Digital & Tech Evangelist Namita Tiwari on Why Marketers need to Pivot towards Performance Marketing

With digital and data transformation, it is imperative that we identify the power of marketing as a growth driver, not a cost center.

Measurability is becoming key to marketer’s decision making process and while there are ways to compare results from physical experiences versus digital clicks, we need to advance towards performance marketing for effective evaluation of our marketing strategies.

In this article, Namita Tiwari, a senior marketing leader with two decades of experience is sharing her thoughts on measurability in marketing and the need of the hour to pivot towards performance marketing. To know more about her success journey, go to her website.

Namita Tiwari believes that in today’s digital climate "all marketing is digital, all digital is measurable; hence all marketing is measurable.”

Digital and performance have emerged as an inherent part of marketing strategy as every marketing dollar is expected to give returns when go-to-market campaigns come into action.

All marketing channels are powered by digital and technology platforms which allow for metrics to be measured and provided for periodic evaluation and revision of tactics.

Performance marketing is where marketing outcomes directly influence business outcomes. Business leaders turn to marketers to  elevate brands to accelerate growth, where growth is an act of customer acquisition. Brand marketing encourages customers to raise their hands. Performance marketing makes it as easy as possible for a customer to get your product into their hand after they raise it.

It has been traditionally believed that  brand was historically so much harder to measure than performance. However with the convergence of digital, media & technology — all marketing is measurable, accountable and predictable. A good example for this is OTT/connected TV.

For Namita, performance marketing should combine creativity and intuition with outcomes that match expected results. She further believes that an effective performance marketing strategy breaks away from the 'set it and leave it' mindset. This is because performance asks for constant evaluation.

Namita recommends data-driven approaches as it redirects the marketer's energy to measurable outcomes. Moreover, they enable more explicit and more cohesive pictures of what the customers want and predict their future wants, promoting strategies that leave a long-term impact rather than short-lived ones.

Pivoting from vanity marketing metrics to deliver on business metrics means clearly understanding what causes that drop or uptick in performance, how needs vary by customer segment and how effective a campaign is.

“Half the money spent on advertising is wasted; the trouble is we don’t know which half.” This age-old quote from the marketing world has been deciphered with the latest technology and digital platforms, which are enabling marketers to bring clarity to measures and metrics and rigorously tracking ROI.

It is sacrosanct to engage with test-and-learn pilots so that the new insights based on changes in messaging and channels are applied to marketing campaigns.

To seek more insights on performance marketing, follow Namita Tiwari on LinkedIn and Instagram, where she regularly posts on innovation and trends in marketing.