Lola White and I attended the 2014 MMA CEO/CMO Summit this week in Hilton Head, SC which included a keynote address by John Costello, President – Marketing & Innovation, Dunkin’ Brands. John is also Global Chairman of MMA and his perspective included “We are seeing what will be the most profound change in marketing and e-commerce through mobile.” This is why approx. 150-200 people attended including senior marketers from American Express, Campbell’s, Chase, Coca-Cola, Cosi, GM, Heineken, Hilton, P&G, Perry Ellis, Reckitt Bensicker, and Sears.
Jeff Hasen was one of 60-70 CMOs in attendance and his conference highlights are below.
Key Highlights by Jeff Hasen – Mobile Marketing Strategist in Seattle, WA
Predictably, the topics of privacy, personalization and ROI led the discussion at the recent CEO/CMO Summit staged by the Mobile Marketing Association. What was new was talk of the use of technology that gets marketers too close to mobile users.
xAd showed how a toothpaste brand can serve up an ad to someone that it knows is at the dentist’s office. There was significant pushback during the presentation and afterward with several noting that a dentist’s visit is off limits for brands even if the technology is there to reach out to a mobile user before, during, or after a deep clean or root canal.
The MMA opened the conference by teasing the notion that a 16 percent share of the marketing spend for mobile could bring companies such as Coca-Cola an additional $1 billion in market cap. Most brands spend in the single digits and have yet to be convinced that more is justified.
Still, we learned lots from major brand marketers.
For instance, addressing questions about the ROI on mobile, Andrew Flack, Hilton Worldwide’s vice president for product marketing and customer insights, said that just as Hilton knew when it was time to put TVs and air conditioning in rooms, it knows that “now is the time for mobile.”
Mr. Flack’s advice?
“Be prepared to not be perfect,” he said. “In a year, three or four things will work. One will be OK. One will be a learning.”
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