Javier, welcome. You have a new report out looking at digital
marketing maturity, but this is not your first time, is it? Now,
you've been looking over this for many years -Yes, true.
What did you find this year, and how does it compare to previous
years? Yes, actually, we have been, in BCG, we have been
launching this series of reports about data marketing maturity
since 2018 now. So every year, every two years, we update the
way of measuring and, and adjusting to the new trends that
are happening in marketing
and see the value, the value that we can see in marketing
maturity, but also the value that this marketing maturity is
providing to business. So this year, we have just launched a
new report, commissioned by Google,
covering all industries for Europe. And it was one
month ago. Can you tell me some of the main insights from it?
Yes. So, there are a few things that are interesting this year.
So over the years, we see that the more mature the brands are,
the better results they get, in some cases, on efficiencies they
get. So two years ago, we saw 30 percentual points improvements
in efficiencies with brands that are more mature and more than 20
percentual points in
revenues. So this is consistent. So we see that companies that
are doing better in marketing, actually they become more
profitable as a business.
And let's say, there are two things to say this year. Good
news is that this year is as consistent. So still we see
brands that are more advanced in digital marketing, they are more
profitable, they have better productivity, and also we see
that they are faster to adapt to consumer changes and market
changes. So this is very good and consistent to what we see
every year. But bad news.
What's the bad news? Yes. So the bad news is, it’s the first time
in eight years that we see that the overall maturity as we
measure, indeed our marketing is going backwards, and in not,
not, not little, it's 8% in the average that is going backwards.
So still we see good brands doing good things and getting
these results, but it seems that results are elusive for the
majority of brands, with 8% down. What do you put that down
to?
So, of course
there are many things that are happening in
marketing—disruptions, but disruptions have been always
there. So two years ago, we were dealing with the end of the
cookies, with first-party data, with other things.
Now we are seeing topics like GenAI, or for sure, AI, cloud.
These are things are impacting fast. Companies are doing a lot
of things, but also they are seeing less results. Why? So
actually, there are two things. One, is the use cases that I'm
choosing the right ones, or even the ones that if I am doing them
well I can scale? And the answer is sometimes is no, because we
don't have the capabilities well enough, the foundations in place
to do it right.
How do leaders turn it around?
So, what we are seeing is—and also following the, the
structure of the report that I, I suggest everybody to
read—instead of thinking of capabilities that you can do
right and, and do better, let's do data-driven better in
marketing, in media, let's do all these connections of data.
That is OK. But as soon as you have these foundations, you need
to think broadly. And, and you see the framework that now we
are presenting in the, in the report is more around
a virtual, let's say, flywheel, where you start with strategic
thinking of what are the things I need to do; with a smart
activation with data and more important, how you collaborate
inside the organizations to make the results better and faster.
Javier, thank you so much. Thank you.