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Here’s What Makes the Modern Marketer Different

Feb 10, 2022
Jeff Haws

We all want to think of ourselves as “modern marketers.” No one wants to believe they’re stuck behind the curve, spinning their wheels and doing things the same way they’ve always been done. We want to be pushing the envelope a bit, taking chances and disrupting whatever industry we’re in with new and innovative ideas.

We’ve found that the truly modern, forward-thinking marketers we talk to regularly can be counted on to be doing a number of things very well. And they’re seeing some tremendous results from their work too. Here’s what they’re doing to really separate themselves from the pack:

Putting data at the center of everything

Successful marketing is all about getting the right message out to customers (and potential customers) at the right time, influencing their behavior along the way. And doing that well means your marketing strategy — yes, your entire marketing strategy — needs to put first-party data at the gravitational center.

That’s why the modern marketer is getting their data into a centralized data platform with a unified view of their customers, syncing up the flow of information from every possible touchpoint to give them a customer-centric mindset. Ensuring direct access to that data and using it smartly to target customers with cross-channel campaigns that are meaningful to them personally is modern thinking.

Smartly dividing audiences based upon what you know

Modern marketers are always thinking about the best ways to segment out their audience, and ensuring they have the tools they need to do it in a smart way. How do you define a “recent purchase”? When should customers fall into a “lapsed” category? What buying signals can we use to create a “likely purchase” audience?

Being strategic about this is essential, and then making sure your customer engagement platform enables you to make changes to the audiences as you deem them necessary will make a significant difference as time goes on. Flexibility and vigilance are your friends when trying to ensure you’re always on the forefront of audience engagement.

Always looking ahead

Modern marketers aren’t content to simply act off the data they have, but they also want to be thinking ahead so they can be proactive instead of always reacting to customer activity. With live data access, modern marketers are always aware of customer behavior immediately and can build in predictions about customer needs based upon that knowledge.

If a customer purchases a bed, what does that tell you about their likelihood to also be interested in a side table or a dresser? If they buy a heavy winter jacket, can you anticipate they’ll buy gloves or a pair of snow boots next? Don’t just sit back and wait for the customer to tell you what they want by adding it to their cart or saving it in their profile. Anticipate what they’ll do next, based upon the data you’ve collected on all your customers.

Analyzing and testing, with goals in mind

And, of course, the modern marketer isn’t just guessing at all this. They’re always digging into the data for new learnings. Always running A/B and other multivariate tests to determine the best subject line for a campaign, best call-to-action to get clicks, best headline to keep people reading.

They’re not following hunches. They’re making every attempt to be as objective as possible when they pursue a new strategy. This means it’s never been more important for marketers to have full, live access to all their data, and for them to have a single source of truth that everyone is confident in. That way, the data is true, and your learnings from it can be trusted.

Takeaways

In short: the modern marketer puts data at the center of everything, and never settles for delivering a merely OK customer experience. Making the customer feel special and understood is essential, and they’ll leave no stone unturned to meet that challenge. To find out more about how MessageGears can empower you — the modern marketer — to exceed all your goals, reach out today.

About the Author

Jeff Haws

As MessageGears’ Senior Marketing Manager, Jeff is focused on producing engaging and thoughtful content that resonates with enterprise marketers, helping them to better understand how MessageGears makes their jobs easier. He’s passionate about understanding the way data impacts messaging, and he’s also hopelessly obsessed with baseball.