In these uncertain economic conditions it has never been more important for organisations to deliver growth. Research from Deloitte, the business advisory firm, finds that CEOs are placing their faith in marketing above all other drivers to shape strategy and drive growth.
Malcolm Wilkinson, head of Deloitte’s marketing effectiveness team said: “As market conditions deteriorate growth is like gold dust. Our research has found that organisations believe that marketing is the driver of growth through its role as a generator of demand. It is now up to marketing to rise to the challenge.”
Deloitte’s research found that 81% of CEOs identified marketing as a key driver of growth and 85% identified it as crucial to devising corporate strategy.
Once in a lifetime opportunity for marketing
Malcolm Wilkinson continued: “There is a once in a lifetime opportunity for marketing to step up to the challenge and prove itself as being integral to business growth. That marketing is fundamental to organisational growth is understood, but to deliver that growth marketing needs to be effective.”
The views of senior marketers surveyed by Deloitte in July 2008 reveal a widespread lack of confidence in their own profession with only 20% believing that marketing in their organisation is truly effective.
“The irony here is that executives are saying in the same breath that marketing is fundamental to growth but are also looking to cut marketing budgets in this challenging trading period. We believe it is the failure of marketers to demonstrate effectiveness that ultimately leads to an inability to defend marketing budgets. That marketing budgets are viewed as expendable when it is almost universally accepted that marketing is responsible for generating demand highlights an inherent contradiction and a lack of clarity around its role and value.” Malcolm Wilkinson said.
Deloitte believes that an organisation’s inability to deliver marketing driven growth is largely due to a lack of shared understanding of the role of marketing.
* Only 12% of senior marketers strongly agree that the role of the Marketing function is clearly articulated within their organisation.
* And of the same set of respondent only 20% strongly agree that the roles and responsibilities of the marketing department are well defined.
* This is also a view held within the boardroom where 77% of c-level respondents believe their employees do not fully appreciate the value of marketing.
These findings are based on three years of research and analysis (1) into the role of marketing (2) and the differing boardroom perspectives and an ongoing benchmarking exercise (3) that reveals the detailed views of 160 senior marketing professionals. Deloitte are also today publishing Leadership for Growth, the second in a series of reports that focuses on the need for leadership from the CEO to generate marketing driven growth.
Marketing should move to the centre of business
Malcolm Wilkinson continued: “Marketing can become central to business if it can live up to its own billing. You can’t expect an organisation to articulate itself when the Marketing function cannot articulate its own role.”
“It will need to do more to convince finance professionals through a shared understanding of marketing measures that are clearly linked to strategy. The marketer must present the value created in terms that the Finance function can understand. Only 16% of respondents said that their Marketing function is able to communicate its needs to other operational areas. It is clear from our research that Marketing is not taking up this challenge – it only has itself to blame.”
“Our report calls for CEOs to review where their organisation sits in this debate in order to turn their vision and strategy of marketing driven growth into reality. To do this business leaders must clearly identify the drivers of growth for their business, align leadership around a shared understanding of the role of marketing and clearly articulate its role across the wider organisation.”