What Marketers Want: Five Strategic Opportunities for 2018

In our latest report, we’ve identified the greatest opportunities and challenges for marketing in the year ahead following our survey with more than 1,000 marketers across the US, UK, France, Germany and Asia-Pacific (APAC) regions.

Download the report now!

In the early years of online retail, targeting shoppers was a straightforward process. Fast-forward to 2018, the consumer journey has become incredibly complex, with our data showing that consumers now interact with brands through an average of 9.2 touchpoints before making a purchase.

This evolution means that the modern marketers’ role has become as intricate as the purchasing journey. Faced with new media channels, data sources and regulations, marketers have had to become data and analytics experts, constantly managing customer expectations both online and offline.

Through the data collected, we identified that the modern marketer works in accordance with four core marketer profiles: the Advancer, the Advocate, the Adapter and the Architect. For marketing teams, these four profiles offer a simple and easy way to identify their current team mix and new-hire needs, so they can ensure the right balance that makes for an industry-winning team:

• Advancers: Making up half of our respondents, their priorities are exploring new marketing technologies and winning new authority for their marketing team within the organization
• Advocates: This smaller segment, making up 30% of respondents, are predominantly influencer specialists and networkers who are focused on relationships, both internally and externally
• Adapters: These attribution experts (11% of respondents) are interested in optimization, creating efficiencies and adapting creatives
• Architects: Making up 8% of respondents, this smallest segment are mainly occupied with where data originates and are focused on compliance and regulation

Delving deeper into these profiles, the data collected revealed marketers’ views on the greatest opportunities and fears for marketing in the year ahead which we explore in detail in our new report What Marketers Want: Five Strategic Opportunities for 2018.

The report provides insights into the following areas of attention which you should be focusing on in 2018:

• Reducing waste in marketing spend
• Going global
• Changing customer expectations
• Video investment
• Seasonal marketing campaigns