In today’s society, individuals and brands can face immense backlash and cancellation in an instant. A poorly timed tweet, a translated advertisement with the wrong meaning or a marketing campaign that fails to properly address the concerns and interests of its target audience are all cause for concern. While not every marketing lapse can be avoided, there is one tactic that can help organizations more easily navigate this increasingly complex world.
Collaboration offers many benefits for businesses. And when it comes to marketing, collaboration can enhance the effectiveness of messaging. Read on to learn how to collaborate to make your marketing more memorable – in a good way.
Incorporate the following best practices to make your marketing truly collaborative:
Marketing can’t happen in a silo. To truly tailor your messaging to your target audience and future proof it, you need to expand your brainstorming beyond just the marketing department. Having regular conversations with various teams, including purchasing, production, R&D, sales and customer service, can open up new insights and help avoid messaging lapses.
For example, the sales and customer service teams can detail the types of conversations they’re having with prospects and customers. What are the most common pain points they’re experiencing? What areas of improvement have they noted regarding the product or service you offer? Are there benefits they’ve realized that might make a noteworthy case study or could be used to better promote the solution?
Companies with global operations can improve their marketing campaigns by working closely with counterparts based in North America, Asia and other regions of the world. This type of collaboration can reveal successful marketing campaigns that could be replicated in other countries or even highlight best practices learned from campaigns that missed the mark.
If the intent is to take a campaign global, it’s essential to vet the copy, imagery and even any music that might be used to ensure the messaging remains consistent. Sometimes there are unintended “lost in translation” issues when translating copy or using certain images in other countries. A global campaign requires a greater investment, so taking the time to do it right is key. Otherwise, reworking and relaunching materials will end up costing your business more.
Diversity drives creativity and problem-solving, which is why it’s important to have people from different backgrounds on your team and to cultivate a culture that encourages everyone to actively voice their opinions. This will give you honest feedback about your marketing plans and the content you produce.
Focusing on diversity at every level of your organization is key. Leadership teams especially need to become more diverse so that higher-level decision making is well rounded. According to a 2019 analysis from McKinsey and Company, “companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on executive teams were 25% more likely to have above-average profitability than companies in the fourth quartile.”
Being mindful of gender, sexual orientation, age, disability, race and other factors and including people who can offer insights on these experiences can help your brand avoid tone-deaf marketing and create campaigns that more effectively resonate with your target audiences. Being inclusive and developing better content? It’s a win-win for your business’s culture, brand reputation and bottom line.
In addition to collaborating with internal team members, you can also consider seeking feedback from external audiences to further improve your marketing campaigns. Focus groups and surveys are affordable methods that can help your marketing department test out messaging. The results of these session will enable you to fine-tune content before launch. If possible, aim to have input from a diverse group of people so that you can verify that your campaign adequately resonates with your target audiences.
When executed in a collaborative way, marketing has the power to better engage your target audience. Fine-tuning your messaging and visuals with the help of numerous people and departments within your organization, and sometimes with support from external audiences, can help you avoid the dreaded tone-deaf marketing that continues to make headlines today. However, it’s important to remember that diversity of thought without diverse representation in the decision-making process is not the right approach. Prioritizing gender, racial, age diversity and other types of diversity within your organization will give your team the best chance of marketing success.
Looking for an outside perspective on your brand’s marketing initiatives? Contact Mulberry to learn how we can help your B2B marketing campaigns come to life.
Jess Messenger is an Account Director at Mulberry Marketing Communications, an award-winning full-service B2B communications agency based in Chicago, London and Australia. She enjoys developing PR campaign strategies and writing for B2B audiences across numerous verticals such as retail, foodservice and healthcare.