Implement Agile Marketing

Transcription

1 Implement Agile Marketing Taking small marketing tasks and managing them through an Agile process is straight forward and much easier to do in a quick, responsive, iterative way. But, how do you manage larger more complex marketing campaigns and programs that have many moving parts in an Agile process? Summary This paper is a summarized guide to the fundamental elements of using Agile Scrum to create and execute marketing programs and campaigns. I have assumed the reader has a basic knowledge of Agile and the Scrum framework. Let s start with Agile, which I am sure you know is simply a set of 4 values and 12 principals, as defined in the Agile Manifesto. However to take these values and principals and make them practical we need to use a management framework or methodology such as Scrum which is one of the most popular Agile frameworks. From the inception both Agile and Scrum where conceived to address the problems of managing and delivering IT projects, specifically software development. So to make them more relevant we will need to modify and introduce marketing specifics. The end result is a management approach that combines Agile, Scrum and Marketing to create Agile Marketing. The core marketing elements of: 1. Content (message, brand, ideas, product, services, etc.) 2. Campaign/Program Execution 3. Analytics and Insight All three elements need to be integrated into the Agile Marketing approach.

2 Contents Summary... 1 Where do I start?... 3 Organizing the team structure... 3 Small Simple Team (5-6 people)... 3 Larger more complex Team (6+ people)... 3 The Process How does it work?... 4 Agile Scrum Cycle or Cadence... 4 Integrating your Campaign/Program Execution with the an Agile Scrum framework... 4 Content is King... 4 Integrating Content Creation with an Agile Scrum framework... 5 Breaking the work down into manageable chunks... 5 Results Driven Improvement... 6

3 Where do I start? Teams are the corner stone of Scrum and not just any teams, cross functional multi-discipline teams that are self-organizing. Studies have shown that team size of 7-9 people are the most optimum however, in my experience many marketing organizations need or use larger teams because of the range of specialist disciplines and expertise that is need. Generally the Marketing Scrum team is 3 discipline groups all working together: Marketing: Product, Solution, Service The marketing people who are your content experts have deep subject knowledge, follow trends, anticipate the next big development, understand the market, future direction, etc. Generally these are the people that develop content (identify themes & topics, author the raw material, write copy). Marketing Execution The people that develop marketing campaigns and programs that will drive awareness, promote the brand and generate sales leads. Often they are allocated to a region, area or sector and generally have the job of making a marketing contribution to the sales pipeline. Marketing services The specialist people that support marketing through expertise in social media, creative design, search engine optimization, advertising, video, , blogs, webcasts, etc. These are the people that turn the raw copy, ideas and concepts into marketing deliverables. Organizing the team structure The actual makeup of the team will vary between organizations depending upon the size of the business and what work is in-house or out-sourced, here are some examples of team structures mapped to the roles defined in Scrum: Small Simple Team (5-6 people) 1. Experienced marketer - Team Lead (Product Owner, sometimes combined with Agile Owner) 2. Product/Service Marketing 3. Creative Design 4. Marketing tactics: , Advertising & Social 5. Web developer 6. Possible Stakeholders: Channel, dealer, Partners, Events (in-person marketing) Larger more complex Team (6+ people) 1. Team Lead (Product Owner) 2. Experienced marketer & project Manager (Scrum Master) 3. Product/Service Content 4. Creative Design (Multimedia: Art, video, animation, etc.) 5. (Dedicated to managing tactics) 6. Social (Blogs, public Social media platforms) 7. Advertising (Media) 8. Search (SEO) Banner ads 9. Analytics (Reporting & data analysis) 10. Web developer (technical role that will manage technical work with the dev team or 3 rd parties). 11. Channel, dealer, Partners 12. Events (in-person marketing)

4 The Process How does it work? Agile Scrum Cycle or Cadence The Agile Scrum process is well documented and in its original form provides a great framework that with minimal adaptations can be applied to the marketing function. The key is to align your marketing approach with the Agile Scrum cycle and cadence. The cycle is determined by the sprint duration so depending upon the type of marketing you are doing this may vary but, it is usually a 2 4 week sprint cycle. E.g. you plan work that will be completed Done within a 2 4 week timeframe. Actual campaigns and/or programs are frequently longer than the sprint duration so the work needs to be broken down and spread across the sprints. Typically a marketing program that requires new content to be developed will take 8-12 weeks or longer. Programs that are repurposing or reusing exiting contact can be done much quicker. The Agile cadence is how often the team meets for its Scum meeting. In the original Scrum this is daily meetings and for small teams of 7-9 this can work but, often marketing organizations work better with just once or twice a week Scrum meetings. Integrating your Campaign/Program Execution with the an Agile Scrum framework Not all marketing approaches are the same however, most marketing campaigns or programs will follow these steps: 1) Define goals, 2) plan, 3) build, 4) execute, 5) measure and repeat/modify. A continuous cycle to deliver better results. Integrating these steps with the Scrum framework can dramatically improve your marketing campaign/program execution. To increase the frequency and quantity of campaigns/programs your organization can execute you will need a constant supply of high quality content. So the content creation process is critical to the Agile Marketing process. Being able to develop branding, messaging, themes, topics, etc. in an Agile approach reduces time scales and provide flexibility to change direction or re-priorities as the business or markets need. Content is King Having relevant content that hits current hot topics is an essential part of building successful marketing campaigns. Integrating this creative input into Agile is an important part of the process working effectively. The strategies and approaches to research and understand your markets, customers and prospects combined with developing brands and messaging to address topics, trends and themes is part of modern day marketing. Taking this knowledge and turning it into compelling, exciting and relevant content is a core expertise that every marketing function should have. Combining the content creation process with the Agile Scrum framework will bring repeatability and predictability that will support better campaign planning and execution. I would expect to see improved productivity and better results from your marketing campaigns and programs as well. The relationship between the marketing people tasked with content creation and those engaged in executing effective marketing campaigns is critical. This team dynamic is greatly reinforced by adopting the Scrum framework which provides a common Agile approach. A large part of the product backlog needs to include new content. I would recommend at least 50% of the backlog is new content the rest should be reuse and repurposing of existing content and marketing assets. This approach maximizes the

5 value from your existing marketing investment while still developing new material to meet continuously changing topics, trends and opportunities in your marketplace. Integrating Content Creation with an Agile Scrum framework Implementing the right level of planning and project management into the Agile Marketing process that will aid and support the creative input of marketing requires a balanced approach. Too much rigor and project management discipline and you damage the creative process not enough and the business suffers from late delivery, missed deadlines, etc. The answer is not a project manager role but, rather to help your Agile marketing team adopt the right level of project management skills, tools and techniques. In essence everyone in the team becomes part project manager within the Agile marketing process. Planning, managing work scope, meeting target dates, resolving issues, prioritizing all becomes a function of the team supported by the Product Owner and Scrum Master role. Accountability and responsibility needs to be end to end and not limited to a specialist area or set of tasks. Everyone on the team needs to feel ownership of the marketing campaign/programs from design through build and into execution. Everyone contributes to the campaigns results and should feel their input is valued. This approach builds strong commitment to have campaigns succeed and meet their goals as well as fostering a great opportunity to learn from the results and feed this into future campaigns. Breaking the work down into manageable chunks All work needs to be broken down into chucks that can be completed within a sprint duration. In the world of software development User Story is a method used to define functionality and each User Story is small enough that it can be completed within a sprint. The same approach is taken for marketing deliverable except instead of User Story we have deliverables such as: Messaging, White papers, Logo design, packaging design, advertising copy, datasheets, video, etc. Many of these deliverables cannot be completed within a sprint duration so they must be broken down into several smaller deliverables. Here are some examples of marketing deliverable work breakdown: Video - A short online 3-4 minute video, interview style question and answer. 1. Concept story board and topic 2. Develop Script copy 3. Studio filming 4. Post production White Paper A digital business paper 6-9 pages 1. Outline topic, title and key areas 2. Draft copy 3. Final copy 4. Design layout and digital production (PDF or PowerPoint) 5. Optional: Print production, hardy copy Over time the team will learn how to size work and become more accurate at estimating effort required to complete each deliverable. This learning is an important part of managing workloads and creating work scope that are achievable within a sprint duration. The topic of estimating work and what

6 methods and tools can be used is extensive and warrants a separate paper, so I am not going to explore it here. Results Driven Improvement The use of data to improve marketing outcomes has become a science in this era of digital interaction, and incorporating sophisticated reporting and analysis tools into the Agile process is a capability not to be over looked. The ability to measure marketing campaigns performance and provide meaningful insight against measurable goals, is a valuable tool to foster continuous improvement. In traditional Scrum the team will review the completed product after each sprint to evaluate what they have accomplished and potential lesson learnt for improvement. This same approach works for marketing deliverables produced at the end of the sprint but, potentially more valuable is to also evaluate the marketing campaign performance against a target (goal) such as number of enquiries generated, sales leads, contribution to revenue, video views or webpage hits, etc. Creating a campaign set of goals or target that can be measured and evaluated by the Agile team enables the team to assess their performance and self-adjust to make improvements. In Agile marketing we don t just want selforganizing teams we also want self-improving teams in terms of create better marketing deliverables and marketing campaign performance. Author: Rupert Laslett LinkedIn: