Ted Schadler says, “This is part two in a series on Reinventing the Web to Win the Mobile Moment. Here’s part one, a Drunk History Of Mobile Strategy. For 20 years we have optimized the web as a big billboard broadcasting everything about a company. Marketing owns the public site, and cares more about acquisition than utility. Product teams own the private sites and are faced with an ever-escalating array of digital touchpoints. Is it any wonder firms, aided by their digital agency and web content management software, have built one-size-fits-all reponsive websites and punted on the... [...]

Maxie Schmidt-Subramanian says, “If you are like other CX pros, at some point in your CX career you’ll encounter the “money question.” Your CEO will ask you: “What’s an improvement in our customers’ experience worth in dollars and cents?” And it’s likely that you won’t have a (good enough) answer. I say that because I know that 50% of CX pros we surveyed have not modeled how CX quality influences customer behavior. We know great CX drives revenue. But to make the case, you need a more nuanced and sophisticated understanding. So we used data from our Customer Experience... [...]

Anjali Lai says, “Happy 2017! Settling in to the New Year often renews hope and excitement for the future, and rekindles anticipation for the brands, products, and experiences on the horizon. This year, it’s hard to think about imminent innovations without considering a modern imperative that is rapidly moving to the forefront of conversation: customer empathy. We are barely three weeks into 2017 and already the cry for customer empathy – and brands’ responses to it – are popping up frequently. At the Consumer Electronics Show, the “insanely cute” Kuri personal robot stole consumers’... [...]

Ryan Skinner says, “I’ve always poo-poohed efforts to size the ‘content marketing market’. The definition of content marketing’s very squirrelly, meaning: a) if you size it including A, B, and C, then people will invariably say it should also include D, E, and F (but not B, or C), and b) if you ask marketers to give you a number, then you’re at the mercy of however each marketer defines it (combining apples and oranges). Last year, when setting up our big annual survey of marketing leaders, we sidestepped the definition mine-fields by asking marketers to tell... [...]

Carlton Doty says, “My colleagues Melissa Parrish, Richard Joyce, Susan Bidel and I spent a lot of time since the US Presidential election researching the effect of the so-called “fake news” epidemic. Why is this so prominent, and why now? The truth is this 2016 election cycle shed an enormous spotlight on a nagging problem for advertisers that existed long before the era of WikiLeaks, PizzaGate, and Breitbart News Network. Today we revealed a new report that assesses the challenge ahead for advertisers, outlines the risks to brands, and provides a prescription for how to protect the... [...]

Tom Champion says, “In the lead-up to Mount Vesuvius’ catastrophic eruption — as foreshocks became more frequent and the air grew tainted — the citizens of Pompeii gossiped about a celestial force set to punish them for their sins. Around 2,000 years later, and there’s the same apocalyptic mood around Amazon’s looming impact on retail in Australia. But while Amazon’s eventual launch will certainly disrupt incumbents, don’t overlook the impact of another silent assassin: Kmart. Kmart has been gracefully reinventing itself while its peers are getting squeezed out of the picture.... [...]

Ted Schadler says, “Forrester’s clients frequently ask us how to build the business case for customer journey mapping, particularly for digital experiences and digital products. We have proven that better customer experiences drive revenue in industries with low switching costs. But what about investments in customer journey mapping? Now that I’ve taken on Forrester’s digital business and transformation playbook, I’ve been thinking a lot about the benefits of journey mapping, which I believe is the front end to any transformation initiative. I don’t have a wealth... [...]

Jessica Liu says, “44% of marketers say they haven’t been able to show the impact of social at all and another 36% say they have a good sense of the qualitative, but not quantitative, impact of social initiatives. Marketers feel stuck with engagement metrics that don’t tell them anything about the business impact of their social programs. And, some fall victim to thinking there is an industry standard set of KPIs that will reveal their social impact in relation to other brands. The Forrester Social Marketing Playbook‘s Performance Management chapter guides marketers on... [...]

Mary Shea says, “Are your marketing and sales teams caught in that endless loop of finger pointing? B2B sellers who complain about lead quality/quantity and marketers who criticize sellers for poor follow up? After years of acknowledging their issues with each other, many B2B marketing and sales teams continue to be at odds. Just “google” marketing and sales relationships and see what you find. I did and I surfaced 98 million results! Titles such as: “The Rocky Road Between Sales and Marketing” and “How to Survive a Soured Sales and Marketing Relationship” show the dissonance... [...]

John R. Rymer says, “Application-development leaders shifting to modern techniques are like acrobats performing above a flimsy net. The tools and technologies they need to support the planning, execution, and evaluation of customer-focused applications just aren’t widely available yet. The biggest gaps are in portfolio management, test-and-learn development environments, and digital application platforms. This report provides an overview of the tools and technologies application-development leaders need. Our key findings: Organizing Principles For Tools: Composition, Collaboration,... [...]