Marketing Organization 2010

With athletes congregating in Vancouver and Whistler in 2010 for the Winter Olympics, pretty much 4 years from now --I thought it might be intriguing to look at what a possible marketing organization might look like in 2010 and how a forward thinking corporate marketer can bring back respect and power to a function that at times, seems at the mercy of other functions and seen as a nusiance by senior excutives (note: average tenure of a CMO is now down to 22 months).

See my proposal below for building a true-customer (consumer) oriented organization. Threatening?  Sure this means a complete retooling for some marketing functions ---your title will change as will your responsibilities. Effective? Imagine what importance you can bring to the executive table as the authority on all 4 of the top 5 topline growth levers of your company  - word of mouth, innovation, design and customer experience---damn right, effective.

It's good to dream sometimes. Here goes....

The 2000 organization is designed for brilliance in brand communication and management of key assets and spending areas. Increasingly, customer marketing, PR and customer service is now shifting out of the function and innovation oftnetimes is found in operations or as a standalone function. Brand Managers have the power here and activities rally around brand command and control. It has not embraced the new worlds of social media, Web 2.0 and word of mouth at the fear of loss of brand control. It is increasingly being removed away from the end customer and upstream volume driving initiatives, marketing's key reasons for being. Given a lack of other meaty things to do, it is now crowding out what ad agencies used to do, causing friction and double work there too. 

The 2010 organization is designed for a complete orientation around the customer (and your most valuable customers) and delivery of excelllence in meeting customer needs and wants. The brand isn't just thrown away like some Web 2.0 zealots would advocate. The word of mouth manager, insights/innovation manager and a new role - the design manager - all maintain the equity, tone and manner of the brand.  A description of each role below:

Word of Mouth Managers (formerly brand managers) - whether its mainstream advertising or grassroots product seeding, this role is commissioned is to not only convince the target customer of the merits of your product but also convince their social network; this role's principal focus is
getting new prospects into the brand.

Mega Hub Manager (formerly PR manager) - let's give the internal PR manager some real chops to develop relationships with people beyond traditional media - whoever the power players are in your business (bloggers, governement bodies, partners, media, researchers, trade associations), the Mega Hub manager builds these relationships  to create influence.

Commercial marketing - clearly the needs of the customer side need to be served, any account specific activity or national retail programs are managed by this role - they're not subordinate to any other marketing function - freeing them to make programs that work with their trade channel and build intimacy with customers (consumers) relevant to the shopping environment

Insights/Innovation Manager (formerly research manager) - let's not make the research person the scoreboard watcher and vote tallyer of everybody else's efforts - put the rabbit in with the lettuce - the person commissioned to track and understand consumer performance and insights, should also be the driver behind innovation....a key role. Their key purpose is to drive and measure things that answer the Utimate Question - "will this effort cuase a customer to recommedn this to a friend, family member or colleague".

Media/Social Media Manager - recognizes that media is no longer something you just purchase and put on a media grid - sometimes it's something you invent, sometimes its something you partner with other companies on, sometimes its working with your key social media and sometimes it's still purchasing (I hate this term) GRPs from the influential media or the best awareness getters

Customer Champions Manager (formerly customer service) - handles all the traditional roles of the customer service function but also importantly now is responsible for identifying, building and cultivating a relationship with a group of your passionate brand fans  through advisory councils, corporate blogs, special events and other intimate vehicles. These people would also use their intimacy with the consumer to improve the overall customer Brand Experience working with the Insights/innovation manager.

Grassroots/Buzz Manager (formerly events/sponsorships) - builds more focus in a function that can wander, the aim of any commercial sponsorship is to now to create excitement and buzz that travels through your target market, creates a funnel for adding customer champions while fulfilling some of the required trade relationship pieces - an obvious bias here to moving to grassroots events and support than the mega concert/propoerty wattage where your brand almost always gets lost

Web 2.0/3.0 Manager (formerly Internet manager) - in 2010, the 'net is so much more important than ever but it's not just a question of building a technically pure site, it's SEO, it's RSS feeds, it's podcasts, it's applying whatever web 3.0 looks like before your competitor does, it's using it as a selling tool, it's e-commerce that works, it's making your site look better than other piece of creative in your stable - your leader here is not a code pro but a  savvy business  leader with e-talent

Design Manager (formerly Marketing Services) - unfortunately most marketers have become the authorities on this role with little training (myself included) - let's give the role to somebody who has  training in design, a good understanding of the need for brand consistency and get out their way (look up BMW for potential employees - they do this great). As much as we now invest in whether that print ad should have that red of black keyline: a) it likely doesn't matter and b) you probably might avoid inefficient decisions like that  by having somebody in control that knows what its all about 

V.P. of Customer Evangelism (formerly V.P. of Marketing) - the big cheese, you are the ringleader that pulls this all together and now have the toolbox to deliver real growth to the business. Marketing has received a bit of a bad rap and tends to have a very low trust association (Godin's book "All Marketer's Are Liars" - still #46 on top marketing books list) , why not make the change? It clearly puts the focus of your mission on your customer - hopefully gets you over the moat of your corporate office and into the real world of listening to your influential customers (leaders like Nike and Harley Davidson have their senior marketing staff spending 20% of their time with customers, do you?)

I'll be curious on your thoughts here...could this work? what would we add? or take away?.....let's do it quick though we only have 1,300 days until 2010!