As a marketer, scroll LinkedIn, Facebook, or any social media platform. Read any trade website. Attend an industry event.
You will be inundated with targeted ads. Those ads are meant for you. Those ads will make bold claims; some they can back up and sometimes claims that are in fact too good to be true. They will talk about AI. They will tell you they can create 100s of pieces of content for you. They will produce endless amounts of creatives. They will manage your media. They will improve your conversion rate. They will offer your advanced analytics. And so on and so on.
And behind those ads are often innovative companies with offerings that may in fact help you succeed as a marketer.
However, what I find troublesome is that every ad seems to state that whatever they are offering is the cure to all of your challenges. AI generated content? Cool. But will that alone turn your business into a rocket ship? A better conversion funnel? Cool. So the media planning, ad messaging, and traffic sources no longer matter? Aggregated data? Definitely a benefit. But having a comprehensive dashboard alone never turned a failure into a success.
There are more solutions available to marketers today than ever before. And many of them will live up to their promises. Efficiencies will be created. Frontiers will be expanded. But there will also be failures. There will be things that are better features than stand alone products. There will be consolidation in each niche.
And so as everything evolves, the role of the marketer remains the same. To seek new ways of achieving success. To minimize the time and dollars needed to get there. And to do so without going nuts.
I have often referenced Lumascapes to illustrate how complicated every little slice of our universe can be. As a marketer it is all too easy to go down rabbit holes, to be sold as opposed to actively buying.
As an Agency, it is our responsibility to do much of the seeking out, vetting, selecting, and recommending solutions to our client partners. We strive to always get it right. But sometimes we don’t. But we always learn. Continuously pushing forward while casting wide nets with open minds, ultimately leads us to a better place. And that increases the value we can bring to our client partners. It is about enjoying the journey on the way to the top of the mountain.