When A CEO Should Fire The Marketing Manager

I heard a really scary story the other day. One year ago a company placed an order for a Yellow Pages print advertisement for a fee of $90,000 for the year after being persuaded by the account manager to place the order for the ad. The marketing managers comment to Yellow Pages was that he would keep count of the number of leads that it would produce and 12 months later the results are in and the grand total was “two leads”.

That equates to $45,000 cost per lead!!

Now I don’t know about you but that acquisition cost per lead is a touch expensive and I would love to know what the effectiveness of $90,000 spent on the following would yield in leads and sales.

• Search engine optimization program that would ensure key words and phrases that are used for finding a company appear on page one of Google. (Nearly 90% of all clicks through to a website are a result of a website being on the first page of a search engine results page)
• Google adwords campaign that places paid banner ads driving traffic to a companies website or special offer landing page derived from keyword searches on Google that appear in the right and top areas of a Google search result page.
• Facebook targeted banner ads that are demographically and highly targeted and funnel traffic to the website for capturing leads and enquiries
• A full time content creation position who creates and promotes the company’s thought leadership with blogs and online videos that educates and promotes the companies brand 24/7.

I also wonder – “does he still have a job?”

This story displays the challengers marketers face to educate and inspire leaders and CEO’s of organisations to take them from the wilderness of analog traditional marketing to the promised land of an increasingly digital savvy audience and the leverage of the social web.

So here are some of my ramblings and resources that you may find useful on educating and evangelizing to baby boomer CEO’s and senior management who struggle with the generational shift to a digital world.

1. 5 Creative Ways CEO’s Use Twitter - This article looks at some of the ways CEO’s use Twitter including “Following the Alpha Geeks”
2. Social Media and The CEO – Video Interview With Greg Savage CEO of Aquent – Greg kindly spared his time to chat with me about his companies experience with social media marketing and thought leadership on a personal and corporate level. (by the way through a corporate restructure he now heads up Fire Brand Talent globally)
3. 7 Ways To Get The CEO Crazy For Social Media Marketing – Some observations and suggestions form some of my readers
4. 10 Simple Questions To Assess Your CEO’s Marketing IQ – A list of questions that assess the digital literacy and readiness of an organisation
5. 12 Key Findings On Social Media’s Impact on Business and Decision Making By CEO’s and Managers –  Including “Younger respondents are more likely to read a company blog and to query the Twitter channel vs. older demographics”
6. How CEO’s and Executives Socialize Their Brands – A look at the role of CEO’s and how they are changing some organisations including Zappos and E.L.F.
7. 40 Reasons Why The CEO Still Uses The Yellow Pages And Not Social Media – A fun post with some serious insights
8. New Harvard Study: 30 Key Findings on How The CEO Engages With Social Media – Including evidnece showing that professional decision-making is becoming more social,  traditional influence cycles are being disrupted by Social Media as decision makers utilize social networks to inform and validate decisions.
9. 14 Ways A CEO Can Benefit From Social Media: A True Story- An insight into a global brand management firm STC Associates by the CEO, Sophie Ann Terrisse
10. 6 Questions To Ask The CEO When He Says Social Media Won’t Work For His Company – Questions to ask the the CEO to provide context and relevance to the chasm between personal use of the digital world and how it is not often applied to a corporation.
11. 9 Ways To Convince The CEO To Use Social Media and Enter The 21st Century – Some simple tactics to employ to educate and exhibit to the CEO the fast emerging digital universe.
12. 28 Reasons Why The CEO Is Afraid Of Social Media – A fun post listing the basic fears that senior management and CEO’s have with new and emerging technologies

So what is your CEO experience?

Image by Walking Geek