49% of senior executives believe that implementing localized marketing campaigns is essential to business growth and profitability, according to [download page] an October 2011 report from the CMO Council. Data from “Localize to Optimize Sales Channel Effectiveness” indicates that a further one in 5 believe localized marketing is key to market differentiation and competitiveness or a critical requirement for field effectiveness. Just 4% of senior executives do not feel that localized marketing campaigns are important to demand generation and sell-through in their business sector. By contrast, marketers believe they are only somewhat competent when it comes to engaging and activating local audiences: 39% feel they have reasonably effective programs in place, more than double those (17%) who rate their campaigns and analytics as highly evolved. Just 11% feel that they are underperforming in the area.
Budget Allocations Conflict
23% of respondents report allocating over 50% of their budgets to field or localized marketing campaigns, yet a greater number (27%) allocate less than 10% of their budgets. In fact, just 41% of respondents combined report spending more than 30% of their budgets on these programs.
Demographics and Geography Drive Campaigns
45% percent of marketers say that demographics influence the localization of their marketing messages and campaigns, putting it slightly ahead of geography/location (44%) as the most significant factor. Socioeconomic standing (28%) and psychographic (27%) information are less important to marketers, while just one in 5 say that cultural information (22%), shoppergraphic information (19%), and language (19%) are significant factors. According to CMO Council insight, the relatively low amount of importance attributed to shoppergraphic information (such as buying behavior and transactional history) may be explained by the fact that a number of marketing organizations are still developing their localized campaign strategies, and that it takes automation technology to adequately track this information.
Field Personnel Most Popular Stakeholders
34% of executives support field personnel, giving them top ranking among local stakeholders. Representatives (30%), branch offices (30%), distributors (28%), and retailers (28%) also receive strong levels of support, while network marketers (10%), licensees (8%), banking locations (8%) and hotel or motel properties (6%) receive among the lowest. Organizations are almost evenly split on the question of using exclusivity: 41% report using non-exclusive local sales partners, while 40% say they use corporate-owned channel partners.
About the Data: The CMO Council data report is based on an online survey of more than 300 marketers, the majority of whom hold senior marketing roles including CMO, EVP, SVP, VP, and director of marketing and communications.
