Holistic Marketing Management, Volume 7, Issue 4, Year 2017

Vol ume7 , I s s ue4 , 2 0 1 7

Edi t or i al :Under s t andi ngEmot i onandConnec t i ngI t t ot heBr and,andt heBr andt oRes ul t s TheodorVal ent i nPURCĂREA

TheGr owi ngI mpac toft heMac r oEnv i r onment Andr ewKI LNER

Di gi t alMar k et er satt heI nt er s ec t i onof Di gi t al Tr ans f or mat i onwi t hCX Cos t elI l i uț ăNEGRI CEA I oanMat eiPURCĂREA

Negat i v eI nt er es tRat es-Abs ol ut eDes pai rI mpr ov i s est heEconomy Mar i aNEGREPONTI DELI VANI S

CMOsatt heConf l uenceofAI ,CX,andGr owt h TheodorPURCĂREA

Editorial Board of “Holistic Marketing Management” (A refereed journal published four times annually by the School of Management-Marketing of the Romanian-American University) Editor-in-Chief Theodor Valentin PURCĂREA

Bernd HALLIER

John SAEE

John L. STANTON

Léon F. WEGNEZ

William PERTTULA Levent ALTINAY

Andrew KILNER Dana ZADRAZILOVA Riccardo BELTRAMO Sinisa ZARIC Gabriela SABĂU Hélène NIKOLOPOULOU Vasa LÁSZLÓ Peter STARCHON John MURRAY Kamil PÍCHA Irena JINDRICHOVSKA Holistic Marketing Management

President of European Retail Academy; President of EuCVoT, Member of the Astana Economic Scientists Club; Former Managing Director EHI Retail Institute, Germany, Chairman of the Advisory Board of EuroShop, Chairman of the Board of the Orgainvent, Trustee of EHI Retail Institute at GLOBALG.A.P. President - Association of Global Management Studies (USA); Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Entrepreneurship and Sustainability Issues & Former Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Management Systems, USA; Australian Graduate School of Entrepreneurship, the Faculty of Business and Enterprise, Swinburne University of Technology; Member of France’s National Academy of Scientific Research (CNRS); Director - ESB International Teaching and Research Exchanges, Reutlingen University, Germany Professor of Food Marketing, Erivan K. Haub School of Business, Saint Joseph’s University Philadelphia, USA; Director, Institute of Food Products Marketing, Editor, Journal of Food Products Marketing; Hall of Fame of the European Retail Academy, Honored Personality 2016 Secretary General, International Association of the Distributive Trade, AIDA Brussels; Member of France’s Academy of Commercial Sciences; Doctor Honoris Causa of NUPSPA (SNSPA) Bucharest; Hall of Fame of the European Retail Academy, Honored Personality 2015 Internet Marketing Professor, College of Business, San Francisco State University, USA Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship, Research Area Leader, Oxford School of Hospitality Management, Faculty of Business, Oxford Brookes University, UK First MBA Director at the Rennes Graduate School of Business in France; Director of RAFME Research into Management Excellence; PhD (Cambridge), MBA (City, London) Faculty of International Economic Relations, University of Economics, Prague, Czech Republic University of Turin, Italy University of Belgrade, Yugoslavia Memorial University, Grenfell Campus, Corner Brook, Canada University of Lille 3, France Szent Istvan University, Hungary Comenius University in Bratislava, Slovakia Faculty of Business, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland Faculty of Economics, University of South Bohemia in Ceske Budejovice Deputy Head of Department of Business Economics, University of Economics 1

Norbert HAYDAM Constantin ROŞCA Hans ZWAGA Roxana CODITA Dumitru MIRON Valeriu IOAN-FRANC Iacob CĂTOIU Virgil BALAURE Gheorghe ORZAN Luigi DUMITRESCU Marius D. POP Petru FILIP

Ion VOICU SUCALA Virgil POPA Alexandru NEDELEA Olguța Anca ORZAN Ana-Maria PREDA Ovidiu FOLCUȚ Doinița CIOCÎRLAN Marius Dan DALOTĂ Mihai PAPUC Gheorghe ILIESCU Costel NEGRICEA Alexandru IONESCU Tudor EDU Olga POTECEA Oana PREDA Nicoleta DUMITRU Monica Paula RAȚIU Elisabeta Andreea BUDACIA

and Management, Prague, Czech Republic Faculty of Business, Marketing Department, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, South Africa President of Romanian Scientific Society of Management - SSMAR Kemi-Tornio University of Applied Sciences, Finland Technische Universität München, TUM School of Management Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest National Institute for Economic Research, Romanian Academy; Romanian Marketing Association; Romanian Distribution Committee Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu Babes-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca Dimitrie Cantemir University, Bucharest Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Management and Economic Engineering Department; University of Glasgow, UK, College of Social Sciences, School of Social & Political Sciences; Managing Editor, Review of Management and Economic Engineering Valahia University of Târgovişte Ştefan cel Mare University of Suceava Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy Bucharest Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University Romanian-American University

Associate Editors Diana SOCA Irina PURCĂREA Dan SMEDESCU Art Designer Director Alexandru BEJAN

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“Holistic Marketing Management” (A refereed journal published four times annually by the School of Management-Marketing of the Romanian-American University) Volume 7, Issue 4, Year 2017

Contents

Theodor Valentin PURCĂREA - Editorial: Understanding Emotion and Connecting It to the Brand, and the Brand to Results…………………….…p. 4

Andrew KILNER - The Growing Impact of the Macro Environment…………………….p. 10

Costel Iliuță NEGRICEA - Digital Marketers at the Intersection of Digital Transformation Ioan Matei PURCĂREA

with CX………………………………………………………p. 20

Maria NEGREPONTI-DELIVANIS - Negative Interest Rates - Absolute Despair Improvises the Economy………………………....p. 27

Theodor PURCĂREA - CMOs at the Confluence of AI, CX, and Growth…….…………p. 37

The responsibility for the contents of the scientific and the authenticity of the published materials and opinions expressed rests with the author.

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Editorial: Understanding Emotion and Connecting It to the Brand, and the Brand to Results Friday, November 10, 2017 was a day of great celebration of considerable academic and personal achievement: 10 years after graduating from the Romanian-American University (RAU). There were beautiful moments of: celebrating a common RAU history, where the young personalities were shaped being impacted by RAU learned values and ideals (that inspired RAU Brand and the professions that it serves) from interactions and experiences; recalling four years (2003-2007) with deep emotion by those who took the opportunity to attend this memorable RAU event and honored the importance those RAU years have had in their lives till now; confirming that RAU brand and student experience are detailed and inseparably threaded together. What made us think about the remarkable transformation of RAU Brand’s energy into new action.

On July 18, 2017, Dipanjan Chatterjee, Vice President, Principal Analyst at Forrester introduced Forrester’s new “Brand Energy” framework, explaining that this concept of “Brand Energy” coined by Forrester is seen as a holistic measure of the power of a brand which translates into consumers’ action (when they buy goods and services, advocate the brand, or share socially) while also getting moved into their long-term memory (where it stimulates salience at later times). Forrester identified three contributors (as highly connected dimensions which feed enduring brand preference) to “Brand Energy” (as shown in the figure below): “Emotion” (contributes to almost half of this Brand Energy); “Salience” (about 30% of Brand Energy - the tremendous advantage of a prominent brand); “Fit” (20% of Brand Energy - the relevance and the alignment to the consumer’s world view. As documented by Forrester research, brand energy – powered by the fuel which is emotion – positively correlates with outcomes, this emotion-driven approach to branding being built on the interrelatedness of experience, perception, and outcome. [1]

Figure 1: Forrester’s new “Brand Energy” framework Source: Chatterjee, D., Introducing Forrester’s New Brand Energy Framework – Emotions Fuel Your Brand’s Energy, July 18, 2017, Forrester’s Blog

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Two month later, on September 13, 2017, James L. McQuivey, Vice President, Principal Analyst at Forrester, invited us to a random walk through Ikea in order to discover why Ikea scores top on emotion and to better understand that emotion is the key driver of customers’ outcomes, as shown the figure below: [2]

Figure 2: Ikea scores top on emotion Source: McQuivey, L.J., A Random Walk Through Ikea With James McQuivey, September 13, 2017, Forrester’s blog

It is well-known that Forrester advanced a Customer Emotion Matrix (which allowed understanding and quantifying emotion by examining the nature of the emotion – negative through positive – and the intensity of the emotion) starting from the fact that: “emotion is the basic human build block for decisions and the primary factor in growing or losing affinity - and gaining or losing share-of-wallet.” [3] On May 7, 2017, Brennan Wilkie, Senior Vice President, Customer Experience Strategy & Country Manager - Canada at InMoment, argued that consumers’ first priority in every country is the personalized support, followed by the personalized purchase, and as emotion is the top driver of a positive CX and loyalty, brands must learn how to better design, measure and iterate on the CX. Next day, Michael Lowenstein (“Beyond Philosophy”) responded (among other aspects) that there is a proven direct connection with driving personalized experience value on an emotional (as well as a functional, level and bottom line profitability). [4] And as an interesting coincidence, on the same day we find out “The Top 10 Emotions for Brand Connections” according to a research from CustomerThermometer (as shown in the figure below): [5]

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Figure 3: The Top 10 Emotions for Brand Connections, CustomerThermometer Source: Nanji, A., What Emotionally Connects Consumers to Brands? May 8, 2017, MarketingProfs

Coming back to “Beyond Philosophy”, this time to the reputed Founder & CEO Colin Shaw, it is worth remembering within this context his work about the so-called “Emotional Signature framework” (a study of emotions in CX), [6] where he talked (Beyond Philosophy: Long-term value vs. Short-term spend emotions) about three clusters of positive emotions (Attention: exciting, stimulating, indulging, exploratory; Recommendation: trusting, valued,

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focused, safe, cared for; Advocacy: happy and pleased), as shown in the figure below: [7]

Figure 3: Long-term value vs. Short-term spend emotions, Beyond Philosophy Source: Medelyan, A., Emotional Analysis Of Customer Feedback: The Missing Link, Mar 01, 2017, Thematic’s blog

Recent opinions underline the preoccupations with creating an emotionally intelligent connection with customers with the help of advanced technology (such as artificial intelligence, machine learning etc.). [8] But as scientists argue that people feel first, and think second, let us end by citing the “father of modern marketing” Philip Kotler: “Marketers need to target not only the minds of the customers but also their hearts and wellbeing. The concept of emotional marketing has been described in several books… including Experiential Marketing by Bernd Schmitt, Emotional Branding by Marc Gobe, and Lovemarks by Kevin Roberts. Great examples of emotional marketing were achieved by marketers such as Howard Schultz of Starbucks, Richard Branson of Virgin, and Steve Jobs of Apple. Starbucks’ concept of “third place for drinking coffee,” Virgin’s “unconventional marketing,” and Apple’s “creative imagination” are the implementations of emotionally relevant marketing. These brands occupy a deep place in our emotional hearts… Just be true to your brand’s purpose… Only honesty, originality, and authenticity will work.” [9]

Theodor Valentin Purcărea Editor-in-Chief

References

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[1] Chatterjee, D., Introducing Forrester’s New Brand Energy Framework – Emotions Fuel Your Brand’s Energy, July 18, 2017, retrieved from: https://go.forrester.com/blogs/17-07-18-introducing_forresters_new_brand_energy_framework_emotions_fuel_your_brands_energy/ [2] McQuivey, L.J., A Random Walk Through Ikea With James McQuivey, September 13, 2017, retrieved from: https://go.forrester.com/blogs/seeking-ikeas-secretemotion-sauce/ [3] Milligan, V., A Closer Look at the Monetary Value of Emotion, September 21, 2016, retrieved from: http://blogs.forrester.com/victor_milligan/16-09-20a_closer_look_at_the_monetary_value_of_emotion [4] Wilkie, B., Emotion and Customer Experience: Connecting Feeling With Your Bottom Line, May 7, 2017, retrieved from: http://customerthink.com/emotion-andcustomer-experience-connecting-feeling-with-your-bottom-line/?

[5] Nanji, A., What Emotionally Connects Consumers to Brands? May 8, 2017, retrieved from: https://www.marketingprofs.com/charts/2017/32033/whatemotionally-connects-consumers-to-brands?https://www.marketingprofs.com/charts/2017/32033/what-emotionally-connects-consumers-to-brands?

[6] *** https://beyondphilosophy.com/cx-services/emotional-signature/ [7] Medelyan, A., Emotional Analysis Of Customer Feedback: The Missing Link, Mar 01, 2017, retrieved from: http://blog.getthematic.com/blog/post/emotionalanalysis-customer-feedback [8] Smilovitz, S., Emotional Marketing Examples Scientifically Proven To Sway Buyers, November 28, 2017, retrieved from: https://instapage.com/blog/emotionalmarketing [9] Kotler, Ph., “Branding: From Purpose to Beneficence”, March 22, 2016, retrieved from: http://www.marketingjournal.org/brand-purpose-to-beneficence-philipkotler/

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The Growing Impact of the Macro Environment (abbreviated version of author's article to be published in Expert Insights of the Business Expert Press***)

Andrew KILNER * email contact rafme2000@yahoo.com **http:// rafme.homestead.com ***http://www.businessexpertpress.com/books/achieving-excellence-management-identifying-and-learningbad-practices

Abstract This article extends previous studies of available management actions to that of the external environment which is now becoming the dominant factor for both companies and national governments. It discusses likely trends but since changes are taking place so rapidly, avoids the danger of making a forecast for any particular year ahead.

Keywords: Management Excellence; Macro Environment JEL Classification: A10; E20; F10; F20; M21

BACKGROUND Chapter 1 of the 2010 BEP "Management Excellence" (1) book provided a concise summary of the elements in the study of management. These were subdivided into: a) elements internal to the organisation ( resources, skills, roles, processes) b) elements from the external microenvironment (customers, suppliers, competitors, banks...) c) elements emanating from the external macro environment (economic, technical, social, environmental, political‌) During the following few years as the micro environment became more severe, research effort was mostly devoted to examine how the internal operation of the firm could be improved to face up to these conditions.

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An article on these activities was published in 2015 (2).

INTRODUCTION Following the subprime-caused financial crisis of 2007/8, money became more scarce and consumer demand started to decrease.

At the same time competition increased both from internal and external sources (favoured by excessive mondialisation), leading to reduced margins.

In response, some companies increased output to reduce unit costs causing an oversupply in many sectors such as textiles, household goods and recently steel.

Others put pressure on their suppliers forcing many out of business and even to suicide (French milk industry).Most tried to reduce staff especially those having less urgent roles based on their conceptual skills. An increasing tendency is seen in new entrants to related essential industries such as banks into insurance and vice versa with promotional offers which cannot be maintained in the longer term.

Since 2016 it is becoming evident that the external macro environment is probably becoming an even more dominant aspect in affecting strategies & outcomes. Many of the specific items likely to cause problems were already analysed in the ME book and some have come to light only six years later including the deficiencies of the EU (which led to Brexit), and the divisive electoral systems which harmed the USA but have perhaps been corrected in France by the election of President Macron.

In this text we concentrate on an analysis of future requirements related to the macro environment - an area not as yet sufficiently studied in Business Schools.

IMPACTS FROM THE MACRO ENVIROMENT 1. Economic In order to recover from the above problems, governments counted on increased growth, which is difficult to achieve in a period of reduced demand and of disposable income difficulty for a large section of the population. Many companies, anxious to improve their financial ratings managed to do this by seeking out profitable areas such as sponsorship of sport and video games which may have been good for their stock exchange rating but which created little new employment or real wealth for their country.

Less unemployment yes, but also more real wealth creation and a halt in the increase of precarity levels* should be defined in a comprehensive 'mission' to pursue. (*One sixth of european salaried workers are classed in this category) The desired progress has unfortunately not even been achieved in Germany, often cited as the example of success but where precarity levels have continued to rise to 20% and an individual's Holistic Marketing Management

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life span in good health is 7 years shorter than that in France, a country judged inferior on most economic indicators.

At present, by giving business a free choice we have a situation of overproduction of goods in most sectors, with consequences such as the large amount of food thrown out past its selling date, articles of clothing which need to be cleared out by periodic sales promotions at negligible margins often using dozens of daily invasive emails.

Similarly there is excessive capacity in numerous services driving too many companies and their workers into those other sectors like insurance which have to be maintained. All this is happening at a time when essential services such as housing, medical care, are in short supply or getting more and more expensive.

Rather than just aiming for 'growth' it would therefore be more appropriate to start at the basics considering : -What really needs to be done?

-Who could do it efficiently?

-Who can provide the necessary investment? and since all cannot be done at once, -Where should the priorities lie?

A crucial element in the economic environment is the globalisation of trade. This process hailed in its early days principally because of the provision of goods at lowest prices for consumers, was allowed to go too far and led to the closure of many not inefficient firms with considerable job losses. Of particular concern is its effect on local agriculture and food industries since many products for human consumption need to have local sources of production for reasons of quality and rapid availability. The other side of this coin is the effect on workers in the producing countries who are too often paid miserable salaries for very long hours of work. This not only concerns third world countries like Bangladesh, but even some in southern Europe where textile industry workers can now earn less than their Chinese counterparts!

Correctly managing these situations is a challenge for world and regional institutions such as the EU as individual countries do not possess enough 'clout' 2. Technological With penury in market demand, companies have greatly increased their efforts in new technologies. Many novel things have been discovered in almost every industry. Unfortunately few of these have been creators of large scale employment like were automobiles or chemicals in the past. On the contrary, the increasing productivity, automation and use of digital applications

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have tended to reduce jobs in manufacturing and perhaps even more so in services such as banking or travel.

One extreme example is that of Airbus who, while benefiting from a massive order book, is from time to time reducing staff numbers.

The increase of sharing/repairing rather than more manufacturing is also a tendency to take into account - the number of cars owned is likely to decline.

Of course there has been a huge rise in the number of start-ups, most of them using various applications of digital processing. However the vast majority of these have involved only small numbers of hired staff working for creators who themselves have quickly become wealthy via stock exchange placings. No doubt they are seeking to imitate Google, Apple, Facebook, three members of the GAFAM 'Big Five' now valued at no less than $3000 billion (a figure exceeding the GDP of France!)

In terms of essential benefits we should therefore not succumb to excessive digitalisation like we did to excessive globalisation which is now showing up many disadvantages.

A further unfortunate aspect is that the funds which have poured into many of these start-up firms have not only been of relatively little benefit to their countries in terms of tax income or employment, but have sucked money into sectors of convenience, entertainment, exotic technologies (e.g. aero planes without pilots), neglecting associated social aspects and more essential sectors such as the new antibiotics.

3. Environmental Pollution & climate The importance of the environmental problem has finally been generally accepted. A very positive step has been the greatly increased number of companies inscribed under that RSV label agreeing to protect the local and world environment through actions such as recycling & reduced atmospheric pollution. However the extent of this good citizenship is limited by the need to avoid a significant reduction in their profits.

Moreover, such local actions are only a small element in the world-wide picture of global warming which is increasingly affecting all parts of the planet.

Specifically, in addition to polluted air to be found in metropoles everywhere, much of Northern Europe is becoming short of water, Southern Europe suffering more forest fires, California & Africa more serious draughts and SE Asia more frequent storms and flooding.

The agreements made under COP21, even if adhered to by all, are inadequate to halt this progression as not enough resources can be made available bearing in mind all the other investment also required eg in renewable energy projects, closure and dismantling of existing facilities-especially nuclear power stations.

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Those who put all their hopes in electric cars seem to forget that the electricity has to be generated somehow i.e. these cars are mainly a solution to reduce pollution in the big cities.

The sober picture above had already been predicted by scientists well before year 2000, taking into account growth in world population (now expected to increase 50% from 7 to 10.5 billion) by the end of the century. They even postulated that the human species will by then be on the road to extinction initially due to hunger and thirst in the poorer countries (arid conditions),and subsequently due to submersion of certain vulnerable large metropoles from the melting ice caps (an 80 cm rise in sea levels can wipe out a city of several million people) Conflicts Another important aspect to consider under the heading of environment is that related to conflicts which affect not only the locals but also visitors and potential investors. Their number has been increasing at great pace in almost every part of the world. The underlying reasons are not so much territorial gains as used to be the case in the distant past, but conflicts between religions (Muslims against others, or among themselves ), or between tribes and politicians on a national scale.

As will be discussed in Section 6, the latter aspect is facilitated by political systems inherited from the west in which divisive elections pit an incumbent president against most of the rest of the population considered as an 'obstructive opposition'.

The current situation in Venezuela is one of the best examples but which fortunately has not so far turned into armed warfare as is the case in the Middle East and much of Africa.

4. Sociological Considerable research output has been generated in this discipline during recent years, but not much of this has been utilized by the business nor the political community.

Probably the major factor has been that societies which had been relatively homogeneous have become diverse from several different aspects. Firstly in terms of disposable income which had created a 'middle class' from among the poorer strata but which, since the financial crises of 2008, has been driving many of them back into a precarious state. Or putting it another way, between those who are reasonably comfortable and those who foresee a very difficult future.

(Hence current French conflict on proposed changes in labour laws) Secondly, and related to this, the growing disparity between the young and seniors now in retirement. The former having difficulty in finding employment and therefore prolonging their studies, (at great expense in numerous countries), or lacking skills or willingness to accept vacancies in less attractive sectors. Fortunately many of them have been financially aided by Holistic Marketing Management

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parents who benefit fom a decent pension after a lifetime of employment (if it has not been cut by austerity measures like in several S/SE European countries).

This divergence has been vividly illustrated by the recent US & UK voting patterns where, as opposed to the young, a disgruntled middle class were heavily pro-Trump and UK seniors proBrexit.

For the future, there must be concern as to how many of these young people, avid mainly in the social media,festivals,sport and other amusements, can (or are willing) to earn their living doing useful,if sometimes boring work in old style type companies. Although some jobs proposed to them may be unexciting (100K vacancies in the hotel /restaurant industry in France!), there are others where candidates have also been lacking, such as assembly of the latest Peugeot model in the Rennes factory. At the same time, frequently living on a very tight budget, many of the young will readily spend 50â‚Ź on a festival concert or even 100â‚Ź on the shirt of a famous footballer.

Another increasing division taking place is that between dwellers of city and rural areas, as most new developments are being made in the former while rural areas are becoming a location for the old and the over 50s who now have difficulty in finding new jobs. This kind of lack of territorial planning, (largely due to competition between metropoles to attract new investment), also has a negative side for the cities in creating shortages of lodgings and school places, and in increasing traffic congestion.

A fourth tendency, which has appeared in the UK, Hungary, Poland (and currently in Catalonia), is the desire of many citizens to maintain sole control of their affairs and retain traditional and cultural values which they see disappearing from excessive liberties, immigration of other nationals, or now even excessive numbers of tourists in their attractive cities! As well as creating a less friendly and divided society, this is already causing practical difficulties such as shortages of nursing staff in the UK and of workers in auto plants in Slovakia.

As a final comment in this section, should we accept that there are so many healthy people in the ranks of sport etc. who are paid lots of money while contributing little to the important needs of society?

5. Financial Since the crisis of 2007/8, the financial environment has been at the forefront of attention although a certain degree of stability seems now to have been reached. The consequences for various parties can be briefly summarised as follows: - Most of the financial institutions have been saved due central bank actions favourable to them but which has caused austerity in many countries especially in Southern Europe,

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-

where citizens have suffered from reduced pensions, de-possession of lodgings and unemployment.

Many nation states have been badly hit in terms of deficits and debt , except for Germany benefitting from cheaper former eastern region labour and a favourable exchange rate.

In general, company failures have not been as widespread as feared largely because of the possibility of reducing labour numbers or costs.

Those who have been little affected (or even gained), are the very rich whose wealth has continued to grow to the point where the top 10 now possess as much as half the world population!

Putting aside any notions of jealousy or injustice, most of the money belonging to the very rich is placed in assets or funds likely to substantially increase in value and is thus not targeted into investment in essential or wealth creating projects for citizens of the country (which would never produce the same kind of rate of return).

As typical indicators, the funds available to W. Buffet are estimated at around $100 billion, and after 10 years Apple possessed $250b in cash! And here we are talking about funds accumulated legally (if sometimes under deficient taxation systems), without considering those accumulated illegally via corruption, and criminal activities.

In summary it seems that citizen's well-being will have to depend largely on investments by the state and which will therefore imply paying more taxes in one form or other. Some can be relatively painless like the higher rate of TVA for luxury goods /services proposed by the author several years ago and now being rediscussed. After all, 800€ more on a 40K€ car or 10€ on a 250€ hotel room will not put off the prospective buyer.

6. Political In the past with the exception of interest & exchange rates, it was essentially the country's own politicians who determined what happened within its borders. However in recent years we have reached a situation where external events have become dominant to such an extent that internally made decisions are also at the mercy of what transpires outside. [Politicians who ignored this fact tended to make unrealistic promises such as that of President Hollande that he would reverse the unemployment curve within 2-3 years of taking office] The two major events triggering this situation were the excessive liberisation of transfer of money and goods which led to the subprime crisis, and an unmitigated trend towards mondialisation. Unfortunately, as analysed in the 2010 BEP book, the EU while imposing all kinds of internal regulations, did not do enough to protect member countries against these external forces. As little progress was even made in succeeding years, nations like GB (Brexit), Poland (Kaczynski), think that they could do better on their own.

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These tendencies are partly accentuated by the weakness of national political systems which was also discussed in the book (along with some possible improvements).

Presidential type elections and referenda are very divisive and near to 50/50 results split nations into "us and them" with insufficient regard for national conciliation and overall consequences.

The severity of the divisions has lately been seen in the results of the national elections in that USA and the referenda in the UK and Catalonia. [In less developed countries such elections, coupled with massive corruption, often deteriorate into armed conflicts] Having looked at the weaknesses of existing political systems, it is necessary to examine the nature of the political leaders who emerge from these systems. Leaving aside those who function in a dictatorial fashion, most suffer from various weaknesses to be analysed in a subsequent article on the author's website. (3) A common factor is their reluctance to face realities claiming that they can overcome most problems since lack of optimism is a barrier against being elected in the first place. Once elected, they do not sufficiently anticipate events (even having had warnings), few find an equitable balance between reflection and their eventual actions the consequences of which have not usually been sufficiently evaluated. Moreover, too often they tend to act on less important problems which are generally easier to handle, and without fully considering their effect on other related matters.

Of course the above behavioural characteristics have a serious bearing on the business, social and other topics discussed in the previous sections of the article.

CONCLUSIONS In recent years the external environment has taken an increasingly dominant role in world affairs reducing the freedom of most companies and nations to implement their own decisions. As always, over-confident political leaders avoid too much discussion on future constraints to problems which many individuals questioned in surveys do sense as forthcoming.

There are three major problems with which the world is faced: – the disparity of living standards, – armed conflicts, and – the earth's environment (pollution, climate, life necessities like food & water).

The three are responsible for a fourth i.e. migration which, even with the best humanitarian will, cannot otherwise be resolved since without restrictions maybe 30 million migrants would like to come to the USA and similarly to Europe.

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As principal 'basic' causes of these problems we can identify excessive population growth, an increasing shortage of available financial resources, and the quest for power & wealth among the ruling classes.

Global population is becoming excessive relative to the capacity of the planet and is not matched by sufficient wealth creation/repartition to stop the descent into precarity for more and more people. The Chinese type birth limitation is not envisaged for India and the African nations which are forecast to grow the most, although a few other countries like Bulgaria, Russia and particularly Japan (40 million decrease forecast by year 2100), are seeing this happen voluntarily.

Financial resources which could alleviate all three problems are unfortunately passing into the hands of the very rich and not being much used to create real wealth and a better life for citizens as they can be invested more profitably elsewhere-typically in providing exotic products for the wealthy (e.g. flying taxis), or greater entertainment (sporting events, festivals, films...) for the others.

Power & wealth effects -a major cause for conflicts, can be seen not only in post (fraudulent) African elections, but in corruption or fictitious payments even in otherwise exemplary democratic countries.

As auxiliary causes are government management inadequacies such as insufficient linking of education to jobs. An example is to have students overloading university places if once graduated they have no jobs and, like in South Korea, they pay big money to emigrate to the USA, even to initially do mundane agricultural work.

In addition, we should recognize that citizen behaviour is partly to blame because too many want to have their convenience, comfort or entertainment even if this may bring more problems rather than long term benefits.

Overall, the key issue is that there will just not be enough resources to consecrate to all the problems which seem to be increasing every year. This fact is most relevant to the environmental element and has just been clearly illustrated by the recent hurricanes in the west Atlantic which will require enormous re-construction costs.

And even if these resources were available, we largely lack two essential implementation aspects namely: a) Securing agreement among the increasingly divided society groups as to how to deal with these problems. b) Enabling appropriate institutions to enforce the necessary measures.

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In the light of all the above discussed circumstances citizens will have to accept that we have to change the way in which we run our affairs if at least we want to minimize/delay the painful outcomes with which we are likely to faced.

Copyright Andrew Kilner, October 2017 REFERENCES 1. BEP Management Excellence book, 2010 http://www.businessexpertpress.com/books/achieving-excellencemanagementidentifying-and-learning-bad-practices/ 2. Improving company management: review of recent ideas (April 2015) https://issuu.com/rcdaida/docs/holistic_marketing_management vol 5 Issue 2

3. www.resappmanexcell.homestead.com

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Digital Marketers at the Intersection of Digital Transformation with CX Dr. Costel Iliuță NEGRICEA Ioan Matei PURCĂREA

Abstract Consumers’ technology adoption is powered by emotion and hyperadoption is a defining characteristic today. Digital customer experience (DCX) is evolving step by step and digital marketers are aware of the role of CX as the top digital transformation priority, not forgetting that the customer is one (offline and online) and struggling to offer relevant content and messaging within the today’s customer journey so as to create more cohesive cross-channel customer engagement, considering both the new standards set in the rapidly evolving and the need for increasingly personalized interactions (and how much personalization) at all points of the customer journey. Recent research findings pointed to significant recommendations, knowing both where to focus resources to implement digital transformation, and that improving CX is a very important benefit of digital transformation, CX and brand working together.

Keywords: Digital Marketers; Digital transformation; Digital Expectations; CX JEL Classification: L86; M15; M31; O33

Digital Marketers Facing Digital Transformation 2018 There is no doubt that consumers are more and more emotionally attached to their devices and that technology adoption is powered by emotion. Forrester’s analysts created a model which measures emotions (anticipation, joy, surprise, trust, anger, disgust, fear, and sadness) captured through passive tracking mechanisms (like facial analysis) and processed the raw data by using an algorithm that can reveal insights about how consumers’ emotions evolve as they become aware about the technology and purchase it. (Aquino, 2017) And customer experience (CX) is evolving step by step, confirming that it is all about emotions in the interaction of biological, psychological and social factors, in our world of big data and… semantic understanding, sentiment analysis, neurobiology, genome research, artificial intelligence (AI), neuromarketing, (i-SCOOP) where there is also no doubt that intelligent assistants will bridge the experience of offline and online worlds. (Hill-Wilson, 2017) The perception of experiences is as complex and diverse as human emotions are, and as the lines between offline and online are blurring customers care about experiences and digital, becoming important to distinguish between different interactions and experiences, considering parameters such as: (i-SCOOP) the customer’s intent at any specific moment of interaction and Holistic Marketing Management

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the device used by him, the channels used by customer and the broader and specific context within which the interaction occurs and the digital brand experiences take place. In order to close the gaps between the perceptions of the company’s customers regarding their experiences with the company and the company’s perceptions about the offered experiences, marketers are struggling to better understand journeys, intent, channels and behavior, seeing the digital customer experience (DCX) as the sum of all customer experiences a customer has with their company across all possible digital touchpoints and contact moments, as clearly explained by iSCOOP, which also underlined: • The crucial role of CX in digital transformation, not forgetting both that the customer is one, even if it makes sense to look at the DCX, and that enterprise-wide transformations need enterprise-wide metrics and KPIs; (i-SCOOP) • Digital transformation (DX or DT) is at the top of the agenda for 2018 and beyond of a large number of organizations, being necessary to be cautious as DX still seems to mean many different things to many different people, as shown below: (i-SCOOP)

Figure 1: Digital Transformation 2018: Towards Ubiquitous Convergence and More Interconnectedness Source: Digital transformation 2018: convergence and a more interconnected DX approach, i-SCOOP

• One of the fastest growing digital technologies and digital evolutions for 2018 and beyond is Blockchain (which has a key role in the digital transformation of several processes and industries); the convergence of Blockchain and IoT touches (beyond increasing trust, saving costs and speeding up transactions), for example, upon the various other technologies (such as AI), industries (such as insurance and telematics) and activities (such as SCM and security). (iSCOOP) Holistic Marketing Management

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It is well-known that DCX can be quantified much easier than experiences in non-digital ecosystems, and this due to the amount of data that gets created in the digital ecosystem (including cookies, online forms, existing profiles, and other data sources). Digital marketers can personalize the DCX on the basis of the above mentioned data, offering content and messaging which speak uniquely to their customers. (Glenn, 2017) On the other hand, it is also very important for digital marketers to look deeper into the atomic particles of the multitude of each digital customer experience while going beyond the limits of channels, devices and tactics, not overlooking the essence and better understanding the contextual dimension of digital experiences and the crucial role of digital in today’s customer journey. (i-SCOOP) On September 30, 2017, we received an e-mail from “AMA on behalf of Tealium” having as subject “Forrester Report - The Critical Connection between Offline and Online Marketing”, and inviting us to view the July 2017 Forrester report “Making the Most of Customer Data Onboarding”. Within this framework it was highlighted that less than 1 in 5 marketers are able to build a single view of the customer across digital and offline channels (because their data is siloed across the tools and applications they use), despite the fact that 90% of marketers recognize that building this single view is critical (in order to make informed business decisions or to power the personalized marketing campaigns companies need a cohesive connection between all these sources of data): “Customer data onboarding is the critical connection between offline and online marketing that marketers can leverage in creating more cohesive cross-channel customer engagement.”

Digital Marketers Facing Digital Expectations In September this year, Peter Lavers (Customer Experience and CRM Manager, WCL Customer Management) and Rob Poratti (Product Marketing Manager for IBM Watson Commerce) express the belief that fundamental for companies to win competitive advantage is to deeply understand their customers’ expectations and to innovate to find new ways to meet those expectations economically and reliably, delivering distinctive and profitable customer experiences across all their channels of engagement. They underline that within the dramatically changed landscape and so-called “Amazon and Uber Effect” (term coined by them to describe relevant market’s disruption by being obsessed about customers and keeping its brand promise to its customers) nobody can ignore current developments (such as Omni channel, artificial intelligence and real-time personalization) which reflect expectations increasingly defined by digital (once met in one sector become standard for other sectors). (Lavers and Poratti, 2017) Lavers and Rob Poratti reviewed the new standards set in expectations for availability, speed, transparency, advice and immediacy, highlighting the need for a new model of personalization (doing a better job of engaging customers as individuals) and for making connections across seemingly unconnected data types and sources, drawing insights accordingly and communicating these insights properly. They also raise the question of ethics around customer data management and presented the capabilities of IBM Watson as an useful digital Holistic Marketing Management

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marketer’s and online merchandiser’s cognitive assistant in approaching customer engagement with AI, building the brand experiences your customers want, and bridging the Omni-channel divide.

Within this context it is useful to remember that as the latest issue (January 2017) of the Digital Transformation Initiative (launched by the World Economic Forum in 2015, in collaboration with Accenture) highlights: in order to innovate and improve customer experiences companies use consumer data with the help of digitalization; omnichannel experiences and mass customization of products will be enabled by smart supply chains and factories; central to gaining a competitive advantage will be a firm’s ability to manage consumer experiences; with data as the backbone of their delivery, products will evolve into services, and services into experiences. It was also shown that to keep up with the rapidly evolving expectations of digital customers companies need to constantly reinvent their offerings, focusing on delivering the most compelling experiences (considering CX as the top digital transformation priority), and taking into account customers’ expectations of increasingly personalized interactions (and how much personalization) at all points of their journey. (World Economic Forum, 2017) Driving the Digital Transformation across the Organization Knowing How to Start and that Improving CX is Key McKinsey’s representatives call “digital reinventors” the companies (digital natives, incumbents competing in new ways through digitization, incumbents competing in new industries through digital moves and initiatives) that are making digital moves and are outperforming their traditional-incumbent counterparts, by investing more in digital (in innovative technologies, analytics, and digital talent, in business-model innovations or entirely new business models) and executing differently. The digital reinventors are using practices (such as the approach to investments, the degree of innovation, and the application of digital technologies) both to digitize their core businesses and to innovate through new business models, differing in how they deploy the basic digital technologies ( such as big data, cloud computing, and the mobile Internet). McKinsey’s survey results recommend companies that are not yet digital reinventors to start by taking a dual approach to business-model innovation, to be bold in experimenting with new technologies, and to make decisive investments (recrafting their investment decision-making processes and their overall cultures). (Bughin, J., LaBerge, 2017) But other McKinsey’s representatives (Meffert and Swaminathan, 2017) have shown that to stimulate companies to embrace innovation and change at scale, CEOs need to create a sense of urgency and think big (having a bold plan, putting the customer first and breaking down the functional silos), to build an operating system for speed and reaction time (recruiting the team, being fast and building to adjust) and to create momentum through forceful scale (spreading the change, turning IT into a weapon and find partners and building networks). The target is to

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capture full value by driving the digital transformation across the organization, taking into account of course that is not easy to start a change program.

What concerns marketers, is to know where to focus resources to implement digital transformation at their company. Findings from research firm Altimeter (which surveyed in August 2017 digital transformation professionals in US, Canada, the UK, France and Germany – Altimeter, “The 2017State of Digital Transformation,” Oct 4, 2017) revealed – as shown by eMarketer in the figure below – that: 46.6% of respondents were investing in creating a seamless CX across all social, mobile, web and ecommerce efforts, while 46,4% were investing in better ecommerce and mcommerce platforms and modern processes; 43.0% of respondents were investing in modernized IT infrastructure and technologies with increased agility, flexibility, manageability and security; 42.0% wanted to expand research efforts into better understanding the customers’ digital touchpoints and customer journey and so on. On the other hand, eMarketer also highlighted that improving CX is believed to be a “very important” benefit of digital transformation by almost 70% of US digital transformation leaders polled in June 2017 - according to a research from Couchbase.

Figure 1: Leading Digital Transformation Initiatives at Their Company According to Digital Transformation Professionals Worldwide, Aug 2017, Altimeter Source: Minsker, M., Improving the Customer Experience is Key to Digital Transformation, eMarketer October 17 Holistic Marketing Management

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Conclusions: Challenges for CMO, “the holder of the keys to the customer” In our previous article, we showed that in order to deliver successful customer experiences companies need to achieve digital marketing success on the way of the never-ending digital journey, reinventing marketing with this kind of journey, by better understanding the impact of digital transformation on professional skillsets and improving digital marketing skills.

We started our today’s article by emphasizing the link between emotions (remembering that Forrester’s analysts created a model which measures emotions) and CX (which is confirming that it is all about emotions in the interaction of biological, psychological and social factors). We consider that it is useful to challenge our thoughts and keep moving forward on this way, by taking into account recent valuable recommendations such as those suggested by the reputed Forrester’s representative James L. McQuivey, PhD, Vice President, Principal Analyst (and author of the book “Digital Disruption: Unleashing the next wave of innovation”, 2013; on April 14, 2015, he highlighted (McQuivey with Doty, 2015) the fact that CMO – the holder of the keys to the customer – is challenged to build the right connection with the right customers at crucial moments in the hyperadoption cycle: attention, intention, and action): ● CMOs has to consider the new findings in the science of emotion and to embed specific target emotions in the CX of the entire brand; (McQuivey, 2017) ● CMOs has to consider the new reality that CX and brand must work together to build futureready companies (in order to measure the power of brands Forrester has created the brand energy framework, by applying consumer hyperadoption and the most recent developments in the science of emotion); (Chatterjee, McQuivey, Fleming, Salazar, 2017) ● CMOs has to know how to build a digital relationship that is frequent, emotion-rich, and convenient. (McQuivey, 2017) It is also our duty to add that CMOs must not forget what James L. McQuivey said in his keynote at Forrester’s 2015 Forum For Marketing Leaders in New York about hyperadoption as a “characteristic that will define the next 10 years of your personal and business experience… hyperadoption will cause the next 10 years to generate an order of magnitude more change in your life than the past 10 years did… Because the past 10 years gave you the smartphone and the tablet...” (McQuivey, 2015)

References Aquino, J., Emotion Powers Technology Adoption, Sep 08, 2017, retrieved from: http://www.1to1media.com/technology/emotion-powers-technology-adoption

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Bughin, J., LaBerge, L., How digital reinventors are pulling away from the pack, McKinsey Survey October 2017, retrieved from: https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/digitalmckinsey/our-insights/how-digital-reinventors-are-pulling-away-from-the-pack?

Glenn, R., Digital Customer Experience vs. Customer Experience, May 9, 2017, retrieved from: http://www.veriday.com/blog/digital-customer-experience-2/ Hill-Wilson, M., What’s Your Context? digital or omni-channel, Sep 15, 2017, retrieved from: http://customerthink.com/whats-your-context-digital-or-omni-channel/ Lavers, P. and Poratti, R., Reaching the New Standard in Digital Expectations, September 21, 2017, retrieved from: http://www.customerexperienceupdate.com/edition/daily-average-handletime-customer-expectations-2017-09-21?

McQuivey, L.J. with Doty, A.C., Will People Really Do That? Marketers Must Get Ready For Hyperadoption Now, For CMO Professionals, April 14, 2015, retrieved from: https://www.forrester.com/report/Will+People+Really+Do+That/-/E-RES117907 McQuivey, L.J. (Host), Hyperadoption, digital disruption, and leadership in the age of the customer, A complimentary Forrester event, January 19, 2017, retrieved from: https://go.forrester.com/digital-disruption-sg/ McQuivey, L.J., Will People Really Do That? Hyperadoption Says Yes, April 27, 2015, retrieved from: https://go.forrester.com/blogs/15-04-27will_people_really_do_that_hyperadoption_says_yes/ Meffert, J. and Swaminathan, A., How to break through the gravitational pull of your legacy organization, October 2017, retrieved from: https://www.mckinsey.com/businessfunctions/digital-mckinsey/our-insights/how-to-break-through-the-gravitational-pull-of-yourlegacy-organization? *** https://www.i-scoop.eu/customer-experience-emotions-emotions-and-a-word-on-the-brain/ *** https://www.i-scoop.eu/digital-customer-experience/ *** Digital transformation: deep dive into the customer experience, https://www.iscoop.eu/digital-transformation/digital-transformation-deep-dive-customer-experience/ *** Digital transformation 2018: convergence and a more interconnected DX approach, https://www.i-scoop.eu/digital-transformation/digital-transformation-2018-convergence-holisticdx/ *** Blockchain, digital trust and distributed ledger technology – going big business, https://www.i-scoop.eu/blockchain-distributed-ledger-technology/ *** https://www.i-scoop.eu/digital-customer-experience/ *** World Economic Forum, Digital Transformation Initiative In collaboration with Accenture, Unlocking $100 Trillion for Business and Society from Digital Transformation, Executive Summary, January 2017, retrieved from: https://www.accenture.com/t20170116T084450__w__/us-en/_acnmedia/Accenture/ConversionAssets/WEF/PDF/Accenture-DTI-executive-summary.pdf *** https://www.couchbase.com/ *** Forrester’s Report “The CMO’s Guide To Emotion” (Prepare Your Brand To Act On The New Science Of Emotion), August 14, 2017, James L. McQuivey, https://www.forrester.com/James-L.-McQuivey *** Forrester’s Report “Emotions Fuel Your Brand Energy” (Introducing Forrester’s Brand Energy Framework), June 27, 2017, Dipanjan Chatterjee, James L. McQuivey, Gina Fleming, Juan Salazar, https://www.forrester.com/James-L.-McQuivey

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Negative interest rates - Absolute despair improvises the economy1 Maria Negreponti-Delivanis

Abstract This article deals with a timely issue, the recent EU decision to implement an unprecedented economic measure. This consists of the application of negative interest rates on bank deposits, which in principle represents an incomprehensible measure for economists. In particular, European citizens, who will put their savings in commercial European banks, not only will not be rewarded with a positive interest rate, as was the rule until now, but they will have to pay a negative interest to the banks for safeguarding their money. This incredible measure abolishes the quintessence of savings and causes turmoil and an unprecedented review of the entire monetary theory and policy, as well as the content of basic concepts and principles of economic science. It is a measure of despair and improvisation, moving away from the fundamentals of the economy and trying to overcome the failure of low and very low interest rates to yield the desired results, i.e. the revitalization of the European economy. This paradox measure is an extension of the famous statement by Mario Draghi, the ECB president, on January 2016, that "there are no limits" to what he will do in order to achieve the objectives he has set for his term.

The ECB is the first bank implementing this measure for a year already. It is therefore necessary to investigate the meaning, the causes and consequences of this European absurdity.

Keywords: Macroeconomic policy; Negative interest rates JEL Classification: A11; E02; E40; E60

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*** May 2017, under publication in French, in the Targoviste/Alexandria Review

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1. Which is the Meaning of‌ this unconventional financial measure which punishes savings, and aims at encouraging total expenditure, i.e. consumption and investment? Negative interest rates, from a theoretical viewpoint, aim at making borrowing cheaper, thus leading to an increase in demand and reviving the economy. Savers are discouraged to save as they are required to pay a price to the banks for keeping their savings. The initiators of this measure hope, moreover, that those who are discouraged to save be cause of negative interest rates will shift to consumption or investment. This however is by no means certain. Chances are that under the deep recession prevailing in European economies they will prefer hoarding, awaiting more favorable developments. This is because hoarding will bring about a zero interest rate, while depositing their savings in the bank will result in negative interest rates.

Apart from the fact that the measure of negative interest rates is directed against savings, it also turns against the banks which are penalized for accumulating and not lending enough, while it is hoped that, as a result of negative interest rates, they will increase loans for investment and consumption. This hypothesis however, requires both sufficient bank deposits in spite of the negative interest rates the depositors will be required to pay, as well as the willingness of banks to increase lending to individuals and its fulfillment is by no means certain, for two main reasons: - First, because private savers will most probably prefer inexpensive hoarding over depositing their money in the banks, even at a low cost, they will decrease their deposits which form the basis for lending and - Second, because banks will probably be less willing to lend compared to before the adoption of the measure of negative interest rates, in case they face decreased profits between what they gain through reduced deposits and what they lose from granting loans[1]. The profit of commercial banks will also be lower because they will now be obliged to pay negative interest rates to the Central Bank for the percentage of their deposits there exceeding the required level. This additional measure is also aimed at encouraging lending by commercial banks to individuals, as opposed to maintaining cash deposits at the Central Bank.

Apart from the negative interest rates on government bonds, the unorthodox measure extends to private European debt securities, worth EUR 65 billion[2]. What can possibly be the aim of individuals placing their savings in securities which require them to pay a price for safekeeping?

Safety? Even more important is the relevant question, whether they think of this as a temporary or permanent condition.

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2. The causes for the imposition of negative interest rates What are the causes behind the imposition of such an absurd, in principle, financial measure?

These are mainly: A. The failure of the EU and the Eurozone Given the fact that this unnatural measure apparently started essentially in Europe [3], it makes sense that any attempt at investigating its causes should stem from the situation prevailing there.

The reason is that this is a desperate measure, seeking even unconventional salvation solutions, a measure chosen by institutions and individuals in order to ensure their savings, even by resigning from a positive interest rate, even through their consent to accept a negative interest rate. This negative interest rate is required to face circumstances of abnormally low inflation, deflation and recession, combined with a fall in the general level of prices, phenomena that prevail in Europe on a long-term basis. The aim is mainly to convince commercial banks to lend to individuals rather than to accumulate their assets to the ECB, to which they are also obliged, as mentioned above, to pay a negative interest rate. Some form of logic inherent in the imposition of negative interest rates refers to periods where the general level of prices drops, with the result that the debtor who borrowed at a positive interest rate records losses, while the lender has an extra gain beyond the positive nominal interest rate, through the rise of the effective interest rate he enjoys. Therefore, in times of falling prices, depositors, even if required to pay the banks a negative interest rate, eventually reap the gain from the increase in purchasing power their deposits have acquired in the meantime. This is precisely the case of the EU, which has sunk into recession and falling prices. Negative interest rates also aim at reversing deflation to inflation in Europe. Please observe that the entire structure of the EU, and especially that of the Eurozone is organized so as to protect the common currency from inflation, while its founders obviously considered that it was not threatened by deflation, while Europe already wishes for more inflation.

The adoption of this unprecedented measure, i.e. negative interest rates, on the part of the E.U., certainly testifies to its inability to address the numerous and accumulating problems, using traditional financial measures. Europe’s problems can be summarized as referring to the consequences of a complete failure to fulfill all initial promises given to European citizens, consisting of ensuring rapid growth rates, the convergence of the less developed countries to more developed ones, full employment and more equitable distribution of the European income.

The convergence of the economies, which would be automatic, according to the unfounded tenets of neoliberals, not only did not materialize, but furthermore, the gap between the rich North and the poor South is constantly widening. Moreover, the EU failed to fulfill promises concerning full employment and rapid growth. It also breached the promise of Europe for a more equitable income distribution, since disparities are peaking due to the concentration of wealth in Holistic Marketing Management

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the ever fewer hands of oligarchs. However, in the highly globalized EU environment, which simultaneously combines extreme doctrinal views of liberals and the consequences of the chaotic activity of financial capitalism, what is of prime importance for the evaluation of its economic effects are the numbers, not the data of the real economy. The profits of stock markets and other financial institutions were sending a message of illusory success for many years, while there was an obvious disregard for the degree of prosperity of European citizens, the emaciation of applied democracy, for increasing Euroscepticism and the progressive reduction of solidarity and cohesion in Europe. The introduction of the common European currency, not only did not contribute to the functioning of the economies of its member states, but on the contrary aggravated their condition and brought on the full realization of a deadlock in Europe.

Europe tried to react to the gloomy state of the economy with the adoption of monetary policy measures which were however unsuccessful. The European economy is constantly sinking into chronic depression, which at times intensifies with signs of deflation and falling commodity prices. Unemployment remains high, or very high, especially in many southern European economies, while the propensity to invest is weak and therefore insufficient to revive the economy. Annual growth rate estimates are being constantly revised, as actual values are lower compared to forecasts. Please note in this regard that only in 2008, the income of the 19 Eurozone economies reached the corresponding level of the first months of 2008[4]. The dominant reason for the long-term failure of the EU-Eurozone at recovery is undoubtedly the imposition of austerity, which turned from a short-term measure into a long-term one with no closure date. Additional reasons have emerged recently, which hamper European recovery, such as low oil prices, declining growth in China and other emerging economies, the appearance of numerous indications of fatigue in Germany which operates as the growth engine of Europe, as well as the rise of far-right parties in Europe, fueling pessimistic predictions about the future.

Within the gloomy European scenery one should take into account the constant failures of meeting its objectives. Although one of the main objectives was to limit public debt in Europe, the latter is constantly increasing, in spite of the throttling austerity permanently imposed.

It is therefore hard, based on the disappointing European economic situation, to interpret Mario Draghi’s optimism that negative interest rates would "cause a miracle." Moreover, he is not the only one who seems to believe in the effectiveness of this measure as implied by the fact that several economies have already implemented it [5]. Justified doubts as to the success of negative interest rates in reviving the European economy, have fueled rumors that the secret objective of negative interest rates is not the one officially stated, but the path towards the abolition of money and its replacement by plastic [6]. This view is supported by the fact that: - France has banned all cash transactions exceeding EUR 1000.

- Spain has banned all cash transactions exceeding EUR 2,500.

- Uruguay has banned all cash transactions in excess of EUR 5,000[7].

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B. Zero growth forecast Apart from austerity which would be theoretically possible to modify following a decision of the member states, in spite of the fact that it represents Europe’s permanent macroeconomic policy, condemning it to deep recession, there seems to be something even more serious, not limited to Europe the solution to which is extremely difficult if not impossible. This is the international revival of Alvin Hansen’s[8] theory, updated by Larry Summers[9] and focusing on the heavily burdened already European plane[10]. This theory totally justifies the market forecasts of very low inflation and very low interest rates for many years to come: 1% inflation and 1% interest rate. This is the theory of chronic depression, stating that apart from the consequences of the 2007 crisis, the developed economies are likely to suffer as a result of a significant imbalance between the propensity to save in excess of the propensity to invest. This imbalance pushes interest rates downwards and when the latter reach very low levels monetary policy is no longer able to influence them, with the result that the economy enters a long period of recession[11].

This is the well-known liquidity trap[12], which occurs during periods of intense depression when the interest rate has dropped to such a low level that the relative expectations of individuals exclude any further reduction. A recent study[13] proves that over the last 30 years real interest rates have decreased by approximately 4.5 percentage points both in developed and developing economies. This decrease is the result of many factors, some acting as vicious circles, such as low growth rates and especially changing preferences for savings and investment caused by an overabundance of savings combined with a reluctance to invest. The factors causing this imbalance are expected to have an impact on interest rates, keeping them low and possibly negative, for many years to come.

The prospect of a world with no growth is frightening [14] and negative interest rates can be seen as "the price of fear [15]". It is a reflection of societies, in which the next generation will enjoy a lower degree of prosperity than the previous one.

3. Negative interest rates and economic theory The introduction of negative interest rates in the context of general economic theory, especially when they are perceived as a permanent and not temporary phenomenon, encounters insurmountable difficulties. This is because the interest rate is a monetary phenomenon, which is determined by four factors [16]: * Time preference: people do not attach equal importance to present and future consumption.

Time preference indicates their displeasure when forced to postpone for the future, a satisfaction that could be carried out without delay, and this delay is rewarded by the interest rate. In the case of a negative interest rate, the above logic is reversed and is no longer rational: people prefer future over present consumption, and to ensure it they are willing to pay a price: the Holistic Marketing Management

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negative interest. * Marginal productivity of capital, which is the return on an additional unit invested. In the case of negative interests, an individual will probably expect a negative marginal return on capital because of the recession and low demand for consumption, and therefore will not invest (the imbalance between savings exceeding investment will increase).

* The increase in the quantity of money in circulation provided by seignior age banking (increasing the amount of money in case ofnegative interest rates will not further decrease their level and will not revive the economy).

* The preference of people for liquidity (which does not occur in case of negative interest rates, given the fact that this indicates an excessive liquidity).

Maintaining negative interest rates for long is a case that cannot be interpreted by general economic principles (along with many other cases that are no longer subject to rules because of the incompatible consequences of the almost simultaneous invasion of globalization, extreme neoliberal views and the stock market development stage)[17].

"Part II. Will the desired objectives be achieved by the imposition of negative interest rates?�

As pointed out already in the preceding analysis, resorting to the unorthodox measure of negative interest rates was mainly aimed (at least as officially stated) at revitalizing the economy, both European and global.

1.

The erroneous practice of fiscal policy exclusion

The anxiety as to the success of the attempts at revival of the world economy and the European one in particular, brings up a very important omission of the macroeconomic policy, adopted in the EU. This consists of the EU's decision in the late 70s to only apply monetary policy, almost completely rejecting fiscal policy. This unilateral EU choice contradicts the fact that the inability of monetary policy to effectively help the economy in the Great Depression of 1929-1933, had generally been recognized since 1936, the importance of increased expenditure in the economy for the control of depressions had been realized thanks to the General Theory of J.M. Keynes, and the constant increase in government spending as a share in the GDP of modern economies imposed the complementation of fiscal and monetary policy as an absolute necessity. However, what has radically changed the operating mode of individual national economies in the late 70s, is the absolute predominance of the neoliberal vision, which downplayed demand, attributing an excessive importance to supply, with the result that resorting to fiscal policy was deemed Holistic Marketing Management

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unnecessary. However, it was not unnecessary [18]. That decision proved not only wrong but also extremely dangerous, as the adverse factors that led the European economy into a long term recession cannot be dealt with only through monetary policy. In the case examined here in particular, resorting to low and already negative interest rates, does not promise to be an effective solution, especially as these are imposed on economies that have suffered the adverse effects of chronic austerity and are thus extremely problematic. In order to get back on their feet, these economies require a radical review and restructuring of their entire economic system. More specifically, their accumulated problems can only be solved through the widespread use of properly selected measures, measures available in the arsenal of fiscal policy. Recognizing the abandonment of fiscal policy as a major mistake, many economists now argue that if governments had attributed sufficient importance to demand since the 70s, their economies would now be witnessing low underemployment, high income and low inflation [19].

Concerning in particular the problem of inflation, please note that since the mid-80s inflation has caused widespread panic, in spite of the fact that it did not contribute significantly to the decaying structure of the EU-Eurozone.

2.

The causes of long-term recession or zero growth

The fundamental cause for this long term recession, which particularly affects Europe and not only, is besides austerity, probably the non-implementation of fiscal measures in the economy, for about 45 years. This lack of budgetary measures can be summarized in the minimization of state intervention in the economy, which gradually led to the new zero-growth model for Europe and the world, characterized by an overabundance of savings.

This dangerous overabundance [20] with its many abnormal aspects is the focus of current imbalances in the world and is especially manifest in Europe, as a result of the austerity policy.

These imbalances are largely the result of widening income inequalities and wealth distribution on many levels. In the first place, although, the share of wages in GDP is perceived as constant in the long term, it is nevertheless subject to a significant decline during the period 1983-2006, according to relevant IMF estimates [21], which is considered dangerous for the system, since in many cases it has exceeded what is considered a crucial point in the context of the prevailing theory [22]. Specifically, the share of wages in the G7 member countries decreased by 5.8% in the period 1983-2006, namely by 8.8% in the countries of the EU, 9.3% in France and 13% in Greece respectively. At the same time, the share of profits is obviously constantly increasing as a share in the GDP of developed economies, as income shares are changing hands and are channeled from wage-earners to financiers, from labor to capital. This anomaly is due to the fact that, since the 80s, wages constantly fall short of labor productivity, which means that employees not only do not reap the fruits of progress, though their productivity is rising and rising fast, but witness in many cases a decrease in their real earnings. Let me remind you that, according to the prevailing economic theory, the equation of wages with labor productivity is a sine qua non for Holistic Marketing Management

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the smooth functioning of the economy. However the neoliberal State remains inactive, so that the alleged state neutrality essentially favors profits at the expense of wages.

An additional aspect of creating uncontrollable inequalities refers to personal income distribution, where developments have been exponential since the imposition of globalization and neoliberalism: 1% of the Earth's richest residents is in control of about 45% of global wealth ... and 50% of the poorest inhabitants of the planet is called to share 1% of global wealth. In the future it is expected that the share of wealth in the hands of the global elite will increase further.

These uncontrollable inequalities fuel the overabundance of savings which, on one hand reduce demand, resulting in crises of overproduction and, on the other hand, are not channeled into productive investment which remains weak, but in the hoarding of or demand for luxury goods and services. It is indeed well known that the creation of savings is the prerequisite for the generation of investment, but does not guarantee the latter. While savings depend on the level of income and are enhanced by unequal distribution, the propensity to invest is a function of the profits expected in return. During a period of decreasing prices which is expected to continue, the elasticity of business forecasts is equal to -1, which means that entrepreneurs not only do not expect a profit from their investment, but fear further losses, in which case they will not invest.

The overabundance of liquidity on the other hand, is no longer primarily directed to the acquisition of financial assets, as long as their returns are too low. Regarding the demand for consumption, the drastic reduction of wages, insecurity prevailing everywhere, the reduction of the welfare state services and high unemployment maintain it at low and inadequate levels as far as encouraging development is concerned. The oligarchs on their part have accumulated about half of the world income, have long met their basic needs and the kind of luxurious goods and services they buy, and their preference for hoarding do not contribute to stimulating the deeply recessionary economy through active demand.

Conclusion The critical situation in Europe, as well as the failures of macroeconomic policy, which is entirely based on monetary policy measures, necessitates its supplementation with fiscal policy measures. The most urgent among the latter is the immediate effort to redress the totally unregulated mode of income distribution. The explosive and extremely dangerous income distribution inequalities prevailing over the last 30 years are the dominant cause hindering the smooth operation of the European economies. It is naturally obvious that consolidation should start by substituting this paranoid permanent austerity system with an automatic correction mechanism of the economic cycle. The analysis shows that without a revision of European macroeconomic policy as a whole, the measure of imposing negative interest rates has no chances of achieving its objectives.

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*May 2017, under publication in french, in the Targoviste/Alexandria Review

References

[1] The Bank of International Settlements warns against “widespread insecurity” in its March 2016 report [2] Jacques Adda, "Taux négatifs: le prix de la peur", Alternatives Economiques, no 356 avril 2016 [3] The measure was imposed for a short period in the USA in 2008, and since 2012 has spread to Europe. Japan adopted it as well in 2016 [4] James Kanter, "E.U. lowers growth forecasts amid uncertainty", International New York Times, 4.4.16 [5] Eurozone, Denmark, Switzerland, Sweden and Japan [6] Phoenix Capital reproduced in Nikolaos Bayartaki(notification+pdfhecle+facebookmail.com), 6/5/16 [7] Ibidem [8] “Economic Progress and Declining Population Growth”, Psident’ s speech 1938 [9] IMF, November 2013 [10] As well as Japan and almost all developed economies [11] "Secular depression" in the term used by Alvin Hansen [12] John Hicks, Capital and growth, New York, 1965, p. 472, Μ. Negreponti- Delivanis, Macroeconomic Equilibrium in Capitalism and Socialism, Papazisis, Athens 1977, p.190-1 [13] Staff Working Paper No. 571: Secular drivers of the global real interest rate by Lukasz Rachel and Thomas D Smith 11 December 2015 [14] Patrick Artus et Marie-Paul Virard, Croissance zéro,Fayard, 2015, Introduction Holistic Marketing Management

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[15] Jacques Adda "Taux négatifs: le prix de la peur", op.cit.

[16] Raymond Barre, Economie Politique,Tome Second, (sous la direction de André Marchal), Presses Universitaires de France, 1956, p. 183 (combination of relevant theoretical views by Sir Dennis Robertson - theory of "fonds prêtables" and John Bates Keynes- Rate of Interest, Essays in Monetary Theory,1940) [17] Maria Negreponti-Delivanis, "La dévalorisation de la théorie économique dans le nouvel ordre économique international", Rapport au Colloque à l'Université Valachia (Targoviste), 1718.10.2014 - Espaces Européens(publication au procès verbales) [18] Maria Negreponti-Delivanis, Macroeconomic Equilibrium in Capitalism and Socialism,op.cit. pp. 157(in Greek).

[19] Lawrence H Summers "The age of secular stagnation", Foreign Affairs, March/April 2016, p. 5 [20] Identified initially in 2005 by the director of the FED Ben Bernanke in his speech "The world over-abundance of savings and the current deficit of the USA", cited in The Economist, 24.9.2005 [21] March 2008 [22] As defined in the wage/profit ratios in the neoclassical Cobb-Douglas function.

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CMOs at the confluence of AI, CX, and Growth Theodor Purcărea Abstract Marketers recognize Artificial Intelligence (AI) as a valuable tool, already employing AI solutions in order to deliver value at key points along a customer journey, AI impacting marketing to a great degree in some significant areas, and a growing number of marketers understanding that CX can be transformed with the help of AI, AI solutions turning frustrating experiences into productive conversations by blending AI with true human intelligence across any channel. It is important for companies to better understand how to link CX to ROI considering the expectations of the empowered consumer, to support CX strategies with CX maturity roadmaps. There is strong evidence that CX matters, CX correlating to loyalty, and mastering CX core competences becoming a must, while employee experience (EX) beginning to be understood as a top priority. There is no doubt about the real need of aligning marketing and sales, and ensuring customers with relevant recommendations, offers and experience in an Omni channel world, CMOs needing to engage with customers in a single communication platform, ensuring transparency and visibility across every touch points with their customers on the basis of real-time customer data and information. Recent research findings revealed that AI marketing enhances personalization of Omni channel CX and drives continuous CX evolution, that the role of marketers will be transformed by AI, CMOs being challenged to manage brands holistically.

Keywords: CMOs; AI; CX; Growth JEL Classification: L84; L86; M31; M37; O33

Marketing impacted by AI. Value delivered with the help of AI solutions.

Transforming CX with the help of AI In the last issue of our journal we show how important is the artificial intelligence (AI) in helping marketing leaders achieve a new gold standard for customer journeys, 64% of the surveyed marketing leaders saying their company has become more focused on providing a consistent experience across every channel as a result of changing customer expectations (according to the 2017 Salesforce State of Marketing report). We also underline that AI is expected to become one of the most valuable tools in a marketer’s arsenal by actually delivering on the promise of 1:1marketing (according to Emarsys), with AI technology (being conferred to AI the ability of performing clearly specified functions) marketers having an unprecedented opportunity to close the gap between data science and personalized customer experiences.

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A recent Forrester Consulting thought leadership paper commissioned by Genesys, November 2017 – “Artificial Intelligence with the Human Touch. Blend AI with Human Agents to Improve Both Customer and Agent Satisfaction” (on the basis of an online survey of 429 decision makers responsible for customer experience, contact centers, and digital experience in North America, Mexico, Brazil, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Australia; it was explored which AI solutions are currently employed to assist customer service activities, how they are used, associated implementation and adoption challenges, and the benefits they provide to the entire organization) – revealed significant key findings such as: AI solutions are adopted by enterprises in order to improve both customer and agent satisfaction ahead of cost savings; in understanding emotion, building trust, personal engagement and handling complex requests human agents are still superior; blending AI with human agents allows enterprises to achieve the strengths of both. It is useful to retain among other aspects the fact that in order to deliver value at key points along a customer journey AI can be applied throughout marketing, sales, and customer service domains.

In September 2017, Adelyn Zhou, Head of marketing for TopBots (a strategy and research firm in applied Artificial Intelligence/AI) – interviewed by Thorin McGee, Editor-inChief and Content Director of “Target Marketing” (within the podcast “The Marketing Garage” talking to marketing executives about their technology) – stated that AI is going to impact marketing to a great degree in three areas: improving lead scoring (personalization, who is going to buy or not, creating similar target market segments); improving creative ad copy and visual content (Toyota, Dove); improving marketing operations by using different tools (such as AI assistants, schedulers etc.). You can see below the TopBots’s infographic of 100 companies by industry: (McGee, 2017)

Figure 1: 100 Top Bots for Brands Source: McGee, T., 3 Areas Artificial Intelligence Will Impact Marketing, Target Marketing, September 18, 2017 Holistic Marketing Management

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It was no wonder that a month before, in October 2017, eMarketer showed – in “Driving Customer Engagement Roundup: Growth and Retention With Data, Analytics and AI” – among other aspects that: 69% of the marketing executives surveyed by the marketing firm Persado focused on retailers’ adoption of AI (Persado uses AI to optimize messaging); 86% of these surveyed marketing executives plan to invest in AI or machine learning this year; the surveyed marketers were confident in their ability to use data for personalized content in some marketing channels (email and “web” marketing), but with a lower confidence level for “offline” (for social and “display” this confidence level being considerably lower). It is also interesting to note that for personalization these marketing executives (according to the same August 2017 poll from Persado) use demographic data (80%) and geographic data (74%), while psychographic data (53%) or behavioral data (34%) were much less likely to use.

The last CustomerThink’s virtual iCXM Summit, Intelligent Customer Experiences (three webinars organized on October 12, 19, 26, 2017 and chaired by CustomerThink founder/CEO Bob Thompson), offered a true opportunity to learn how AI can transform CX, revealing that: ▪ CX (CX applications: Listen – Speech Recognition, Natural Language Analytics; Engage – Personalization, Digital Assistants, Coaching; Serve – Predictive Case Management, Bots, Knowledge Discovery) can be transformed with the help of AI (the capability of a machine to imitate human, a technology to help computers sense, reason, and learn); ▪ AI is a trend worth watching: it will create 823K jobs by 2021, more than the number displaced (IDC); Automation “raises output in ways that lead to higher demand” for workers, “raising the value of tasks that workers uniquely supply” (David Autor, Journal of Economic Perspectives); Economists: “Jobs of the future will require more education and creative skills.” (https://journalistsresource.org); ▪ Predictive analytics usage by CX stage looks as shown below:

Figure 2: Predictive analytics usage by CX stage Source: icxmsummit102617.pdf, p. 6 Holistic Marketing Management

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▪ The top 15 brands deliver 28 positive customer experiences for every negative one, double the average of 13:1; ▪ The power of human touch is critical with AI, and AI doesn’t have to be complex or costly (according to Lindsay Frazier, Global Solutions Director for Digital, Genesys); ▪ Interactions Intelligent Virtual Assistants (IVAs) are AI solutions that turn frustrating experiences into productive conversations (by blending AI with true human intelligence) across any channel (according to Phil Gray Phil EVP of Corporate Development, Interactions); ▪ Emotional intelligence of sales and service professionals can be enhanced with the help of AI unified with behavioral science (according to Steve Kraus VP of Marketing, Cogito).

How to link CX to ROI considering the expectations of the empowered consumers.

Supporting CX Strategy with a CX Maturity roadmap. CXEvolution Maturity Model and Organizational Assessment As achieving maximum ROI is a continuing challenge for all the companies, they are under the pressure of reassessing the role of CX. Ernan Roman ( Roman, 2017) – who is the President of ERDM Corp. (“Ernan Roman Direct Marketing”; inducted into the DMA Marketing Hall of Fame for creating three transformational methodologies: Integrated Direct Marketing, Opt-In Marketing, and Voice of Customer (VoC) Relationship Research; having as Clients innovative Fortune and Growth companies such as IBM, MassMutual, Microsoft, NBC Universal, Walt Disney, Symantec and Songza), author of three books (the latest book on marketing best practices being entitled: “Voice of the Customer Marketing: A Proven 5-Step Process to Create Customers Who Care, Spend, and Stay”), and named by Crain’s B to B Magazine to << B to B’s Who’s Who >> as one of the “100 most influential people” in Business Marketing, being also named by the Online Marketing Institute as one of the “Top 40 Digital Luminaries” – revealed at the mid of September this year: ▪ the findings of Capgemini’s study “The Disconnected Customer” (81% of consumers are willing to pay for a better CX); ▪ the ERDM learnings from VoC research interviews (consumers were definite and clear that short-term sales-focused tactics were irritating, brand damaging, and undermined loyalty.

Starting from the above mentioned aspects and taking into account different experts’ opinions Roman identified what could help companies to link Customer Experience (CX) to improved Return on Investment (ROI): the alignment of the CX strategies with consumer demands; the driving of CX initiatives with the support of Omni channel accurate data-driven strategy; the use of CX-focused relevant content; the establishment of CX-oriented metrics, compensating accordingly.

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Figure 3: The Ultimate CX Infographic, 2017, October 3 Source: Adapted from Temkin, B., https://experiencematters.blog/category/roi-of-customer-experience/

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There is no doubt today that CX matters, as argued by the reputed Temkin Group which published on October 3, 2017 a new infographic (as shown above in the figure 3) as part of their CX Day celebration, underlining that: CX correlates to loyalty, a bad experience can be very costly, companies know that they aren’t doing a great job, and they must master the four CX core competences (purposeful leadership, compelling brand values, employee engagement, and customer connectedness), purposeful leadership leads to CX leadership, and CX Management remains immature (considering the six stages of CX Maturity: Ignore, Explore, Mobilize, Operationalize, Align, Embed). (Temkin, 2017) With regard to employee engagement it is worth remembering the clear message sent in August this year by Chris Garthwaite, CEO and Founder of CGA: “Experiences demand a blend of skills – rational process and seamless delivery excellence, logistically pleasing to the head; emotional experiences that capture the heart; and individual engagement to feed the soul!”. Within this context it was recommended that company leaders make employee experience (EX) a top priority (designating senior team leadership to own it, listening to employees’ voice, measuring it, agreeing action points for change) and then build into companies’ CX roadmap for transformation. More recently, on October 2017, CGA highlighted the need for companies to know where they are on the CX Maturity Curve (and to establish where client organizations or brands currently sit in their characteristics, culture and current focus), presenting “The Heartbeat® CX Maturity roadmap” (considered both essential to begin or refresh their journey towards customer centricity and best-in-class behaviors, and as providing a framework for strategic debate on the companies’ CX vision), as shown below in the figure 4:

Figure 4: The Heartbeat® CX Maturity roadmap Source: https://www.cgaexperience.com/heartbeat/ Holistic Marketing Management

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This Heartbeat® CX Maturity roadmap shows three maturity stages (Transactional experience: Fix the basics, listen & understand; Predictable experience: Fill the gaps, Service optimisation; Differentiated experience: Best in class, CX Transformation), understanding the “Point of Departure” (having a robust diagnosis for creating a baseline, plotting the roadmap, and defining company’ s strategy for getting there), considering the reality of the disruptive competition, defining a vision and strategy for CX Management (converting good management intentions into an adequate roadmap which reflects the reality of the gap between customer expectations and their perceptions of the current delivery).

On the other hand, we also have to consider that a month before, at the end of September 2017, Lisa Pohlman London, PhD, Director of Strategic CX Consulting at MaritzCX approached the topic of “The New Evolution of CX: Measuring and Assessing CX Maturity in the Modern World”, starting from the new framework to assess CX progress (Assess, Place, Evolve; going beyond a Voice of Customer - VoC program, VoC being an important cornerstone of any CX program), explaining how – by contrast with other maturity models which abound in the CX industry – their CXEvolutionTM maturity model includes 8 discrete stages based on an evaluation of 14 different CX competencies, revealing “The other measurement trap: whiz bang metrics don’t solve the problem either” (also remembering the introduction of NPS® and of other numerous metrics, the failure of strategies that use measurement disciplines alone, the fact that there were a few companies addressing both recovery and opportunities proactively etc.), and arguing that their “CXEvolution Maturity Model and Organizational Assessment helps companies focus on what matters, set clear objectives for their program, gain executive buy-in and commitment, and align the organization behind their efforts”. (Pohlman, 2017)

Aligning marketing and sales, and ensuring customers with relevant recommendations, offers and experience in an Omni channel world

Providing prospects and customers with the right content at the right time and through the right channels is a continuing challenge for all companies. The necessary strategies and processes while going on this way are enabled by the adequate technology.

Relevant engagements are made possible by a mix of business application platform, integration, and AI, as suggested by Thomas Wieberneit (aheadCRM Ltd/movento GmbH) and shown in the diagram below:

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Figure 5: Business application platform, Integration, and AI Source: Wieberneit, T., How AI Can Mend the Marketing-Sales Gap, Sep 21, 2017, CustomerThink

The chief strategy officer of PR measurement solution provider AirPR, Rebekah Iliff (a contributing writer to Entrepreneur, Huffington Post, and PRWeek’s The Hub) argued that – whether companies focus is PR (whose value is now seen by marketers as a measurable vehicle for generating quality leads and driving real brand awareness and business outcomes), content, or advertising – PRtech is the missing piece to the automated marketing puzzle, PRtech built on AI providing insight which can be applied across functions (beyond company’s PR or communications strategies and teams). (Iliff, 2017) Mohanbir Sawhney, McCormick Foundation Chair of Technology & Clinical Professor of Marketing, Kellogg School of Management, (Sawhney, 2017) argued that CMOs deal successfully with today more power than ever (while representing the customer and driving growth), the most vital emerging areas of expertise being broken down into six avatars: the CX conductor (in order to deliver a winning CX an organization requires a firstrate social media experience); the insights generator (CMOs can drive a lot of positive transformation by considering insights as the fuel for innovation, growth, and sustainability); the growth catalyzer (smart marketers are identifying the potential growth opportunities and committing, acting on fresh ideas, coordinating customer engagement and facilitating cross-team collaboration); the brand steward (CMOs can identify, cultivate, and rally loyal brand advocates, nurturing loyal advocates and determining this way an exponential impact, building and sustaining brand affinity); the marketing communicator (CMOs need to engage with customers in a single communication platform, connecting seamlessly to legacy customer-facing systems, so that all company’s employees have the same unified brand voice in viewing and approaching customers); the talent incubator (CMOs need to be better equipped to seek candidates with the right skill sets in data, Holistic Marketing Management

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analytics, and automation, developing their technical fluency and expertise, and also providing the right training for current employees).

In the current Omni channel world companies need: to ensure transparency and visibility across every touch points with their customers on the basis of real-time customer data and information; to gather real-time insights about buyers’ preferences, tastes, and online and mobile behavior (in this last case, a new report of Verto Analytics focused on two related trends: multitasking and a sequenced pattern of app usage called “consumer mobile journeys”, mobile users starting with social apps, then moving on to browsers and search), (Sterling, 2017) by monitoring the customers’ interactions; to build personalized relationships with customers across every touch points and create remarkable Omni channel customer experience, by providing convenience, consistency, empowerment, and agile strategy across interactive processes within the entire life cycle of the customers’ journey. (Bhagwat, 2017) Within this framework it is useful to better understand the working together of Multichannel (where brand’s efforts are focused on growing customer engagement across multiple platforms and channels) and Omni channel marketing (where brand’s efforts are focused on ensuring a seamless message and a consistent and unified at every touch point CX, no matter what device customers use, when they use it, or where in their journey they are), as shown below in the infographic of Emarsys: (Forer, 2017)

Figure 5: Omni vs Multi-channel Marketing, Emarsys Source: Adapted from Forer, L., Omnichannel Versus Multichannel Marketing: What's the Difference?

[Infographic], September 27, 2017, MarketingProfs Holistic Marketing Management

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As retail investments in Omni channel technologies which provide competitive differentiation beyond core goods and services are driven by rising expectations for dramatically improved CX, in order to understand if there is still a gap between the readiness of AI marketing solutions to execute on real-time B2C marketing campaigns, and the readiness of marketing tech users and business decision makers to adopt AI marketing technology, Emarsys commissioned Forrester (in April 2017) to conduct a study of the retail and e-commerce industries in in US, UK, Germany, France and Australia (the revenues format of the surveyed businesses was least $50m to more than $5bn). The findings of this study completed in July 2017 revealed among other aspects that AI marketing: enhances personalization of Omni channel CX; closes the insight-to-action gap; execution is not understood by business decision makers; it is used by expert marketers (those 11% of respondents who demonstrated true AI marketing readiness across three dimensions: strategy, organization and technology) – this being the major finding from the survey results – to drive business results, engage with customers more frequently and have the ability to scale their marketing campaigns as needed; drives continuous CX evolution.

The Forrester research commissioned by Emarsys also revealed that: marketers plan to leverage an array of AI capabilities, AI will transform the role of marketers (whose work will become more strategic, marketing teams becoming more efficient and effective, being enabled to focus on value-generating tasks), and AI maturity provides competitive differentiation.

It is also worth remembering that: ▪ according to Salesforce’s fourth annual “State of Marketing” report, June 15, 2017: as CX is the brand battlefield, in their quest to execute a connected CX (which begins one channel at a time) marketers struggle to leverage data from different sources, and marketing and service unite for consistent CX; the high point need for marketing and sales alignment in order to get a shared, single view of the customer within the top teams’ number one challenge to creating a CX; among marketers, AI and IoT/connected devices are expected over the next two years to rack up the highest growth in usage; ▪ according to “100 Data and Analytics Predictions for 2021”, Tealium Newsletter Featuring Gartner Analyst Note: developing the ability to centralize and connect data across silos is a must, being predicted that 80% of organizations will initiate competency development to improve data literacy by 2020, when is also estimated that at least one aspect of CX will be covered by 40% of all analytical projects; when adopting a customer-centric approach, mobile (within three years, more than 50% of consumer mobile interactions will be in contextualized and “hyper personal” experiences based on past behavior and current real-time behavior) and AI (which together with subsets such as Machine Learning will become a core business and analytic competency) represent two areas of particular focus.

Instead of conclusions Just two years ago we highlighted the real need for rethinking the businesses in another way in the era of the “Nonstop Customer”, better understanding the role of CMOs in the C-Suite Holistic Marketing Management

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under the pressure of data and measurement, and how the marketing organization must redefine itself as a revenue generator, the game changer for marketing transformation being the reciprocity of value equation, ensuring a higher quality faster interaction with customers deeper targeted through increased knowledge of their preferences and behaviors, developing multiple points for customers’ feedback, harnessing the power of new technologies, building engaging brands and relevant content, personalization of digital experience being at the heart of the efforts to overcome around how they create intimacy and relationship in the digital world of customers overwhelmed by a lack of time and too much choice.

This year, at the beginning of November, we witnessed that Forrester launched a significant signal – “Predictions 2018: The CMO bar rises with more pressure for growth” – arguing that customer obsession (seen as the foundation of organizational success in 2018) disrupts any remaining CMO complacency, the only alternative for CMOs being to become leaders of growth and to remodel their organizations and strategies accordingly. Continuing on this path, CMOs must position themselves so as to lead customer obsessed transformations and ensure consistency between brand promise and the experience delivered, by optimizing ad spend and reinvesting in high frequency, emotion rich, and connected experiences. (Johnston, 2017)

References Bhagwat, S., How to provide the perfect Omnichannel customer experience? Sep 13, 2017, retrieved from: http://customerthink.com/how-to-provide-the-perfect-omnichannel-customerexperience/?

Forer, L., Omnichannel Versus Multichannel Marketing: What's the Difference? [Infographic], September 27, 2017, retrieved from: https://www.marketingprofs.com/chirp/2017/32825/omnichannel-versus-multichannelmarketing-whats-the-difference-infographic?

Iliff, R., How to Choose the Right Martech and PRtech Solutions, September 20, 2017, retrieved from: https://www.marketingprofs.com/articles/2017/32819/how-to-choose-the-right-martechand-prtech-solutions?

Johnston, K., Predictions 2018: Visionary CMOs Will Focus On Growth And CustomerObsession, November 6, 2017, https://go.forrester.com/blogs/predictions-2018-visionary-cmoswill-focus-on-growth-and-customer-obsession/ McGee, T., 3 Areas Artificial Intelligence Will Impact Marketing, September 18, 2017, retrieved on 22.09.2017, from: http://www.targetmarketingmag.com/article/3-areas-artificial-intelligencewill-impact-for-marketing/#ne Pohlman, L., The New Evolution of CX: Measuring and Assessing CX Maturity in the Modern World, September 29, 2017, retrieved from: http://www.customerexperienceupdate.com/edition/daily-omnichannel-average-handle-time2017-09-29?

Roman, E., 4 Requirements for Linking CX to ROI, Sep 12, 2017, retrieved on 18.09.2017, from: http://customerthink.com/4-requirements-for-linking-cx-to-roi/?

Sawhney, M., Becoming the CMO of Tomorrow, September 2017, retrieved from: https://blog.sprinklr.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/20170818_guide_CMOofTomorrow.pdf Holistic Marketing Management

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Sterling, G., Report: Mobile users start with social apps, then move on to browsers and search, November 9, 2017, retrieved from: https://marketingland.com/report-mobile-users-start-socialapps-move-browsers-search Temkin, B., The Ultimate CX Infographic, 2017, October 3, 2017, retrived from: https://experiencematters.blog/category/roi-of-customer-experience/ Wieberneit, T., How AI Can Mend the Marketing-Sales Gap, Sep 21, 2017, retrieved from: http://customerthink.com/how-ai-can-mend-the-marketing-sales-gap/? *** Artificial Intelligence: the bridge between data and personalization, Emarsys, retrieved on 12.09.2017, from: WP-AIM.pdf *** Artificial Intelligence With The Human Touch. Blend AI With Human Agents To Improve Both Customer And Agent Satisfaction, Forrester Consulting Thought Leadership Paper Commissioned By Genesys, November 2017 *** Driving Customer Engagement Roundup: Growth and Retention With Data, Analytics and AI, October 2017, eMarketer_Roundup_Driving_Customer_Engagement_2017_1, p. 5 *** iCXM Summit: Using Artificial Intelligence to Improve the Customer Experience, retrieved from: http://customerthink.com/icxm-summit-2017/ *** CustomerThink, icxmsummit102617.pdf *** https://www.amazon.com/Voice-Customer-Marketing-Revolutionary-Customersebook/dp/B0049SOOOW *** Great Customer Experience means Engaging your People First, 6th August 2017, retrieved from: https://www.cgaexperience.com/great-customer-experience-means-engaging-your-peoplefirst/ *** A Graphic Roadmap to support your Customer Experience (CX) Strategy! 26th October 2017, retrieved from: https://www.cgaexperience.com/graphic-roadmap-to-support-yourcustomer-experience-strategy/ *** Building Trust and Confidence: AI Marketing Readiness in Retail and eCommerce, A Custom Technology Adoption Profile Commissioned by Emarsys, July 2017 *** Salesforce’s fourth annual “State of Marketing” report, June 15, 2017, salesforce-researchfourth-annual-state-of-marketing.pdf *** 100 Data and Analytics Predictions for 2021, Tealium Newsletter Featuring Gartner Analyst Note, June 2017, retrieved from: https://tealium.com/resources/100-data-and-analyticspredictions-for-2021/? *** Predictions 2018: The CMO Bar Rises With More Pressure For Growth, November 6, 2017, retrieved from: https://www.forrester.com/report/Predictions+2018+The+CMO+Bar+Rises+With+More+Pressu re+For+Growth/-/E-RES140082?

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