A survey by the well respected Economist Intelligence Unit called "Service 2020: Megatrends For The Decade Ahead", is based on the forecasts of 479 business-leaders across the world, including about 50 from Australia. The businesses range from large to small, with a spread across regions and sectors.
The identified mega trends throws down the gauntlet to Australian businesses, adapt rapidly and embrace these emerging trends or face increasingly tough trading conditions and competition.
The trends place the rapidly changing customer environment at the centre of the challenges facing businesses.
The eight mega trends were:
- Global competition will drive up service standards.
- Companies must maintain service standards in the face of "the need for speed".
- Firms must learn to use the increased transparency brought by social media to their advantage.
- Companies must use new sources and types of data to rethink the way they track and personalise their service.
- Good employees will remain fundamental to good service but with technology as an enabler.
- More firms will outsource aspects of customer service to new kinds of specialists.
- The rise of the mass affluent and other customer segments will force companies to find new product or service niches.
- Customer expectations, including the purpose of the store, are evolving with new technology.
g2m solutions has advocated for a long time that B2B marketers must face the fact that the customer's buying behavior is rapidly changing (watch a short video on this topic). The all pervasive use of the internet to continually graze on information, interact with other buyers and peers and educate themselves, has enormous implications for marketers and the way in which you segment your markets, define your customer's challenges, define your value and communicate that to them.
In response to these mega trends, we believe organisations must:
- 1. Embrace the increased pace of business and global competition without forsaking customer service standards.
- 2. Understand how technology can help your marketing efforts and get on with it now!
- 3. Experiment with new ways of using technology, particularly the move to the cloud as a way of making marketing technology investments affordable and scalable.
- 4. Appreciate that collection and analysis of data is the new skill set marketers must have. Marketing is a science as much, if not more than, an art. Train your marketing staff.
- 5. Adapt your marketing campaigns to acknowledge that there are new ways to influence and attract buyers to you (so called inbound marketing) and that old techniques of outbound marketing like print advertising, telesales and email blasting are increasingly expensive and ineffective.
- 6. Accept that whether you like it or not, customers are using social media on an increasing scale, both in B2B and B2C environments. Build a social media strategy as part of your overall marketing plan.
- 7. Understand that outsourcing is an accepted way of working allowing you to focus on where you create your core customer value. Outsourcing your marketing to new hybrid, cross functional, inbound marketing agencies is increasingly available and affordable.
Piecing together a comprehensive approach to your lead generation efforts and marketing plans in these challenging and rapidly changing times is tough. We have published a short eBook with a step by step guide. Please feel free to download a copy if you are interested in reading further.
Have you noticed any emerging mega trends that aren't mentioned here? Let us know in the comment section below. What are your views on the impact of these mega trends on the B2B Marketing function?