Scott Brinker

How a marketing technologist says “Happy Holidays”

It’s been a great year — and a busy one — for everyone in the marketing technology space. And all indications are that next year will be even more of a rocketship. For now though, I just want to say thank you for reading and contributing to this blog this year. The exchange of ideas that we’ve shared over the past 12 months has been very inspiring to me. Reflecting back on the year, these …

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Why this CMO loathes marketing plans (interview)

One of my favorite marketers in the Boston area is Frank Days. He’s super smart, speaks his mind, and is a great champion of innovation in the marketing department. He was one of the early pioneers of agile marketing, implementing it at Novell several years ago and sharing his experience with others. So I was excited to finally catch up with him for an interview on some of his current thinking about agile marketing. You …

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Agile marketing in 20 slides and 5 minutes (video)

“What the heck is this agile marketing thing people keep talking about?!” If that question is on your mind — and you aren’t familiar with agile software development, from which its ideas sprang — this 5 minute video will give you the quick lowdown. It was recorded at the ASAE’s technology conference earlier this month in an “ignite talk” format — 20 slides, 15 seconds per slide auto-advancing, 5 minutes total. (I’m not sure who …

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4 out 5 analysts recommend a marketing technology office

Admittedly, the statistical validity of that headline is suspect. As a child of the 80’s, back when people actually watched commercials on our sole screen in the living room, such tag lines were embedded in my psyche and occasionally pop out. (I always wondered why the fifth dentist from those Trident commercials was such a killjoy.) But I digress… More and more people — even those with credentials primarily from IT — are reaching the …

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5 marketing meta-trends (the presentation)

I’m giving a presentation today at the ITSMA‘s annual marketing conferencing on the topics of agile marketing and the rise of marketing technologists — two of my favorite subjects. I’ll be discussing them in the context of the 5 meta-trends in modern marketing that I wrote about earlier this year. Here’s the presentation, along with an essay version of my talk. It’s long — about 8,000 words — so if you want the Cliff Notes …

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“Every customer experience is a brand moment of truth.”

The reason why I like Google’s term “ZMOT” — the Zero Moment of Truth — is because I really do visualize that the distance of most prospect’s initial moment-of-truth with a company has collapsed to effectively zero. It’s the distance someone’s finger needs to travel to click (or tap) on a link that holds forth a promise, explicitly or implicitly. Does your brand live up to that promise? In all channels, digital and physical? The …

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Technical expertise is more important than agency experience for CMOs

The Economist Intelligence Unit is on a roll with its marketing industry research. It just released another report, sponsored by SAS, titled Outside Looking In: The CMO Struggles to Get in Sync with the C-Suite. The gist of the report, a global survey of 389 executives, is that marketing is in a period of great change, it’s becoming more strategic, and many organizations are not yet in agreement on what that means for the CMO’s …

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Why marketing may solve the innovator’s dilemma

You may have heard of the recent report by the Economist Intelligence Unit, Cultivating Business-Led Innovation. The big conversation nugget that has been appearing on a number of marketing industry sites is the survey result stating that more than twice as many executives cite marketing as involved in bringing innovative ideas to market than IT. Yes, 45% of senior executives say marketing is involved in birthing innovative ideas, but only 19% say their IT teams …

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Moving marketing beyond the arts and crafts department (interview)

While the marketing technology landscape is vibrant and crowded with innovators of all kinds, there are only a handful of companies that can legitimately take credit for having — near single-handedly — changed the very way marketers think and talk about marketing. HubSpot, the people who invented “inbound marketing,” is one of them. So it was great to ask Mike Volpe, their CMO, a few questions about how they manage their own marketing — including …

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What agile marketers can learn from the U.S. CTO

Think your organization is too large or too political to adopt agile marketing? You might take inspiration from the U.S. CTO Todd Park, who has ignited a number of agile projects in the U.S. federal government and — isn’t there a law against this? — is actually getting stuff done. Park, who has a successful background as a tech-savvy entrepreneur (he co-founded Athenahealth in the 90’s), was the CTO of the Department of Health and …

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