DM Magazine March 2023

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Data is the Spark

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VOL. 36 • NO. 3 • MARCH 2023

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Talking Points

Vol. 36 | No. 3 | March 2023

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Highlights From Shopify and Astound ❯ 24 Commerce Sustainability Report Microlearning

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Brand Positioning: An Interview With Ulli Applebaum

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BFSI, healthcare, and education sectors.

Canada has some of the greenest data center facilities, with an average Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) of around 1.2. According to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), in 2020, around 81 percent of the renewable energy generated in the country came from hydro and other marine sources.

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Survey of CMOs: Recession Fears Cause Companies to Double Down on Demand Activation Chief Outsiders is a firm that offers companies fractional Chief Marketing Officer and Chief Sales Officer services. These services are delivered by executives with Fortune 500 experience. They recently released the results from their fourth annual survey of its CMOs on their 2023 outlook - among the main findings: fears of a recession are driving a shift to demand activation and away from longterm brand building.

the highest priority for the C-Suite in 2023.

They also see that CEOs increasingly give CMOs the responsibility to drive that effort, and it looks like this shift to a very strategic, even business-critical, role for the CMO will be permanent,” said Pete Hayes, CMO and coprincipal of Chief Outsiders. “What will now help bring about the much-desired growth?

Our CMOs believe that revisiting market and competitive insights, refreshing strategy, and accelerating digital marketing capabilities will be three critical factors in helping companies grow in 2023.”

The survey of 80 CMOs provides insights into the shifting CMO role in driving growth, the impact of technology and emerging trends, and the priorities for C-suite and private equity in the coming year. The survey also shines a light on the importance of customer experience, the impact of emerging technologies on marketing, and the trends in social media and DTC sales in 2023.

Some specific insights that CEOs and other members of the C-Suite can draw from the survey include:

Canada’s Data Centre Demand

According to Arizton’s latest research report, the Canadian data centre market is to grow at a CAGR of 8.70 percent during 2022-2028.

Over the next few years, Canada’s maximum data centre demand will come from the cloud segment, followed by the IT and Telecom, government, eCommerce, BFSI, healthcare, and education sectors. Canada is a well-established market in North America. The country supports investments with its macroeconomic policies and other incentives for investors. Toronto and Montreal are Canada’s primary data centre hubs, with cities such as Calgary and Kamloops also receiving investments from eStruxture Data Centers and Equinix, respectively, during the forecast period.

Toronto and Montreal are the primary data centre hubs in Canada, with cities such as Calgary and Kamloops also receiving investments from eStruxture Data Centers and Equinix, respectively, during the forecast period. Over the next few years, the maximum data center demand in Canada is expected to come from the cloud segment, followed by the IT and Telecom, government, eCommerce, ❱ DMN.CA

“One of the key findings of our 4th annual survey of CMOs indicates that the current inflationary environment is having companies place a much greater emphasis on near-term sales, so we have a recalibration of the brand building/demand activation strategic mix, in favour of the latter,” said Art Saxby, founder, co-principal and CEO of Chief Outsiders. “The new emphasis on demand activation is very understandable. Of course, it is then the role of CMOs to make sure that in the current economic climate, companies do not forget to invest in their brands altogether.”

“CMOs believe safeguarding growth to be

AI and Machine Learning Revolutionary.

AI and machine learning will be a gamechanging technology in 2023, and they will have the most impact on marketing regarding customer targeting and modelling customer behaviour. ❯ Economy a Headwind to Growth. 84 percent of CMOs believe the economic and business climate of the next 12 months will negatively impact business goals. The economic climate will hamper the ability to meet performance expectations, citing inflation, talent issues, and supply chain issues. ❯ Sales & Marketing Misaligned. CMOs believe ❯

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Following the launch of ChatGPT, CMOs were also asked what value ChatGPT is most likely to offer marketers. They answered that ChatGPT and other generative AI applications will be used, especially in content creation and management. Market research and digital marketing came in second and third respectively.

MARCH 2023

“Marketing professionals should embrace AI for the many ways the technology can help them serve their clients efficiently,” said Hayes.

“AI will not replace experienced marketers and everything they have to offer their clients, but marketers who are versed in AI will replace those who do not understand the technology.”

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Arima and Vividata Partner to Enable Use of Study of Canadian Consumer Within Arima Data Science Platform Arima today announced that the Vividata Study of the Canadian Consumer (SCC) is now available as a premium addition to the Arima Data Science Platform. Now, Vividata’s SCC data is available across Arima’s advanced marketing platform, which includes fully customized consumer insights (Persona Builder) and enables media planning (Cross Media Planner) and spatial decision-making (Location Intelligence).

Arima and Vividata will continue to explore and educate the Canadian marketing sector

planning, measurement and evaluation.”

As marketers, agencies, broadcasters, and publishers develop new approaches to privacy compliance and data protection, this integration offers key benefits including: ❯ Variables within Arima’s Synthetic Society expand from 5,000 to 25,000 attributes; ❯ Ability to fuse Vividata media planning data with Arima Marketing Mix Models for crossmedia planning and attribution; ❯ Vividata/Arima users can begin to explore the use of SyntheticIDs within media buying/selling arrangements; and, ❯ Advertiser’s custom questions could be added to the Synthetic Society.

“Vividata is pleased to partner with Arima — a thought leader in synthetic data,” says Pat Pellegrini, President and CEO at Vividata. “The expanded capabilities offered by working with the Arima platform deliver immediate benefits to Vividata users. Its advancements through synthetic data let users see our data in new ways that are completely privacy compliant, creating new possibilities for analysis.”

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poorly defined strategy and corporate culture are the most likely causes of misaligned sales and marketing. Still, they believe that the relationship between sales and marketing has improved as companies rely on digital channels for demand generation. ❯ CMO Role in C-Suite Changing. 74 percent of CMOs believe there has been a shift in the past 12 months in the role CMOs are expected to play in driving growth, with the majority of CMOs believing there is more emphasis on immediate sales, less long-term thinking, and more short-term thinking. Most CMOs believe this shift is driven by changing customer behaviour and increased competition. 75 percent of CMOs believe this shift in how CEOs view CMOs as growth drivers are permanent. ❯ Improved Perception of CMOs. 73 percent of CMOs believe they are viewed more positively by CEOs than in previous years. ❯ Market Research Driving Growth.

CMOs believe that market research and competitive insights, strategy development and planning, and digital marketing will be the most significant driving factors in delivering growth. ❯ Growth Trumping Other Priorities. The majority of CMOs selected “Setting the growth agenda” as the highest priority for C-Suite / PE in 2023. ❯ Customer Experience a Competitive Advantage. CMOs believe that creating a best-in-class customer experience is a significant competitive advantage and that market research and competitive insights, strategy development and planning, and digital marketing will be the most important driving factors in delivering growth. ❯ Video Popular on Social Media. Most CMOs believe that customers want to be communicated with over social media platforms through video. Most of them will make video content production a priority in 2023. ❯ LinkedIn and Instagram Most Popular. CMOs cited LinkedIn as their likely predominant social platform for B2B, and Instagram for B2C influencer campaigns in 2023. ❯ DTC Sales up in Retail. CMOs believe either Retail or Health Care will significantly increase DTC sales in 2023. ❯ Gen Z Caring about ESG. Most CMOs surveyed believe Gen Z is the most concerned about a brand’s stance on ESG when considering buying.

on the benefits and implications of synthetic data for marketing uses.

“Synthetic data is regarded as the gold standard for data sharing by privacy advocates. It is inter-operational across digital and analogue media, does not depend on cookies, and because there is no one-toone connection with individuals, it does not require consent management,” says Arima founder, Winston Li. “We expect that our work with Vividata, a company that is highly regarded in the media and marketing industry, will greatly advance cross-media

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Preventive Healthcare Technologies And Services Global Market Report The global preventive healthcare technologies and services market grew from $220.95 billion in 2022 to $251.83 billion in 2023 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 14.0 percent. The Russia-Ukraine war disrupted the chances of global economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, at least in the short term. The war between these DMN.CA ❰

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two countries has led to economic sanctions on multiple countries, a surge in commodity prices, and supply chain disruptions, causing inflation across goods and services and affecting many markets across the globe.

The preventive healthcare technologies and services market is expected to grow to $441.5 billion in 2027 at a CAGR of 15.1 percent.

The preventive healthcare technologies market includes revenues earned by entities remote patient monitoring, 5G-enabled devices, and wearable sensors. The market value includes the value of related goods sold by the service provider or included within the service offering. Only goods and services traded between entities or sold to end consumers are included.

Preventive healthcare technologies include screenings, check-ups, and patient counselling to identify and prevent health problems. Preventive healthcare technology devices are more commonly used to measure daily life health patterns like blood oxygen saturation, heart rate, blood pressure, and sleep patterns.

Preventive healthcare technologies and services are used to take measures and identify future illnesses and treatment by healthcare providers. North America was the largest region in the preventive healthcare technologies and services market in 2022.

Europe is expected to be the fastest-growing region in the forecast period.

The main types of preventive healthcare technologies and services market are early detection and screening technologies, vaccines, chronic disease management technologies, and advanced technologies to reduce errors. Early detection and screening technologies are used to identify future health conditions of patients.

The early detection and screening technologies include x-ray, CT, ultrasound, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

The applications of preventive healthcare technologies and services are in hospitals and clinics.

An increase in the older population pool ❱ DMN.CA

is increasing demand for the preventive healthcare technologies and services market.

Medical problems are known to increase with age, due to this preventing or identifying problems at an early stage can decrease the risk and intensity of the issue.

According to the United Nations survey, an intergovernmental organization, there were around 727 million persons that were aged 65 years or above in 2020 and it is projected to reach around 1.5 billion in 2050. This increase in the aged people population can also directly impact the preventive healthcare technologies market.

The use of artificial intelligence (AI) as a preventive healthcare technique is a rising trend in the preventive healthcare technologies and services market. Many medical conditions such as identifying type 1 diabetes, indications of Alzheimer’s, and predicting breast cancer, and cardiovascular diseases can be identified using advanced AI technologies.

Some orthopedic spine surgery experts from Boston-based Massachusetts General Hospital suggest that machine learning and AI can also predict personalized and accurate assumptions of where fractures will happen on a patient based on the history of the patient and the historic database available.

Similarly, in November 2020, Medtronic, American-Irish registered medical device company acquired France based company, Medicrea that provides AI-driven surgical planning and predictive modelling tools which helps to improve the quality of spine management.

In November 2021, Hellman & Friedman and Bain Capital, a private equity firm, acquired Athenahealth, Inc for $17 billion.

This acquisition will help Athenahealth become the largest and most innovative provider of cloud-based electronic medical records and physician practice solutions in the USA. Athenahealth, Inc is a cloud computing vendor that enhances the clinical quality, operational efficiency, and delivery of preventive care to many patients in the US.

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INSIGHT

Introducing Canada’s Newest Marketing Legends ROBERT MACLEAN

C

anada’s Marketing Hall of Legends just announced the inauguration of six new Marketing Legends and this year’s Marketer-on-the-Rise. And like last year, data-driven, response-based marketing has played an essential part in their achievements.

Our newest Marketing Legends include two brand builders and four agency founders: Lisa Lisson, SVP of hubs, ramps, and global operations control, FedEx; Noel O’Dea, president and founder, Target Marketing and Communications Inc.; Sandra Sanderson, SVP, marketing, Empire Company Limited and Sobeys Inc.; as well as Chris Staples, Ian Grais, and Tom Shepansky, the founding partners, Rethink Communications.

The 2023 Marketer-on-the-Rise is Hyla Nayeri and Adrien Bettio, founders of the meteoric 437 Swimwear, a luxury swimwear and apparel brand launched in 2017.

“These diverse marketers have each elevated our industry in Canada and on the world stage,” says Barbara Boyd, president of AMA Toronto, the association that runs the award.

“Through the Marketing Hall of Legends, we celebrate and recognize their remarkable leadership, vision, and achievements.”

Canada’s Marketing Hall of Legends honours the industry’s most inspiring visionaries, enablers, builders and mentors who’ve had tremendous impact on the marketing field throughout their careers. The Marketer-on-the-Rise award celebrates Canada’s top upand-comers — the next generation of influential marketing leaders.

The class of ‘23 have all demonstrated that datadriven intelligence has driven organizational success for their companies and clients. Analytics and key performance metrics have provided them with the confidence and capabilities to generate MARCH 2023

insights into optimized decisionmaking, support customer engagement, and develop awardwinning creative marketing.

Lisa Lisson is the first marketing leader from the transportation sector to become a Marketing Legend. Last month, she took on a new role at FedEx, leading nearly 40,000 employees across the United States. Previously, Lisson spent 12 years as SVP and president of FedEx Express Canada, and was the first Canadian and first woman to hold the post. Under her leadership, FedEx Canada was consistently listed highest among transportation companies in reputation rankings and as a best employer.

“I’m fortunate to serve as a leader in work that I’m passionate about at FedEx, and being acknowledged for this work means so much to me,” says Lission. “It’s even more exciting to accept this award as FedEx celebrates its 50th anniversary, knowing I’ve made an impact on the strides we’ve made in Canada while serving the communities our team lives and works in.”

Noel O’Dea, best known for his company’s poetic brand campaigns for Newfoundland and Labrador, becomes the first marketer from the province to be inducted. “We set out to make our moms proud — and our clients famous. We took the road less travelled, here in the most creative place on the planet.” says O’Dea. “Newfoundland is our inspiration, and Target’s indispensable competitive advantage.”

Since founding Target in St. John’s 40 years ago, his agency has helped build hundreds of brands and won creative awards in Canada and globally. “I’ve always been committed to doing emotional work that makes people ‘feel’ something, that moves them, that evokes laughter or love. That people remember,” says O’Dea. Sandra Sanderson becomes the

first woman from the grocery retail industry to become a Legend. At Empire Company Limited and Sobeys Inc., she’s been a driving force in transforming the company’s marketing, including it becoming an Olympic sponsor and the first Official Grocer of Team Canada.

“Marketing has undergone extraordinary change in recent years,” says Sanderson. “I count myself lucky to have played a role in its transformation, as brands strive to meet customers’ everevolving needs.”

Beginning her career in CPG working on Ivory, Mr. Clean, and Kraft Dinner, Sanderson went on to lead marketing at Canada Post and Universal Studios before moving to Shoppers Drug Mart, Walmart, and eventually Empire Company Limited and Sobeys Inc. Chris Staples, Ian Grais and Tom Shepansky are the founders of Rethink Communications, and the first business “trio” inducted.

“We are so honoured to be the first trio inducted into Canada’s Marketing Hall of Legends, they said in a joint statement. “There’s never been a CEO at Rethink — we believe our shared leadership model featuring all sides of the business has been a crucial factor in success.

Creative directors Staples and Grais are famous around the world for their body of award-winning work. Shepansky, the business lead, is well-known for brilliantly overseeing strategy, account services and finance. Today, the

three founders have stepped away from their management of the agency, but remain on the Rethink Board of Trustees.

“For nearly 20 years, the Marketing Hall of Legends has been evolving with the marketing sector,” says Jacob Kessler, VP, CMHOL, AMA Toronto. “Today, the award proudly reflects a mosaic of marketing talent from coast to coast, but remains a once-in-a-lifetime, one-of-a-kind achievement.”

Canada’s Marketing Legends is made possible by AMA Toronto’s dedicated community of volunteers and through the backing of Zulu Alph Kilo, this year’s presenting sponsor.

“We’re happy to support and celebrate this year’s class and all their contributions to the industry.

We hope it helps inspire the next generation of leaders in the Canadian marketing industry,” says 2022 inductee Zak Mroueh, founder and creative chairman of Zulu Alpha Kilo.

The new inductees will be honoured by AMA Toronto at a gala event in Toronto on May 10.

Learn more about how data-driven response-based marketing has driven the accomplishments of these Marketing Legends in AMA Toronto’s upcoming Legendary Leadership Series of events.

ROBERT MACLEAN is the principal of MacLean PR & Corporate Communications, and vice president, of public relations, at AMA Toronto.

DMN.CA ❰

INSIGHT

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Highlights from the Shopify and Astound Commerce Sustainability Report

2022 WAS A RECORD YEAR for extreme climate events. From

a deadly hurricane off the Atlantic coast to torrential rains and melting glaciers in Pakistan to Europe’s record-high temperatures not seen in nearly 500 years, these events are becoming increasingly prevalent. And global consumers have no illusions regarding the threat climate change poses in the long term.

Astound Commerce deployed a survey to 1,000 global consumers from the Americas (Canada, Mexico, and the United States), Europe (Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom), and the Middle East (the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates) to obtain an understanding of how consumer behaviours related to sustainability have evolved and how they will shape the future of commerce. The results clearly underscore the reality that brands must do their part to help curb the growing global threat.

Respondents to the 2021-2022 Global Risks Perception Survey from the World Economic Forum rated climate change inaction “as the risk with the potential to inflict the most damage at a global scale over the next decade.” Human health will bear the brunt of this damage in the form of disrupted food systems, diminished air and water quality, uninhabitable regions, and more, as global temperatures continue to rise without action.

Consumers feel the magnitude of this crisis, and they want brands to act now. ❱ DMN.CA

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INSIGHT

by 78 percent in the Middle East and demographically by 71 percent of Millennials.

WHY SUSTAINABILITY MATTERS As extreme weather events become more common, the growing effects of climate change are now more apparent than ever.

Beyond the potential loss of life, damage to property and critical infrastructure, and the economic implications, these global catastrophes are permanently shifting consumer attitudes and behaviours.

As temperatures rise, more areas of the planet are becoming uninhabitable, causing mass migrations, and the impact on wildlife, agriculture, and our water

CONSUMERS ARE WATCHING Three out of five global consumers indicate that the public position a company takes on the environment and/or climate change has had at least some impact on their decision to buy or not buy from a brand.

Gen Z consumers are the most influenced by a brand’s stance on environmental issues, at 62 percent. These conscious consumers are using their purchasing power to advocate for climate action, indicating that brands need an authentic, transparent environmental messaging strategy. Transparency is key, as consumer attitudes are rapidly shifting to meet this urgent issue and brands that don’t back up their words with actions may face consumer contempt.

RECOMMERCE Another solution to the growing emphasis on environmental sustainability in the broader consumer goods industry is recommerce, or the sale of previously worn or used products.

Broadly, recommerce can help brands extend the life cycle of their products, reduce waste, and solidify their commitment to sustainability. The recommerce market has experienced a significant boom in recent years, thanks in part to innovative startups and resale sites.

Statista projects the value of the MARCH 2023

secondhand apparel market to more than double in size in the next few years, reaching US$218 billion in 2026 and making it a powerful potential revenue driver for apparel brands. It can also provide brands with an opportunity to resell returned products in an effort to curb the amount of unwanted inventory that ends up in landfills the world over.

And consumers show strong interest in recommerce, with 54 percent saying they are at least somewhat interested in this sustainable model, led by 59 percent of Millennials.

70 percent of Millennial consumers consider a brand’s business practices at least somewhat important when shopping online. When highlighting your brand’s measures to operate in a more sustainable way, it’s crucial to ensure your actions speak louder than words, or consumers may interpret your efforts as greenwashing or conveying misleading information.

The implications of greenwashing can be dire with potential reputational damage and a loss of consumer trust as a result. Maintaining transparency as you make progress toward your environmental goals should be inherent to your sustainability strategy.

THE VALUE OF SUSTAINABILITY Even as record-high inflation persists and the threat of a global recession looms, consumers understand the value of sustainable products and are willing to shoulder some of the costs associated with producing products in a more socially responsible way. A majority of global consumers say they would be willing to pay more for a sustainable product, led regionally

supply may soon be irreversible.

Everyone must be engaged in this shared mission toward a more sustainable future. Bold, innovative, and urgent action is needed, and while individual consumers are doing their part, collectively they expect brands to act now. Bottom line: sustainability can boost your bottom line, serve as a competitive advantage, and most importantly preserve the planet for future generations.

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© PINTEREST

STRATEGY

Pinterest Predicts 2023 DM Magazine: When it comes to using the data from Pinterest to predict trends, which areas do you find are extremely accurate? What do you think accounts for this?

Jenna Landi, Director of Global Insights, Pinterest: Pinterest’s trends are a great signal of where society is going and how advertisers can add value to those planning moments.

People use Pinterest to plan the actions in their lives and come to the platform months in advance, which enables Pinterest to have an early look into what ideas are likely to be really big, really soon.

More than 400 million people around the world come to Pinterest every month to plan what to do, try or buy next. This is why we’re able to analyze what they have ❱ DMN.CA

been searching for, getting early insights and helping us define what’s coming next for consumers, advertisers and creators.

Our trend predictions are based on months of data, rigorous analysis and evaluation by our team of researchers and strategists to ensure we nail our trends each and every year. We break down the research and development of our annual Pinterest Predicts report into four key stages.

In the first stage, data examination, our team sifts through billions of search results from over a two-year period and filters out any seasonal biases to ensure they don’t skew the data set. From there, we move to the curation stage where our team of trendspotters take thousands of searches and narrow them down

into about 30 trends by looking at the cultural context to help identify the “why” behind the trends in consideration.

That brings us to the next stage, inclusion, which is a value that is core to our company’s mission.

Alongside NXT Labs, an external focus group, we work together to ensure that people from all backgrounds and perspectives are included in our predictions.

In our final stage, accountability, which happens after the release of the report, our team watches the trends to see how well they are performing. Gathering both internal and external feedback, we assess what we got right and why some predictions didn’t come true.

Using our findings, we update and enhance our trendspotting process each year. This has led us MARCH 2023

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STRATEGY

You state the prediction rate is 80 percent — what were some of the things you got right and what did you miss?

At Pinterest we love to take smart risks and actively bring past lessons to our next effort. This is why Pinterest Predicts has had an incredible success rate over the past three years.

In a recent study with Black Swan Data, a leader in consumer data insights and predictive analytics, we identified three key findings on how trends took off on Pinterest compared to other platforms.

The first is that our trends take off faster as they grow 20 percent quicker than trends across other platforms in their first six months.

This momentum gives brands and marketers the confidence they need to stay ahead of the curve and reach their target customers.

Pinterest trends also last longer since they sustain a monthly growth of more than 20 percent longer than other trends that tend MARCH 2023

to lose popularity after six months.

This allows brands and marketers to invest in trends that are proven to have a longer lifespan.

The last finding, which is core to the Pinterest experience, is that our trends inspire across audiences. When people come to Pinterest, they don’t search for a trend just once — Pinterest users often revisit a trend multiple times, allowing them to go deeper into topics they’re interested in.

Barkitecture and Dopamine Dressing were two trends from our 2022 Pinterest Predicts report that definitely came true!

How can marketers maximize your Pinterest tool?

With over 400 million people coming to Pinterest each month to plan for the future it provides a unique window into what people are looking for so they can act on it in real life, providing the insights that marketers need to make decisions on how to best reach their customers. On Pinterest, marketers can drive their audience from discovery to decision — all in a more positive place online where a brand’s product helps people accomplish what they came to do,

© PINTEREST

What are some of the most surprising trends or ideas that you are predicting for 2023?

Our trends are a reflection of the diverse sets of interests that Pinners have. They’re turning to Pinterest for inspiration for all areas of their life, which allows us to showcase a wide variety of trends we predict will be impossible to miss this year.

For 2023, our predictions range from celebratory plans like pool pawties and the YOLO years to financial planning with the chaching challenge hobby inspiration with good old paper, and more.

One trend that I loved seeing and may come as a surprise to some is our fourth-trimester trend. It’s also a trend that I can relate to personally — I have a 9-month-old at home, and those first few months post-birth are raw and real. While babies have always been celebrated, I love that we see more and more people supporting parents as well. Driven by Millennials, we see people searching for everything from postpartum meals to gifts and essentials.

Bringing this life-changing time into focus is a movement I can definitely get behind.

© PINTEREST

to have an 80 percent accuracy rate for three years in a row.

rather than distract them from it.

For example, with Pinterest Predicts, marketers can lean into the not-yet-trending annual report to see what will likely arise in the upcoming year because staying ahead allows businesses to make informed decisions before anyone else.

Our insights also power a suite of other tools for marketers including

Pinterest Trends, a tool that allows you to see what’s trending right now, and our Ads Manager tool, a hub for professionals to create campaigns, track results and improve performance.

Since people come to Pinterest with uniquely high intent to act, brands of all shapes and sizes find success on Pinterest.

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❱ DMN.CA

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KICKER INSIGHT

BY STEPHEN SHAW

W

hiter teeth — or fewer cavities?

Longer lasting — or more reliable?

Everyday low prices — or quality and selection? Tastes great — or healthier for you?

Driving performance — or comfort and luxury?

All are examples of brand positioning options in different market categories.

The concept of brand positioning has been part of the marketing canon for over fifty years.

Pretty much every marketing organization now uses a positioning statement as the strategic overture to any sort of brand identity work or communication plan. So why, after so many years, do positioning exercises often fail to break new ground or yield much in the way of strategic value?

The method for crafting a positioning statement is taught in every marketing course.

It gets explained in every book about branding.

There are countless YouTube tutorials. And there are many positioning templates available to follow, all of which adhere more or less to the same construct “For [name the target segment], Is a [name the market category], Which Provides [name the main benefit], Unlike [name the top competitor]”.

For a lot of marketers, however, brand positioning is nothing more than a “fill in the blanks” obligation. Just another hoop to go through on their way to the fun creative stuff.

This is a shame — because the right positioning can pay off many times over in winning a greater share of mind amongst consumers.

And that’s what branding is supposed to be about — finding a “window on the mind”, in the immortal words of Al Ries and Jack Trout.

Those are the two ad guys who popularized the idea of brand positioning in the early 1970s.

They wrote a series of articles for Advertising Age in 1972 called “The Positioning Era Cometh”, declaring that creativity must take a back seat to strategy (later converting their thesis into one of the most influential marketing books of all time called “Positioning: A Battle for Your Mind”.

In an era of “me too” products, they argued, the minds of consumers are overwhelmed by choice, making it hard for them to distinguish one brand from another. To break through the clutter, ad messaging had to focus on differentiation, making clear to people why the brand deserved to be considered ahead of the alternatives. That way, the brand could “position itself” in the minds of busy people by narrowing the main message to why it uniquely meets their needs.

Today that formula for advertising success has become conventional wisdom. But back MARCH 2023

then, it was heresy. Agencies at that time made their money selling clients on Big Creative Ideas.

On expensive image-building ad campaigns. By declaring that creativity by itself is worthless, these two iconoclasts were impugning an entire industry. However, in the end, they won their rightful place in history. The creative guild eventually came around to the idea that strategy should indeed come first.

So you would think that by now marketers would have perfected the practice of brand positioning — that, after five decades, they would understand what the legendary David Ogilvy once said, “The results of your advertising depend less on how you write your advertising than on how your product is positioned”. But brand positioning is tough slogging. It’s a brain-teasing exercise. When marketers merely go through the motions, they end up with vapid positioning statements. Getting it right demands divergent thinking, according to Ulli Appelbaum, an acclaimed expert on brand positioning, taking the time to examine the problem from as many angles as possible. But most marketers think that level of effort is more bother than it’s worth.

The purpose of brand positioning, Appelbaum says, is to find the right set of “associations” that you want people to connect with your brand (an “association” being what you want a person to immediately think of when they come across the brand). He’s defined 26 possible positioning platforms that can be used as a springboard for development and lays out his methodology in a very practical guide he wrote called “The Brand Positioning Workbook”.

Shaw: Was your company’s name the outcome of a rigorous brand positioning exercise?

Appelbaum: No, it was actually the result of a very chaotic and fun brainstorm. And unfortunately, too much liquor was involved, to be candid. But ultimately, the name stuck because it really captures the idea that strategy comes first. Strategy is creative problem-solving. When you develop a positioning platform, you develop hypotheses about what the potential solution could be. It’s a creative process. And so, “First the Trousers Then the Shoes” is a creative take on saying strategy needs to go first. And then the following day I woke up with a headache and loved the name out of the list of all the ones we had generated, and it’s stuck ever since.

Shaw: So “Put Your Underwear and Socks on First” never made the cut?

Appelbaum: That would have been too long!

Shaw: The concept of brand positioning has been around for a long time. Yet marketers still struggle to master the process. Why do marketers have such a tough time getting it right?

Appelbaum: A brand is really just a network of associations tied to a specific offering. Because that’s how our brain works. I take a new piece of information and tie it back to something familiar.

And the more I see this piece of information, the stronger the link becomes. I see a brand asset, a colour scheme, and a logo, all tied to a specific network of knowledge in my mind, and I combine the two. Brands are really these networks of associations that we create in our brains.

Instead of driving yourself crazy with what’s the key benefit and the reason to believe, brand positioning is nothing more than identifying the desired associations you want to attach to your brand to make it more appealing.

Shaw: So positioning is both a strategic and creative process to understand which associations will resonate the most with the people most likely to want my product?

Appelbaum: That’s exactly right. We try to find a unique positioning statement for a brand problem that we have defined upfront. And the more broadly you search for a solution, the greater the likelihood that you will come up with a truly innovative idea that you can then test and validate. It’s easy to come up with the top four or five benefits a consumer is looking for - but it’s your ability to think beyond those benefits that’s the secret. So the way to do that is to look at your potential solution from many, many different angles, which is what our method is based on. And when we use this methodology, we usually come up with 40 to 60 potential solutions. Now, 90 percent of them will be crap, but that still leaves you with four to six viable solutions that are relevant; that is novel in the category compared to what the competition is doing; and that you can then validate to determine which one will work the best.

Shaw: What distinguishes an exceptional positioning statement from a mediocre one?

Appelbaum: How you react to it when you first CONTINUED ON page 16 DMN.CA ❰

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INSIGHT CONTINUED FROM page 13

see it. I wish I could tell you there’s a mathematical formula. But it’s usually a gut reaction. If you just react rationally to seeing it — “Oh, yeah, that’s a really smart thought, that’s really well thought out” — that’s going to be an average positioning statement. What I’ve learned is that really breakthrough positioning reframes the way you look at a category, and unleashes all these new ideas, “Oh, we could do this, and we could do that.” You have a vision of what the brand could be.

We all aspire to be creative. But for most people being creative is actually something very scary.

Being creative is having the guts to stand up in a meeting with a group of people, including executives, and say, “I think we should do something completely different, something completely novel, and I want you to embrace my idea and give me millions to execute it.” It’s a scary thing, your new idea being judged by others.

My approach allows you to think about what the future could be without boundaries. It’s a safe space because it’s embedded in a disciplined process.

Shaw: Can you give me an overview of the methodology?

Appelbaum: Yeah, absolutely.

Twenty years ago I had an ‘aha’ moment. I was working in Europe on the agency side for Procter and Gamble. And one thing I noticed was that you could find the same positioning in different categories across different time zones and geographies. And so, I started to identify these different positioning patterns and wondered, “How many of those are there out there?”. I started to review hundreds and hundreds of case studies and identified exactly 26 sources of brand association.

For example, can I tie my brand to a specific usage occasion? Can I involve myself in an existing consumer ritual to make it more relevant for consumers? There are 26 of those.

Once you start to explore these 26 possible associations, the amount of ideas you’re able to generate is mind-blowing. So then, you start to group these ideas thematically. And then all ❱ DMN.CA

of a sudden you have four or five or six potential territories that you can research qualitatively, quantitatively, which is way more powerful than simply asking, “What are the consumer benefits, and what is unique about our brand?

Let’s try to come up with ideas.”

Nothing wrong with that. But the problem is all your competitors are doing exactly the same.

So, to summarize, first define your problem; and then use the 26 territories to explore options for your brand. And the truth is, 40 percent will not apply to your brand. But that’s okay. You still have 60 percent that do apply.

And then use your rational brain to validate your hypotheses and positioning platform.

Shaw: Do you start the process by exploring all 26 possible associations?

Appelbaum: Typically we like to start with a series of stakeholder interviews. And in parallel to that, we do a deep dive into the consumer and the competition.

And this automatically eliminates a whole bunch of potential sources of association. So, I usually start with 12 to 16. And some will lead to no ideas because they’re not inspiring enough, or the client team just isn’t excited about them.

Sometimes, even with the right questions, you still don’t get ideas.

So, what you need to do is do little exercises to get people to think more creatively.

Let me give you an example.

A couple of years ago I did a global positioning workshop with a lot of German engineers in a big pharmaceutical company.

Now, trying to get them to think creatively — is extremely difficult.

First, they want to talk. Then they challenge everything they hear, “Why do you say that?”. I said, “No, guys, this is blue sky thinking. We don’t challenge the ideas.” But it was just part of their DNA. And so I had them do a little exercise: “Everyone takes a piece of paper, and write down five ideas that my questions triggered.” Everyone wrote down their ideas. Then I said, “Okay, now take this sheet of paper, give it to your neighbour to the right, and take the sheet from your neighbour from the left. And then look at their list and build on it, add five more.” And

that completely changed the group dynamic. They stopped challenging each other, and became focused on the task at hand.

Shaw: How do you form these teams? What is the mix of people? How diverse does that mix have to be?

Appelbaum: The name of the game for me is always extreme variety. So, we might include R&D people, marketing people, market research people, front-of-the-line people, and maybe an external category expert. For example, we did a positioning workshop for a bourbon brand where we had the master distiller along with three bartenders who were part of their ambassador program. So, the more variety, the better. Converging these different points of view is really where the magic lies. And then you always have people within an organization who will resist a new positioning, so I try to find out who those people are and invite them to participate.

Creativity is messy, it’s dirty, and there’s tension involved, so might as well throw everyone together, and try to figure it out as you go along, because you need to create a shared understanding. You create buy-in, right? So then there’s a greater sense of ownership.

Shaw: Do you bring the accountants into the process as well?

Appelbaum: You need to understand how the company makes money, and where it makes money. CFOs are typically smart people who understand how the business works. And that gives you great insight into where the money is really made. Now, if the CEO’s attitude is, “I don’t believe in marketing”, you might have a bit of a problem. But the truth is, even a CEO who thinks like that will offer insights that can fuel your process.

Shaw: Well, I was just going to say, if the CEO doesn’t believe in marketing, I rather think they’re probably not going to hire you, are they?

Appelbaum: Probably not.

Shaw: Once the winning idea emerges from the incubation stage, and makes its way into the boardroom, do you find that

occasionally it’ll be overturned by the CEO who says, “No, that’s not our positioning”?

Appelbaum: No, because that’s why I do the stakeholder interviews. I try to speak to the CEO, and if the CEO tells me, “I want the solution to look like nothing we’ve done before,” then I have a license in the workshop to push the team and say, “Guys, your boss wants novel ideas”. So, it gives me the ammunition to push the group in the right direction.

The purpose of the stakeholder interviews is to understand where the guardrails are and avoid the CEO saying, “That’s crap!”.

Shaw: I’m presuming your clients don’t want to bring you in every time they’re faced with a positioning exercise. Is it feasible to train somebody in these techniques so that they can make them replicable?

Appelbaum: It’s almost like I gave you $500 for you to ask me this question because that is totally feasible! Actually, since the book came out, I’ve had several organizations reach out to me and ask if I can spend a day training their teams. So, yes, that’s definitely something I’ve started to do.

Shaw: What role does the ad agency play in this process?

Appelbaum: I’ve worked in the agency business long enough to know that your agency creative team needs to embrace the strategy to really come up with great ideas. And one way to do that is to involve them in the process.

The same with the external research companies my clients work with. I have no problem involving them. Sometimes I see a bit of resistance on the agency side – they may have preconceived ideas about what the solution should be. But 90 percent of the time bringing in the agency helps tremendously. And frankly, they’re very thankful for my contribution because I push for edgier solutions which leads to better creative.

Shaw: It sounds like all of this work — the upfront research and analysis, the consensus building, the ideation — takes a lot of time. What, in your experience, is an adequate amount of time to give over to MARCH 2023

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INSIGHT this process?

Appelbaum: It can take anywhere from one week to six months. It really depends. If the client lacks a basic understanding of their consumers, we might need to do additional research to get new insights. For example, we might have to do qualitative research, or a segmentation study, which takes longer, and is, of course, significantly more expensive. But it really depends on the situation.

There’s a base of information we need to gather before we can apply the methodology.

Shaw: Does it make a difference whether you’re developing product positioning versus, say, master brand positioning?

Appelbaum: If you have a master brand, that probably means you have a bunch of sub-brands that speak to different consumer segments with different benefits and value propositions. So, the spectrum of solutions that your master brand needs to encompass is much broader. You try to find a common element amongst the, “I sell peanuts”; “I sell peanut butter”; “I sell jam”; “I sell juices.” What is the core competency? What is the one association at the master brand level that will help all these business groups be perceived as more appealing? I don’t think it’s any more complex. It’s just that the solutions you need to encompass under your master brand are more numerous. So, you have to elevate your thinking a little bit.

Shaw: This brings me to this whole idea of corporate brand purpose, which has had a lot of traction of late. You do reference it in the book, although you don’t appear to be a big fan of the idea.

Appelbaum: It’s great you bring that up. I’m actually a huge fan of brand purpose — if it’s done right and for the right reasons.

What I’m very cynical about is how marketing has used the concept of a brand purpose for commercial purposes, using it as a communication trick as opposed to making a difference. But I look at brand purpose as one of 26 sources of brand association. It is not just a lofty idea. It needs to be anchored in your product or in what you have to offer. So, if it’s about making MARCH 2023

people healthier, you better make sure that your product is healthy before you go out there and say, “We want to make the world a healthier place, blah, blah, blah.”

make a comment, but I don’t want a conversation with that brand.

So, this notion of social media facilitating conversations between consumers and brands is just BS.

Shaw: Should a position statement be built to last?

What’s the trade-off between the competitive context today versus what it could be in 10 or 20 years from now?

Appelbaum: Well, I think that the general rule of thumb is it should be valid for three to five years. But that’s a very abstract rule. It all depends on whether you maintain your consumer relevance over time.

If you still satisfy that original need, the chances are very high that you can stick to your original positioning. You just may have to execute it differently. When you think about GEICO, the insurance company — “15 minutes can save you 15 percent” - they’ve done that for, what, 30 years or something like that? They refreshed their advertising, but the positioning is still the same. Coke has been the same for 100 years. So unless something really drastic changes in the way you do your business, or in the market, there is no need to revisit the brand positioning.

Shaw: But what may be different today is that if you find your brand purpose, and you share the same values, passions, and interests as your customers, you can turn them into advocates, and then build that brand community through social media.

Appelbaum: And that is 100 percent true. But that is different from me having an in-depth conversation with the peanut butter brand my kids like to eat in the morning. And a great place to look for these types of communities, I’ve learned, is Reddit and YouTube. YouTube is full of these communities of people with shared interests and shared passions that love to discuss every single detail about every new product.

Shaw: Unless of course a new CMO arrives with a “not invented here” attitude.

Appelbaum: And that is the worst. Absolutely.

Shaw: What are some branding myths or zombie ideas that you really hate?

Appelbaum: Oh, don’t get me started! A couple of things. One is this notion that the consumer owns your brand. The consumer doesn’t own your brand. You own the decision on which associations you want to create. Whether the consumer buys into that or not, that’s up to him or her, and that’s perfectly fine. Consumers owning the brands drives me nuts. It’s ignorant. The second thing is that social media allows brands to have conversations with their consumers. Now, I don’t know about you, but I’ve never had a conversation with my favourite brand of peanut butter on Facebook or Instagram. I may follow them, I may think they have funny content, I may like them, or

Shaw: Do you have an example of a brand you’ve worked on in the past which really nailed its brand positioning statement, a brand you point to as a paragon of positioning?

Appelbaum: It was for a state lottery, oddly enough. The client approached us and said, “We’re growing by 2 percent to 3 percent a year. That’s not enough for us.

Can you help us reposition the brand and unlock new growth opportunities?”.

It took us six months to go through the process. We had to understand the lottery category — reframe that category — and then reposition the brand in that reframed category. Our research showed that they weren’t in the category of playing lottery games — they were in the business of managing your mood. Because we looked at all the emotional motivators for playing lotteries, on many different occasions, and we talked to 60, to 70 lottery players to understand what motivated them. And we realized that people play the lottery to manage their moods. You buy the ticket, and the results come three or four days later, meanwhile, you’ve bought yourself three or four days of hope.

So, that’s why we said the lottery

business is actually the business of mood management. And by reframing the category, we were able to show our client that what he thought was a $1 billion business was actually $2 billion. And today I think their revenue is $1.3 billion, about $500 million more than it was when we started the project.

That was an example where we applied the full rigour of our methodology — the workshops with the client, a segmentation study, and ideation — and we could show them, “Your market is twice as big as you think it is. Here’s the way you need to position it, and here’s how that translates into different products you have at your disposal.”

Shaw: Toward the end of your book, you write, “Marketing has evolved from being a highly strategic discipline” much as you’re just finished describing - “to become a mainly transactional one.” Are you referring to the tension that exists today between performance marketing and more traditional brand marketing?

Appelbaum: I am referring to what the Internet has done to our profession. It’s all about clickthrough rates, number of visitors, and number of likes. It has shifted the focus to “Here are the types of headlines you need to come up with to improve your click-through rate.” Over the last few years, there’s more and more literature and research that has been done on the effective brand-building that brings back the strategy part of the process. Luckily. But for a long time, it was about beating the SEO game which as a strategy just bores me to death. One of my last agency jobs was sitting in meetings for two weeks where we discussed with three people on the client side and four people on the agency side the creative execution of a stupid banner. So that was for me the trigger moment to say that’s not what I want to do.

STEPHEN SHAW is the Chief Strategy Officer of Kenna, a marketing solutions provider specializing in delivering a more unified customer experience. Stephen can be reached via e-mail at sshaw@kenna.ca DMN.CA ❰

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STRATEGY

DATA IS THE

SPARK

Content Matters 2023 Report from WPVIP.com

T

he content we create connects us as people. Platforms now allow more people to create rich experiences in less time which fuels the opportunity to deepen those connections.

In our inaugural Content Matters 2023 report we heard from more than 1,500 respondents across a variety of industries and roles. Here’s what we learned: Resources: Teams and budgets are still growing despite economic uncertainty. In fact, 58 percent expect their content budgets to grow in 2023.

Strategy: 61 percent are still creating more content, but focus is shifting to quality over quantity. Some are even turning to artificial intelligence tools to create content and fill gaps in resources.

Analytics: Measuring performance is key to proving the value of content yet only 46 percent actually use data to make strategic decisions planning the future.

Planning: The future of content is bright but understanding what works is the spark.

Marketing teams continue to make up only a small percentage of an organization’s headcount, but those teams largely continue to grow even despite fears of inflation, rising interest rates and roller coaster markets.

Even more promising, the number of internal contact creators has grown substantially compared to 2022. Organizations that prioritize tracking content ROI — proving the value of content in the teams that produce stand to be in a better position to maintain or increase their headcount.

Last year, 42 percent of respondents expected the content marketing budget to increase. Based on results from this year’s survey they did.

Despite global economic uncertainty, marketing budgets are expected to increase again next year, proving the essential value of content marketing for organizational success, even in shaky times. For those that expect their budget to decrease, it’s almost solely due to economic factors. As a declining economy raises concerns, the ability to tie ROI to content will only increase in importance over the next year.

As the economy and business goals shifted over the past year, the need to drive revenue through content became increasingly important. ❱ DMN.CA

Despite brand awareness remaining the top purpose for creating content, generating revenue and sales jumped from #5 to #2 in this year’s survey: It’s clear when you have revenue goals tied to content, senior leadership is more likely to understand the value of your content marketing efforts.

If you’re struggling to get leadership buy-in, tie your content goals back to revenue to prove value. Additionally, in times of economic recession, customer retention expansion becomes crucial to business success. Only 33 percent of people use content to build loyalty with existing customers so we expect this to increase over the next year, along with a percentage of those who use contact to nurture leads as the number of leads decline.

Overall, more content is being created than last year but the percentage of organizations creating more content dropped a bit from 66 percent to MARCH 2023

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STRATEGY 61 percent. Interestingly, 18 percent are producing less content (compared to just 9 percent in 2022), possibly focusing on quality over quantity.

Prioritizing content is necessary in a time of limited resources. So how do you decide which content to create? Many organizations are going straight to the source and surveying customers and prospects about what content they want to see.

As for formats, multimedia content creation has skyrocketed with video and audio, both increasing in importance over the past year. Social media and community building overtook blogs as the most popular type of content marketing. This makes sense with most teams struggling to keep up with demand. Not only is social media often faster and easier to produce, but much of community building is actually user-generated content, requiring fewer internal resources.

A large part of content strategy involves giving your audience exactly what they want, which is why content personalization is one of the biggest topics in marketing right now. Yet, a quarter of teams still don’t have a strategy in place. Respondents aren’t sure where to start, noting the process is cumbersome. The number of people who want to create more content is drastically lower for those doing personalization. This is likely due to personalization efforts being successful enough to warrant a decreasing content production aligning with the quality versus quantity trend.

A strong personalization strategy, and allows organizations to engage with the audience more effectively with less content. There are many emerging personalization and localization technologies to make personalization easier, like SalesForce and Parse.ly. These tools will help your team make smarter, stronger content connections To create more resonant content, three in four marketers are running tests (like A/B and headline testing). If the goal is to create higher quality content (rather than just producing large quantities), strategies like testing should support this effort.

Surprisingly, however, the opposite is happening: 54 percent of those testing content actually want to produce more. This leads us to believe the testing is not producing effective enough results to relieve the rise in demand for personalized content.

If you’re on the hook to drive revenue with content, you’re also incentivized to measure your progress and impact, so it makes sense most teams that have content marketing revenue goals tend to clearly understand the performance of their content.

The most interesting result to us, however, was that the number of people who measure their content performance and have a clear understanding of how it’s performing jumped to 76 percent — a 25 percent increase over last year.

But as we saw only 46 percent actually use analytics to decide what content to create. It’s no surprise teams lacking in data are also struggling with resources due to the strong positive correlation between content performance and leadership buy-in.

Google Analytics is by far the most used web analytics tool, but we continue to see customers struggle with its complexity, especially nontechnical users. With the upcoming shift from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics, the concern is only growing.

Twenty-four percent of those who measure their content still don’t have a clear picture of performance, likely due to the complexity of the popular analytics tools. While many customers use Parse.ly and Google Analytics in tandem, they prefer the user-friendliness of Parse.ly for making critical content analytics available to everyone with a stake in content performance.

The future of content is bright, but data will be the spark. More people are still creating more content, but the focus is on quality over quantity due to unyielding demand. Understanding content performance is key to proving its value to leadership and therefore, increasing resources.

Our advice for contact marketers is as follows: most leadership now understands how valuable content is. Capitalize on this by asking for more resources to support your strategy Fast and easy content is becoming more important. Prioritize valuable content and channels that drive traffic, like social media, and userMARCH 2023

generated content communities Get more people making data-driven content decisions. If you’ve been relying on someone else to report on your content performance, start getting involved yourself. The need for more revenue means more people will be incentivized to track the impact of their work.

Technical marketers should expect more demand for content publishing methods on owned channels, including video, interactive website content, and potential traffic spikes. Encourage stakeholders to start looking at the data themselves, not sit passively, waiting for you to share content performance reports. Invest in strong personalization technologies and strategies. Your existing CMS and/or analytics tools may already have these capabilities on board.

EXCERPTED FROM WordPress VIP’s Content Matters 2023 Report.

DMN.CA ❰

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TECHNOLOGY

How Digital Out of Home Advertising Completes the Marketing Circle

BY MICHAEL BROOKE

W

hile outdoor media might be the oldest form of advertising, it has in recent years made some significant leaps in technology and innovation. As Scott Mitchell, Managing Director Vistar Media Canada explains, “if you look at your own experiences in the real world and you think about the way that you move from your house ❱ DMN.CA

to your office to meeting friends after work, you’re open and more receptive and engaged with digital outdoor media.”

Digital Out of Home advertising is a compelling way to connect with consumers for a number of unique reasons. “Many of us are in front of a computer 75 percent of our working day,” says Mitchell.

“Out of home reaches people when

they are disconnected - when they are not in front of their screen and doing things they really enjoy doing. This could be things like picking up their kids or going to a sporting event or something as simple as going for a walk.”

But outdoor media is somewhat different from what one finds in other parts of the digital landscape.

When using the web, cookies

enable customized interaction with each consumer. Outdoor is a oneto-many audience. Advertisers take a larger funnel approach, but there are nuances that can be added to make the marketing message that much more impactful.

For most of its existence, out-of-home media was strictly a geographically based medium after all, it started with a billboard MARCH 2023

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COURTESY VISTAR

TECHNOLOGY

poster and sticks in the ground.

The onset of digital signage allowed advertisers and media owners to change messaging and to monetize things a little bit more by adding additional advertisers.

Traditionally, marketers buy out-of-home advertising by choosing a specific postal code and then approach every billboard media company and inquire about space. There are a few dozen of these media companies and they offer thousands of unique screens across Canada. It can take a huge amount of time and effort to organize a plan to reach a specific demographic.

But another approach allows MARCH 2023

marketers to index all these various media outlets. This is where technology companies like Vistar have found success.

“Our software allows brands to achieve their marketing initiatives by removing a lot of the manual process,” says Mitchell.

Vistar’s technology is centred on three pillars. The first is automation, which means users can simply log into the platform and start to choose exactly who they want to work with immediately. There are no phone calls or emails — every transaction is automated.

The next pillar is data. This is an opportunity to reach a specific demographic by using

quantifiable data. Vistar aligns this with time and movementbased information. Finally, there is the pillar of measurement. “Our customers want to know if their investment in outdoor moving the needle forward”. This can range from things like brand awareness, purchase intent, purchase consideration and things like foot traffic” says Mitchell. Vistar works with advertisers to model different campaigns and choose the best one that achieves their marketing objectives.

As a way to illustrate the power of outdoor digital advertising, Mitchell offered up the example of a bank’s marketing initiative hoping to target the area of Markham, Ontario. “We could take a list of all their bank branches that exist in Markham, input them into our platform and build a plan that would map out every single out-of-home venue type that’s within a one-kilometer radius or 100-metre radius of these banks.

The bank would be able to put whatever message you want on those boards.” The message could be that reminds people about a special offer within these locations.

Digital provides flexibility and allows advertisers to test different messages and swap creative practically in real time.

Additionally, technology allows marketers to take things one step further. As Mitchell explains, “assuming you already know a lot about the demographics of a certain area, now it becomes a question of where do people go once they leave that area?”

Marketers want to know how best to connect with consumers with the right message at the right time.

Mitchell calls this a probabilistic movement pattern. It selects the affinity of a specific audience based on passive mobile location data.

The information is PI compliant and it gives companies like Vistar insight into people’s travel habits and how they are moving throughout the day.

Armed with this information, Vistar can now build out a complete campaign and start to understand where the audience went once they left the bank. As an example, you can start to understand the patterns of people who start a the bank, go to the shopping mall, then go for lunch, stop by the grocery

store and then finally go home. “If you examine this pattern, then you recognize that we’ve already defined them as a specific bank customer,” says Mitchell. “The opportunity to remind them of an offer can exist as that pattern throughout the day.”

When it comes to providing psychographic and demographic data points, Vistar can also plug in this information. Companies can define their audience through Environics PRIZM database and this information can be merged with geo-spacial processing which provides time and movement. From here, the data can be uploaded to the site to create a complete multi-platform outdoor plan from a variety of different inventories.

While the success of Vistar’s approach is based on a number of factors, one key element Mitchell stresses is that of measurement.

“Eighty percent of our clients who come back and work with us do so because we have a very compelling story. We can consolidate everything to the platform. We can look at a number of parts of the sales funnel and slice and dice it. From brand recognition to purchase intent, we can show clients how their investment in out-of-home actually moved the needle on brand metrics.”

When it comes to the evaluation of the effectiveness of outdoor advertising, Vistar works with third parties who run studies on both exposed and controlled groups.

From here, they can work with the brands to create the most effective media plans. Vistar also does foot traffic studies and knows exactly the time a specific outdoor ad was shown. They also know all the passive mobile location data that would have been exposed to the ad.

Vistar can take this information, and integrate it into measurement studies to determine how effective the ad was within the sales process.

“Since we know what time a consumer saw a specific ad, we can collect that mobile information and pass that information back to our client,” says Mitchell. “From here, specific marketing messages can be sent to the consumer’s smartphone.” The technology integrates both outdoor (digital billboards) and indoor (on your phone) creating a seamless experience that truly completes the marketing circle.

DMN.CA ❰

// 22

TECHNOLOGY

Part 2

How to optimize mailing operations: Tips for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) Quadient iX-5HF - Office

BY ALAIN FAIRISE

S

mall to mediumsized businesses are under extreme pressure to consistently deliver a satisfying customer experience that meets or exceeds rising customer demands. The work landscape has changed significantly in recent years.

This fact coupled with economic hurdles and a growing competitive environment has challenged many SMBs to find ways to increase productivity while saving costs.

One way to achieve these goals is by improving essential business processes. Mail management is one area SMBs can optimize using the technology and innovative solutions available today, which are not only costeffective but also easily accessible.

Different strategies may be applied depending on how your organization is structured and your available resources.

Gartner states, “the ability to affect ongoing process optimization will become a differentiator for client and provider alike, increasing the speed of response to change and providing the organizational agility required.”

Insourcing, outsourcing or both It is up to each organization to evaluate what type of investment will yield the most business impact. Whether you choose to insource or outsource your mailing needs largely depends on: ❱ DMN.CA

Mail volume (Ranging anywhere from 1,000 – 10,000 pieces a month for most SMBs) ❯ Mail type ❯ Level of standardization required ❯ Outbound delivery channels (print, digital or both) ❯

Insourcing Mailing Operations Accurate, timely, personalized, and low-cost mail production is the foundation of effective and efficient customer communications. If your business handles complex jobs, each with its own customized needs, for example marketing materials, or other transactional documents, a dedicated in-house solution is preferable. Insourcing gives you more hands-on control and insight into your processes, which you can achieve by taking advantage of the following modern mailroom technologies: Intelligent document processing Folder inserters speed up the mail production process. The addition of automation software creates intelligent bar codes on each document that instruct the inserter to group, sort, collate and process documents based on your pre-defined business rules. This allows the user to incorporate personalized offers or inserts intended for the same customer into one envelope and transforms ordinary mail into high-impact and actionable communications.

Quadient DS-64i

Folder inserters may also be upgraded with closed-loop verification software to ensure the right documents go to the intended customer. This solution adds an extra layer of security

by recording and monitoring the insertion process at every step and alerting the user if any item was not fed correctly.

The combination of hardware and software carries a host of benefits.

MARCH 2023

// 23

TECHNOLOGY

In 2022, Quadient asked customers to describe which features they found to be the most valuable: Intelligent Mail Metering From reducing trips to the post office to tracking and reporting capabilities, mail meters have come a long way. Advanced mailing systems give customers access to multiple postal rates and services, automatic rate change updates, increased security, postage spending accuracy and reduced ink usage. Mail and parcel processing also may be combined within your mailing system to enable multicarrier shipping, offering the ability to rate shop all in one place.

In fact, in some countries, like the US and the UK, the postal service is mandating that all mail meters meet specific indicia requirements after a certain date and will not accept mail processed on noncompliant meters.

Quadient iX-5HF - Office

Adapt and evolve to stay ahead After evaluating what strategy is right for your business, you may opt for a combination of solutions.

Many SMBs prefer to keep certain communications in-house and outsource larger jobs. If you have peaks and valleys in your mail production, this allows you to not only leverage outside expertise but take advantage of postal discounts.

Modern mailing systems also deliver a long list of benefits as observed in a recent survey: Data cleansing enrichment Maintaining complete and current customer data with accurate addresses that improve mail and package deliverability is of utmost importance. For example, if 15 percent of an organization’s mail is returned as undeliverable, this leads to multiple issues from delayed cash flow to lost marketing opportunities.

Quality is key to making sure that mail pieces get to the right people in a timely and accurate manner and the audience reads them and takes some level of action. Returned mail can cost businesses up to $25 per returned item, which includes the additional effort required to correct the mistake and resend the item.

According to the United States Postal Service, the total cost to forward, return, and in most cases dispose of these undeliverable pieces exceeded $1.38 billion in 2021. That cost is not just absorbed by the USPS, but instead is passed through to the mailing industry in the form of postage increases, which now continue to occur twice annually in July and January.

MARCH 2023

Outsourcing mail operations Certain organizations can benefit from outsourcing mail when they simply do not have the capital, technical knowledge, or space to manage and maintain a mail center internally. Outside mailing facilities invest in high-speed equipment and stay current on emerging mail technology. Organizations that outsource mail should ensure the facility meets strict data security requirements and protocols.

Additionally, if you send large volumes of mail that are common from one job to another or if your business has a one-time event type of occurrence, such as sending a letter to all your customers or a mass mailing to prospects then outsourcing makes sense. When it’s the same communication and the only level of customization

is the address, this is a typical example of when you will get the most benefit from outsourcing.

Outsourcing mail offers your business a great amount of flexibility. Your outsourced jobs can still be created, designed and managed internally using cloudbased platforms while the tedious task of mail prep and production is handled externally. SMBs by nature are staffed with leaner teams. Outsourcing mail gives you the opportunity to increase productivity by eliminating manual mailing processes and reallocating staff to higher-value tasks. If you have staff that works remotely, a cloud-based platform can be accessed from anywhere with an internet connection. The platform also enables you to designate print and digital delivery channels.

Consult with a mailing expert Before investing in shipping and mailing solutions, be sure to consult with an expert who can help tailor the solutions to best fit the needs of your business now and to have the capacity for expanded features and modules as your business grows. Quadient, for example, offers integrated, scalable, hardware and software solutions that help optimize customer communications and improve business processes. Quadient intelligent mailing and shipping solutions have been proven to reduce mail processing time and increase customer satisfaction by greater than 75 percent. The company is driving intelligence and digital processing technology into its mailroom solutions, providing SMBs with value-add capabilities that extend well beyond the processing of printed mail.

ALAIN FAIRISE is Chief Solution Officer, Mail Related Solutions for Quadient, a leader in helping businesses transform their customer experience by creating meaningful connections through digital and physical channels.

DMN.CA ❰

STRATEGY

// 24

Excerpts 2023 Thinkific’s Learning TrendsReport

T

he creator economy is a juggernaut, valued at over $100 billion and employing as many as 300 million people worldwide. And while an exclusive tier of popular creators continues to generate the most revenue (and headlines), a creator middle class has quietly emerged in the background.

This segment of creators is less motivated by fame and money than they are by intrinsic factors, including self-expression, and the ability to work on projects that give them a sense of meaning and purpose like sharing knowledge.

They seek to make a living through their content and intend to operate as a business. In fact today, nearly twice as many creators want to become business owners versus achieving some celebrity influencer status.

The E-learning industry is expected to be worth more than $460 billion by 2026. That’s a big pie that can be sliced into a lot of pieces. There’s more than enough room for many people who want to create a steady, sustainable and scalable business — one that’s resistant to upstream factors.

Technological innovation is happening at a rate that is difficult to comprehend. Research suggests that technical skills now have a half-life of five years, and the more technical skill, the shorter the lifespan. To thrive in a rapidly evolving, content-saturated landscape, creators need to cultivate different connections to their communities. These connections need to be solid enough to withstand the next ❱ DMN.CA

ISTOCK/ POIKE

Microlearning A Time Sensitive Way to E-Learn

internet earthquake.

As part of its 2023 Digital Learning Trends Report, Thinkific surveyed over 2,000 people in the US and spoke directly with successful creators to understand current trends in digital learning, side, hustles, and the creator economy. Its hoped that this report will help people create and build, solid, sustainable businesses doing what they love in 2023 and beyond.

Microlearning emerges as a solution for life on the go as we all recognize that time is the ultimate limited resource. We are in a golden era for e-learning. Just look at the many headlines about Gen Z’s use of TikTok as a search engine. The last few years have turbocharged interest and participation, and there’s never been more tools and assets available to creator educators. But the one resource we’re all lacking is time. As we return, to pre-pandemic levels of activity, any time for learning we do have will have to be squeezed in around work, appointments and commutes.

It’s a big business, too. The mobile learning market is poised to nearly quadruple in value by 2026 up to $155.8 billion from $42.2 billion in 2021. But just because our time is scarce doesn’t mean that we don’t prioritize learning. That’s where microlearning comes in.

Compared to traditional models, bite-size classes — anything under 10 minutes in length counts, but think closer to the 30-to-60-second mark — are not only more convenient, but they are also more effective at boosting long-term retention. In our survey, MARCH 2023

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// 25

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STRATEGY the second most cited benefit to short-term form learning after discovering new topics (41 percent) was that it’s easier to absorb short-term short-form content (26 percent).

The growth of microlearning is incredible news for creators who are early in their entrepreneurial journey. Shorter learning experiences are cheaper, faster, and easier to produce, meaning you can get a lot of content out into this world with limited resources.

This is particularly valuable as you begin your business journey because you’ll be iterating and testing quite a bit. It’s also a lot easier to pivot on a course topic or lesson when you’ve invested hours into it instead of weeks.

The other important thing that microlearning brings to new creators is a mechanism for audience growth. Yes, microlearning is a trend to consider regarding paid learning products.

But more creators should be using microlearning as a way to grow and engage their audience. Take Miss Excel, for example. She used microlearning on TikTok to build a massive audience (currently over 875,000 followers). Her content is concise, free and highly informative — all the microlearning staples.

If you’re an established business with existing learning products, you might be wondering if you really need to embrace microlearning. Not every trend is right for every business but microlearning is firmly aligned with peoples’ shortening attention spans and their growing reliance on mobile devices.

If you have an established course driven by long lessons, you may be missing out on a segment of your audience who simply no longer wants to learn that way.

This is especially true if your target market includes millennials and GenZ. The use of microlearning could expand your audience in the segments, helping you scale. Also, microlearning doesn’t require you to start from scratch. If you have established learning products, you may be able to reuse portions of the content or even split up lessons into more digestible chunks.

Miss Excel does exactly this.

She pulls quick tips from her lessons and if people want more information - which they often ❱ DMN.CA

// 26 do: our survey showed 57 percent of people decided to learn about a topic after seeing short-form content about it on social media - then her entire course is just waiting in the wings.

Shortening your lessons not only helps learners absorb and retain content better, it can also increase your discoverability. By featuring more, shorter lessons on your website, you expose visitors and search engines to a higher number of keywords that might trigger interest or a sale While, creator entertainers produce content anchored in the creator’s, performance, or influence, creator educators create content designed to share knowledge or drive impact.

Although the algorithm rewards the top tier of creators - a thin segment of superstar entertainers who retain a vast majority of revenue - the model is changing.

Platforms that allow direct payment like Substack. Patreon and Twitch, have seen skyrocketing investments so monetizing your own (already heavily engaged) audience is increasingly accessible.

And people are hungry for it. One big way creators are looking to build sustainable revenue is through digital learning products, which, along with books and podcasts, are expected to see the biggest yearover-year growth in creation.

By focusing on sharing knowledge and driving impact, creators, and educators, build trusting, long-lasting relationships with their audiences. That kind of community is much more sustainable and can be monetized over time. Plus unlike entertainment, education isn’t a zero-sum game: You’re not battling for the biggest share of eyeballs.

Look for educators to form a steady and sustainable backbone of the creator middle class.

Excerpted from Thinkific’s 2023 Digital Learning Trends Report. Thinkific is a Vancouverbased company that enables entrepreneurs to create, market, sell, and deliver their own online courses. Their mission is to revolutionize the way people learn and earn online by giving them the tools they need to turn their expertise into a sustainable business that impacts both them and their audience.

MARCH 2023

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