channels that present opportunities in the client space. It also serves as a spot for updating trends that have been captured in past Vision Reports. The goal is to keep a historical record of all channels in play or under consideration in the overall marketing map.

Formatting
The Vision Report will be delivered as a PowerPoint deck in the clients templates, in MS Word format for easy printing, in HTML for use on a corporate intranet or email newsletter, and in client specific Wiki Markup so that it can go right into the organizations Wiki. Any other formats that the client believes will help in disseminating and spreading the Vision Report will be used.

Goal of the Vision Report
Give the client the best and most recent information on their market, their progress on core goals, and trends that could influence future decision making. Ensure that the client provides a consistent and strong voice within the organization. Establish corporate mindshare over digital marketing topics, emerging channels and current digital markeing activities.

Next time I’ll cover Executive Coaching and Training. This is an area that is often ignored within most marketing agencies because they feel like their client can do all of the fighting/explaining on their behalf. In the digital marketing world, the complexities of the business language along with the solutions means that most executives could use coaching intended to help them better articulate to their various audiences what they need to be successful.

© 2008 Keith Boswell

A few days ago, I touched on an idea for a new role in the economy - a digital marketing advocate. I called it an Internet marketing specialist in the last post. I vacillate back and forth on the phrasing, but I believe as of today I’m settled into only using digital marketing advocate.

Because in this new role, I might recommend marketing channels or partners outside of the Internet depending on my clients goals and capabilities. The portfolio of options and agencies I discuss with my clients will always be fully engaged as I am their advocate.

After working twelve years in various agencies I realized I was only as good as the capabilities emblazoned on my trade show attire. The agencies reputation and some misinformed clients mistaken belief that we could do everything for a client because we were an agency led to a moment of enlightenment.

I was tired of being in a position that if we were asked about services or features we knew we couldn’t deliver, someone was tasked with bluffing our clients into believing we could deliver it. Screenshots, promises of future road-mapping, fueled by a foundation of MS Excel and MS Word based reports with the most rudimentary analysis because the people tasked with building it all were AM’s, PM’s, engineers, production roles and and anything else not an analyst.

Building and managing web sites, ad systems, software, marketing programs, and content for clients, but having to do it through the single production unit of the agency you’re in, began to tie this marketing advocate and my ideas down like rock rope shorts in a tarry river.

Many agencies have the instinct to do everything they can, even if they’re not good at it. Growing the account, expanding services into a client, constantly pushing to figure out how do we grow business from the marketers who already pay us well for what we do? Like a lap dog that found its perfect master, it waits and begs for table scraps because that is all it knows.

The advocates instinct is to carefully plot a perfect path, researching every millimeter from send off to welcome delivery. The goal is to help guide the great corporate Titanic’s gently past the iceberg, helping avoid the need for lifeboats and gut wrenching decisions because you knew well about the dangers ahead. And your client was right there with you, navigating with the best of them.

In today’s more nimble environment, I was increasingly under fire, having my good reputation staked on junior staff delivering services outside of my groups domain. Their mistakes and inexperience damaging a strategic client relationship I had built for years.

I also realized that no one agency can solve every need for a client today. They don’t need to and they shouldn’t. Digital marketing agencies need areas of expertise that they build thought leadership in, and niche value to maintain customer loyalty.

They could not and should not attempt to market across all digital channels, but increasingly they try. At some point, the sheer size and points of communication that must be maintained for a single client to run smoothly begin to overwhelm the agency model.

Why put good customers and relationships in jeopardy when all it could take was a little honesty and hubris? We don’t do everything you need us to, but the thing you do need from us, we do better than anybody. I’d buy that.

What I and most corporate marketers don’t want to buy is a company that is really good in X, buys companies that do Y and Z, and suddenly we’re supposed to translate that belief in service of X over into Y&Z. This wobbling, stacking blocks of value doesn’t deliver what a client really needs. The only person to benefit from these corporate mash-ups is a misinformed shareholder.

Unless your agency has built every single platform and channel management tool for every service they are selling you, I can almost guarantee that behind the scenes, you are getting the most Frankenstein, stitched together by the seat of your pants digital marketing mirage you’d never believe you saw unless you lived it. And I lived it, so trust me when I say I’ve seen it all.

Agencies that try to grow business by expanding their services deeper into their clients ultimately lose focus on their area of excellence or the ones they are dragging their clients into. Why do you think most clients of agencies receive reports in Word and Excel from many of their digital agencies, and not through an online reporting function?

Most agencies are struggling to consume and process the amount of data they are taking in and tasked with reporting back to clients. As they add new channels, they are adding thousands of data points per client into their systems. Growing their business means ultimately moving expertise into the data management business. And if they are expanding their service offering, it means keeping expertise and leadership across all of those channels., plus managing all that data.

In my estimation, the workforce is about five to ten years away from having enough people with the right experience in each channel to make that a possibility for the largest, global agencies. And that gap is where I smelled opportunity for a new class of strategist - the independent digital marketing advocate.

Someone with a depth of experience delivering digital marketing services, the ability to write like an analyst, the candor and honesty of a good friend, and a communicator who could tie it all together to help clients make better informed decisions, and manage the growing list of needed digital marketing relationships. The advocate can’t build and deliver it all, but they can plan, architect, map, and help steer corporations in ways that someone within an agency doesn’t have the freedom to do.

The advocate can investigate and test new channels on their clients behalf. They can serve as a springboard for new ideas and procedures. They sit in a neutral, analyst stance - giving researched and vetted opinions about various topics, as needed by clients and their own gut reactions to new technologies and trends. They can also help digital marketing agencies and their clients find more value in their relationship.

I chose also to limit myself to a single client per vertical industry. This really leaves plenty of room in my mind for many more digital marketing advocates to begin finding and delivering value until the rest of the workforce catches up.

At this point, valuable time says I should pause and tell you something. This post has turned into a five day epic editing session, so I know I have a lot more to say about this. Rather than keep editing and rewriting, I’ll lay today’s rant to rest.

I ended up just describing the digital marketing advocate this time. Next time, I’ll get into specific deliverables and the types of value I expect this role to create for large organizations. I’m very interested in any and all feedback and ideas that might pop up upon reading this.

May advocacy for a topic fall upon you like a wet, heavy winter rain. Reminding you of its strength with an icy grasp on your imagination. Until next time.

© 2008 Keith Boswell