February 4, 2025 • 47 mins
In this episode of The Unicorny Marketing Show, host Dom sits down with Camilla Davison, CMO of ZF Aftermarket, to explore how B2B marketing can deliver meaningful customer value.
Camilla shares her journey from consumer goods to the aftermarket industry, revealing key lessons about value creation, marketing leadership, and the challenges of balancing short-term profitability with long-term brand building.
What you'll learn:
- The role of marketing insights in strategy development.
- How to build cross-functional relationships for better business outcomes.
- Why marketing must transition from a support function to a strategic driver.
Tune in for practical advice on shaping marketing as the hub of organisational growth.
About Camilla Davison
Camilla Davison has had a long and windy career that has provided many exciting opportunities for fulfilling growth and new experiences.
Starting very conventionally on a Marketing graduate recruitment scheme, Camilla spent 15 years with Kimberly-Clark on exciting Brands like Andrex and Kleenex. On moving to Africa, she found a different purpose in charitable work, supplying the basics in a more practical way for 6 years. On return Camilla settled back at KC to lead their baby business in Europe, driving both product and commercial innovation in a very competitive arena. Camilla then moved to B2B - taking those fundamental brand marketing skills to build brands in the public washroom arena. From there she went to a completely different arena of Autoparts and the aftermarket...First with Tenneco and now with ZF.
Links
Full show notes: Unicorny.co.uk
Watch the episode: https://youtu.be/seBnHjQs0Jc
LinkedIn: Camilla Davison | Dom Hawes
Website: ZF Aftermarket
Sponsor: Selbey Anderson
Other items referenced in this episode:
FMCG = fast moving consumer goods
OE = original equipment
BGM = Buying group marketing
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
If we are not delivering tothe customer's expectation with respect
to, you know, supply, thenthat's letting the brand down.
So, you know, the valueproposition isn't just about the
end product, it's about theentire experience across the whole
journey.
And so once you've got aninsight, then you're halfway there
(00:21):
to influencing your strategy.
But the process of developinginsights is, is not well, embedded
in organizations yet or evenin agencies.
Well, traditionally, and I'mgoing to be, I don't know, a little
bit possibly contentious here.
(00:41):
Go on, give us a headline.
Welcome to Unicorny today.
I am your host, Dom Hawes andwe are about to meet the marketing
powerhouse that is Camilla Davison.
(01:02):
Now, these days she is CMO atAutomotive Aftermarket, global leader
ZF Aftermarket, but she cuther teeth in the razor sharp competitive
world of consumer marketingwith Kimberly Clark.
Now, she's going to tell youall about her own journey in just
a minute.
But together today, we aregoing to set aside the usual thing
we do, the frameworks, thestrategies, all that kind of stuff,
(01:24):
and we're going to focus onsomething altogether less predictable.
The unexpected insights thatcan quietly reshape how you think
about marketing, but alsoabout your business as a whole.
These are the kind of insightsthat emerge when you look past the
obvious answers and startconnecting ideas in new ways.
(01:44):
For instance, we often hearabout the tension between short term
profitability and long termbrand building.
But what happens if we stopframing it as a trade off and start
looking at how marketing canalign these seemingly opposing goals?
Or take the idea of data inB2B marketing.
It's often seen as alimitation compared with the transparency
(02:05):
and the reams and reams andreams of data that get generated
in B2C.
But could this very constraintactually open the door to more human,
more customer centric approaches?
We're going to find that outlater, but we're also going to reflect
on how marketing teams canstep beyond their traditional role.
Not just communicators or thedreaded only one P, that promotional
(02:28):
P, but how marketers canbecome agents of organizational alignment,
building bridges betweensales, operations, leadership and
more.
So this episode, it's notabout quick fixes or flashy trends,
if that's what you're lookingfor, you might need to go somewhere
else.
But what you will get today isa very, very thoughtful exploration
(02:49):
and a deeper understanding ofhow you ask the questions that lead
to better understanding.
So if you're ready tochallenge the.
Way that you think aboutmarket your business, well, right
now you're in the.
Right place, let's get started.
Thank you very much.
Thanks, Dom.
Very excited to be here.
Well, I'm very excited becauseI've seen a trend recently where
(03:11):
quite well known andaccomplished FMCG or I hate the phrase
B2C but B2C marketers arecoming to B2B and shaking up their
approach to or the approach ofthe sector.
And we've only gone and gotourselves a live one in the studio.
I think I'm live.
Camilla, why don't we start.
(03:31):
Why don't you tell us a littlebit about you and about your career
and then we can go from there.
I think B2B is actually havinga bit of a moment at the moment.
So I come here really proudlyto sort of represent that segment.
But yeah, my first 15 yearswas very much B2C and I joined Kimberly
Clark at a time and it wasquite a long time ago that we were
(03:55):
really fortunate.
We had really traditionalmarketing skills drummed into us
on two or three, three yearprograms where as graduates we were
given exposure across thebusiness and talk some principles
that quite frankly have beenthe sort of foundation for everything
that I have done since withKimberly Clark as well.
(04:16):
I was privileged to work onsome of the strongest B2C brands
that we have in the UK.
Andrex toilet tissue, Kleenexfacial and I actually led the launch
of Huggies Nappies and all ofthe baby care range in Europe during
that period.
So super exciting brand, superexciting time.
(04:38):
And it really built a broadunderstanding of what marketing is.
But also it taught me to be avery commercial marketeer because
marketing in Kimberly Clarkhad profit responsibility and that
isn't always the case.
So in some ways we were sortof GMs for our brands during that
(04:59):
time.
I worked in local roles,responsible for markets, I worked
in regional roles and I workedin global roles.
And that's really important Ithink, because I would encourage
anyone at an early stage intheir career to do something similar
because it gives you a verydifferent lens on the business.
(05:19):
And I also worked in marketingroles and sales roles.
So again, trying to really seethings from different perspectives.
From there I set up my ownbusiness, did something completely
different for a few years andthen when I came back I rejoined
consumer Kimberly Clark againand they asked me, after a few years
(05:42):
of managing the EMEA babybusiness to take those skills and
build that marketing muscle inour B2B side of our business.
And at the time I thought, whywould I want to do that?
I mean there's no real equityfor our brands.
And nobody really understandsthe power of marketing in B2B, least
(06:05):
of all ourselves.
But that was precisely whythey wanted me to go there.
And it was such a fun journey,building that muscle, building the
understanding of how valuablebrands and brand innovation can be.
So I did that and then joined,followed our CMO into Tenneco Car
(06:28):
Parts, quite a transition,very far from B to C and started
to again build the, theTenneco way of brand building and
apply it to another B2B category.
Much more complex customerjourney, much longer customer journey.
And really started tounderstand that you can have a passion
(06:53):
for brands even in categoriesthat you aren't necessarily interested
in as you think, until youstart to understand the insights
around it.
And the more you understandabout it, the more intriguing it
becomes and the more connectedyou can feel to that particular industry.
And so now I've moved toanother competitor.
I've moved to ZF Aftermarket.
(07:14):
Absolutely love thatopportunity and the opportunity to
really, you know, build anunderstanding of what the brands
are.
In another B2B environment ina company that is largely driven
by OE is the challenge thatI'm embracing full on now, OE original
equipment.
So selling directly to carmanufacturers, for example.
(07:37):
But within that I amresponsible for aftermarket.
So again, a very classic B2Bmodel where the potential for us
to really build the strengthof our brands and the connection
with our end users is up for taking.
Brilliant.
We might come on to that later.
We're going to, we're going totouch on a couple of subjects, innovation
(07:57):
and organizational alignmentand design.
But first I just want to pickup on a couple of things that you
mentioned.
I talk a lot on this podcastabout the difference.
One of the fundamentaldifferences between the people that
we build or create in businessmarketing rather than consumer brand
marketing is, is the threeyears you described when you started
at Kimberly Clark, where youget broad exposure to the business,
(08:20):
you understand the metrics andyou're starting to be taught about
commercials from day one.
Yeah, so I think that's reallyinterest interesting.
And then you talked aboutalmost being a brand gm so having
profit responsibility.
So in the businessenvironment, often when people talk
about profit responsibility,they're talking about an outcome
of more often than not shortterm marketing activity akin to sales.
(08:41):
The way you described itsounded much more like the full marketing
mix where you, where you aregenuinely involved in price and product
and place, not just promotion.
So I wonder whether, you know,before we get stuck into detail,
whether you can comment onsome of the differences that you've
seen, not necessarily in thebusinesses you're in, but amongst
(09:02):
peers that you now meet in B2B.
What are some of thestructural differences between the
way marketing is done inconsumer and business marketing?
The fact that I had thosethree years in a company that really
did hold its marketersresponsible for a P and L has really
helped me with respect to thecompany perspective in B2B.
(09:25):
Because B2B marketing is, itis emotional, but it's also very
commercial, very rational.
And at the end of the day, youneed to be able to converse with
a value proposition that makessense, makes sense from a commercial
perspective for the businessthat is actually, you know, your
(09:48):
target.
And so having an understandingof how you run a business, of how
you drive profit growth, howyou manage costs across the entire
P and L, how you makedecisions on resource deployment,
on what you're prioritizing,and the impact of changing the dial
(10:13):
on any one of those areas thathas been crucial to refining the
value proposition beyond justthe most obvious levers that one
can pull.
So I'm very grateful to Caseyfor doing that.
And you know, that's what B2Bhas over B2C.
(10:34):
The discussions that we'reinvolved in and the breadth of the
value proposition is morecomplex, it is more commercial.
The way that we're looking atthe value to our target has to incorporate
so many more considerations.
(10:55):
So if you haven't had theopportunity to really understand
that in your own business youcannot speak with experience and
authority to your customer.
Yeah, I think there are somany more stakeholders in B2B, particularly
in an intermediated businessor many B2B's will of course be selling
direct and will beintermediated as well.
And therefore they have awhole channel they need to communicate
with.
(11:15):
And the end customer they needto communicate with.
And even in the end customer,they've got a buyer group that they
need to speak to.
Interestingly, as an aside, Isaw the big thing at the moment everyone's
talking about is buyer groupmarketing, which is obviously a revelation.
And I looked into this becauseI thought, oh my God, here we go,
another three letter, threeletter acronym, bgm.
And it's the revelation thatsometimes when you're selling, you
(11:39):
don't just market to decisionmakers, you need to reach influencers.
Yeah, the buying.
This is not new.
Yeah, exactly.
That's kind of what I wastrained in in the 90s.
I think the one thing that'scoming into B2B now, certainly as
far as the companies that I'mrepresenting over the last couple
of years is a betterunderstanding of the customer journey
and trying to understand likewho the customer is, who influences
(12:03):
them at different points, whomakes the final decision and who
influences the decision makers.
So again, it was a B2C skillthat we were using, as you say, 10,
20 years ago, but now we'rebeginning to apply the same thing
in B2B.
So the equivalent, the B2Bequivalent of pester power.
Yes, exactly.
(12:24):
Well, it's real, it exists.
Let's talk about some of themisconceptions about marketing.
Get stuck into the meat.
I don't know how seriously totake a lot of the discussion that
one sees on LinkedIn becauseso often people are motivated by
their own needs rather thantrying to comment on what's going
on, actually going on in the market.
But I do get the perceptionthat marketing is very much still
seen as tactical, a reactivefunction in many organizations.
(12:47):
And people don't take a stepback and think strategy.
What are your observations at Casey?
Marketing led strategy.
And that built in me a beliefthat it was the right way to do it
because marketing was thevoice of the consumer.
And any strategy that isn'tbuilt on consumer needs, frankly,
(13:12):
as far as I'm concerned is wrong.
When I joined the B2Bcompanies that I've worked with,
that was not the case thatmarketing led strategy.
It was very far from the case.
And as such, I really didn'tfeel that the strategy was customer
(13:33):
centric.
And to be honest, we aretrying to change that.
Sales has an opportunity alsoto change and needs to change because
sales is seen as the voice ofthe customer.
But actually sales hashistorically had a very sort of close
(13:57):
relationship with a few distributors.
And as we move to a moreomnichannel approach, as we need
to create pull as well as pushfrom workshops in our case, as well
as selling into distributors.
So we cannot rely on thosefive or six really strong relationships
(14:18):
that we have with our key distributors.
We have to get a betterunderstanding of how we drive pull
for our brands, how we createthat understanding of what's important
and how we translate that intoinsights that can influence our strategy
development.
And that's the role of marketing.
But it's not just the role ofmarketing, it's the role of the entire
(14:42):
organization.
And marketing needs to havethe voice that that influences the
entire organization throughbeing respected for its understanding
of how we run the business.
And that comes right back full circle.
You know, if you've gotmarketers who only understand a very
narrow dimension of the fourPs for example, and don't have the
(15:05):
respect within the leadershipteam as a whole to be able to engage
and have their, you know, seatat the table, then no one will listen
to you.
And it doesn't matter how goodyour customer insights are.
You need to be respectedcommercially as being someone who
can understand where thebusiness is going and influence that.
Do you think that amisunderstanding or an underestimation
(15:28):
of the importance of pull insome non marketing execs might add
to that?
Our business is a typicalexample of how a push strategy has
worked very effectively for decades.
Yeah, but the world isbecoming more competitive, it's becoming
more commercial.
Competition is becoming rife,you know, and it's not okay.
(15:52):
We need to have the power ofour brands being pulled through the
system and the company isrecognizing that, but not necessarily
recognizing how to managethat, how to build pull.
And it requires a root andbranch change in the way that we
not just market, but sell.
And the relationship betweenmarketing and sales needs to change.
(16:15):
So it's not something thathappens overnight and it's something
that certainly I'm trying tolead by building those relationships
and that respect for theentire domain internally and doing
it in a very agile way.
You know, we have to iterate,we have to constantly just try things,
test it, work with ourcolleagues in commercial excellence
(16:38):
and sales, prove to them thevalue of doing something a little
bit different and then startbuilding that inner standard work
step by step.
How do you bring yourcolleagues with you on that?
Because that's a lot of change.
I mean, a lot of change.
And we know that, we know the.
Transformation when you'regoing from a short term tactical,
functional marketingdepartment that really is just doing
(17:00):
the promotion p to being moreof a brand manager approach.
Because you are trying tocreate pull and you know, you've
got a lot of stakeholdersinternally to bring along with you.
Yeah, I mean, how do you do that?
Not, not in one, you know, instant.
I grew up in an environmentwhere understanding how you drive
(17:22):
behavior change wasfundamental to marketing.
And it's not just about thebehavior change of your consumer
or your customer.
You can apply the sameprinciples internally.
So you've really got tounderstand at its most basic, like
what's in it for me, you know,of the various different other leaders
(17:45):
within the leadership team,how can you create and prove to them
the value of doing somethingslightly differently and what is
the value for them of doing that?
So, you know, from.
I literally dissect theleadership team and look at what
would be the benefit tooperations of us having closer alignment
(18:07):
to them?
What would be the benefit tofinance of us going on a journey
that actually funnily enough,takes us closer to really understanding
the return on investment ofour marketing investments?
So trying to sort of dissectit and understanding where people
are coming from and how thedirection that you want to go on
(18:28):
is actually going to help themis really the first and only stage
that sort of helps themembrace the journey you want to go
on.
Okay.
So that's your internalstakeholders and I get that by, by
talking to them and sharingwith them how collaboration drives
success, helps customers.
(18:50):
Slightly different thing.
Yeah.
I was really captured by thedefinition of innovation that you
gave me when we had our, ourpre interview call.
You described innovation ascreating new value.
Yeah.
For customers, which isprobably, I mean, maybe that's part
of the change conversation,but when it's customer friend phrased,
(19:10):
it's about creating newinnovation from.
How, how do you think thatview differs from traditional views
of innovation?
Well, traditionally, and I'mgoing to be, I don't know, a little
bit possibly contentious here.
Go on, give us a headline.
Innovation was certainly in.
In the companies that I'vespent the majority of my working
(19:30):
life with, innovation wassomething that, well, engineers came
up with.
Okay.
You know, and they came tomarketing to say, hey, we've had
this amazing idea like can youfind a home for it.
It wasn't necessarily insightdriven from our customer understanding.
(19:51):
Okay, so inside out ratherthan outside in.
Exactly.
And obviously innovationrequires you to really have an insight
that you can monetize,frankly, but you can monetize it
in a way that creates valuefor your target, whether it's product,
whether it's commercial value,whether it's an experience, something
(20:15):
that is valued that is new,that they don't get already today.
So that is what innovationmeans to me.
Over the years, I think thatthe definition of innovation has
been seen to extend it stillsomething that I think is largely
owned by engineering in a lotof these companies.
But how you commercialize itas a value proposition is the magic.
(20:41):
And that is something thatmarketing has to own and has to drive
through insight and understanding.
And we can only do that if wehave a really good understanding,
as you say, of the customer.
And I often feel that we don'tas a profession, certainly within
business marketing, thatpossibly we don't spend enough time
(21:02):
trying to understand our customers.
Yeah, I think that's fair.
I think that.
And it goes back to what I wasjust saying a little while ago.
Historically, we ran ourbusiness through having very strong
relationships with ourdistributors and they had the relationship
with the people who use ourproducts at the end of the day.
(21:24):
And so we have sort ofabdicated the responsibility to understand
the people who are using ourproducts true needs and how well
they're being met to ourdistributor partners.
And we are not getting thatfirsthand experience and value of
the relationship that ourusers have with the products or the
(21:47):
brands.
And so that has had to change.
It's not something that, youknow, is quick to build solid insight
takes time, it takesinvestment to really try and get
to the bottom of what's goingto be valuable in driving your, you
know, your innovation pipeline.
But it is recognized now thatit is important to do and we're starting
(22:11):
to do more of it when you're.
Kimberly Clark in the researchI did before this episode, I went
to my favorite friend GPT, Imust find a pseudonym for.
But I went to ChatGPT and Ithought, well, let's see what research
we can find about CamillaDavison on Chat GPT.
So I asked a very simplequestion, who is Camilla Davidson?
And I got some really, reallyinteresting stuff back that talks
(22:33):
to exactly what we're talkingabout here.
It talks about some of theadaptive marketing you did when you
were running Kleenex usingreal time data basically to allocate
resources to areas where therewas going to be immediate need.
And I looked when I wasreading that first you'd be better
find out whether that'sactually what happened.
(22:55):
But when I was reading that, I.
Thought how would you inbusiness marketing.
This is exactly what we'retalking about.
It's funny, I didn't knowwhere you were going to go with the
sort of the research becauseyou can imagine in a company like
Kimberly Clark whose productsare all about, well, dealing with
body fluids, basically,whether it's coming out of your nose
(23:15):
or somewhere else, theresearch can be quite interesting
for sure.
And it's a company that reallyprioritizes getting beneath the skin
of how consumers relate to theproducts, the brands and so on in
terms of adaptive research anddata driven adaptation.
(23:41):
The plethora of data that wehad at Kimberly Clark on brands like
Kleenex compared with what Ihave now in a B2B environment.
Environment is there's no comparison.
We used to be able to see ourprice to consumers in all the major
retailers on a daily basis.
(24:02):
We have very little idea todayof how distributors are pricing our
brands to workshops.
You know, so it's a completelydifferent world Equally, we would
track things like the weatheror, you know, if you're on Andrex,
the incidence of E.
Coli, basically, I'm afraid to say.
(24:22):
Okay.
Because it would literallyinfluence sales.
So we could ensure that, youknow, whether it was promotional
activity, display space orwhether it was, you know, price.
The four Ps were intricatelyconnected and we could literally
modify, you know, the driversaccordingly on a pretty much daily
(24:44):
basis.
We also had very closerelationships with the key retailers
and they were very able toadapt whatever it was that they were
doing.
That channel worked really effectively.
It's much slower in B2B.
There is much less data transparency.
(25:04):
The whole understanding of themarketing mix and which elements
are really driving sales isfar less scientific and a little
bit more art meets science.
You know, the whole way inwhich you create your plans, test
your plans and learn is stillrelatively immature.
(25:24):
And, you know, it's anexciting area of development.
I think it's really exciting.
I mean, you know, we startedout just a second ago talking about
innovation and innovation hasto come from insight and insight
has to come from informationand information has to come from
data.
So we do need to do somethingto start thinking about how we can
improve transparency.
Yeah.
And what I was really capturedby when I, when, you know, when I
(25:46):
was looking at the, that casestudy of, you know, asset allocation
into areas where there's goingto be need.
There's no reason, if one hadthe data in business to business
marketing, that we couldn't beadopting some of the same tactics
and strategy.
There's no reason at all.
Just the cost of collecting data.
I guess it is the cost ofcollecting data and it's the cost
(26:10):
of not just collecting data,but making sure that internally you
have the systems to be able toanalyze it properly.
Yeah, yeah.
Because, you know, a lot ofcompanies have grown rapidly, quite
a lot of it, often by acquisition.
And the systems don'tnecessarily talk to each other.
You know, they haven'tnecessarily invested in the software
(26:33):
that's required to make itreally easy to use the data that
you have.
So certainly in my experience,you know, there's an awful lot of
reliance on what I would calltribal knowledge, which I really
value.
But it cannot be the only source.
Of intelligence valuable inits own.
Right.
That isn't it?
(26:53):
Yeah.
Invaluable, I should say.
Yeah.
But you need data as well.
And, and then from the datayou've got to be able to extract
the correct information andthen you need someone who can see
an insight and then you've gotto Try and root that insight in a
customer need or in some kindof emotional or rational reason to
buy.
(27:14):
And do we have those skills?
I don't think we do.
I think you convert data intoinsights by kind of combining data
with a human truth as such.
And those two things togethercreate an insight which is something
that's really actionable.
Yeah.
Okay.
(27:34):
And so once you've got aninsight, then you're halfway there
to influencing your strategy.
But the process of developinginsights is not well embedded in
organizations yet or even in agencies.
And it's something that I'mconstantly pushing on the relationships
in the agencies that we have.
(27:56):
Because at the end of the day,quite frankly, I believe that your
strategy is only as good asthe insights upon which it's built.
And unless you're constantlyrefreshing that input of insights
based on how the market isevolving, how behaviors of your customers
(28:16):
are evolving, then yourstrategies aren't going to hit the
mark.
They're not going to be ableto deliver new value.
Do.
Yeah, and so, yeah, it's a,it's a constant effort of insight
generation.
No, I think, by the way, Ithink that's a really important point
and I think one that manypeople overlook.
They think like, we've doneour research, now we're going to
go and do a bunch of stuff andthen they don't come back and validate
(28:39):
and check.
But markets move reallyquickly, especially these days with
social.
And everything's electronicand connected.
I think not enough peoplerevisit their research often enough.
And some people don't do it inthe first place.
They just think they know thatthe business because they've, you
know, been working in it for decades.
So, and that's reallydangerous because then you start,
(29:01):
you know, pouring good moneyafter bad.
So, yeah, you've got to comeup with some kind of fresh insight
upon which to, you know, buildyour growth plans.
But you just sparked a reallyinteresting thought in my head there
with, with that model ofpeople that don't feel they need
to research because they've,they've known the market for years
and years and years.
There is a cohort of peopleout there, as I'm sure you know,
(29:23):
building synthetic panels atthe moment, which is a synthetic
version of the people thatthink they don't need to do the research
because they've known it foryears and years.
And then the, the, the.
I think the proposition isthat people like you and I would
go to the synthetic panel anduse that instead of our market research
because it's faster, cheaper,Whatever else, but, but that's actually
(29:44):
no different than going to theold sweat.
Who says I don't need to doresearch, I know this market and
asking for an opinion is it.
Well, time will tell, won't you?
I hear they're getting like a95% correlation with real research.
So there's a lot of excitementin that area.
But I'm not necessarily sure.
I mean recently we've beendeveloping a new proposition and
(30:07):
you know, there are manyoptions available for research, you
know, and costs differ accordingly.
But for me, one of thefundamental ways of testing that
you cannot go ahead without isrun it past some of the people who
spend their lives actuallytalking to sales on a day to day
(30:29):
basis or our sales talking to customers.
And you know, they won't beshy in telling you what you, you
know, what they think.
And if they don't give you thegreen light for go ahead then frankly,
you know, you probably do needto scratch your head a little bit
more.
And that's a really good point actually.
We owe him everything.
(30:49):
It brings to memory a campaignI did a long time ago now, but we,
we had a client, they were inthe information business and they,
the Internet was just sort ofcoming of age.
That'll give you a clue toits, to its how long it was.
And they had four or fiveproducts that they were selling and
they were going to cannibalizethem all with one new product that
was going to be cloud based.
Yeah, big, big, big risk move.
(31:11):
Yeah, big risk.
I was an agency at the time.
I was saying consultancy wasslightly different because I wasn't
creating things, I was helpingthem answer or solve problems.
But we up anecdotally fromspeaking to their sales teams across
Europe which we did all thetime to try and find out what was
going on.
And exactly the way you weretalking that none of them believed
in this product.
And so we had to go to the, tothe board, the European board, this
(31:34):
was an American public companyand say you've got a major problem,
you've got four weeks tolaunch, you're about to launch this
product and none of your salesteams across Europe believe in it.
And so they said, well, okay,we're resource planning at the moment.
You've got 72 hours or something.
It was, I think it was about72, maybe 48.
You've got something like 72hours to prove this.
Maybe it was a week.
I might be exaggerating.
(31:55):
It's incredible as I get olderhow, how much harder the project
seemed to.
Yeah, oh yes, obviously withinan hour they needed.
No, it was probably a week.
So anyway, we had to go outand run surveys across all of the
sales team and it turned outabsolutely that they were not prepared
to sell this thing.
So we then went into atraining and, and a listening project
(32:15):
to get them on board.
So everyone understood what itwas, how it wasn't going to lead
to a change in pipeline and itall went fine.
Well, I wonder what theinsight upon which that was buil
at the end of the day.
No, I do feel they are a veryhonest audience.
You can decide that you wantto disregard it, but at least hear
what they've got to say andwhy they're saying it.
(32:37):
And then, you know, you candecide which direction you want to
go in after that.
Salespeople are, I mean,they're cousins, aren't they really,
of marketing?
We're related.
Close cousins.
Close cousins.
But you also said something tome which I thought was really interesting
about how marketing should actas the hub of the wheel.
Yes.
Within an organization, it's a connector.
Sales, finance, operations.
(32:59):
And we've talked a little bitabout that today, people, you know,
the HR function and HR andmarketing and procurement.
Indeed, you know, we all needto work together.
Of course.
Talk to me about your hub ofthe wheel concepts.
What does it look like in practice?
Well, I just don't understandwhy anyone wouldn't think that marketing
is the hub of the wheel.
Perhaps I'm a little biased,but the reason is because marketing
(33:22):
is the voice of the consumer.
And at the end of the day, ifthat's not in the center of what
everybody's trying to deliver,then you know, why not?
So marketing is about creatingvalue propositions.
You can argue that sales has acloser voice with a customer, but
marketing and sales have to beso closely connected.
They have to be able togetherunderstand the consumer, the customer,
(33:47):
convert that knowledge into avalue proposition and then work with
operations to make sure thatthe product that's being produced
is everything that that valueproposition has and nothing more.
You know, frankly, they needto work with finance to understand
how everything that we'reinvesting on can be measured.
(34:11):
We know learnings from thatand optimizing our return on investment
the whole time.
You know, they need to workwith every single function to make
sure that what we're doing asan organization is strategically
aligned to delivering thatvalue propos to the customer with
no waste throughout the organization.
And that's why marketing hasto somehow be like an octopus, you
(34:35):
know, and stretching andconnecting with every other Function
to ensure that's happening.
But it doesn't happen in every company.
We know it does.
It doesn't happen in a lot of companies.
Yeah, we know marketing endsup being told what to do at the end.
Of a chain or a labeldeveloper or whatever.
Yeah.
You know, what advice wouldyou be able to give to people listening
on how they can build, buildcross functional relationships you
(34:57):
mentioned a little bitearlier, but I wonder whether we
can look into that in a bitmore detail.
I mean every company'sdifferent and the reasons why it
isn't in the place that itshould be will be different in every
company.
So first understand why, likethat's always the place to start,
like why isn't it?
But at the end of the day myexperience and it has worked effectively
(35:21):
in two organizations is aboutbit like convincing your audience
to buy your product at the endof the day it's the same internally.
What's in it for them?
You know, what need does itsatisfy that they may not even necessarily
be aware of having in thefirst place?
(35:42):
So for example, recently theguy who leads our operations is not
necessarily the first personto see the value in marketing.
Okay.
Thinks it's very fluffy magickind of things and yet he's responsible
(36:03):
for quality.
Well, at the end of the day,the customer experience that ZF stands
for is quality.
Every single aspect of how wetouch customers is about delivering
quality.
And that has to of course berepresented by the product, but it
(36:27):
has to be represented by somuch more than that.
However, if the people who aremaking the product don't understand
what the brand stands for andhow that can be conveyed in the way
in which it's produced, thenthey're not going to think it's important.
So I am more than happy to godown to our manufacturing sites and
(36:47):
explain about what the brandstands for and explain how important
quality is and what qualitymeans in terms of the, the specification
and just build a bit ofrapport with them so that they become
more passionate and moreadvocates of, you know, what, what
we're, what we're selling.
Do you think the concept ofexperience is widely accepted outside
(37:10):
of market experience?
Yeah, the whole brand andcustomer experience unboxing and
you know that the whole rapthat, you know, that comes around.
A product, I think when peoplethink about it in their own lives,
yes, but they're very good at,you know, boxing and not applying
that sort of experience inwhen they go to work.
So no, I think there's a bigjourney to be done in terms of it's
(37:33):
not just about delivering a product.
It's entire experience from,you know, the call center right through
to the packaging, rightthrough to the supply chain.
You know, if we are notdelivering to the customer's expectation
with respect to, you know,supply, then that's letting the brand
down.
So, you know, the valueproposition isn't just about the
(37:55):
end product.
It's about the entireexperience across the whole journey.
And the way the financedepartments experience marketing
is normally a budget time whenthey're having to allocate a large
chunk of cash to get into marketing.
And you've talked to meoffline about developing a relationship
with a CFO so that internalmarketing, if you like, with the
(38:19):
cfo, again, it's not fluffy.
It's about hard things.
You talked about ROI earlier.
How have you gone abouttalking to your CFOs about marketing
as a spend?
I mean, I think that therelationship with finance is probably
the second most importantrelationship I have.
You know, obviously I need tobe very closely aligned with sales,
(38:43):
also finance.
And it is partly to overcomethe attitude that exists that marketing
is the fluffy stuff.
You know, it's not actually.
It's the engine for growth, inmy opinion.
But in order for that to berespected within the organization,
we have to talk the same language.
So, you know, we have to talkfinancially about our investments
(39:08):
and what their return.
And we have to start trying tomake it less of a sort of art and
more of a science.
Now, that's hard because itisn't easy to say, I spent this amount
and this is what I got forevery single penny of that.
But you can start thatjourney, and you start that journey
(39:28):
by saying, right, what am Igoing to measure?
And you know, any strategy isabout the what, why, when, why?
So you can start to alignmetrics to each of those questions.
And even if it isn't a 100%correlation between the metric and,
you know, sales, startlearning, start showing transparency
(39:51):
within the organization, thatyou are prepared to be questioned,
that you are prepared to bevery transparent about how you're
spending the money and aboutwhether it was a good investment
or whether it was somethingwe've learned.
There's never a sort of badinvestment unless you do it wrong
several times.
But be open about it, havethose conversations, start measuring
(40:12):
once the measurement happens,start a B testing and looking and
learning the whole time.
So it really is, as withanything about communication, about
being very transparent aboutsaying what you can do and what you
can measure and what youcan't, but how you're going to tackle
trying to be more objective inthose areas and really make sure
(40:35):
that you've got people withinfinance embedded, your teams at every
level so that they canchallenge you and they can start
to understand why is you'redoing what you are and go back and
be the voice of marketing intheir own, you know, function.
I mean that's reallyinteresting, you know.
I mean, you know, becausewe've had a conversation about it.
(40:55):
I have a rather dodgy historywith the concept of ROI being used
as.
A, as a measure.
But, but what I'm learning inthe action in the last five or six
interviews I've done and, andthis conversation specifically is
you're coming at that metricfrom a very different position than
many of the marketers that Ihave seen.
(41:16):
I won't say spoken to becauseobviously at unicornly only the best
come.
But because your startingpoint is a lot further back in strategy.
Well, it is in strategydevelopment and because you have
this kind of hub spokearrangement internally.
It's a very different conceptI think when you talk about ROI than
(41:37):
when somebody who is at theend of a communication chain does.
Because where, where they arethe coloring in department.
Yeah.
And they're having to talkroi, they can only talk about clicks,
likes, those kind of stuff.
And, and that's fine becausethat's very transparent.
But I mean look at the.
You can't build a businessdoing it.
(41:57):
You can't build a businessdoing it.
You can harvest doing it.
Yeah.
And I think, you know, I thinkrecently some people think that's
what marketing is, you know,but there's a rabbit hole there.
Yeah, it's a very importantpart of marketing.
Absolutely 100 and likely tobecome even more important.
But it's not the whole thing.
(42:18):
Marketing for me is so muchmore, and it's so much more strategic
than that and it has to be somuch more influential than that.
That is a channel channel, basically.
But unless you've got a solidmarket marketing plan, fundamentally
defining why you're using thatchat channel and for what purpose,
(42:39):
then you're kind of missingthe point.
But many people do.
And I think one of thechallenges is there was a rabbit
hole there.
I nearly went down, but I'mgoing to skirt over it instead of
going all the way in.
I think one of the challengesis that that bit is the bit that
everyone sees and that's sothat we sort of, we're inculcating
with people that this ismarketing and it's the, it's the,
it's the, the Google Ads and,or you know, it mass.
(43:01):
It's the stuff.
And because they see so muchof that but they don't see the strategy
work going on, they don't seethe work you're doing with operations
to talk about quality orfinance, to talk about return.
All they get to see is the output.
That's why they think that'swhat we all do.
And I don't know how we changethat with a.
Within the wider organization.
It comes down in my opinion tosome of those things that I've talked
(43:23):
about a couple of times on,on, you know, today, which is voice
of the customer valueproposition development.
The value proposition is somuch more than sort of executing
through channel, it's aboutunderstanding how you play with price,
what is the right promotions,how do you build equity versus influence
(43:47):
short term sales.
You know, all of these thingsare considerations that you can cannot
get a good perspective on ifall you're looking at is a channel
marketing plan based ondigital, which is one aspect of the
execution.
Camilla, I think that's areally good place for us to end today.
(44:08):
Thank you very much.
Lovely summary of what we'vetalked about so far.
It's time for marketing tomove a little bit back in the food
chain and start getting more strategic.
I think.
I certainly would agree withthat then.
Tom, thank you.
Thank you.
Good fun.
Before signing off, I want to say.
A huge thank you to Camilla for.
Taking the time to come andsee us in the studio here and to
share her experience andwisdom with us.
(44:30):
Now I got a very briefsnapshot of her diary when she was
here and I tell you what, her workload.
Is not for the faint hearted so.
I really appreciate her comingto see us.
Let's quickly now recap someof the key ideas we discussed today
and then I'll sign off.
So first we talked aboutlimitations like fragmented data
or competing priorities andhow those can actually often become
(44:50):
opportunities for creativityand human connection.
Now embrace those constraints,you may just find more meaningful
ways of innovating in your business.
Not an easy thing to do, butat least Camilla's given us a pathway
we can all follow to try andget there.
Secondly, we looked at thepower of alignment.
(45:10):
We all already know thatmarketing isn't just all about campaigns
and communications.
It's about about unitingsales, operations, leadership, that
kind of stuff.
It's about delivering realvalue to customers.
But that kind of alignment, itdoesn't come easily.
You have to work at it.
And I think Camilla gave us areally good insight into how she
thinks about doing that andthe prize if you get that is not
(45:33):
just driving results, butbuilding real trust across the business.
And we've talked about trustbefore on the podcast.
It's so important, I think weneed to keep banging that drum.
So some really good takeawaysI think for me today on building
trust and how how marketingcan, if you like, lubricate relationships
(45:53):
throughout a business.
And finally, but again, by nomeans least, we explore the importance
of thinking long term evenwhen you have immense short term
pressures.
And we're talking here reallyabout balancing agility.
Awful word buzzword bingo.
I guess I just won it.
But balancing agility or thethe ability, let's say to change
(46:16):
with patience thinking longerterm and how if you can balance that
sort of flexibility and shortterm ability to change with a longer
term view, that is how greatmarketers ensure that their endeavors
deliver really lasting impact.
(46:36):
So a fabulous episode.
Thanks so much for Camilla.
I really enjoyed that.
And I've got some homework foryou this week.
Take a moment to look at yourown current marketing activities
or your approach and askyourself, where am I operating on
assumptions instead of genuine insights.
Like what's one question Icould ask my customers, my team,
or even myself to uncoversomething that I haven't seen before
(47:01):
and then ask that question theweek after and then ask that question
the week after and then workout how you can put it into practice.
If you do do that, you will.
Be building much, muchstronger foundations for long term
value creation.
Now, as always, we'd love tohear your thoughts.
You can Find me on LinkedIn.
My name again is Dom Hawes.
(47:21):
Or you can leave a comment forus on unicorny.co.uk and if you did
find today's conversationvaluable, I would be really grateful
if you would share it with acolleague or friend.
Because building a smarter,more thoughtful marketing community
starts with conversations likethese and.
Starts with people like you.
Thank you so much forlistening and we will see you next
time on Unicorny.
If we are not delivering tothe customer's expectation with respect
to, you know, supply, thenthat's letting the brand down.
So, you know, the valueproposition isn't just about the
end product, it's about theentire experience across the whole
journey.
And so once you've got aninsight, then you're halfway there
(00:21):
to influencing your strategy.
But the process of developinginsights is, is not well, embedded
in organizations yet or evenin agencies.
Well, traditionally, and I'mgoing to be, I don't know, a little
bit possibly contentious here.
(00:41):
Go on, give us a headline.
Welcome to Unicorny today.
I am your host, Dom Hawes andwe are about to meet the marketing
powerhouse that is Camilla Davison.
(01:02):
Now, these days she is CMO atAutomotive Aftermarket, global leader
ZF Aftermarket, but she cuther teeth in the razor sharp competitive
world of consumer marketingwith Kimberly Clark.
Now, she's going to tell youall about her own journey in just
a minute.
But together today, we aregoing to set aside the usual thing
we do, the frameworks, thestrategies, all that kind of stuff,
(01:24):
and we're going to focus onsomething altogether less predictable.
The unexpected insights thatcan quietly reshape how you think
about marketing, but alsoabout your business as a whole.
These are the kind of insightsthat emerge when you look past the
obvious answers and startconnecting ideas in new ways.
(01:44):
For instance, we often hearabout the tension between short term
profitability and long termbrand building.
But what happens if we stopframing it as a trade off and start
looking at how marketing canalign these seemingly opposing goals?
Or take the idea of data inB2B marketing.
It's often seen as alimitation compared with the transparency
(02:05):
and the reams and reams andreams of data that get generated
in B2C.
But could this very constraintactually open the door to more human,
more customer centric approaches?
We're going to find that outlater, but we're also going to reflect
on how marketing teams canstep beyond their traditional role.
Not just communicators or thedreaded only one P, that promotional
(02:28):
P, but how marketers canbecome agents of organizational alignment,
building bridges betweensales, operations, leadership and
more.
So this episode, it's notabout quick fixes or flashy trends,
if that's what you're lookingfor, you might need to go somewhere
else.
But what you will get today isa very, very thoughtful exploration
(02:49):
and a deeper understanding ofhow you ask the questions that lead
to better understanding.
So if you're ready tochallenge the.
Way that you think aboutmarket your business, well, right
now you're in the.
Right place, let's get started.
Thank you very much.
Thanks, Dom.
Very excited to be here.
Well, I'm very excited becauseI've seen a trend recently where
(03:11):
quite well known andaccomplished FMCG or I hate the phrase
B2C but B2C marketers arecoming to B2B and shaking up their
approach to or the approach ofthe sector.
And we've only gone and gotourselves a live one in the studio.
I think I'm live.
Camilla, why don't we start.
(03:31):
Why don't you tell us a littlebit about you and about your career
and then we can go from there.
I think B2B is actually havinga bit of a moment at the moment.
So I come here really proudlyto sort of represent that segment.
But yeah, my first 15 yearswas very much B2C and I joined Kimberly
Clark at a time and it wasquite a long time ago that we were
(03:55):
really fortunate.
We had really traditionalmarketing skills drummed into us
on two or three, three yearprograms where as graduates we were
given exposure across thebusiness and talk some principles
that quite frankly have beenthe sort of foundation for everything
that I have done since withKimberly Clark as well.
(04:16):
I was privileged to work onsome of the strongest B2C brands
that we have in the UK.
Andrex toilet tissue, Kleenexfacial and I actually led the launch
of Huggies Nappies and all ofthe baby care range in Europe during
that period.
So super exciting brand, superexciting time.
(04:38):
And it really built a broadunderstanding of what marketing is.
But also it taught me to be avery commercial marketeer because
marketing in Kimberly Clarkhad profit responsibility and that
isn't always the case.
So in some ways we were sortof GMs for our brands during that
(04:59):
time.
I worked in local roles,responsible for markets, I worked
in regional roles and I workedin global roles.
And that's really important Ithink, because I would encourage
anyone at an early stage intheir career to do something similar
because it gives you a verydifferent lens on the business.
(05:19):
And I also worked in marketingroles and sales roles.
So again, trying to really seethings from different perspectives.
From there I set up my ownbusiness, did something completely
different for a few years andthen when I came back I rejoined
consumer Kimberly Clark againand they asked me, after a few years
(05:42):
of managing the EMEA babybusiness to take those skills and
build that marketing muscle inour B2B side of our business.
And at the time I thought, whywould I want to do that?
I mean there's no real equityfor our brands.
And nobody really understandsthe power of marketing in B2B, least
(06:05):
of all ourselves.
But that was precisely whythey wanted me to go there.
And it was such a fun journey,building that muscle, building the
understanding of how valuablebrands and brand innovation can be.
So I did that and then joined,followed our CMO into Tenneco Car
(06:28):
Parts, quite a transition,very far from B to C and started
to again build the, theTenneco way of brand building and
apply it to another B2B category.
Much more complex customerjourney, much longer customer journey.
And really started tounderstand that you can have a passion
(06:53):
for brands even in categoriesthat you aren't necessarily interested
in as you think, until youstart to understand the insights
around it.
And the more you understandabout it, the more intriguing it
becomes and the more connectedyou can feel to that particular industry.
And so now I've moved toanother competitor.
I've moved to ZF Aftermarket.
(07:14):
Absolutely love thatopportunity and the opportunity to
really, you know, build anunderstanding of what the brands
are.
In another B2B environment ina company that is largely driven
by OE is the challenge thatI'm embracing full on now, OE original
equipment.
So selling directly to carmanufacturers, for example.
(07:37):
But within that I amresponsible for aftermarket.
So again, a very classic B2Bmodel where the potential for us
to really build the strengthof our brands and the connection
with our end users is up for taking.
Brilliant.
We might come on to that later.
We're going to, we're going totouch on a couple of subjects, innovation
(07:57):
and organizational alignmentand design.
But first I just want to pickup on a couple of things that you
mentioned.
I talk a lot on this podcastabout the difference.
One of the fundamentaldifferences between the people that
we build or create in businessmarketing rather than consumer brand
marketing is, is the threeyears you described when you started
at Kimberly Clark, where youget broad exposure to the business,
(08:20):
you understand the metrics andyou're starting to be taught about
commercials from day one.
Yeah, so I think that's reallyinterest interesting.
And then you talked aboutalmost being a brand gm so having
profit responsibility.
So in the businessenvironment, often when people talk
about profit responsibility,they're talking about an outcome
of more often than not shortterm marketing activity akin to sales.
(08:41):
The way you described itsounded much more like the full marketing
mix where you, where you aregenuinely involved in price and product
and place, not just promotion.
So I wonder whether, you know,before we get stuck into detail,
whether you can comment onsome of the differences that you've
seen, not necessarily in thebusinesses you're in, but amongst
(09:02):
peers that you now meet in B2B.
What are some of thestructural differences between the
way marketing is done inconsumer and business marketing?
The fact that I had thosethree years in a company that really
did hold its marketersresponsible for a P and L has really
helped me with respect to thecompany perspective in B2B.
(09:25):
Because B2B marketing is, itis emotional, but it's also very
commercial, very rational.
And at the end of the day, youneed to be able to converse with
a value proposition that makessense, makes sense from a commercial
perspective for the businessthat is actually, you know, your
(09:48):
target.
And so having an understandingof how you run a business, of how
you drive profit growth, howyou manage costs across the entire
P and L, how you makedecisions on resource deployment,
on what you're prioritizing,and the impact of changing the dial
(10:13):
on any one of those areas thathas been crucial to refining the
value proposition beyond justthe most obvious levers that one
can pull.
So I'm very grateful to Caseyfor doing that.
And you know, that's what B2Bhas over B2C.
(10:34):
The discussions that we'reinvolved in and the breadth of the
value proposition is morecomplex, it is more commercial.
The way that we're looking atthe value to our target has to incorporate
so many more considerations.
(10:55):
So if you haven't had theopportunity to really understand
that in your own business youcannot speak with experience and
authority to your customer.
Yeah, I think there are somany more stakeholders in B2B, particularly
in an intermediated businessor many B2B's will of course be selling
direct and will beintermediated as well.
And therefore they have awhole channel they need to communicate
with.
(11:15):
And the end customer they needto communicate with.
And even in the end customer,they've got a buyer group that they
need to speak to.
Interestingly, as an aside, Isaw the big thing at the moment everyone's
talking about is buyer groupmarketing, which is obviously a revelation.
And I looked into this becauseI thought, oh my God, here we go,
another three letter, threeletter acronym, bgm.
And it's the revelation thatsometimes when you're selling, you
(11:39):
don't just market to decisionmakers, you need to reach influencers.
Yeah, the buying.
This is not new.
Yeah, exactly.
That's kind of what I wastrained in in the 90s.
I think the one thing that'scoming into B2B now, certainly as
far as the companies that I'mrepresenting over the last couple
of years is a betterunderstanding of the customer journey
and trying to understand likewho the customer is, who influences
(12:03):
them at different points, whomakes the final decision and who
influences the decision makers.
So again, it was a B2C skillthat we were using, as you say, 10,
20 years ago, but now we'rebeginning to apply the same thing
in B2B.
So the equivalent, the B2Bequivalent of pester power.
Yes, exactly.
(12:24):
Well, it's real, it exists.
Let's talk about some of themisconceptions about marketing.
Get stuck into the meat.
I don't know how seriously totake a lot of the discussion that
one sees on LinkedIn becauseso often people are motivated by
their own needs rather thantrying to comment on what's going
on, actually going on in the market.
But I do get the perceptionthat marketing is very much still
seen as tactical, a reactivefunction in many organizations.
(12:47):
And people don't take a stepback and think strategy.
What are your observations at Casey?
Marketing led strategy.
And that built in me a beliefthat it was the right way to do it
because marketing was thevoice of the consumer.
And any strategy that isn'tbuilt on consumer needs, frankly,
(13:12):
as far as I'm concerned is wrong.
When I joined the B2Bcompanies that I've worked with,
that was not the case thatmarketing led strategy.
It was very far from the case.
And as such, I really didn'tfeel that the strategy was customer
(13:33):
centric.
And to be honest, we aretrying to change that.
Sales has an opportunity alsoto change and needs to change because
sales is seen as the voice ofthe customer.
But actually sales hashistorically had a very sort of close
(13:57):
relationship with a few distributors.
And as we move to a moreomnichannel approach, as we need
to create pull as well as pushfrom workshops in our case, as well
as selling into distributors.
So we cannot rely on thosefive or six really strong relationships
(14:18):
that we have with our key distributors.
We have to get a betterunderstanding of how we drive pull
for our brands, how we createthat understanding of what's important
and how we translate that intoinsights that can influence our strategy
development.
And that's the role of marketing.
But it's not just the role ofmarketing, it's the role of the entire
(14:42):
organization.
And marketing needs to havethe voice that that influences the
entire organization throughbeing respected for its understanding
of how we run the business.
And that comes right back full circle.
You know, if you've gotmarketers who only understand a very
narrow dimension of the fourPs for example, and don't have the
(15:05):
respect within the leadershipteam as a whole to be able to engage
and have their, you know, seatat the table, then no one will listen
to you.
And it doesn't matter how goodyour customer insights are.
You need to be respectedcommercially as being someone who
can understand where thebusiness is going and influence that.
Do you think that amisunderstanding or an underestimation
(15:28):
of the importance of pull insome non marketing execs might add
to that?
Our business is a typicalexample of how a push strategy has
worked very effectively for decades.
Yeah, but the world isbecoming more competitive, it's becoming
more commercial.
Competition is becoming rife,you know, and it's not okay.
(15:52):
We need to have the power ofour brands being pulled through the
system and the company isrecognizing that, but not necessarily
recognizing how to managethat, how to build pull.
And it requires a root andbranch change in the way that we
not just market, but sell.
And the relationship betweenmarketing and sales needs to change.
(16:15):
So it's not something thathappens overnight and it's something
that certainly I'm trying tolead by building those relationships
and that respect for theentire domain internally and doing
it in a very agile way.
You know, we have to iterate,we have to constantly just try things,
test it, work with ourcolleagues in commercial excellence
(16:38):
and sales, prove to them thevalue of doing something a little
bit different and then startbuilding that inner standard work
step by step.
How do you bring yourcolleagues with you on that?
Because that's a lot of change.
I mean, a lot of change.
And we know that, we know the.
Transformation when you'regoing from a short term tactical,
functional marketingdepartment that really is just doing
(17:00):
the promotion p to being moreof a brand manager approach.
Because you are trying tocreate pull and you know, you've
got a lot of stakeholdersinternally to bring along with you.
Yeah, I mean, how do you do that?
Not, not in one, you know, instant.
I grew up in an environmentwhere understanding how you drive
(17:22):
behavior change wasfundamental to marketing.
And it's not just about thebehavior change of your consumer
or your customer.
You can apply the sameprinciples internally.
So you've really got tounderstand at its most basic, like
what's in it for me, you know,of the various different other leaders
(17:45):
within the leadership team,how can you create and prove to them
the value of doing somethingslightly differently and what is
the value for them of doing that?
So, you know, from.
I literally dissect theleadership team and look at what
would be the benefit tooperations of us having closer alignment
(18:07):
to them?
What would be the benefit tofinance of us going on a journey
that actually funnily enough,takes us closer to really understanding
the return on investment ofour marketing investments?
So trying to sort of dissectit and understanding where people
are coming from and how thedirection that you want to go on
(18:28):
is actually going to help themis really the first and only stage
that sort of helps themembrace the journey you want to go
on.
Okay.
So that's your internalstakeholders and I get that by, by
talking to them and sharingwith them how collaboration drives
success, helps customers.
(18:50):
Slightly different thing.
Yeah.
I was really captured by thedefinition of innovation that you
gave me when we had our, ourpre interview call.
You described innovation ascreating new value.
Yeah.
For customers, which isprobably, I mean, maybe that's part
of the change conversation,but when it's customer friend phrased,
(19:10):
it's about creating newinnovation from.
How, how do you think thatview differs from traditional views
of innovation?
Well, traditionally, and I'mgoing to be, I don't know, a little
bit possibly contentious here.
Go on, give us a headline.
Innovation was certainly in.
In the companies that I'vespent the majority of my working
(19:30):
life with, innovation wassomething that, well, engineers came
up with.
Okay.
You know, and they came tomarketing to say, hey, we've had
this amazing idea like can youfind a home for it.
It wasn't necessarily insightdriven from our customer understanding.
(19:51):
Okay, so inside out ratherthan outside in.
Exactly.
And obviously innovationrequires you to really have an insight
that you can monetize,frankly, but you can monetize it
in a way that creates valuefor your target, whether it's product,
whether it's commercial value,whether it's an experience, something
(20:15):
that is valued that is new,that they don't get already today.
So that is what innovationmeans to me.
Over the years, I think thatthe definition of innovation has
been seen to extend it stillsomething that I think is largely
owned by engineering in a lotof these companies.
But how you commercialize itas a value proposition is the magic.
(20:41):
And that is something thatmarketing has to own and has to drive
through insight and understanding.
And we can only do that if wehave a really good understanding,
as you say, of the customer.
And I often feel that we don'tas a profession, certainly within
business marketing, thatpossibly we don't spend enough time
(21:02):
trying to understand our customers.
Yeah, I think that's fair.
I think that.
And it goes back to what I wasjust saying a little while ago.
Historically, we ran ourbusiness through having very strong
relationships with ourdistributors and they had the relationship
with the people who use ourproducts at the end of the day.
(21:24):
And so we have sort ofabdicated the responsibility to understand
the people who are using ourproducts true needs and how well
they're being met to ourdistributor partners.
And we are not getting thatfirsthand experience and value of
the relationship that ourusers have with the products or the
(21:47):
brands.
And so that has had to change.
It's not something that, youknow, is quick to build solid insight
takes time, it takesinvestment to really try and get
to the bottom of what's goingto be valuable in driving your, you
know, your innovation pipeline.
But it is recognized now thatit is important to do and we're starting
(22:11):
to do more of it when you're.
Kimberly Clark in the researchI did before this episode, I went
to my favorite friend GPT, Imust find a pseudonym for.
But I went to ChatGPT and Ithought, well, let's see what research
we can find about CamillaDavison on Chat GPT.
So I asked a very simplequestion, who is Camilla Davidson?
And I got some really, reallyinteresting stuff back that talks
(22:33):
to exactly what we're talkingabout here.
It talks about some of theadaptive marketing you did when you
were running Kleenex usingreal time data basically to allocate
resources to areas where therewas going to be immediate need.
And I looked when I wasreading that first you'd be better
find out whether that'sactually what happened.
(22:55):
But when I was reading that, I.
Thought how would you inbusiness marketing.
This is exactly what we'retalking about.
It's funny, I didn't knowwhere you were going to go with the
sort of the research becauseyou can imagine in a company like
Kimberly Clark whose productsare all about, well, dealing with
body fluids, basically,whether it's coming out of your nose
(23:15):
or somewhere else, theresearch can be quite interesting
for sure.
And it's a company that reallyprioritizes getting beneath the skin
of how consumers relate to theproducts, the brands and so on in
terms of adaptive research anddata driven adaptation.
(23:41):
The plethora of data that wehad at Kimberly Clark on brands like
Kleenex compared with what Ihave now in a B2B environment.
Environment is there's no comparison.
We used to be able to see ourprice to consumers in all the major
retailers on a daily basis.
(24:02):
We have very little idea todayof how distributors are pricing our
brands to workshops.
You know, so it's a completelydifferent world Equally, we would
track things like the weatheror, you know, if you're on Andrex,
the incidence of E.
Coli, basically, I'm afraid to say.
(24:22):
Okay.
Because it would literallyinfluence sales.
So we could ensure that, youknow, whether it was promotional
activity, display space orwhether it was, you know, price.
The four Ps were intricatelyconnected and we could literally
modify, you know, the driversaccordingly on a pretty much daily
(24:44):
basis.
We also had very closerelationships with the key retailers
and they were very able toadapt whatever it was that they were
doing.
That channel worked really effectively.
It's much slower in B2B.
There is much less data transparency.
(25:04):
The whole understanding of themarketing mix and which elements
are really driving sales isfar less scientific and a little
bit more art meets science.
You know, the whole way inwhich you create your plans, test
your plans and learn is stillrelatively immature.
(25:24):
And, you know, it's anexciting area of development.
I think it's really exciting.
I mean, you know, we startedout just a second ago talking about
innovation and innovation hasto come from insight and insight
has to come from informationand information has to come from
data.
So we do need to do somethingto start thinking about how we can
improve transparency.
Yeah.
And what I was really capturedby when I, when, you know, when I
(25:46):
was looking at the, that casestudy of, you know, asset allocation
into areas where there's goingto be need.
There's no reason, if one hadthe data in business to business
marketing, that we couldn't beadopting some of the same tactics
and strategy.
There's no reason at all.
Just the cost of collecting data.
I guess it is the cost ofcollecting data and it's the cost
(26:10):
of not just collecting data,but making sure that internally you
have the systems to be able toanalyze it properly.
Yeah, yeah.
Because, you know, a lot ofcompanies have grown rapidly, quite
a lot of it, often by acquisition.
And the systems don'tnecessarily talk to each other.
You know, they haven'tnecessarily invested in the software
(26:33):
that's required to make itreally easy to use the data that
you have.
So certainly in my experience,you know, there's an awful lot of
reliance on what I would calltribal knowledge, which I really
value.
But it cannot be the only source.
Of intelligence valuable inits own.
Right.
That isn't it?
(26:53):
Yeah.
Invaluable, I should say.
Yeah.
But you need data as well.
And, and then from the datayou've got to be able to extract
the correct information andthen you need someone who can see
an insight and then you've gotto Try and root that insight in a
customer need or in some kindof emotional or rational reason to
buy.
(27:14):
And do we have those skills?
I don't think we do.
I think you convert data intoinsights by kind of combining data
with a human truth as such.
And those two things togethercreate an insight which is something
that's really actionable.
Yeah.
Okay.
(27:34):
And so once you've got aninsight, then you're halfway there
to influencing your strategy.
But the process of developinginsights is not well embedded in
organizations yet or even in agencies.
And it's something that I'mconstantly pushing on the relationships
in the agencies that we have.
(27:56):
Because at the end of the day,quite frankly, I believe that your
strategy is only as good asthe insights upon which it's built.
And unless you're constantlyrefreshing that input of insights
based on how the market isevolving, how behaviors of your customers
(28:16):
are evolving, then yourstrategies aren't going to hit the
mark.
They're not going to be ableto deliver new value.
Do.
Yeah, and so, yeah, it's a,it's a constant effort of insight
generation.
No, I think, by the way, Ithink that's a really important point
and I think one that manypeople overlook.
They think like, we've doneour research, now we're going to
go and do a bunch of stuff andthen they don't come back and validate
(28:39):
and check.
But markets move reallyquickly, especially these days with
social.
And everything's electronicand connected.
I think not enough peoplerevisit their research often enough.
And some people don't do it inthe first place.
They just think they know thatthe business because they've, you
know, been working in it for decades.
So, and that's reallydangerous because then you start,
(29:01):
you know, pouring good moneyafter bad.
So, yeah, you've got to comeup with some kind of fresh insight
upon which to, you know, buildyour growth plans.
But you just sparked a reallyinteresting thought in my head there
with, with that model ofpeople that don't feel they need
to research because they've,they've known the market for years
and years and years.
There is a cohort of peopleout there, as I'm sure you know,
(29:23):
building synthetic panels atthe moment, which is a synthetic
version of the people thatthink they don't need to do the research
because they've known it foryears and years.
And then the, the, the.
I think the proposition isthat people like you and I would
go to the synthetic panel anduse that instead of our market research
because it's faster, cheaper,Whatever else, but, but that's actually
(29:44):
no different than going to theold sweat.
Who says I don't need to doresearch, I know this market and
asking for an opinion is it.
Well, time will tell, won't you?
I hear they're getting like a95% correlation with real research.
So there's a lot of excitementin that area.
But I'm not necessarily sure.
I mean recently we've beendeveloping a new proposition and
(30:07):
you know, there are manyoptions available for research, you
know, and costs differ accordingly.
But for me, one of thefundamental ways of testing that
you cannot go ahead without isrun it past some of the people who
spend their lives actuallytalking to sales on a day to day
(30:29):
basis or our sales talking to customers.
And you know, they won't beshy in telling you what you, you
know, what they think.
And if they don't give you thegreen light for go ahead then frankly,
you know, you probably do needto scratch your head a little bit
more.
And that's a really good point actually.
We owe him everything.
(30:49):
It brings to memory a campaignI did a long time ago now, but we,
we had a client, they were inthe information business and they,
the Internet was just sort ofcoming of age.
That'll give you a clue toits, to its how long it was.
And they had four or fiveproducts that they were selling and
they were going to cannibalizethem all with one new product that
was going to be cloud based.
Yeah, big, big, big risk move.
(31:11):
Yeah, big risk.
I was an agency at the time.
I was saying consultancy wasslightly different because I wasn't
creating things, I was helpingthem answer or solve problems.
But we up anecdotally fromspeaking to their sales teams across
Europe which we did all thetime to try and find out what was
going on.
And exactly the way you weretalking that none of them believed
in this product.
And so we had to go to the, tothe board, the European board, this
(31:34):
was an American public companyand say you've got a major problem,
you've got four weeks tolaunch, you're about to launch this
product and none of your salesteams across Europe believe in it.
And so they said, well, okay,we're resource planning at the moment.
You've got 72 hours or something.
It was, I think it was about72, maybe 48.
You've got something like 72hours to prove this.
Maybe it was a week.
I might be exaggerating.
(31:55):
It's incredible as I get olderhow, how much harder the project
seemed to.
Yeah, oh yes, obviously withinan hour they needed.
No, it was probably a week.
So anyway, we had to go outand run surveys across all of the
sales team and it turned outabsolutely that they were not prepared
to sell this thing.
So we then went into atraining and, and a listening project
(32:15):
to get them on board.
So everyone understood what itwas, how it wasn't going to lead
to a change in pipeline and itall went fine.
Well, I wonder what theinsight upon which that was buil
at the end of the day.
No, I do feel they are a veryhonest audience.
You can decide that you wantto disregard it, but at least hear
what they've got to say andwhy they're saying it.
(32:37):
And then, you know, you candecide which direction you want to
go in after that.
Salespeople are, I mean,they're cousins, aren't they really,
of marketing?
We're related.
Close cousins.
Close cousins.
But you also said something tome which I thought was really interesting
about how marketing should actas the hub of the wheel.
Yes.
Within an organization, it's a connector.
Sales, finance, operations.
(32:59):
And we've talked a little bitabout that today, people, you know,
the HR function and HR andmarketing and procurement.
Indeed, you know, we all needto work together.
Of course.
Talk to me about your hub ofthe wheel concepts.
What does it look like in practice?
Well, I just don't understandwhy anyone wouldn't think that marketing
is the hub of the wheel.
Perhaps I'm a little biased,but the reason is because marketing
(33:22):
is the voice of the consumer.
And at the end of the day, ifthat's not in the center of what
everybody's trying to deliver,then you know, why not?
So marketing is about creatingvalue propositions.
You can argue that sales has acloser voice with a customer, but
marketing and sales have to beso closely connected.
They have to be able togetherunderstand the consumer, the customer,
(33:47):
convert that knowledge into avalue proposition and then work with
operations to make sure thatthe product that's being produced
is everything that that valueproposition has and nothing more.
You know, frankly, they needto work with finance to understand
how everything that we'reinvesting on can be measured.
(34:11):
We know learnings from thatand optimizing our return on investment
the whole time.
You know, they need to workwith every single function to make
sure that what we're doing asan organization is strategically
aligned to delivering thatvalue propos to the customer with
no waste throughout the organization.
And that's why marketing hasto somehow be like an octopus, you
(34:35):
know, and stretching andconnecting with every other Function
to ensure that's happening.
But it doesn't happen in every company.
We know it does.
It doesn't happen in a lot of companies.
Yeah, we know marketing endsup being told what to do at the end.
Of a chain or a labeldeveloper or whatever.
Yeah.
You know, what advice wouldyou be able to give to people listening
on how they can build, buildcross functional relationships you
(34:57):
mentioned a little bitearlier, but I wonder whether we
can look into that in a bitmore detail.
I mean every company'sdifferent and the reasons why it
isn't in the place that itshould be will be different in every
company.
So first understand why, likethat's always the place to start,
like why isn't it?
But at the end of the day myexperience and it has worked effectively
(35:21):
in two organizations is aboutbit like convincing your audience
to buy your product at the endof the day it's the same internally.
What's in it for them?
You know, what need does itsatisfy that they may not even necessarily
be aware of having in thefirst place?
(35:42):
So for example, recently theguy who leads our operations is not
necessarily the first personto see the value in marketing.
Okay.
Thinks it's very fluffy magickind of things and yet he's responsible
(36:03):
for quality.
Well, at the end of the day,the customer experience that ZF stands
for is quality.
Every single aspect of how wetouch customers is about delivering
quality.
And that has to of course berepresented by the product, but it
(36:27):
has to be represented by somuch more than that.
However, if the people who aremaking the product don't understand
what the brand stands for andhow that can be conveyed in the way
in which it's produced, thenthey're not going to think it's important.
So I am more than happy to godown to our manufacturing sites and
(36:47):
explain about what the brandstands for and explain how important
quality is and what qualitymeans in terms of the, the specification
and just build a bit ofrapport with them so that they become
more passionate and moreadvocates of, you know, what, what
we're, what we're selling.
Do you think the concept ofexperience is widely accepted outside
(37:10):
of market experience?
Yeah, the whole brand andcustomer experience unboxing and
you know that the whole rapthat, you know, that comes around.
A product, I think when peoplethink about it in their own lives,
yes, but they're very good at,you know, boxing and not applying
that sort of experience inwhen they go to work.
So no, I think there's a bigjourney to be done in terms of it's
(37:33):
not just about delivering a product.
It's entire experience from,you know, the call center right through
to the packaging, rightthrough to the supply chain.
You know, if we are notdelivering to the customer's expectation
with respect to, you know,supply, then that's letting the brand
down.
So, you know, the valueproposition isn't just about the
(37:55):
end product.
It's about the entireexperience across the whole journey.
And the way the financedepartments experience marketing
is normally a budget time whenthey're having to allocate a large
chunk of cash to get into marketing.
And you've talked to meoffline about developing a relationship
with a CFO so that internalmarketing, if you like, with the
(38:19):
cfo, again, it's not fluffy.
It's about hard things.
You talked about ROI earlier.
How have you gone abouttalking to your CFOs about marketing
as a spend?
I mean, I think that therelationship with finance is probably
the second most importantrelationship I have.
You know, obviously I need tobe very closely aligned with sales,
(38:43):
also finance.
And it is partly to overcomethe attitude that exists that marketing
is the fluffy stuff.
You know, it's not actually.
It's the engine for growth, inmy opinion.
But in order for that to berespected within the organization,
we have to talk the same language.
So, you know, we have to talkfinancially about our investments
(39:08):
and what their return.
And we have to start trying tomake it less of a sort of art and
more of a science.
Now, that's hard because itisn't easy to say, I spent this amount
and this is what I got forevery single penny of that.
But you can start thatjourney, and you start that journey
(39:28):
by saying, right, what am Igoing to measure?
And you know, any strategy isabout the what, why, when, why?
So you can start to alignmetrics to each of those questions.
And even if it isn't a 100%correlation between the metric and,
you know, sales, startlearning, start showing transparency
(39:51):
within the organization, thatyou are prepared to be questioned,
that you are prepared to bevery transparent about how you're
spending the money and aboutwhether it was a good investment
or whether it was somethingwe've learned.
There's never a sort of badinvestment unless you do it wrong
several times.
But be open about it, havethose conversations, start measuring
(40:12):
once the measurement happens,start a B testing and looking and
learning the whole time.
So it really is, as withanything about communication, about
being very transparent aboutsaying what you can do and what you
can measure and what youcan't, but how you're going to tackle
trying to be more objective inthose areas and really make sure
(40:35):
that you've got people withinfinance embedded, your teams at every
level so that they canchallenge you and they can start
to understand why is you'redoing what you are and go back and
be the voice of marketing intheir own, you know, function.
I mean that's reallyinteresting, you know.
I mean, you know, becausewe've had a conversation about it.
(40:55):
I have a rather dodgy historywith the concept of ROI being used
as.
A, as a measure.
But, but what I'm learning inthe action in the last five or six
interviews I've done and, andthis conversation specifically is
you're coming at that metricfrom a very different position than
many of the marketers that Ihave seen.
(41:16):
I won't say spoken to becauseobviously at unicornly only the best
come.
But because your startingpoint is a lot further back in strategy.
Well, it is in strategydevelopment and because you have
this kind of hub spokearrangement internally.
It's a very different conceptI think when you talk about ROI than
(41:37):
when somebody who is at theend of a communication chain does.
Because where, where they arethe coloring in department.
Yeah.
And they're having to talkroi, they can only talk about clicks,
likes, those kind of stuff.
And, and that's fine becausethat's very transparent.
But I mean look at the.
You can't build a businessdoing it.
(41:57):
You can't build a businessdoing it.
You can harvest doing it.
Yeah.
And I think, you know, I thinkrecently some people think that's
what marketing is, you know,but there's a rabbit hole there.
Yeah, it's a very importantpart of marketing.
Absolutely 100 and likely tobecome even more important.
But it's not the whole thing.
(42:18):
Marketing for me is so muchmore, and it's so much more strategic
than that and it has to be somuch more influential than that.
That is a channel channel, basically.
But unless you've got a solidmarket marketing plan, fundamentally
defining why you're using thatchat channel and for what purpose,
(42:39):
then you're kind of missingthe point.
But many people do.
And I think one of thechallenges is there was a rabbit
hole there.
I nearly went down, but I'mgoing to skirt over it instead of
going all the way in.
I think one of the challengesis that that bit is the bit that
everyone sees and that's sothat we sort of, we're inculcating
with people that this ismarketing and it's the, it's the,
it's the, the Google Ads and,or you know, it mass.
(43:01):
It's the stuff.
And because they see so muchof that but they don't see the strategy
work going on, they don't seethe work you're doing with operations
to talk about quality orfinance, to talk about return.
All they get to see is the output.
That's why they think that'swhat we all do.
And I don't know how we changethat with a.
Within the wider organization.
It comes down in my opinion tosome of those things that I've talked
(43:23):
about a couple of times on,on, you know, today, which is voice
of the customer valueproposition development.
The value proposition is somuch more than sort of executing
through channel, it's aboutunderstanding how you play with price,
what is the right promotions,how do you build equity versus influence
(43:47):
short term sales.
You know, all of these thingsare considerations that you can cannot
get a good perspective on ifall you're looking at is a channel
marketing plan based ondigital, which is one aspect of the
execution.
Camilla, I think that's areally good place for us to end today.
(44:08):
Thank you very much.
Lovely summary of what we'vetalked about so far.
It's time for marketing tomove a little bit back in the food
chain and start getting more strategic.
I think.
I certainly would agree withthat then.
Tom, thank you.
Thank you.
Good fun.
Before signing off, I want to say.
A huge thank you to Camilla for.
Taking the time to come andsee us in the studio here and to
share her experience andwisdom with us.
(44:30):
Now I got a very briefsnapshot of her diary when she was
here and I tell you what, her workload.
Is not for the faint hearted so.
I really appreciate her comingto see us.
Let's quickly now recap someof the key ideas we discussed today
and then I'll sign off.
So first we talked aboutlimitations like fragmented data
or competing priorities andhow those can actually often become
(44:50):
opportunities for creativityand human connection.
Now embrace those constraints,you may just find more meaningful
ways of innovating in your business.
Not an easy thing to do, butat least Camilla's given us a pathway
we can all follow to try andget there.
Secondly, we looked at thepower of alignment.
(45:10):
We all already know thatmarketing isn't just all about campaigns
and communications.
It's about about unitingsales, operations, leadership, that
kind of stuff.
It's about delivering realvalue to customers.
But that kind of alignment, itdoesn't come easily.
You have to work at it.
And I think Camilla gave us areally good insight into how she
thinks about doing that andthe prize if you get that is not
(45:33):
just driving results, butbuilding real trust across the business.
And we've talked about trustbefore on the podcast.
It's so important, I think weneed to keep banging that drum.
So some really good takeawaysI think for me today on building
trust and how how marketingcan, if you like, lubricate relationships
(45:53):
throughout a business.
And finally, but again, by nomeans least, we explore the importance
of thinking long term evenwhen you have immense short term
pressures.
And we're talking here reallyabout balancing agility.
Awful word buzzword bingo.
I guess I just won it.
But balancing agility or thethe ability, let's say to change
(46:16):
with patience thinking longerterm and how if you can balance that
sort of flexibility and shortterm ability to change with a longer
term view, that is how greatmarketers ensure that their endeavors
deliver really lasting impact.
(46:36):
So a fabulous episode.
Thanks so much for Camilla.
I really enjoyed that.
And I've got some homework foryou this week.
Take a moment to look at yourown current marketing activities
or your approach and askyourself, where am I operating on
assumptions instead of genuine insights.
Like what's one question Icould ask my customers, my team,
or even myself to uncoversomething that I haven't seen before
(47:01):
and then ask that question theweek after and then ask that question
the week after and then workout how you can put it into practice.
If you do do that, you will.
Be building much, muchstronger foundations for long term
value creation.
Now, as always, we'd love tohear your thoughts.
You can Find me on LinkedIn.
My name again is Dom Hawes.
(47:21):
Or you can leave a comment forus on unicorny.co.uk and if you did
find today's conversationvaluable, I would be really grateful
if you would share it with acolleague or friend.
Because building a smarter,more thoughtful marketing community
starts with conversations likethese and.
Starts with people like you.
Thank you so much forlistening and we will see you next
time on Unicorny.
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