Egmont Philips: Driving Growth and Digital Transformation

The chief marketing officer (CMO) role has always evolved with the market landscape. Egmont Philips, Marketing Director of DAS, believes that the time for change has come and executives now need to evolve their roles as CMO. 

What does that have to do with cooking?

In this interview, Egmont shares with us his perspective on how CMO roles have transformed to meet current markets, the challenges they face in strategizing transformation, and why you need to think like a cook.

For more insights from Egmont Philips and other industry leaders, join Management Events’ 600Minutes Marketing and CX event in the Netherlands. 

 

Evolving The CMO Into a Digital-Driven Role

 

CMO has always encompassed numerous roles, from bottom-of-the-funnel lead generation and sales support to brand development. This has always set the role for failure as they lack the strategic, longer-term strategy of other c-level roles.

However, digitization has disrupted the traditional CMO position and has forced many executives to rethink what the term “CMO” means in today’s landscape. The effects of the pandemic are a catalyst to this development.

 

Has the role of the CMO changed dramatically since the pandemic? And is the change here to stay or for the short-term?

 

The role has changed. As a marketeer, you always need to anticipate, adapt, and change the organization. But some market developments went faster than planned. 

On one hand, digitization has a steeper development curve, which is good news for marketers. On the other hand, as platformication increases, this will lead to a faster shift of power based on customer ownership and causes many traditional players to rethink their business models.

With over 4 billion active users, the CMO needs to be able to bridge the gap between marketing and technology to successfully forge meaningful connections with their customers. Given the diverse platforms available and channels such as Clubhouse, catching the attention with the right content in the right context will require a shift from the traditional behaviors of marketers.

Of course, there are challenges when making that transition, and 2021 looks to be as challenging for the CMO as was the pandemic for businesses last year.

 

Achieving Sustainable Growth Through Data and Transformation Strategy

 

What are the major challenges you foresee in 2021 and how should the CMO overcome them?

 

1.Growth via new business models: Digitization, platformication, the energy transition, the need for a more inclusive world are trends that create new opportunities. It will also disrupt current business models. The speed of change is much faster than before and to succeed, the key will lie in the talents you hire and the business ecosystem you build to signal changes and develop new propositions.

2.Resilience: For many industries, market dynamics have changed due to the pandemic. 

The way to overcome this is to develop scenarios. Use scenarios where you exaggerate variables. Think of ways to deal with extremes. This will fuel your creativity and it helps in decision-making for the short term.

While growth and resilience stand as the key priorities that Egmont highlights, there is also a growing awareness to develop sound customer experiences in both B2B and B2C markets.

The need to be an experience-driven organization is becoming important as more and more consumers (59% in a post-Covid-19 survey) are prioritizing customer experience in a post-pandemic world. 

Egmont delves into the reasoning as to why CMO is needed in this transformation and the approach that they should adopt.

 

Why is becoming an experience-driven organization increasingly important? And what is the CMO’s role in this transformation?

 

Many products have become commodities. The only way to differentiate is by building bespoke experiences, experiences that are built around a strong company purpose. The CMO is the chief experience design officer and is at the forefront to set design criteria and build multidisciplinary teams around customer journey optimization themes.

 

How should the CMO strategize their marketing plans to improve and strengthen customer experience?

 

The struggle is often how to determine the ROI of investment in customer experience optimization and figure out how to allocate a budget. The recipe for strategizing CX is to use journey maps to pinpoint which part gets what KPIs and what investment is needed in capacity and budget. 

This allows for a simple overview that will help convince boards to invest.

As for the tools needed to help the CMO improve CX and strengthen the customer journey, there are a few emerging technologies that Egmont believes will be key for organizations to invest in.

 

What are the key tech tools that the CMO needs to focus on investing, especially in today’s “new normal” market?

 

RPA and digital assistants are most effective when used to automate processes that are of low value to the customer as well as to your company. Such as changing your address, categorizing and directing incoming emails to the right person, etc.

Data analytics are the real thing, no doubt that the CMO needs to invest in market intelligence, customer intelligence, and algorithms that help to personalize the customer experience and create higher conversion rates.

   

Reinventing the CMO role

 

Given the drastic change that industries around the world have experienced due to Covid-19, it is not shocking to think that the marketer’s role has changed alongside it. 

For Egmont, the title of the CMO has to be re-imagined, and he offers his advice on how marketers should approach the shift in marketing roles.

 

There have been talks in the industry about changing and re-inventing the CMO title in today’s “new normal” markets. In your opinion, what should it be changed to and why?

 

I am spreading the gospel of changing the CMO into Chief Customer Officer. Marketeers do not only translate market developments and change customer behaviors into propositions. They have also become the orchestrators of customer journeys.

 

What is your advice for the CMO on how to prepare for the shift in marketing roles?

 

Maybe the most fundamental way to prepare is to change your self-image.

I see myself as an experimental cook. I build various propositions for several customers and personalize them by combining a basic set of ingredients in completely different dishes. Restaurant and food are like fashion. It changes every season. When it comes to experimentation with the ingredients, you need to be a bit of a chemist. 

I use this analogy when approaching market research, data analysis, creating propositions, and managing the team in the marketing kitchen.