Podcast: Experimentation, Alignment of Incentives, and Focusing on the Bigger Thing

Thanks for having me on your podcast, Marketing Trends!

Quotes:

“Growth includes marketing and product and whatever it is that you need to do to get your business to expand.”

“Incrementality is this idea of ‘what would have happened anyway if I didn’t do any marketing activities at all?’”

“If you’re treating your customers as a homogenous herd that is behaving in the same exact way, it’s frankly disrespectful to them and it isn’t good business.”

“If you create a habit in your consumers to expect a promotion on a certain schedule, not only are you delaying their transactions, but you’re ultimately creating a less profitable business.”

“Creativity can be made so much better with the numbers.”

“It’s okay to have an experiment that doesn’t work. If you are able to create a culture where true experimentation is possible and people’s egos aren’t hurt, if their experiment doesn’t work, then you truly can learn and you can spin on a dime.”

“I’m a big believer in setting a culture that allows people on the ground to actually care about ‘the bigger thing.’ When the bigger thing is about learning and overall company success, you’re able to make things work.”

Takeaways:

– Marketers need to consider incrementality, or what would have happened had they not taken a given action.

– Great marketing leaders need to create a culture where failure in the pursuit of experimentation is an acceptable outcome.

– For marketers to be effective, they can’t just be concerned about their own budgets or channels. They need to be focused on “the bigger thing:” learning and optimization of the overall business.