Where's The Talent?

I participated in a vendor-sponsored survey today, answering questions about the relevance of a product the vendor wanted to sell to businesses.

Toward the end of the survey, the person asking questions queried me regarding what the first thing is that I would purchase if I had an additional $100,000.

I told her, "A Highly Talented Analyst". Her response to my proclamation was "That's what every respondent says."

Somewhere between the strategy our leaders ask us to implement, and all the tactics we employ to drive sales and profit, we have a gaping pothole on the multichannel marketing turnpike that needs to be filled with an immediate infusion of talent.

We give Google responsibility for driving fifteen percent of our online business. In the process, we give all the intelligence of knowing why our business works to Google. We hire internal staff and vendors to be subject matter experts at manipulating Google.

Half of UK businesses fail to adequately measure the performance of their e-mail campaigns.

Maybe it's ok that we don't measure the ROI of e-mail campaigns, given that the performance of e-mail continues to free fall. As mentioned yesterday, we celebrate a medium where we sell something to one customer in five hundred. My father sold vacuum cleaners door-to-door in the 1960s. Do you think he would have celebrated one sale in five hundred visits?

In the past ten years, I observed at least three trends that resulted in a dearth of talent.

• Demographics: There are far fewer thirty to forty year old employees than there were ten years ago, as Gen-X moves into their prime earning years.
• Algorithms: We learned how to manage computers, or we learned how to manage businesses that managed technology. We spent less time understanding why our businesses worked. We spent more time managing the technology that made our businesses work. Now, we're a slave to technology. We need to be slaves to understanding why customers purchase from our businesses.
• Strategy vs. Tactics: The time we spend on tactics, especially those tactics that allow us to manage algorithms, takes away from the time we need to spend developing strategies. Take an honest look at the company you work for. Can you identify the three strategies your company is working on in 2007 --- and do you know which tactics you can use to make your strategy happen?

We need to spend time developing humans (not algorithms), teaching the skills humans need to be effective in a world dominated by real-time algorithms.

Where you can, spend more money developing your employees, and spend less money outsourcing your key functions to vendors. Obviously, there is a balance to be achieved in outsourcing key functions. Where possible, invest in your own people.

Use today to develop tomorrow's leaders.

The MineThatData Honor Roll: John Hagel at Edge Perspectives about The Gap

John Hagel at Edge Perspectives earns an Honor Roll nomination for his strategic discussion of the problems at Gap. I wanted to write about their business all week, John saved me from an hour of work that couldn't possibly measure up to what he wrote.

What Is More Important, Sales Increases Or Increased Profit?

In a recent comment, Ray S. asked if it is acceptable to have an advertising campaign that increases net sales, but does not increase profit.

Let me pose two scenarios to you.

Campaign Result, Scenario #1: Net Sales increase by $100,000 verses last year's campaign. Profit is flat, compared with last year's campaign.

Campaign Result, Scenario #2: Net Sales decrease by $100,000 verses last year's campaign. Profit increases by $25,000, compared with last year's campaign.

Ok, you are the CEO of this company. Which of the these two scenarios is preferable to you?

Who Manages Your Online Strategy?

Jeremiah Owyang talks about folks who lead web strategy in media businesses. In your multichannel organization, who leads your web strategy?

• An Online Expert?
• Your Chief Marketing Officer?
• A Catalog Marketing Expert?
• A Retail Marketing Expert?
• A Merchandising Expert?
• Somebody Else?

Who should lead your web strategy? Offer your comments, please.

Macy's Pricing

On a commercial this evening, Macy's advertised Friday doorbusters. In the mouse print, they stated that when doorbuster supplies run out, pricing reverts back to normal, with regional differences.

Multchannel pundits --- here's a question for you. Is regional pricing acceptable? Should a customer in Milwaukee pay less than a customer in San Francisco? And how would you recommend Macy's execute their online pricing strategy? How should Macy's price the item online?