The Modern Marketer Part Artist – Part Scientist

Marketing is an important business function that works in a challenging environment. The scope of marketing is continuously changing because the expectations of customers are always fluctuating. Marketers today are forced to be on their toes as they thrive to build customer relationships. To be a successful marketer today, you need to learn much more than the basic concepts of marketing itself. You have to keep evolving and most importantly, you have to be creative.

Moving in to 2013, a marketer is required to perform a variety of tasks. For better understanding, we have divided the roles in two different categories i.e. marketer as an artist and marketer as a scientist.

SalesForce has released this simplistically detailed infographic drawing a comparison between the two roles of a marketer. The left side depicts the artist while the right side depicts the scientist. Check it out below and read on for details:

Marketer as an Artist:

In this role marketers need to use their creativity and imagination to engage with customers. Without the creativity, you cannot hope to grab the attention of a passer-by. But how do you get creative? We’ve believe the following set of skills should help you perform your role as an artistic marketer:

• 1. Content: For modern marketers, content is an energetic appearance of the brand. Marketers think that content marketing and the emphasis on earned media is not just a shift in the basic marketing techniques, but in fact is much more than a trend. Inbound marketing heavily relies on the marketer’s ability to come up with fresh content.
• 2. Visual Assets: In addition to content marketing, the visual representation of a brand holds a significant importance in the eyes of modern marketers. The basic aim of a marketer is to create brand recall. Simply put, this means that a consumer should be able to visually differentiate a brand from its competitors.
• 3. Social Media: Social media has had a huge impact on the business culture, the way businesses work and the way businesses interact with consumers. Social media has become an integral part of today’s business environment and when it comes to marketing, it simply cannot be ignored. Modern marketers know that use of social media in a marketing strategy is not a choice anymore, it is mandatory.
• 4. Email Marketing: Customized emails are still one of the major resources for modern marketers. However, correctly drafted content, appealing design and catchy body copy are still the main skills for marketers.

Marketer as Scientist:

In this role marketers need to use their analytical side to measure and calibrate marketing strategies. The marketers use the following skills to successfully perform the role of a scientist:

• 1. Performance Tracking: Previously, marketing departments were treated as a cost center. This perception has gradually changed as efficient and fast paced strategies have taken over. Today, the modern marketer keeps track of all the marketing activities and campaigns.
• 2. Operations: Modern marketers have learned that they need to move ahead and be able to adjust in any kind of environment. Marketers now take responsibility to manage their own activities and budgets. They have learned the art of getting the work done with minimum resources.
• 3. Analytics: The very basic thing for a marketer is to know the trend and analyze responses that can make their campaign a huge success. To perform this task, modern marketers need to be data experts, and should have the expertise to derive meaning out of facts and figures.
• 4. Campaign Performance: Modern marketers need to know about the various success factors for a marketing campaign. They need to understand the importance of technology and the tools that measure the performance of the campaign, to easily identify the things that require modifications and detect areas of potential.

Conclusion:

Modern marketers are responsible for a number of things but perhaps the most important of all is that they should maximize customer satisfaction throughout the buying process i.e. from lead generation to monitoring post-purchase feedback. Marketers can adapt to the changes once they are able to develop both an artistic side and scientist side.