The examples keep piling up: This month we profile yet another company that begins its marketing strategy by mapping out the role promotions will play. So much for being the marketing afterthought of years gone by. At Clorox, the whiz kids of the consumer promotions department, who provide dedicated promotions support to the corporation’s brands, got waylaid in the halls by the marketing directors who hadn’t had their turn yet with the in-house team. The group has gone from three to 17 staffers in four years because its has consistently pulled off sophisticated campaigns while giving metrics-minded top management the ROI they crave — all this while the rest of Clorox is trimming staff. (Betsy Spethmann’s story begins on page 32.)
As the new kid in town, I’ve been hearing a lot of stories and asking a lot of obvious questions of the brand managers and agency folks I talk with. I’ve also spent the last few months combing through the back issues of PROMO. After all that talk and reading all those case studies, I’m compelled to ask: When does it stop being anecdotal? What’s the tipping point at which the rising respect for the impact of promotion marketing, at higher and higher levels within corporations, across nearly all market segments, becomes common wisdom?
You say it will be when promotion marketing agencies get the same retainer-based status as traditional ad agencies? It’s happening now. When promotion account executives get invited to the early meetings in the CEO’s office? Happening less frequently, but CEOs are learning to love promotional marketing — if only because their CFOs are teaching them to! If there is any silver lining to the economic downturn of the last two years, it is that corporate brass and the brand managers who work for them are grasping for quantifiable results. And each measurably successful promotion campaign tips the scales a bit farther in our favor.
SPEAKING OF GREAT ANECDOTES: Don’t miss our brand new column this month from contributor Rod Taylor. “Backward Glance” takes a look at favorite campaigns from years gone by, and extracts the wit and wisdom that made them great. First up: Remembering the “Miss Rheingold Campaign.” Hope you enjoy — and tell us what you think!
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