Marketing Governance

Unilever, the consumer goods group, is prioritising advertising and branding over promotions as it pursues a long term growth strategy, despite the challenging financial climate.

Jean-Marc Huët, Unilevers chief financial officer, argued the pressure on disposable income in Western Europe and North America, combined with rising commodity costs and intense competition in emerging markets, posed significant obstacles. However, he added the organisation would not let economic fluctuations prove a distraction from its overarching focus on innovation, new market launches and brand building. Read More

Marketing executives are planning to increase spending on all forms of marketing in the coming year, according to the CMO Survey. Marketing budgets are expected to increase 9.1 percent and companies plan a 7.2 percent increase in marketing hires over the next 12 months.

At the same time, optimism among marketing executives for the overall U.S. economy reached its lowest point in two years.  On a scale of 1 to 100, respondents rated their own optimism level 52.2 on average. The lowest time before this was in February 2009, when the average was 47.6. Read More

Dave Frankland of Forrester once said, the goal is not to collect data, but to develop insights. Insights are the purview of analytics.  Analytics are algorithms: advanced and/or mathematical techniques on large volumes of data that help marketers translate data into actionable insights to help drive marketing and customer strategies and optimize marketing efforts. Read More